Comment Re:Sucks for them (Score 1) 39
"Don't Be Evil" - Google 30 years ago
"Be Evil" - Google now.
"Don't Be Evil" - Google 30 years ago
"Be Evil" - Google now.
That's what I assumed as well. Buy Now Pay Later loans like this have a long history of being predatory. So I took a look at what it would cost to accept Klarna (as an example) as a merchant. The reality is that they have transaction fees that are very similar to credit cards. In other words, these companies do not need to rely on missed payments to make a profit.
These companies are apparently setting themselves up to replace traditional credit card payment systems, which suits me right down to the ground.
The difference is that it is much easier to get a Klarna account, and it isn't (yet) as widely available.
I felt the same way at first. Traditional BNPL schemes were very predatory. However, Klarna (and others) appear to be playing approximately the same game as the traditional credit card processors. They charge transaction fees that are roughly the same as credit card processors, and like credit cards their customers don't pay extra if they pay their bill on time. Klarna, in particular actually appears to give customers interest free time.
The difference, for consumers, is primarily that a Klarna account is much easier to get, and it isn't universally accepted. From a merchant perspective, depending on your payment provider, you might already be able to accept Klarna, and it appears that it mostly works like a credit card. It's even possible that charge backs are less of an issue, although it does appear that transaction fees are not given back in the case of a refund.
Personally, I am all for competition when it comes to payment networks. Visa and Mastercard are both devils. More competition for them is good for all of us.
IMHO the fact that we have to, under criminal law, to testify against ourself is a violation of our Constitutional Rights, to not incriminate ourselves.
I'm sure there is some weird legal theory that the government uses to get around this.
Things of value are usually rare. The amount of "entertainment" is ever increasing, and thus becoming cheaper and cheaper. Creating MORE isn't going to help.
And with AI starting to be used in the Creation process, that will lower the costs of making it, and start making it widely available to more people in the creation process.
This ends in a death spiral of more and more "entertainment" with less and less perceived value, chasing diminishing returns. I suspect that places like OF will make quick end once AI girls are able to do everything by prompts on the fly for their "users".
In America we have essentially legislated against small vehicles. Our CAFE standards were supposedly designed to push us towards more fuel efficient vehicles, but the reality is that the easiest way to pass CAFE standards is to simply make the vehicle larger. So the United States ends up with larger vehicles, and the smaller vehicles that we do get tend to be more expensive than we should be. We have essentially legislated away the category of a ultra basic small car. That happens to be a pretty popular segment in most of the world. The small cars we can buy are nearly as expensive as their larger brethren and so they make a lot less sense.
EVs are an even better example of how U.S. legislation skews things towards larger ICE vehicles. The most popular EVs in most of the world are the most basic EVs. I personally would love to buy a basic EV to replace my current commuter car. I have a house and a place to plug in an EV. My commute is short and even the most basic EVs would be fine. However, the only vehicles available in the market are essentially luxury vehicles. I can buy a whole lot of gasoline for $30K, which is the least expensive new EV available here, but if I could get my hands on a cheap Chinese EV for $12K I absolutely would do that. For the price of the least expensive EV you can basically buy a Toyota RAV4 that is a much more capable vehicle.
Remember Darwin; building a better mousetrap merely results in smarter mice.