[moneytalks]

Yes and that's what's so depressing about it.

As engineers, wouldn't it be cool if the most valuable thing we could do was building tools that are inherently valuable instead of valuable because of the tool's ability to connect users with someone who wants to buy their attention?

You know, build some software that doesn't make you feel like a pimp.

[fiblye]

Your first problem there is monetizing it. If nobody can pay for it, nobody is going to get together to make it.

[saimiam]

I've posted this on HN before but we at Datajoy are trying to solve the problem of consuming without paying which lets ad platforms treat us as the product: https://datajoy.us/fupm.html.

Use it, block ads, pay for content...sleep better?

[eli_gottlieb]

Maybe we should get rid of capitalism, then. It's obviously not doing the job of allocating resources to beneficial goods or raising productivity.

[alexanderstears]

It's important to separate society's tastes, preferences, and incentives with market-based resource allocation.

At the very least, corporations and capitalism give us a productive place to put sociopaths (the alternative is religion, healthcare, government, exile/six feet under). And more communal economic systems seem to work well until the anti-social types take over - North Korea was actually better off than South Korea for awhile after the war and the anti-social types always do take over.

Capitalism does a really good job of making it easier to do more with less. My phone is a weather station, a flash light, a calculator, a camera, a camcorder, etc. and it's cheaper than most Cameras were just 30 years ago. On the flip side, a lot of the materials that make my phone come out of conflict zones and I'm sure that my phone funded some warlord's attack helicopters and that's not great and it's unfortunate that the 'past of least resistance' involves such unsavory things but the solution rests with more capitalism - the warlord needs to demand a higher price or operate the mines and figure out how to build a phone and go legit.

[pc86]

I was unaware allocation of resources toward "beneficial goods" (to whom?) was every a touted positive effect of capitalism.

[eli_gottlieb]

I was unaware that anyone actually believed deontic moral justifications for an economic system, so I would have thought actual benefits to the population are the only effective anyone's ever touted.

[fiblye]

Even the USSR had money and wealth. Desire to accumulate wealth in some form is a primitive instinct.

[omphalos]

Money isn't the only motivation someone can have. People write lots of open source code for free, for example.

[astura]

A lot of open source work is professional paid work.

[alexanderstears]

And good thing too but not all of it is - in fact, it's a sign of how well developers are treated that they can afford to volunteer their time and expertise for everyone: developers don't need to spend every second of every day on the grind for basic living.

[omphalos]

Yes, and a lot of it isn't, which is what I'm saying :)

[freshhawk]

Sex work is way more honest.

[drawkbox]

And porn and games always lead the way on innovation.

[popopobobobo]

stopped me from innovating though