Bruce Sterling @bruces*Televisions and phones are for poor people.
bitzero@bruces
Whoa. Panem et circenses, Third Millennium version.
StarkRG
Nicole ParsonsSo, the output of China has been nicer to US consumers than the billionaires of America?
Schwarzman & Blackstone's private equity continues to hollow out the economy
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/16/blackstone-is-buying-rental-homes-again-heres-why.html
https://www.npr.org/sections/planet-money/2025/09/09/g-s1-87699/private-equity-corporate-landlords
Ruining lives one medical debt at a time
https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/blackstone-tpg-acquire-medical-device-maker-hologic-up-183-billion-deal-2025-10-21/
Mike McCaffrey@bruces Nice to know my lifestyle of video games and doom scrolling is staying affordable. At least until I need medical care for all the sitting around getting high blood pressure.
๐ธ๐๐๐๐๐๐ฅ ๐๐ ๐ฆ๐๐๐ค ๐@bruces
Graphic applies only in the USA
Graphic applies only in the USA
Josh Summer
Fahri Reza ๐@bruces import from China?
Szewek
Passwordsarehard4
Rastal@bruces The other way to analyse this is the TVs, phones, etc are for mindless consumers.
The people at the top want their populations dumbed down, not thinking, only emoting and allowing the stuff they consume to tell them what to "think" that's why these things are cheap.
The further up you go, the more thinking is required, college fees, books, etc.
The people at the top do not want their populations to be critical thinkers, because that would mean the inevitable fall of the regime.
Fred G@bruces TVs and phones have really gone from tools (the object you use to do something) to extractive mechanisms, with surveillance, etc.
I haven't been in the market for toys in a while, seeing them follow the same trend makes me wondering how bad they got...
@passwordsarehard4 @bruces boundless opportunities... ๐คฎ
Jaime Robertson@bruces So the next time you see someone whine about homeless people with cell phonesโฆ
Bill
The Turtle@bruces "energy" is missing...
Le Monolecte ๐ท๐คฌ๐ง 
schlaf@Monolecte @bruces actually, a 2000 TV is basically free, as no one would pay for it..
this is the joy of the "quality effect" that counts as a decrease on price
your TV is still $500 now, as it was last year, but as it is *better* it would have cost $600 last year (if it existed), and now 500, so it lost $100.
same for cars, in france a basic car is 20kโฌ, while it was 12kโฌ, but there is no inflation because you have GPS-integration and heating mirrors that were on luxury cars at the time.
@Monolecte @bruces imagine a car from the year 2000, but built with today's technology. no bullshit, use 3L/100km of petrol, could be produced and sold for 10kโฌ....
damn, so sad that we have to spend 25k for a SUV that is barely more usable, and on this, 1k or even 1.5k of the price is dedicated to the advertisement budget, because, how could you convince people it is somehow acceptable to pay for this shit?