In all honesty a little bit of eugenics probably wouldn’t be a bad idea, the problem is that once you have government mandated eugenics you begin a slippery slope that should never be approached.

While not strictly eugenics, similar outcomes have occurred naturally in places where genetic testing and access to abortion are more available. For example Iceland has almost no Down Syndrome persons. (https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/down-syndrome-iceland/).

Frankly, now that we can test for these things, there are several genetic disorders which a reasonable society would self select to remove from the gene pool. Things like Huntington’s Disease shouldn’t keep propagating. Basically there shouldn’t be a government mandated program, but if you know you have some horrible genetic disorder you shouldn’t pass it on.

Become ungovernable

My experience is as anecdotal as yours, but it seems to me that the typical conservative male is more likely to return the cart than not. Conservatives, as backward as they can be, typically have irrationally higher expectations for certain rules.

These are the same people who would be ok with police brutality, but would be upset with swearing in front of an old lady.

The people I see leaving carts more often than not are older people (perfectly capable of walking into, through, and out of the store but act like they’re too frail to return the cart) or two different groups of women (stuck up Karens or moms who are by themselves with children).

I honestly don’t know enough to say, I’m just repeating what I’ve heard from others many times over the last decade or so.

From what I’ve heard the BBB is as much a BS organization as HP, companies can pay to have the complaints removed.

No, you misunderstand what I mean.

Ah I see, you’re correct, I did misunderstand you. I think your point is true, but still lacks finesse in describing the relationship between developers and digital store fronts. I also think you’re disregarding the benefit that the additional 18% cut the developer gets to keep as well as creating partnership options rather than being stuck with a defacto monopoly.

I also don’t think it’s fair to compare GOG or Humble Bundle with Epic or Steam, their purposes and market share is so much smaller than Steam. Epic isn’t trying to compete with GOG or Humble.

Also, you’re correct that the developer is making money either way, but they are making a larger percentage on sales through Epic. You’re probably right that the developers aren’t taking that into account, but they are materially benefited by its success. If they fail to account for that benefit and Epic fails then it will mean they make less money overall.

I think instead of your McDonalds example a better one would be contractors for a large business. Maybe your business frequently uses an electrical contractor and due to special circumstances the field is exceptionally limited (specialty license or security clearance). There is one contractor available and they have a monopoly and can charge whatever they want. So far this company has been really fair and not abused their power, but a new contractor becomes available. The new contractor has an inferior service line and is a bit slower, but they’re also cheaper. You could just ignore the new contractor and what happens happens, but in the real world it’s fairly common for businesses to diversify service contracts to maintain a pool of available contractors.

Sure, but the idea of fostering a mutually beneficial preferential relationship between two companies is far from new. I’m not saying that the developer has to take a loss, but they could decrease the sell price on Epic while still making more money than on Steam, GOG, or Humble Bundle. If doing so causes more people to switch to Epic it also means they’ll make more money in the long term and in the short term.

I’d argue that the statement that Epic is just as much a customer as the consumer isn’t really true. Epic as a storefront is different from Gamestop as a store front. Gamestop buys the product at a given price and then marks it up to make profit, Epic provides fulfillment and gets paid a percentage of the sale. Epic isn’t a customer in that sense because they aren’t buying and reselling the product.

Yeah, the developers can say fuck it and not help out Epic, but it just furthers the limited monopoly that Steam is. They can’t complain that Steam takes too big of a cut and then make businesses decisions that are counter to that complaint. It’s like complaining about Reddit but choosing to stay there.

I would agree that Epic is a customer in the sense that they are paying for exclusivity, but I think that contract should also include a reduced sale price in it.

EX: Epic pays the developer X dollars so that the first week of the release it’s sold at -Y% of the MSRP exclusively on Epic. After that they can sell it on other storefronts for the MSRP for Z months (with no sales) or they have to refund the X dollars.

hing like that now do ya?

I’m not sure if you’re being sarcastic or if you really don’t understand. If you don’t understand I’d be happy to elaborate.

Well it shouldn’t be at a loss. As the person I responded to pointed out, Epic had a lower fee than Steam so the developer can sell on Epic for less than they would on Steam and make the same amount of money.

