concordtom said:

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SFBear92 said:

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concordtom said:

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We should tax unhealthy food and subsidize healthy food as a health care initiative.
Duh!!!!
It's basic and simple.
People who don't get that are uninformed.

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Tax the manufacturer, not the consumer.

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Paid for by the consumer.
Same difference?

The objective is to incentivize healthy behavior (eating healthy foods) and dis-incentivize crap, not matter how tasty it might be.
We'd save money on the health care front by a mile. And people would have been quality of life in the meantime.
Oh, but FREEDOM! I can hear the catcalls now.
Sure, go ahead and eat crap. It'll just cost you more. You have the freedom to eat dirt, too.
Taste buds change, habits adjust.

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bearister said:

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I wish I had the choice of not being on the hook for the healthcare cost of anyone that chooses to smoke, eat themselves into obesity and abuse drugs. Other than that, knock yourself out with your lifestyle choices.

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SFBear92 said:

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bearister said:

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SFBear92 said:

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bearister said:

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I wish I had the choice of not being on the hook for the healthcare cost of anyone that chooses to smoke, eat themselves into obesity and abuse drugs. Other than that, knock yourself out with your lifestyle choices.

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So you're saying you don't drink alcohol or use marijuana?

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Moderate drinker, the consequences of which will cost society nothing. Stopped smoking weed at Cal in 1973. It was not helping me get where I wanted to go.

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Everybody thinks they're a moderate drinker. Except me, because I don't drink alcohol.

So why should I be on the hook for any health consequences you have later from the "moderate" drinking you've done. It's not like it's a healthy product. There's literally no health benefit to it at all and there are some health consequences form using it.

In other words, don't cast stones unless you're a vegan, non-alcohol drinking, non-drugging vision of perfection. i.e. the kind of people no one likes.

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SFBear92 said:

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concordtom said:

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SFBear92 said:

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concordtom said:

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We should tax unhealthy food and subsidize healthy food as a health care initiative.
Duh!!!!
It's basic and simple.
People who don't get that are uninformed.

---

Tax the manufacturer, not the consumer.

---

Paid for by the consumer.
Same difference?

The objective is to incentivize healthy behavior (eating healthy foods) and dis-incentivize crap, not matter how tasty it might be.
We'd save money on the health care front by a mile. And people would have been quality of life in the meantime.
Oh, but FREEDOM! I can hear the catcalls now.
Sure, go ahead and eat crap. It'll just cost you more. You have the freedom to eat dirt, too.
Taste buds change, habits adjust.

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It's hell living in a free society and letting people have choices that other people don't like.

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bearister said:

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I wish I had the choice of not being on the hook for the healthcare cost of anyone that chooses to smoke, eat themselves into obesity and abuse drugs. Other than that, knock yourself out with your lifestyle choices.

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SFBear92 said:

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bearister said:

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SFBear92 said:

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bearister said:

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I wish I had the choice of not being on the hook for the healthcare cost of anyone that chooses to smoke, eat themselves into obesity and abuse drugs. Other than that, knock yourself out with your lifestyle choices.

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So you're saying you don't drink alcohol or use marijuana?

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Moderate drinker, the consequences of which will cost society nothing. Stopped smoking weed at Cal in 1973. It was not helping me get where I wanted to go.

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Everybody thinks they're a moderate drinker. Except me, because I don't drink alcohol.

So why should I be on the hook for any health consequences you have later from the "moderate" drinking you've done. It's not like it's a healthy product. There's literally no health benefit to it at all and there are some health consequences form using it.

In other words, don't cast stones unless you're a vegan, non-alcohol drinking, non-drugging vision of perfection. i.e. the kind of people no one likes.

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concordtom said:

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SFBear92 said:

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concordtom said:

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We should tax unhealthy food and subsidize healthy food as a health care initiative.
Duh!!!!
It's basic and simple.
People who don't get that are uninformed.

---

Tax the manufacturer, not the consumer.

---

Paid for by the consumer.
Same difference?

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bearister said:

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Moderate: one 8 pack of these a day:

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okaydo said:

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concordtom said:

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okaydo said:

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It's been a long slow death.
Maybe a couple years ago I went into the Roseville store and noticed that the product on shelves was next to nothing. I had a 10 min talk with an employee and knew it was only a matter of time. The guy blamed Amazon.

So, for computer stuff, you've got, what? Best Buy? Walmart? Target? (All NOT computer stores)
No more Radio Shack for electronics.
Amazon is the answer?

I have to be missing someone, no?

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Quote:

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It's not Amazon's fault. Very few people build computers anymore. Gamers buy consoles or gaming laptops and everyone else uses a phone or a tablet.

