innovation has stagnated because businesses have driven us to stagnation. Very few businesses provide any real value - the ones that do are running circles around everyone else - given the lack of ability, businesses turns to other, less useful methods of prying our money away from us and largely succeed because consumers are gullible and malleable.

ah the classic "most people are mere sheep, unlike us Great Minds"

Where did you get that from that comment?. It seems clear to me that it was meant were all consumers.

yes, thank you - I did mean to include myself in the 'customers' category, apologies if it came off as holier-than-thou

apologies if my comment came off this way, it was not intended. I think all consumers (myself included!) are vulnerable to being swayed by commercial propaganda

I took pg's point to mean that just because consumers see value in the purchase, that is not the same thing as the purchase being valuable - the race changed from 'provide the best function/value for the thing' to 'provide the most differentiated value to the consumer as an identity' and that is, for the most part, less useful.

Defining your identity to other humans is incredibly useful. It's one of the essential tasks a human faces, and it makes all other tasks easier if done effectively.

I suppose my question with it is will our identity be associated with brands who can/do spend billions and billions of dollars on advertisements or a brand of more authenticity.

Do we as humans feel more at ease with our identity/purchases buying a brand which is known by other people because it spends billions on it/ or a niche brand/smaller shop which is more authentic but people don't know about it.

To me, it feels like the david vs goliath story. My intuition says a mix of small but not too small / something which has history that you compromise on like support/quality of product etc. and sometimes price efficacy.

It's true that consumer choice is what defines the market. So really, yours is a cultural question. What do we as a society value? If it's brand identity, like today, then we will get branded products with as little purpose as possible. If we value authenticity, then brands will start building more authentic products. There's obviously a delay between what we value and what they offer, but its clear that building what customers want always yields a place in the market.

Casio is the best watch brand in the world. This is measurable - most features, battery life, versatility, utility, and durability for the lowest possible price. It's an objective truth. Given this, other watch brands have had to differentiate, and since they cannot compete on pure functionality alone, they offer luxury or, as pg points out, brand identity as a differentiatior.

I would argue Garmins are better value for the money for fitness features but I agree. I excluded Casio because they build “brand era” watches as well as extremely cheap watches, not to mention all the other things they do. So I’m not sure where Casio is to average consumer when it comes to watches.

I have to disagree - I have seen the video, and I also have ordered the product, but the marketing isn't what sold me, and I don't see any evidence that the marketing is what is responsible for people's desire of the product. It's affordable in a world where all prices are increasing everywhere. That's my theory on why people want this product.

It's also just a good product for the price. My only real gripe is the non-haptic trackpad.

What features do matter to you?

Last time I was shopping for a laptop, I needed battery life, low glare, high screen brightness, rugedness was a plus. Cheapness is a good proxy for rugedness. Being able to upgrade/repair components is generally something I value highly too. Something that's made to be maintained, meaning opened, disassembled (and reassembled!), feels good to me.

What options do you see available on the market today that meet those needs? I agree that all of those are super nice to have

Used thinkpads and dell latitudes, battery and brightness aren't always what I'd like though. Frameworks and similar sound nice, but can't bring myself to pay the premium.

What features matter to you?

I have a framework and love it - repair-ability is exceptionally important to me, and I support it as often as I can.

That being said, I have a really specific use-case I have to fill right now: I travel all the time for work, and my work laptop already takes up a good amount of space, so I need something small and easy to use when I travel

I guess a lot hinges on what kind of work you need to do while travelling. I've been on tmux and vim for the longest time which works great over mosh, so almost any device worked for me, as long as I had an ok internet connection. Spent a summer working in a park, on an epaper tablet and a bluetooth keyboard. Good times.

Nothing AI can do replaces the important part of my work.

or the common sense to not store absolutely everything they own with one giant megacorp

This is, I believe, the definition of a free market choice

Yes, a free market isn't the answer to everything. It will never optimise for sustainability unless this is a conscious consumer choice factor. It's way too important to leave it to that though. Hence regulation.

Just change the underlying economic incentives - but nobody is even barely there yet, except maybe the EU. Doughnut Economics, when are you going to save us (& the planet)?

Fair enough, and I agree that regulation is often needed, but we cannot, in general, expect it to have only the consequences explicitly sought.

Reads like AI slop and the name makes me want to take a shower

ok