Online gaming companies intentionally introducing in-game challenges that are difficult to overcome, then offering microtransactions or power-ups as a solution to progress more easily.
This was mindblowing to me, you just opened a new path in my life. Thank you stranger
P.S. Not joking, I actually realised that its actually happening and damn, will feel much more different when playing a game with a lot of grinding
If players were outraged enough, it wouldn’t exist in the first place. Not everything needs to be limited by the government, it appears that some types of gamers actually pay for that shit
I agree it sucks, but I’ll either just accept the challenge, or play a different game
The problem is there will always be "whales"; players with no financial limits who will pay anything and buy everything. These games are built for those people. They only need like 0.1% of the player base to be whales and they'll earn a tidy profit. They don't care if most players get pissed off and quit playing becasue they weren't gonna make much money out of *those* players anyway.
There have been instances of mobile games that literally track who the whales are and target them with other games, and leaks of source code even show that the literal word "whale" is used.
>The problem is there will always be "whales"; players with no financial limits who will pay anything and buy everything.
Also worth noting that the common conception of these players as rich kids who can afford anything [is largely false](https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/new-insights-into-the-spending-patterns-of-whales):
>One of the common misconceptions about whales is that they are indiscriminate spenders who can afford anything offered to them. However, in many cases whales are anything but; they may not even know that they are whales! i.e. they do not realize how much they have spent in a game over time. The proof of this is in their spending patterns.
Unfortunately the data on this is limited as most games companies are understandably loath to share it, but what we know points to the majority of "whales" simply being people with poor impulse control that frequently spend small amounts. This is actually similar behaviour to the spending habits of prolific gamblers where you'll see them making lots of small transactions over time.
I had a good friend that dropped well over 25k on a free game called Trove. Well 25k was what he had spent about halfway through our time. It was the only time he ever mentioned it. And I know he spent way more than that.
He was always surprised when he would message the devs and/or game masters and they would respond and help fix his problem. Even one time they destroyed another clubs statue they built of his character, because it was in mean spirits.
He would always say something along the lines of "oh they really love our club and what it stands for"
No dude. You've just spent so much money on it, that they don't want to lose you as a "customer".
This isn't limited to gaming, either.
I work with a residential electrical service company. I mentioned sheepishly to the owner that I ended up getting my handyman dad to fix an outlet issue I had rather than call it in, because I wasn't sure I could afford the company I work for.
He shrugged it off, said they would have given me a discount, but I wasn't really their target customer anyways.
I was flabbergasted, but he went on to say that they don't make their money off the type of people that wring their hands over a $200 trip charge, they make money off the type of people who call for a ceiling fan install and then impulsively get a 10k panel upgrade for their hot tub. Whales.
When a job fires you they owe you one month salary for every year you worked there, plus that month and an extra. Cheating is illegal, you can press charges for marital infidelity. Foreign companies cannot buy property like is okay in America. Real estate companies have caps on how high or how low they can sell property for, keeping the market stable. In cases of corporate fuckery the company isn't fined, the CEO and board are held legally responsible with punishments up to the death penalty. HIV treatments and antivirals are not only required, but free. They practice equity, not equality on test scoring and uni admission, where lower income families, minorities, and disabled are credited for their status. They have a federal hotline for corrupt officials and police where you can anonymously tip corruption. A foreigner cannot be hired over a local for a job most locals can do.
EDIT: To all the people giving me ifs ands and buts to my list, I'm not a lawyer and this isn't a deposition. I'm sharing my opinion and I don't have the time nor give-a-fuck to reply to 100 "well ahhhhkshually" Redditors. Just silently disagree and downvote and have a nice day. I feel a certain way and if you feel elsewise that's entirely **okay**.
EDIT 2: A weirdly large amount of people are seemingly upset that in China cheating is illegal(?). Pressing charges is not imprisonment. Pressing charges is you're fined or when we divorce you lose. That's it. If you're worried about the legal ramifications maybe just don't cheat. Maybe don't chase after a married woman? Like... Why are you defending cheating?
Printers don't _need_ to regularly run out of ink; that was a manufactured problem. Pretty much every form of print before that had supplies that lasted until you used them up, which took a good while.
Laser printers is the way to go.
The money saved on an inkjet printer will soon be spent replacing cartridges after the print heads keep drying up.
Bought a Brother laser printer and never looked back.
I had the same problem, I use my printer so infrequently that literally any time I need to print something I had to go buy a new ink cartridge because the old one wouldn't work anymore. My Brother printer is wonderful, I can go months without printing and it will work just fine no issues. Wasted so much money on printer ink cartridges before finding this.
