This guy is obviously not a parent - Kids will watch TV- and usually the same thing over an over. If this is mixed with reading to them and physical acticity it is not necessarily bad. Netflix allows kids to watch the rpetitive shows easily. Also, I have found it a great way to bond with my son - he loves when I sit down with him to watch G.I. Joe, Transformers and TMNT - what a blast to be able to share my favorites with him.
I'm sure for people employed in low level positions in these industries that this change is very scary. However, for people employed in the larger industries - communications for example, this is a good change. This article could be run every 20 years or so. When cars started to gain popularity there were probably a lot of articles about the poor street cleaners, wagon makers, and stable hands, and how the evil automobile tycoons were depriving them of work. I think the lesson is that people have to be able to change to keep up with technology. I doubt many would argue that we should go back to filthy, smelly, sh*t filled streets because all those poor horse related workers need jobs.
I use my phone in stores all the time for comparison shopping, shopping list building - or to get a consultation from my wife via text message. If any person in a store tried to take my phone to confiscate pictures I would use it to call the police instead. Stores need to embrace this, and maybe even provide devices to their employees to do their own comparisons. Any store that banned this would never get my business, no matter what their prices.
Actually - I believe that the anology to any suitcase is tenuous at best. Luggage left unattended in a public transportation station is most likely not protected from search by authorities - especially in this day and age. It is probably required for most unattended luggage to be searched.
In the case of the thumbdrive - it could be argued that the perosn who finds it is reasonably expected to look at the files to try and determine ownership. Or at the leat - semi-polite to see if perhaps pictures can be found that could help return the dirve to the owner. If the person who found it saw who left the drive than they probably should have jsut pulled it and handed it to the owner. However, when people find electronic devices - picture files are the most common place to find clues concerning ownership - which would explain why the pictures were found so easily.
Think back to the iPhone scandal - after a few months at the outrageous first price $699, Apple dropped the price by a few hundred bucks. What happened? The original buyers creamed bloody murder calling Steve Jobs horrible names and accusing him of ripping them off. He had to issue credits to those people to keep them from storming the Apple stores. Heck - even the Bible addresses this - the parable about the farmer who hires different workers at different times but pays them all the same is a great illustration of 1) Capitalism and 2)Comparative Compensation.
People don't want to feel like they were ripped off - but sometimes that is what happens - the electronics industry uses this model all the time - but they are usually smarter and change the model number before lowering the price. The fact is the first 42 inch flat panel TV's cost $20,000 - now they can be purchased for $500 and they are better.
If you spend your whole life looking over your shoulder to check if you were ripped off you will be very unhappy.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by Andy.
Obviously not a parent
Dying Industries
Phones in stores
Analogy
In the case of the thumbdrive - it could be argued that the perosn who finds it is reasonably expected to look at the files to try and determine ownership. Or at the leat - semi-polite to see if perhaps pictures can be found that could help return the dirve to the owner. If the person who found it saw who left the drive than they probably should have jsut pulled it and handed it to the owner. However, when people find electronic devices - picture files are the most common place to find clues concerning ownership - which would explain why the pictures were found so easily.
Seen before
People don't want to feel like they were ripped off - but sometimes that is what happens - the electronics industry uses this model all the time - but they are usually smarter and change the model number before lowering the price. The fact is the first 42 inch flat panel TV's cost $20,000 - now they can be purchased for $500 and they are better.
If you spend your whole life looking over your shoulder to check if you were ripped off you will be very unhappy.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by Andy.
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