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by mdp2021 872 days ago
> People like you really think not purchasing the bad will fix stuff like this?

Well yes, certainly. A market exists because it has buyers - without them, it withers. And a market exists because there is a need, that producers will ride. «if nobody bought the car», they would not produce it.

> If you don't buy any car at all, then you simply don't exist to them

So you misunderstood the proposed idea. It is not the individual that changes the market: a critical mass does. But the responsibility is individual.

> Cars aren't spying on you because people are voting for the spying

The statement is, "if people did not accept it it would not happen, and by financing it they accept it".

> If you want a car from the current market

If the «current market» only contained traps ("and you will give us rights to your grandson" etc.), why would one «want [an item] from the current market».

> Odds are they're all going to have some sort of surveillance-state bullshit, or the ones that don't have it are just going to be less-nice vehicles in general

This makes it sound like "some people will trade decency for items that they see as nicer". That is plain sinister.

> before Framework

There is a difference between suboptimal products - "optimal is not available yet" - and unacceptable products - "this service comes with jus primae noctis".

> do you still need a car anyway? Then I guess you vote in favor of a locked-down vehicle

Let us hope you won't, and find other solutions. But the problem is not about open-source: it is about reliability, security and privacy.

> for "voting" for every feature the car has. You voted for the car

By financing and simply purchasing a product you endorsed it, and with it all its implications. You are responsible. Sweatshop shoes? Responsible. You are given a faculty of awareness and an obligation to use it. Some implications are good, some are minor, some are immoral, some are bringer of dire social consequences.

2 comments

<< You are responsible.

There is plenty of blame to go around. From corporate owners, through captured regulators to end users. Between all those parties I think the ones that have to choose between grades of shit are the least to blame. This does not absolve consumers, but it does put into question the framing you presented.

> this does not absolve consumers, but it does put into question the framing you presented

Allow me: it extends the framework presented (we could also mentions faults in other parties, were we not addressing one specific part), but I do not see how it would «put it into question». As you say, it «does not absolve consumers».

«There is plenty of blame», which does not absolve John. And John gives signals that he is holding resistance against seeing it...

> This makes it sound like "some people will trade decency for items that they see as nicer". That is plain sinister.

I don't see how it's sinister at all to say that. I hate Windows, but I use it because I no longer have access to macOS, and nothing works on Linux. Am I sinister for "voting" for Windows even though it lacks decency? It is currently the least bad option for me, that is all. The value in having a working computer is greater than the value in perpetually stressing myself out over whether things are free and libre or not.

Ensuring the absolute purity of my personal supply chain is too much of a pathetic chore for me to want to care about. I really, really do not care if that nice Tesla I may buy in 10 years tracks my every move, receives random OTA updates, makes me pay a subscription fee to use the hardware that's already installed in the vehicle, and so on. What if I just wanted a nice EV and nobody else does it right?? What am I going to do, buy a Rivian instead?