Comment by Aicy | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Aicy | Hacker News Reader

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Is it just me who thinks this article is silly? The entire point of it seems to establish causation that removing digital friction increases friction in the real world.

But they barely manage to do this, they just have a single example of their flight being delayed repeatedly over and over. You'd think if this was an actual phenomenon they could come up with lots of examples and not need to keep repeating themselves.

I can think of obvious and damning counter examples, too. In China their physical infrastructure massively improved during the same period they got access to smart phones and unlocked the digital world. Contactless payments, including Google and Apple Pay, along with apps like Monzo to easily send money to friends have rendered cash obsolete where I live (London). I have an app that connects to my automatic cat feeder so I no longer need to feed my cat 3 times a day. She still loves me, sits on my laps and purrs all the same.

Am I missing something or is the central point of the blog that digital frictionless increases real world friction obviously untrue?

It is a bit silly, but I think it is silly in a different way than you do. For me it is silly in a way that some American discovered that real world do not exists just to keep Americans happy and content, but it requires real, continuous hard work of million of people to keep infrastructure running.

About Chinese people in China: they are working very very hard. My wife family in New Zealand have a new neighbors from China and they are saying that they escaped from China to lead normal life in NZ, instead of working all the time.

You example of Cat feeder: yes seems nice but only because you were able to get it from China or Indonesia or other country like that for 50$ dollars probably. To actually make it and deliver it to you most probably few thousands of people had to do their job, including mining for resources, transportation, design, software, microprocessors etc. just to save you few minutes every day. Exactly what author of this article is talking about. If this would be done in UK, by people that live there you probably would have to pay 5000$ dollars and it would brake every month. At some point you would most probably came to conclusion that feeding your cat by yourself would be much easier.

I am sorry, I am not trying to be personal here, but seems like you are the target of this article, make people understand that our civilization is taken for granted by people glued to their phones for entertainment.

My partner has lived in China for 2 years, and I can assure you many people who live in China are also buying automatic cat feeders and in fact the domestic market is their primary one.

The cat feeder is I understand a feels like a good point as it feels rather trivial, but for the most part technology helps everyone to be more efficient. Even with the cat feeder its not just a few minutes - it means I can stay out later from work, or go on trips for several days without having to worry, or pay someone to come as a cat sitter. Its cost of $50 pays for itself in just one 7 day trip of not paying for a cat sitter, which usually would be some low paid immigrant from East Asia. Efficiency gains all around.

I was not trying to convince you that you cat feeder is not necessary.

If you need it and think it is totally worth it, great!

What I was trying to say that it is not live essential item. Cost of all of those nice items that western world is buying from China and similar countries, made of the back of low-wage workforce is low just because those people are not having the same lives as you have. Or children mining rare metals in Africa. This is basically modern day slavery with extra steps.

And what I was trying to say, if you cat feeder would be made by your UK fellow citizens from top to bottom, entirely, can you imagine what would be the cost? Would you still be able to afford it? And you would, would be worth it? Or it would be cheaper to pay your neighbor to watch the cat?

And IMHO this is more or less what article is about: 'wow real world takes a lot of hard work to keep it running and it is easier to scroll tik tok instead of work!'. Hardly a new thing, so yes, article was a bit silly.

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