Gyroscopic Investing

[quote=https://medium.com/matter/shitphone-a-l ... 4e66434807]If shitphones were ready for everyone, they wouldn’t be shitphones. As devices, they’re nearly there; as buying decisions, they’re still exotic. They represent a compromise and a risk. They are classic shitworld. Still, smartphone shitworld is already encroaching on brands, and smartphone brandworld is ceding to shit. Major carriers offer cheaper devices, though many of them are older devices from familiar brands; ZTE and Alcatel sell affordable smartphones through pay-as-you-go carriers Cricket and Boost Mobile as well as T-Mobile. More and more casual phone-buyers?—?people who either can’t or don’t want to pay $80+ a month for a traditional contract, or who don’t have good credit, or who don’t care to enter into a multi-year contract just to Snapchat with their friends?—?could be tempted to pair such options with cheaper prepaid plans, pushing the industry toward some kind of populist tipping point.

It is tempting to see this as the triumphant rise of the shitphone. But nothing from shitworld ever really rises, it just reaches up at whatever is above it and pulls relentlessly down. Brands that can escape before the pulling becomes too strong must then find, or invent, something new. These breakthroughs, or new features, or new categories, comprise innovation. Or are they just fresh economic inefficiencies waiting to be solved?

I look forward to my first good shitwatch. I trust I will not wait long.[/quote]

It's incredibly cheap to get 80-90% of what people pay hundreds a month for. You can get a pay-as-you-go cell phone plan for $10 a month and it'll work with a smartphone. Add Netflix and Amazon Prime for another $17 a month or so and you're totally loaded with movie and TV entertainment (not to mention the scarily tempting ability to impulse purchase junk from Amazon). That people pay like $200 a month for this stuff plus a little bit more sort of boggles my mind, especially when the primary objection is sports, much of which you can get for free with an OTA digital antenna for your TV.

MangoMan wrote: As an aside, does anyone know a reliable way to DVR broadcast TV received on a digital antenna so it would be easier to dump cable?

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00MXUDD0O/

You can get your regular rate reduced to promo deals by contacting the social media for your cable provider and complaining.  So for me, $99 a month for triple play (HDTV/Internet/Phone) is hard to beat because one of the three becomes free in comparison to double play normal rates.  I personally don't even have a HD-DVR or HD digital box anymore to watch anything now that basic cable is encrypted and I can't be bothered to setup the shitty digital adaptor that is only free for a year or two.  I'm fine with the Roku for Netflix and PBS.  There's not enough time in the day for much else after all the Internet reading!

If they stop giving me the promo rate (no response this week, normal rate is $147!!!), then I certainly will get a HDTV antenna for Gma who spends 24/7 on ABC.

EDIT: Thinking about it some more, my time is just too precious to be wasting my remaining life suffering through endlessly annoying and hyperreal commercials or being forced fed programming I'm rarely in the mood to watch.  Nor do I have a water cooler to worry about peer pressure "belonging" in keeping up with the latest fanboy-cum-fads like The Game of Thrones.  I also think the picture quality of overcompressed HDTV digital cable sucks donkey balls vs Netflix's SuperHD or even an HDTV antenna.

Desert wrote: Pointedstick,

I agree.  Our problem right now is with the cost of internet access required to enjoy the Netflix, etc.  Any ideas on that front?

Netflix can be enjoyed on a 1.5 Mbps down connection; I did it for 6 months with no problem. In my area, I could get 6 Mbps down for $30 a month; I chose 25/5 for $50 from a different company instead due to higher bandwidth needs since I work from home. These choices seem very reasonable to me and I live in "flyover country." I wish towns would stop granting monopolies to wired internet companies; there would be so much more competition that would drive down the prices of wired internet the way the wireless companies are currently engaged in a price-slashing race.

Hey PS got any room in your house?  I wanna move in! 

MachineGhost wrote: Hey PS got any room in your house?  I wanna move in! 

The joys of flyover country, man. California is too damn full of people all scrabbling over the same pool of resources. Unless you're directly connected with one of the two major moneymaking industries in the state in a way that's making you rich, it's really not worth sticking around IMHO especially considering how ridiculous the localized real estate bubble is getting. It's getting so people really just can't afford to live there anymore.

Pointedstick wrote: The joys of flyover country, man. California is too damn full of people all scrabbling over the same pool of resources. Unless you're directly connected with one of the two major moneymaking industries in the state in a way that's making you rich, it's really not worth sticking around IMHO especially considering how ridiculous the localized real estate bubble is getting. It's getting so people really just can't afford to live there anymore.

Gotta stay for Gma's lungs, but once she moves on...  <insert famous MLK quote here>

Pointedstick wrote:

Desert wrote: Pointedstick,

I agree.  Our problem right now is with the cost of internet access required to enjoy the Netflix, etc.  Any ideas on that front?

Netflix can be enjoyed on a 1.5 Mbps down connection; I did it for 6 months with no problem. In my area, I could get 6 Mbps down for $30 a month; I chose 25/5 for $50 from a different company instead due to higher bandwidth needs since I work from home. These choices seem very reasonable to me and I live in "flyover country." I wish towns would stop granting monopolies to wired internet companies; there would be so much more competition that would drive down the prices of wired internet the way the wireless companies are currently engaged in a price-slashing race.

Flyover country is apparently a lot better for internet connections than BFE, where I live.

True stuff.  I just bought a shitspa - deeply discounted cosctco hot tub.  No ridiculous number of jets, blinkeNlights, headrests, bellagio fountains, Bluetooth audio systems, etc.  Basically the base model civic of the spa world.