this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2026
498 points (99.6% liked)

News

36512 readers
2280 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.


Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, blogs, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.


7. No duplicate posts.


If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.


All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] riskiedingo@lemmy.world 77 points 1 month ago (5 children)

Similarly with housing. Why make cheap starter homes when you can make so much more with “Luxury” homes and condos.

[–] SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 53 points 1 month ago (2 children)

And yet use the same cheap materials in the "luxury" ones that you would have used in the cheap ones anyway!

[–] almost1337@lemmy.zip 36 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I follow some home inspectors who post videos from their new home inspections, and holy crap the things they find are ridiculous. Like, construction companies should lose their licenses bad.

[–] adespoton@lemmy.ca 21 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I visit some partially built homes from time to time, and recently saw one just after it had been inspected. On one wall, on the insulation, the inspector had scrawled STUD? In red felt.

The stud was completely missing from the wall. It was just an empty frame filled with insulation. You’d think someone would have noticed earlier during construction, but obviously the actual contractor had just let the day labor go to town and never bothered to review their work before inspection.

[–] Maeve@kbin.earth 4 points 1 month ago

A lot of times, it's the contractor cutting corners and hoping no one notices.

[–] quoll 18 points 1 month ago

lol, that is 100% every australian apartment built in the last 15 years. the window frames are plastic and the cladding is combustible... but it's got Italian tiles and "European appliances" so it's an "executive suite". that will be $1.5million fuck you very much.

[–] sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Similar to literally every market that involves 'things', as we transition from failing liberal capitalism to horrifying technofascist neofeudalism (aka cyberpunk dystopia).

The next step is... well they won't lower the luxury prices, everything becomes renting, loaning, etc, even further and harder... untill you end up with bundled subscription plans / leases on a diverse array of physical things, as we currently have with bundles of online services.

We literally going to transition to a subscription based model for just being alive.

... unless enough people actually do something effrctive about it.

Other wise, the K shaped economy becomes a === shaped economy. You're either on top, or you're not, and you're basically treated as a kind of cattle; raised, milked, then expended whenever it is most profitable to do so.

[–] IamSparticles@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

We literally going to transition to a subscription based model for just being alive.

Isn't that just health insurance?

[–] sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Yes, that's true, but I meant more like uh...

The Disney+ life supscription is partnered with Starbucks, which is also partnered with Amazon Whole Foods and Trader Joes, and Verizon, and Subaru and GM.

The Netflix life supscription is partnered with Costco, Cox, and McDonalds, Chevy and Toyota.

The HBO Max life supscription is partnered with Walmart, ATT, Honda and Ford, ... Cluck'in Bell, fucking whatever.

And then also some kind of alliance type structure with various regional or national landlords/land developers.

Like, uh, roughly the idea of a Japanese Keiretsu, or a Korean Chaebol, but kind of inverted, applied much more thoroughly to the consumer side, than to the finance/internal corporate structures.

So yeah, you just pick one of those three life subscription plans, they all have various tiers, etc, and you... well you rent or lease or finance basically everything.

Thats how the idea of a kind of Corporate Citizenship will start, something like that.

That's my nightmare/prognostication.

It won't be based around like, families of business that define your employment paths, as exists in much more uh, 'classic' cyberpunk, I guess.

It'll be oriented around consumption, getting things, because... practically no one will even have 'real' jobs, having a career will become a defining marker of being born into an upper crust corpo elite class of some kind, the rest of us proles will just be shuffled between gig work, retail jobs, jail, prison, military, etc.

[–] IamSparticles@lemmy.zip 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I gotcha. Hell, we've been there before. The company towns essentially owned every aspect of the lives of the people that lived there.

[–] sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 month ago

Yep.

I guess maybe a less verbose way to say it would be:

Company towns, but...! Everything is computer!

[–] worhui@lemmy.world 5 points 1 month ago

It cost nearly the same to make a luxury unit as a stripped down one. Most of the cost is labor. Spend 5 k in fancier materials and get 50k for the unit.

[–] Maeve@kbin.earth 4 points 1 month ago

There's a difference between "cheap" and "inexpensive." Mcmansions are cheap.

[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world -1 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

People wanted those mcmansions and rebuilds jack up prices. Now those massive suburban mcmansions are getting old in the tooth and no one wants to buy them. They are realizing they need to build smaller homes finally. We'll probably see more townhomes with shared structures (walls/roofs).

[–] hark@lemmy.world 4 points 1 month ago

Before they were building mcmansions and charging a fortune for them. Now they're building sardine cans and charging a fortune for them. Much better.