New App Lets You Boycott Koch Brothers, Monsanto And More

http://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2013/05/14/new-app-lets-you-boycott-koch-brothers-monsanto-and-more-by-scanning-your-shopping-cart/?partner=yahootix

by duggieawesome • 13 years ago

117 75 13 years ago

forbes.com

svmegatron• 13 years ago

Awesome! I've been working on something similar:

http://www.collectiveoffset.com/

I think this is an interesting concept and it will be cool to see how this space evolves!

zarify• 13 years ago

Interesting, as it accepts that we're likely to buy stuff from companies we don't like regardless (very difficult to avoid in some spaces). Mixed feeling about the offset idea in general however.

alloftheabove• 13 years ago

Cool project.

I actually don't like the use of offset however. Why do I want to offset Chic Fil A? If I don't even eat there--I don't have anything to offset. Offset also makes me feel like I am helping to return to the current status quo. What if I don't want the status quo? What if I just want to fight Chic Fil A?

I think that the idea that users contributing a small amount of money to combat the negative spending of some corporations is incredibly sticky. ("Look at the power of my small dollars! I'm making this evil corporation burn their money!").

But how do you convince visitors to the site that this math adds up? Users may want to donate but would probably be more likely to donate if they were convinced their dollars had that much power. Maybe an infographic explaining it?

benjohnson• 13 years ago

As a someone who supports the right to life, you'd think I'd be interested in this app, but on reflection, I not interested.

Turning everything in ones life in to a form of politics would be way too draining I'd think and ultimately not a productive as one would like.

I'd rather spend ten minutes a day helping on a suicide prevention hotline, or donating resources to newly expectant mothers, than try to ferret out every last connection to abortion clinics by furtively scanning bar-codes every time I went shopping.

imichael• 13 years ago

The problem is that we do not have any discernable influence on our nominal political representatives. A workaround is that we might be able to influence the corporations that do have significant influence. It's worth a try.

The Citizens United decision means the money you spend is used to influence the political process. It's part of what you're buying, so why not factor it in to your purchasing decision?

twoodfin2• 13 years ago

It's part of what you're buying, so why not factor it in to your purchasing decision?

Because one hallmark of a civil society is the ability to have vigorous disagreements in the political sphere and yet continue to live and work together as a community.

bilbo0s• 13 years ago

heh...

It's funny... the UX person in me was thinking it would be easier just to take a picture of your shopping cart and have it highlight the items you shouldn't purchase. Just based on packaging. Then I thought ... hey ... an even better idea would be to hold the phone up in front of the shelves and have all of the offending items X'd out.

Then I thought ... man ... all of this would be a LOT easier if Google Glass had a better camera! Maybe Apple will make a better pair of glasses and in the not too distant future we can just walk up the aisles and have all the products we wouldn't want to support X'd out for us.

Point is... in the future you will most likely not have to scan the bar code. The software will just put X'es over all of the products that are "bad" by some definition set by you. That would be a pretty interesting use of something like Glass I think.

davidw2• 13 years ago

Maybe you could also have it do face recognition and tie that in with sentiment analysis of people's twitter, facebook and Google+ feeds so that you can be cold and aloof or just plain avoid people with "bad" viewpoints.

guelo• 13 years ago

Abortion clinics are tiny businesses compared to giant conglomerates like Koch. I don't think there's much boycotting you could do even if you wanted to.

rdl• 13 years ago

Arguably you could boycott everyone who funds abortion clinics (e.g. Warren Buffett who is the #1 donor to Planned Parenthood). So, no NetJets for you.

I agree it becomes really silly beyond one or maybe two steps. IBM in the 1930s was about the limit of "second degree hate"; I'd still have been happy to mow the lawn of IBM employees back then. I probably would have had problems doing business with IBM directly if I'd known all the details. The only transactions I'd have done with nazis were sell side death transactions, i.e. real life Castle Wolfenstein.

boi_v2• 13 years ago

So you prefer to spend your life doing band-aid actions instead trying to fix the probem in it's root, that is, money in the wrong pockets. All these problems you prefer to work with are consequence of an unfair and corrupt system that is screaming for a fix. These anti-ethical companies are the ones responsable for turning politics and democracy (if it exists) into a mere tool for personal and not social profit. Read a book called The Black Book on Brand Companies and start scanning barcodes.

kevinthew• 13 years ago

So what exactly makes the Koch Brothers and Monsanto worse than Facebook (also a horrible political lobbying monster corporation)? Because they're not tech companies who your friends work at?

onan_barbarian• 13 years ago

I am not sure that the target audience for the app is identically opposed to "lobbying" and "big corporations" for any player. They might feel that there's something particularly repugnant in the goals or ideology of Koch Brothers or Monsanto that doesn't apply to Facebook. Further, you are unlikely to accidentally buy Facebook-owned breakfast cereal.

