alt Hacker News> I call out Boris but I also don't think he's being malicious.
From a market perspective, he's acting completely rationally in his own interests. Bottom line is that these companies need to do whatever they can to keep growing token consumption because that's their goal.
If the nation's drinking skyrocketed, we wouldn't be sitting here wondering why the CEO of Budweiser isn't advocating for temperance. His job is to move kegs, just like Boris' job is to move tokens.
Replies
His job is to do what’s in the long term interests of his company.
[Edit: was thinking of the ‘CEO’. This doesn’t apply as cleanly to Boris.]
> we wouldn't be sitting here wondering why the CEO of Budweiser isn't advocating for temperance
But we would start to wonder if the CEO of Budweiser started advocating binge drinking.
I never understood this perspective. Just because a person's behavior is market-rational, it does not mean they can't be criticized for externalities.
That is, in fact, an important thing to do. It turns those externalities into public perception, which turns into market forces that adjust the behavior, if you want to think purely in market terms.
The analogy with Budweiser is not a good one. This would be the CEO of Budweiser actively pushing more drinking while the nation's drinking was increasing. And yes, people would be right, and effective, to oppose this (see Oxycontin).