Doing so wouldn’t be at a loss, but it wouldn’t make as much profit as possible.

If the developers did choose to sell on Epic for less than it would bolster the Epic store and potentially lead to more people moving to Epic.

If Steam’s fee is 30% and Epic’s is 15% the developer could sell on Steam for $70 and make $49 and they could sell on Epic for $60 to make $51. That’s a 4% increase in profits.

If the Epic store takes off and a large enough user base switches they could maybe increase the Epic price to $62.5 which would result in an additional 4% increase in profits.

Epic’s deal is that they’re offering a lower rate, but the developers aren’t sharing the benefits of that to help Epic grow. If they did the long term profits would likely exceed the short term.

If the developer chooses to do so themselves then it’s likely ok, but forcing the developer to do so likely violates some sort of law.

I imagine that when Epic instituted it’s lower percentage they hoped that developers would sell exclusively on their platform for higher profits. Instead the developers decided to sell on both platforms and just make a larger percentage on the Epic sales. From the developer perspective it would have been wise in the long run to lower prices so that Epic could grow, but that hurts their short term profits and also stymied Epic’s potential.

If Epic’s store grew to truly rival Steam more developers might have jumped ship, but to do so prematurely would be losing a large portion of the potential customers.

Ultimately Epic had to develop a full Steam clone quickly while all Steam had to do was not suck for the end user.

I generally prefer AMD, how are they for Linux?

The only thing that seems expensive is the veggie patties in my opinion. For $4.99 I would have expected a 4 pack.

The buns are a bit pricey, but we’re talking a dollar and some change then.

Looks to me like you have most of 4 lunches and 4 breakfasts for $18.

MLs? I tried googling it, but the closest approximation is Marxist-Leninists?

What are you trying to say? Legit question, not sarcasm, just confusion.

Huh, interesting, I didn’t realize Tolkien had started writing portions of the Silmarillion in 1914. I had to do some looking based on your response and learned something.

To be fair the children’s story came first. In that regard Tolkien and Rowling had something in common, their first books were written for a much younger and simpler audience. It wasn’t until they took off commercially that the more adult and deep lore was developed.

EDIT: I’m wrong

I wish people would talk about this, but Elon really isn’t that smart and he certainly isn’t a genius. I learned a long time ago that smart is relative and really shouldn’t be foisted onto people. Elon has a BA in Physics from a school known for business degrees. He also got a BS in Business, but UPenn and Wharton are known more for how hard it is to get in than how hard the classes are.

The website CollegeVine says UPenn is known as the “Social Ivy” and “UPenn’s admissions is highly-selective, but students applying to the UPenn College of Arts & Science (CAS) will find it less academically competitive than schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford (although exceptional academics are still a must).”

By the way, he started college in 1990, transfered to UPenn in 1992, and states he graduated in 1995, but UPenn refutes that saying he graduated in 1997. This is a school where 96% of those who are accepted graduate within 150% of the degree time (4 year degree within 6 years) (https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/edu/215062/university-of-pennsylvania/graduation/).

Musk of course says he completed the courses in 1995, but there was some sort of mixup with an English and History credit that delayed the degree by 2 years.

Lol. $4,274 is 400,000 roubles? That must be a joke.

I think the idea of it is pretty smart, Instagram probably has a lot of shared users with Twitter. If the quality of Twitter decreases then Instagram making a competitor seems like an easy win, especially if the issues plaguing Twitter aren’t plaguing Instagram. The privacy concerns due to required permissions are probably the most concerning, but if you were using Twitter and Instagram you’re probably not even considering that.

I’m definitely not going to try it, but I kinda hope Twitter completely busts at this point. Elon’s next autobiography is going to be, “The Art of the Deal 2: How I won by losing $44 Billion.”

Once upon a time Quora had reasonably accessible information. Now I find it nearly unusable and only go there as a last desperate effort which is generally fruitless. Pinterest is annoying, but generally you can still view some content. What’s annoying is trying to download, copy, or isolate content there. If all you want to do is view an image, Google can typically still pull the image out and make it viewable from the search. The problem only arises if you try to go in and see the original.