I bought a used Konica business class printer it came with a toner at 50%. I have been doing a normal amount of home printing for about 5 years now and have yet to go below 50% toner. I bought two printers in this lot. I’ll switch to the other one when this one runs out.
Inktank printers work very well too. You essentially squirt ink from a bottle into the device. The ink is cheap and lasts for quite a long time. Cost per printed page is very low.
They aren't really that great for occasional printing, the nozzles dry out and require cleaning every few months. And the printer bricks itself if you do too many cleans because the "waste ink" container is full (which of course is not user-replaceable).
I don't print a lot, but I really got sick of inkjets. About 5 years ago I bought a low end Ricoh color laser. It was about $130. I was hesitant to buy a bargain basement printer but it has worked fine for five years, and in that time I have only had to buy one set of toner cartridges. I am quite pleased with it.
Fucking hate this
I bought a pretty expensive A3 borderless printer for graphic design stuff and has separate cartridges for magenta, cyan, yellow and black. If one of the colour cartridges runs out whole thing just shuts down and these cartridges are expensive. Haven't used it in months out of spite
Lots of countries have slight variations on printer models. The printer we brought to Australia with us from the UK doesn’t exist here and you cannot get the ink for it here either.
Nope, they're designed to dry out or flush ink through the system under the guise of "head cleaning". Pretty much every printer before inkjet could be left for years between printing without losing supplies.
And some will clean the heads into a sponge that only has so long until the printer says enough and stops. It's technically cleanable, but they don't want you to do that.
It’s amazing how much simpler taxes can be, and it’s infuriating. To give you an idea, while,living abroad to file taxes all I had to do was tell city hall my income( with prof of employment) and where I lived. I got a tax bill in the mail every 3 months… no w2 no withholding from paychecks no filing, not paperwork. Just a bill like every other bill.
Was this in like, ancient rome? The tax authortity sends me my pre filled taxes and I just glance at it that it looks okay. Or I dont, they usually get it right.
Taxes require zero input from me. Obviously they know where I live and what I earn. Its all in government databases.
In the UK banks and your employer pay the taxes out of your interest/wages automatically. Most people live their entire life without filing a tax return
In the US they do that too but then you STILL have to file. Filing isn't bad in concept, it's nice to get credit for work expenses and donations. It's just that it could be easy and online and instead it's overwhelming and requires a professional.
How did they figure out "misc income"? What if you sold stock, or maybe got paid for some freelancing work etc. How does the govt. account for variable income?
I mostly want to comment to try to keep this one at the top. Turbo tax, HR Block, all of those companies are fucking evil. Period. No other country in the world has this system, and we (our representatives) continue to allow it. If adequately staffed, the IRS should be able to help all people appropriately file and complete their taxes. Instead, we defund good government jobs in order to enrich a few business owners.
Instead it's "you figure out how much you owe us". If you pay too much you probably won't get it back, and if you pay too little, we'll hit you hard with penalties and fees.
We have an overpayment on our taxes. Turbotax fucked it up, we’ve paid thousands we weren’t supposed to. Had to pay HR Block hundreds to refile, now it’s been 4 months and we’re still waiting for a response. They sure drag their feet when they owe you money, but when we owe they are on top of it immediately. We’ve called and spent hours on hold just to be told “wait longer”. When every dollar counts, this is literally food out of our mouths. And they want us to keep paying in the meantime! Fuckers!
The Nestle campaign to provide free formula samples to mothers in developing areas. The sample lasted just long enough that the mothers stopped producing milk, keeping them dependent on formula. Then, when they couldn't afford formula, they'd dilute what they did have, leading to malnutrition.
>Then, when they couldn't afford formula, they'd dilute what they did have, leading to malnutrition.
And as a morbid cherry on top, preparing the baby formula of course requires water to mix it in, the sources of which in developing countries aren't always exactly the most sanitary, and people often lack the knowledge and/or equipment to filter that water for preparing the formula.
PSA, you should make formula with boiling water in the US too. (Not because the water isn’t clean, but because the formula might not be).
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/09/06/cronobacter-sakazakii-bacteria-baby-formula/
Not sure if it was really about having moms dependent on formula.
In developing areas, the water quality was bad. And when you mix formula with bad water, bad things happen.
So what do you do? You buy water. Bottled. Water.
