I would personally pay $2x market price for a Phone, Computer, Tablet that guaranteed privacy (via whatever technical means necessary) for all my interactions with the internet.
Is that so much to ask?
Could the next "Apple" produce such hardware/software stack to black box this for the consumer -- simply buy "Pineapple" products and guarantee this stuff can't touch you (user obsfuciation for all external platforms could be a hard technical challenge, I know - hence the big value if delivered)
> At the Electronic Frontier Foundation, we call this "privacy first": you can't solve all the internet's problems by fixing privacy, but you won't fix most of them unless we get privacy right, and so the (potential) coalition for a strong privacy regime is large and powerful:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/06/privacy-first/#but-not-ju...
Everyone who said "A technical solution can not fix a social problem" needs to read this. In our technical society, for many things a technical part is required to enable social change. The proactive technical work is important and necessary, despite the fact that there is more to it. It may not be sufficient but it is necessary.
Related Consumer Reports post:
https://www.consumerreports.org/money/questionable-business-... (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46205041)
I have a really hard time believing that people who are actually struggling to make ends meet would use Instacart. This article does point out some pretty despicable behavior, but its attempt to pull at heartstrings falls flat due to the idiotic nature in which the argument is constructed. It’s comparable to complaining how terrible it is that caviar costs different amounts to different homeless people. Should’ve just stuck to the numbers — they are compelling and the story does need to be told.
Have you ever watched Caleb Hammer's "Financial Audit?"
People in dire financial situations very often have a history of making bad decisions with money.
Personally I do not struggle with money/budgeting but the only time I will ever use something like InstaCart is if I am sick and can't leave the house.
You are privileged enough to be ABLE to make good decisions. Some people are victims of the boots theory of economics and better choices aren't actually an option.
Lifting yourself by your bootstraps only works if you can afford boots in the first place.
Pratchet said:
"The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. ... A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. ... But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet. This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socio-economic unfairness." [0]
Instacart (and other delivery providers) accepts EBT SNAP.
> When you live in a food desert where your only store is a Dollar General that defrauds you at the cash-register, you are more likely to accept a higher price from Instacart, because you have fewer choices than someone in a middle-class neighborhood with two or three competing grocers.
Yes, that’s exactly my point. My family has been poor. You just take the bus to the store, because you don’t pay extra money for someone to go there for you. You don’t have that money.
The effect of money is the opposite of this. You use it to save time. The poorer you are, the less your time costs effectively and the more things you do yourself, like going to the grocery store, no matter how far.
In rural America their often is no bus.
In the city I grew up in they had no busses until a local company paid for the first one simply to get the poorer employees to work reliably because it was impacting production.
There are still many places in America where you either walk or you own a car, period. When the car breaks down and you need parts.. you walk. Worse there are no sidewalks. When the snow is a foot deep you risk frostbite and hypothermia.
This is also nonsense. Instacart is too new for anyone over 18 to have somehow not died of hunger if they live out of reach of food if they had no way to get food before Instacart’s existence…
Poverty is nothing if not diverse. You can't judge what others are dealing with based only on what was true for your experiences.
Instacart is a SNAP/EBT vendor, so clearly they have low income customers. Some people prefer online shopping because of the stigma of using benefits in-person. For others without reliable access to transportation, delivery might be the most reasonable option. Public transit also takes time that might be better spent with family, or at your job.
There's limitations on how much you can carry on the bus.
I imagine some people use Instacart because they don’t have a car and there are no grocery stores or public transit nearby.
They still usually can buy lots of food from amazon/walmart in bulk with cheap/free home delivery and cook at home.
The price of caviar fluctuates a lot depending on quality and where you are buying it, there would really be no reason to get angry about that.
> Instacart has disclosed its pricing experiments in corporate marketing and investor materials, noting that “shoppers are not aware that they’re in an experiment.”
If it’s not a big deal why don’t they come out and tell the users?
Why doesn't Instacart directly display their sucker ooops "surge pricing" ? This would empower poor people to make an informed choice on directly funding the billionaires associated with Sequoia Capital so that they can buy their next luxury yachts faster. Have some pity for the oligarchs!