But nice try at sophomore cynicism.

aaronbrethorst4• 13 years ago

Koch Brothers: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-02/koch-brothers-flout...

Monsanto: poisoned people with Agent Orange, DDT, and polychlorinated biphenyls (re PCBs: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0101-02.htm)

Facebook: ???. I guess their CEO is an arrogant, 20-something billionaire, and they play fast and loose with online privacy. They have yet to kill anyone or commit treason[1]. So there's that.

[1] Or, as they'd call it on Arrested Development, "light treason"

tptacek3• 13 years ago

So, you're going to boycott every other company that dumped PCBs and pesticides and other carcinogens into groundwater, right?

xenophanes2• 13 years ago

How can you poison people with DDT? DDT is harmless to humans. It's been eaten in large doses to demonstrate this point.

The only harm involved with DDT is the millions of poor mostly-non-white people dead from malaria (including many children) because of the irrationality of some privileged wealthier mostly-white people (not including many children).

For more info start with http://industrialprogress.com/2012/01/26/the-story-of-ddt/ and google.

brucefancher3• 13 years ago

The Bloomberg story on the Koch Brothers is a complete smear job: http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/09/bloomberg-legi...

Statists don't like the Koch's because they hate anyone who believes that people should be free to make their own decisions without being ordered about by small-minded busybodies whose self-image depends on the delusion that they know what's best for everyone else. And rather than engage in debate, they find it much easier to just demonize their opponents with dishonest ad hominim attacks.

rayiner• 13 years ago

Because Zuck wears a hoodie while pushing his corporatist political agenda via his well-funded PAC.

enraged_camel• 13 years ago

Well, no. As influential as Zuck is, his influence simply pales in comparison to that of Koch Brothers or even Monsanto.

Shivetya• 13 years ago

because the first has the audacity to not agree with the left and the second is a corporation who patents genetics and similar?

Really it all comes down to irrational hate by one side or the other and unfortunately this type of irrationality is best observed on sites like Hacker's News and Slashdot, Digg was bad too in its good days. The level of pretentiousness is astounding, but fortunately other than up/down/karma and bombastic posts the members of such sites do little else.

protomyth2• 13 years ago

So, the evolution of this is some app running in your glasses that rates everyone you meet on some criteria based on what your preferred media source(1) (e.g. MSNBC, Fox News) says about the companies they buy from and the artists/writers/politicians they like.

1) note, facts require research not punditry

jbigelow76• 13 years ago

The Revolution will be an In App Purchase.

harryf• 13 years ago

The iOS app appears nicely designed but the server side is struggling. Couldn't create an account, app website is very slow http://buycott.com

Looks like Ivan could use some help

jack-r-abbit3• 13 years ago

Honestly, this sounds like just too much trouble and I guess I just don't really care enough. If I refused to buy anything that was made or sold by anyone that had ever done harm to anyone, I'd probably starve to death... homeless & naked. I've spent the last 2 years reading the label of every food item I buy my son because he's allergic to eggs and soy (and we avoid nuts because we're too afraid we'll kill him with one) so I can tell you a little something about how much of a pain it is to scrutinize every single item you purchase. It is not as easy as it sounds. And even if there is an app for that... it will still suck. Personally... I don't think this is worth it. To each their own.

AJ007• 13 years ago

Consider the possibility that the point is to not purchase consumer goods from corporations.

jack-r-abbit3• 13 years ago

Unless I buy everything on Etsy.... aren't most things coming from corporations?

glurgh• 13 years ago

That seems wildly unlikely given that the thing is an app designed to run on a pricey smartphone.

coldpie• 13 years ago

There is a middle ground, you know. You're right, you probably can't completely boycott products from evil actors. But that's not what this is about. This is about making more informed decisions about who you are supporting with your money. Not everything has to be taken to its extreme to still be worthwhile.

kevinpet• 13 years ago

So you're telling me you get my email, my political inclinations, and my offline purchasing habits.