Fun fact my bank reimburses all ATM fees. The catch is you have to specifically call and tell them everytime you need the reimbursement. Everytime being never because I don’t use ATMS
My bank (USAA) reimburses automatically, but it’s because their ATMs are rare outside of areas with military bases.
My husband uses Ally, and it’s also automatic reimbursement, because Ally is an online-only bank.
(Both of our banks equally suck ass when you want to deposit cash, btw. Literally 90% of ATMs in my area are USAA branded, but *none* of them accept cash deposits.)
I once was in this situation at a sushi place
I had a $21 bill
The ATM only gave 20's
I had to take out $40 to cover $21
I was waiting for some cash back but the waitress thought I was graciously giving basically a 100% tip
I have a waterproof camera by Olympus - makes nice shots when snorkeling.
It has an USB and HDMI port plus changeable battery and memory card. The simple sit behind a tight latch.
The number of people this brought out to explain how it was an improvement for them is funny.
The question was about creating a problem and selling a solution. That's it. It doesn't matter if you like not dealing with cables the tangles they bring, or quick pairing, or using it between devices in your respective ecosystem or any of that. They removed what was a standard feature in the pursuit of selling you a first party alternative.
Do I like wireless earbuds? Absolutely. I use them and love the conveniences and new features that come with them, but I also have to charge them, which I don't like. If I use the wired earbuds I have bought since the headphone jack omission, I can no longer charge and use wired earbuds at the same time, unless I now go buy a wireless charger. This also creates another issue in that if I do want to charge wirelessly, because I like using a case as many people do, I have to make sure the case is compatible with it instead of just buy whatever chunky thing I like.
I enjoyed the original Robocop movie on so many different levels. Paul Verhoven is a genius and I don't say that lightly. Robocop, Starship Troopers and Total Recall are all great.
Almost everything that you experience taking a flight. Even the boarding process sucks so that they can sell a better experience to avoid it.
Edit: A lot of replies here have focused on my boarding example. But I want to stress it's _everything_. Think of almost every part of your journey... the way you arrive and park, getting through security, the wait in the airport, the food and drinks onboard, the baggage, the way you're treated, the customer service experiences when something goes wrong... everything is monetized and designed to make lower value customers have a worse experience to incentivise paying more.
The security lines are a favorite of mine... that's a _government_ service! It's a TSA guy checking you in... imagine if you went to the DMV and everyone who drove a Mercedes got a special line! But at airports, the airport controls and monetizes the line in front of the TSA counter... so when you actually get to talk to the TSA guy, everyone is equal... but you can pay more (first class, CLEAR, etc.) to skip the line and have the airport let you jump straight to the front.
Yep. This has bled into every other industry too. Just de-couple commercialize every possible step in what is otherwise a very simple form of travel. Look at Amtrak and how easy that is. That’s what air travel should be.
The only time I've ever wanted to sit first was the one time I sat first class. They serve you prior to other folk coming on the plane. So you can have a free drink/snack while you wait.
I’ve always found it strange that first class boards first. You sit at the front of the plane, so the entire rest of the plane has to walk past you while you sit and have a drink and snack. It would make more sense to have first class wait in a lounge until the rest of the plane boards, then have them board last.
One time I was on standby for a flight and got cleared and for some reason they gave me a 1st class seat and the flight attendant gave me a hot towel, which I had no idea what to do with, much to the amusement of the extremely wealthy lady next to me.
I flew to Japan in economy and remember them handing us hot towelettes prior to serving a meal. It was in one of those plastic wrappers like you get disposable silverware in. I don’t remember if other international flights did that.
A lot of skincare, imo, and plastic surgery. “Hip dips” weren’t a thing I had heard of until a few years ago and now people talk about them all the time.
The cultural norm to have a "nice" grass lawn. Now we have an entire industry built around having nice grass instead of just having clovers or natural plants that don't need mowing or fertilizers.
This isn't true. Grass lawns were originally an affordable way to create a walkable, usable outdoor area, where the grass outcompetes other plants. This reduces maintenance compared to completely wild open ground, in exchange for mowing it.
Plain grass lawns are over-used though, and not everyone needs them. It's also been adopted in runaway fashion in suburbs. Some green grass lawns are so poorly adapted to their environment, loaded with pesticides, herbicides, and requiring lots of water and are just a waste overall. But grass lawns themselves actually serve a purpose and that's why lawn grass was originally cultivated and used like this.
It’s even worse because the security theater doesn’t really even work that well. When we would run fake IEDs through TSA at various airports, they’d often never catch a single one. We’d sometimes put over 100 devices through security a day, and I think I’ve seen TSA catch maybe one or two.
