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Comment by pfisch | Hacker News Reader

Is any form of entertainment or art a social good?

People can get "addicted" to practically any type of entertainment in that they spend a massive chunk of their time on it to the point it stifles their development.

Is sports gambling worse than f2p games? Are f2p games worse than regular video games? Is someone addicted to video games worse than someone addicted to reading fantasy novels? What about smutty novels?

I'm not sure is disagree with you but I think it is hard to start drawing these lines without saying you are now the arbiter of good art and bad art and you can ban some forms of art if you don't like them and have decided they are bad.

Now are you just banning things you don't like because you point to the societal harms as a fig leaf defense that could be applied to the art you do like as well?

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Luckily all those companies have done tons of research to exactly qualify and quantify exactly this. Those companies don't seem to have problems identifying those addictive mechanisms, why should the government?

Yes, banning video games would probably be a win for society.

No, you probably won’t get anyone to admit to that here.

So would banning air travel, but such an example is purely to highlight how subjective “a win for society” is.

> I'm not sure is disagree with you but I think it is hard to start drawing these lines without saying you are now the arbiter of good art and bad art

There's a super easy line to draw actually and it has nothing to do with art

Are you selling a product or an experience?

If you're talking about someone addicted to fantasy novels or video games, they are addicted to products.

If you're talking about someone addicted to opening Magic the Gathering booster packs, or videogame loot boxes, or sports gambling, or prediction markets, they are addicted to experiences. In the case of loot boxes they are experiences shaped like products but the addiction is about the experience of opening the box, not really whatever is inside

So.. easier than you seem to think

Of course once lawyers get involved they'll quibble over this shit until the sun goes out

Is selling a ticket to a movie an experience, or a product? Is a subscription to netflix a ticket or an experience? What about a subscription to world of warcraft?

If you paid for world of warcraft by the hour does that change if it is an experience or a product?

This doesn't really work because products and experiences have too much overlap.

What you are really against I think is the different ways in which we are gift wrapping a skinner box, but there are an infinite number of ways to wrap it that will bypass your specification system.

> there are an infinite number of ways to wrap it that will bypass your specification system.

Which will matter to no one except lawyers

When most people smell shit they don't care if it's rat shit or cat shit, they just know it smells bad

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