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SFBear92 said:

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Quote:

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It's not Amazon's fault. Very few people build computers anymore. Gamers buy consoles or gaming laptops and everyone else uses a phone or a tablet.

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Speak for yourself. I buy the parts individually every time and assemble them. Especially cause most of the time, I'm happy with 75% of the innards of my current rig. It's only when I need to upgrade a motherboard to run a better processor or get a newer better video card that I need to change something and why would I want to pay for new parts I don't need?

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Unit2Sucks said:

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SFBear92 said:

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Quote:

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It's not Amazon's fault. Very few people build computers anymore. Gamers buy consoles or gaming laptops and everyone else uses a phone or a tablet.

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Speak for yourself. I buy the parts individually every time and assemble them. Especially cause most of the time, I'm happy with 75% of the innards of my current rig. It's only when I need to upgrade a motherboard to run a better processor or get a newer better video card that I need to change something and why would I want to pay for new parts I don't need?

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He's not speaking for himself, he's speaking to the market. I don't agree with him that people aren't buying computers - and neither do the numbers - but he's not wrong that the market for homebrew computers is small. The fact that you build your own doesn't change that.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/1/11/22225356/pc-sales-shipments-2020-growth-idc-canalys-remote-work

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concordtom said:

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SFBear92 said:

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bearister said:

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SFBear92 said:

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bearister said:

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I wish I had the choice of not being on the hook for the healthcare cost of anyone that chooses to smoke, eat themselves into obesity and abuse drugs. Other than that, knock yourself out with your lifestyle choices.

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So you're saying you don't drink alcohol or use marijuana?

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Moderate drinker, the consequences of which will cost society nothing. Stopped smoking weed at Cal in 1973. It was not helping me get where I wanted to go.

---

Everybody thinks they're a moderate drinker. Except me, because I don't drink alcohol.

So why should I be on the hook for any health consequences you have later from the "moderate" drinking you've done. It's not like it's a healthy product. There's literally no health benefit to it at all and there are some health consequences form using it.

In other words, don't cast stones unless you're a vegan, non-alcohol drinking, non-drugging vision of perfection. i.e. the kind of people no one likes.

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You are changing the subject.
But if you wanted to go full monty, exercise would be mandated.

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okaydo said:

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Sebastabear said:

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okaydo said:

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Sad to see. Fry's was a Bay Area institution. I did some deals with John Fry back in the day (helped them buy some of the assets of Egghead.com when they went bust in the dot com implosion). He was one of a kind. He and his brother had their own 192 acre golf course in Morgan Hill. And when I say "had their own golf course" that's exactly what I mean - he and his brother were the only two members. At one point. He was trying to put a giant castle (like 200,000 square feet) on it and host PGA tournaments. Not sure whatever happened there. He also owned the San Jose Sabrecats arena football team and was an avid fan.

So rest assured there used to be very good money in selling computer gizmos and shrink wrapped video games (and books and tootsie roles and electric mosquito repellers and whatever other bizarro stuff they threw together). E-commerce and Amazon in particular killed that business.

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okaydo said:

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Sebastabear said:

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okaydo said:

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Sad to see. Fry's was a Bay Area institution. I did some deals with John Fry back in the day (helped them buy some of the assets of Egghead.com when they went bust in the dot com implosion). He was one of a kind. He and his brother had their own 192 acre golf course in Morgan Hill. And when I say "had their own golf course" that's exactly what I mean - he and his brother were the only two members. At one point. He was trying to put a giant castle (like 200,000 square feet) on it and host PGA tournaments. Not sure whatever happened there. He also owned the San Jose Sabrecats arena football team and was an avid fan.

So rest assured there used to be very good money in selling computer gizmos and shrink wrapped video games (and books and tootsie roles and electric mosquito repellers and whatever other bizarro stuff they threw together). E-commerce and Amazon in particular killed that business.

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I had no idea the Burbank Fry's, pictured below, only opened in 1995, which is a year before I went off to Cal.

Whenever I'd be home in L.A. from the Bay Area, my dad and I would just go to the Burbank Fry's and just browse around. Sometimes, we'd buy something. Most of the time, we didn't. Other than a trek to the Fremont Fry's, that was the only Fry's I went to.

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Sebastabear said:

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okaydo said:

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Sad to see. Fry's was a Bay Area institution. I did some deals with John Fry back in the day (helped them buy some of the assets of Egghead.com when they went bust in the dot com implosion). He was one of a kind. He and his brother had their own 192 acre golf course in Morgan Hill. And when I say "had their own golf course" that's exactly what I mean - he and his brother were the only two members. At one point. He was trying to put a giant castle (like 200,000 square feet) on it and host PGA tournaments. Not sure whatever happened there. He also owned the San Jose Sabrecats arena football team and was an avid fan.

