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self_awarenesstoday at 12:16 PM1 replyview on HN

Was the business model of Uber ever a secret? What about AirBnb?

Even if we argue that we can't require from every human being to understand what they're doing, I'd still argue that there are more people who perfectly understand it and don't care than people who have no idea how such a business operates.

> You cannot expect every consumer to be fully educated and aware of the consequences of their purchasing power.

Huh? I cannot expect that people understand consequences of their actions? What are we, animals? Of course sometimes things aren't simple, and we cannot predict that using some service will create some longterm effects that in the end will be harmful. Some things are hard to predict.

But some things are easy to predict and my point is that this was exactly this case.

I mean, now we all know what Uber and AirBnb did, and we still use them because we don't care (generally speaking, I've used uber maybe 3 times in my life, AirBnb never).


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4gotunameagaintoday at 12:30 PM

No, we are not animals. But life has become so increasingly complex that is infeasible for the average person to be that invested in everything in order to have an educated opinion.

I do NOT want to have to research the business model of companies before I buy their products or services. I would like to outsource that to the government, and spend my time actually enjoying life.

Am I supposed to be invested in every change that happens around me ?

What if I am a baker, using chatGPT to experiment with recipes and develop them. Am I supposed to read about LLMs, tokens, and the silicon valley playbook ?

No. I should not have to do any of those things.

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