[georgemcbay]

I can't speak for "US consumers" broadly, but this is 100% why I'm angry as a consumer.

Everything is a fucking scam.

And often also a subscription for something that doesn't warrant being a subscription, and signing up is one click, cancelling is a written letter or a 3 hour long phone call (because see again the part where "Everything is a fucking scam").

[anal_reactor]

It's incredible that a fucking TV is also a scam. I have an LG TV that only works as a dumb screen and it's really beautiful but now when I look at it, I don't see the technical marvel, I think "is someone at LG reading screencaps of my conversations and 4chan threads" because recently I got aware that this could be a very real possibility. And it's not about the TV itself, it's about having to be on 24/7 in order to avoid scams. You cannot just exchange one unit of money for one unit of product or service that gives you one unit of happiness, you have to first get PhD in avoiding scams. And often you watch yourself fall for the scam even though you're aware of it because realistically, you have no other options. Sometimes I need to buy something in a supermarket nearby and then it's "do you sir have our cattle-tracking ad-infested resource-draining attention-grabbing fucking-annoying useless dehumanizing app?" and if you don't you pay €5 extra because fuck you that's why, there's no winning move here. I sometimes go to a shop 30 minutes further down just to avoid the humiliation ritual.