So rest assured there used to be very good money in selling computer gizmos and shrink wrapped video games (and books and tootsie roles and electric mosquito repellers and whatever other bizarro stuff they threw together). E-commerce and Amazon in particular killed that business.

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calbear93 said:

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Sebastabear said:

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okaydo said:

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Sad to see. Fry's was a Bay Area institution. I did some deals with John Fry back in the day (helped them buy some of the assets of Egghead.com when they went bust in the dot com implosion). He was one of a kind. He and his brother had their own 192 acre golf course in Morgan Hill. And when I say "had their own golf course" that's exactly what I mean - he and his brother were the only two members. At one point. He was trying to put a giant castle (like 200,000 square feet) on it and host PGA tournaments. Not sure whatever happened there. He also owned the San Jose Sabrecats arena football team and was an avid fan.

So rest assured there used to be very good money in selling computer gizmos and shrink wrapped video games (and books and tootsie roles and electric mosquito repellers and whatever other bizarro stuff they threw together). E-commerce and Amazon in particular killed that business.

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Adapt or die.

Walmart and Best Buy recovered just in time to understand the importance of e-commerce. Lack of adaptability killed businesses like these. If regulation, taxes, and higher costs won't kill the traditional small to mid-size businesses, lack of adaptation will.

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SFBear92 said:

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Unit2Sucks said:

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SFBear92 said:

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Quote:

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It's not Amazon's fault. Very few people build computers anymore. Gamers buy consoles or gaming laptops and everyone else uses a phone or a tablet.

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Speak for yourself. I buy the parts individually every time and assemble them. Especially cause most of the time, I'm happy with 75% of the innards of my current rig. It's only when I need to upgrade a motherboard to run a better processor or get a newer better video card that I need to change something and why would I want to pay for new parts I don't need?

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He's not speaking for himself, he's speaking to the market. I don't agree with him that people aren't buying computers - and neither do the numbers - but he's not wrong that the market for homebrew computers is small. The fact that you build your own doesn't change that.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/1/11/22225356/pc-sales-shipments-2020-growth-idc-canalys-remote-work

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That article has nothing to do with anything I said.

The reason PC's will never go away is because of heat and the ease of upgrade. Upgrading parts in a laptop is a pain in the butt and the extra airspace in a PC is good for the life of the components. I use a laptop for most things, but when I have a hard-core program to run, it's always the PC.

Of course most people will buy pre-fab stuff rather than build it, but "very few" is not true.

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Unit2Sucks said:

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SFBear92 said:

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Unit2Sucks said:

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SFBear92 said:

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Quote:

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It's not Amazon's fault. Very few people build computers anymore. Gamers buy consoles or gaming laptops and everyone else uses a phone or a tablet.

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Speak for yourself. I buy the parts individually every time and assemble them. Especially cause most of the time, I'm happy with 75% of the innards of my current rig. It's only when I need to upgrade a motherboard to run a better processor or get a newer better video card that I need to change something and why would I want to pay for new parts I don't need?

---

He's not speaking for himself, he's speaking to the market. I don't agree with him that people aren't buying computers - and neither do the numbers - but he's not wrong that the market for homebrew computers is small. The fact that you build your own doesn't change that.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/1/11/22225356/pc-sales-shipments-2020-growth-idc-canalys-remote-work

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That article has nothing to do with anything I said.

The reason PC's will never go away is because of heat and the ease of upgrade. Upgrading parts in a laptop is a pain in the butt and the extra airspace in a PC is good for the life of the components. I use a laptop for most things, but when I have a hard-core program to run, it's always the PC.

Of course most people will buy pre-fab stuff rather than build it, but "very few" is not true.

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I mostly objected to you saying "speak for yourself" when he clearly was speaking to a market trend and you were speaking to a niche that isn't growing. I used to build my own computers and spend plenty of time walking the aisles at Frys to do so. I bought my last PC more than a decade ago and still use it occasionally after having upgraded some of the internals (SSD, etc.). I don't think I will ever build another PC but if I were a gamer I might. Regardless, I think it's pretty obvious that there isn't a strong business case for a warehouse size store catering to the DIY PC crowd in 2021 and beyond.

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Big C said:

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My kids heard one of Paul Simon's hits the other day and I had to go through a long explanation of what Kodachrome was. The next time my daughter wants to borrow my phone to take a picture, I'm gonna tell her, sorry, it's out of film.

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