Let the Poor Have Fun

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/opinion/let-the-poor-have-fun.html

by fleaflicker • 13 years ago

59 21 13 years ago

JonSkeptic• 13 years ago

Even Facebook, that great time suck of FarmVille, not farmers, seems to have suffered a head injury and is now imagining itself as Mother Teresa.

After reading the FB propaganda, that's a fair statement.

zebra• 13 years ago

Yes, new and shiny things catch people's attention, but when the factor of newness wears away, people will use internet for work.

liotier• 13 years ago

Games and leisure activities are a great way to build proficiency with a new technology. Then, when a need arises, that mastery can be put to good use... But that would not have been possible without having fooled around with the technology beforehand.

PhasmaFelis4• 13 years ago

I learned a good bit about data processing while reformatting 78-column BBS text files and manuals for printing in full-page-width proportional font (so as to save my father's printer paper).

cantankerous• 13 years ago

"people will use internet for work"

And yet here we all are ;-).

mseebach2• 13 years ago

My current salary is easily double what it would have been had I not aggressively subjected myself to the basic philosophy espoused here, and on Slashdot before it.

maxk42• 13 years ago

Please stop linking nytimes.com. I understand it's simple to subvert the paywall, but they shouldn't be encouraged regardless.

smacktoward• 13 years ago

Seriously?

Believe it or not, outside the VC bubble, businesses need to make money to survive. (I know, right? Shocking!) Without revenue, there won't be a New York Times anymore. The paywall seems to be helping with that (see: http://allthingsd.com/20120806/the-new-york-times-reports-a-..., http://go.bloomberg.com/tech-blog/2012-12-20-the-new-york-ti...), and it's low enough that it's never seriously inconvenienced me as a non-subscriber. (Though it has prompted me a few times to think about becoming a subscriber, which is a feature, not a bug.)

So what's the beef?

astrodust• 13 years ago

The beef is posts to paywall sites need to be tagged somehow.

rocky1138• 13 years ago

Interestingly enough, whenever I go to nytimes I don't see a paywall. And I'm not a customer, either. ? Hmm.

PhasmaFelis4• 13 years ago

The whole point of a news aggregator is to make it easy to find and consume content. It's bad form to link to content that a large chunk of their audience can't easily read, and by "easily" I mean "click the link". I get that the NYT has some worthwhile content that doesn't exist elsewhere, but paywalled links on HN should be clearly marked at the very least.

ajiang• 13 years ago

Maybe linking to Google's I'm Feeling Lucky with the NYT title as the search term will work

http://www.google.com/search?btnI=I'm+Feeling+Lucky&q=let%20...

kanamekun• 13 years ago

So many posts on HN encourage startups to charge their customers and not to fall into the trap of offering everything for free...

When it comes to content, I think we should be encouraging companies to find ways to fund high quality content. That's what the NYT has done with their metered pay wall, and it feels like this is something that should be encouraged. Otherwise they will become yet another newspaper that is sold off or shut down...

mikevm• 13 years ago

I wish I had enough HN karma to downvote you.

joonix• 13 years ago

Wow, really. Charging money for a product is a crime now? We must shun this practice? Ridiculous.

namenotrequired• 13 years ago

Yes, I'm all for their right to have fun, too. But please, don't let those who can't afford it become obsessed with shiny gadgets and internet karma points too. There are many other ways to have fun.

mariusz79• 13 years ago

I find it curious that the author believes in internet.org propaganda.. All they really want is to have more customers. Plain and simple

mseebach2• 13 years ago

"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest."

Who the f.. cares about their ulterior motives if they're successful in their unequivocally positive mission?

PhasmaFelis4• 13 years ago

He doesn't believe it, though. That was kind of the point.

ibuildthings• 13 years ago

A slightly related project is this one: http://www.hole-in-the-wall.com/

I remember getting my first PC at the age of 10, and a feeling of empowerment it brought me. Be it writing my first program that did sometime substantial, or playing Prince of Persia ( and clearing those levels ); what was substantial was the feeling that I am in control of this machine, and I can add/mould things as I want it! This sense of empowerment ( and later the ability to make use of the technology ) was possible only due to the latent fun quotient associated whilst using it (and it is best unspoiled by lack of supervision/or other's deciding how I should use the technology ).

This is very pertinent in an Indian context, where most act for "empowerment of poor" is coupled with the assumption that "poor are incapable of making their own decision".

Let the Poor Have Fun

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