T&C includes the "no class action" and binding arbitration clauses. Privacy policy doesn't actually mention anything about campaigns I use or products I scan, which makes my suspicious mind ... umm... suspicious. At least it omits the "or as otherwise allowed by law" blanket "we do whatever we want" clause.

They do say they won't sell or rent personally identifiable information. I'm not sure if they could weasel out of it by using some sort tracking cookie, but it looks like they seem to be limiting themselves to selling aggregate data.

I'm not a lawyer, of course, but I don't think I really said anything anyone else can't read for themselves.

pi18n5• 13 years ago

I said I was going to get this but just changed my mind. Holy shit. Thanks for posting.

StavrosK2• 13 years ago

I don't understand why things just have to be online-enabled nowadays. It seems like this app could be implemented with a daily-updating list of which products belong to which company, but my understanding is that they do a live server check, which wastes data and is very bad for privacy.

It seems like "talking to a server" is the default for everything nowadays, even when it doesn't need to be.

VLM2• 13 years ago

"my understanding is that they do a live server check, which wastes data and is very bad for privacy."

Hmm so it doesn't work online where I buy tons of stuff from Amazon Prime, and it doesn't work in brick and mortar because my brick and mortar and steel grocery store has absolutely dismal minimal coverage if any (maybe they have a jammer?). I suppose it would work great at the farmers market ... where everything is grown locally and mostly organically so it doesn't have much of a point anymore. Other than stunts in front of a camera for journalists I'm not sure where I could use this app.

jasonlotito• 13 years ago

You aren't really uncovering anything unique or special. Take a look at your companies own terms:

https://www.wealthfront.com/static/documents/wealthfront_cli...

There is a "no class action" and arbitration clause. Hell, it's data sharing policy is even worse:

"We do not share non-public personal information about you with unaffiliated third parties with whom we have no contractual business relationship for their independent use unless (1) you give us permission, (2) it is necessary to complete a transaction on your behalf, (3) it is necessary to protect against fraud, comply with a subpoena or other court order or is otherwise required or permitted by law. We do not sell information about you to outside unaffiliated companies."

That carefully tip-toes around the idea that they "can" share non-public personal information about you with affiliated third parties whom they do have a contractual business relationship with. Note the conditions they provide are only for sharing with unaffiliated third parties.

"We do not sell information about you to outside unaffiliated companies." "unaffiliated third parties with whom we have no contractual business relationship"

Heck, these two lines essentially suggest that affiliated and unaffiliated have nothing to do with contracts. Therefore, they are free to sell information to whomever they deem they are affiliated with.

My point isn't to pick on you or your company, but merely to point out that what you are suggesting is pretty common-place.

femto• 13 years ago

An alternative is to specify generic items (eg. breakfast cereal) and let the program construct a shopping list that most closely fits your criteria (eg. brand XYZ fruity munchies). For each item, maybe offer a pop-up that lists alternatives in descending order, so you are not happy with a suggestion you can easily scan for and select a "next best"? You can then use your shopping list in the normal way.

Maybe it could also offer the option to place the order for you, so it becomes an "ethical online shopping" site? Like any other shopping site, your list could be saved and reused/tailored next time. If the status of any item changes, a suggestion to change brands could automatically be made next time the list is used. Funding could be by negotiating a cut of each purchase with the vendor?

quattrofan• 13 years ago

Nice, now we just need one to avoid products made in Israel.

vijayr• 13 years ago

wow, this is very interesting. It would be awesome if they can give away the data that powers the app. Others can build their own apps

a3n• 13 years ago

Note: you don't have to do this in the store. You can buy your stuff as usual, scan it at home where you may have better connectivity, and then revise your shopping list for next time.

If you get a hit on Choco-bits at home, then you know that you also won't be buying Fruti-bits, as they're both made by Sulfur Industries. I don't think you need to go slowly down the aisle scanning everything with a bad connection.

danilevy• 13 years ago

That's seriously genius. I can't believe how creative people are honestly. Can't wait to use this app.

tmrggns• 13 years ago

As I go through a store using this app, a storekeeper stops me, concerned that I'm just using his store for "showcasing". Luckily I'm able to explain to him how the app is helping me not buy many of his products. Once he learns this, he is much relieved and lets me go on my way.

New App Lets You Boycott Koch Brothers, Monsanto And More

Related Stories