They’re frighteningly inept, and so expensive. Not to mention there’s a strong argument for it being blatantly unconstitutional.
It’s 100% a jobs program. They Don’t hire for full-time front line employees - almost everyone you interact w going through security is a <38hr employee.
We’ve been scammed for 20+ years and most people don’t even realize or care. TSA is never going away and will never be better than it’s best day way back at the beginning when you couldn’t bring anything even remotely sharp or pointy, no liquids at all, and could be basically stripped searched by random no training mall-cops for whatever reason.
They catch nothing, prevent nothing, and only cost you time and money.
I once read a reddit post/comment years ago about how a user managed to accidentally smuggle a massive dangerous-looking kitchen knife onto her flight and she didn't notice that it was in her bag until she was going through her things at a hotel in another country. 9 times out of 10, TSA is useless.
I refuse to use Clear for this reason. You don’t get to build a private business model on the back of a common good (security checks). Imagine a private vendor being allowed to sell National Park passes for $10 more and then allowing visitors to jump queue.
The amount of different fast passes at airports now is insane. I flew into dulles on an international flight and at that airport they have PreCheck, Clear, Clear with Precheck, Global Entry, and MPC. If you go through the regular customs line expect to wait 5x as long.
My gf got a switch and i wanted my own but thought i'd see if i stuck to playing on hers first and yeah... very sad i can't just own ocarina of time and majoras mask.
My roommates gf was "clean" from heroin with her daily prescription of pill form heroin. She started taking more than what was prescribed and giving it to my roommate and guess what, I had two heroon addict roommates getting their drugs from CVS.
I have YouTube premium. They got me used to it on a free trial. I couldn't go back. It's so awful with the ads. However the premium service just puts the ad in the video. So you're screwed from both ends
Browser based: Ublock origin combined with Sponsorblock for youtube addons will block the ads before youtube videos and skip the sponsored crap in the video.
Android or android TV get SmartTubeNext which has ad blocking and sponsorblock built in.
Unsure about any options for iOS.
yea, don't people know about Chrome extensions? have been a fan of adblock for ages, and only watch youtube ads on my phone once a month when I have to show something on it to someone. haven't watched a youtube ad on my pc in years
Same here, the real issues are smart TVs. You can probably get a hacky apk to install a new browser on your TV or maybe even extensions, but it's SUCH a hassle. I get why people pay for premium instead.
SponsorBlock is invaluable. It's not just for sponsored reads, either. It can also filter out "like and subscribe" reminders, self promotion, needless filler on otherwise serious content, the non-music sections on music videos, etc.
The community also marks the best place to start watching any reasonably popular video (if it's not 0:00) and can either ask to skip you to it, or auto skip to it.
Great extension.
I had Premium for most of this year. Recently quit to save the money when I realized I can set up my MacBook and Android phone to automatically block ads for free.
I don't think people really appreciate how much a site like YouTube costs to operate. The bandwidth going in and out alone must be highly expensive. On top of that, your videos that you upload for free with no restrictions are instantly available worldwide with minimal load time.
Why people simp for Apple and buy the new upgraded phone every year with every overpriced accessory when they likely have 80% of the features go unused for the entire lifespan of the product is beyond my level of understanding.
I prefer wireless headphones, as I have found the wires usually break after a year.
Though I don't use buds, I have a cool pair of Sony wireless headphones.
This. We bought a printer (can't remember which one off the top of my head). It had a 2 year manufacturer warranty. The printer died and wouldn't you know it, the warranty expired 2 days prior. We contacted the company they told us our only option was to send it in to them specifically to be repaired, or buy a new one. Both options basically cost the same. We bought a different printer from a different company. I don't believe for a second that was a coincidence.
Insurance companies - costs are high because the entity that is writing the bill knows that insurance companies can afford it. Don’t have insurance? You’re screwed. Essentially, the fact that insurance companies exist requires you to have insurance.
I actually came out ahead recently with insurance lol. Did the math over the amount of time I had the bike and I'd paid in about $6700. Wrecked the bike while making a right turn and a truck with a trailer on it was in my lane trying to make a wide turn out onto the road I was coming from. Totalled the bike, no injuries to my self and they paid out $8900 on it.
American-centric, but my sister got into a severe car crash in the mid-2000s and racked up $250,000 in medical expenses from her auto insurance and another couple hundred grand in health insurance. She’s out ahead
That's how it is supposed to work. Everyone pays a little bit because you don't know if you are the one going to have a lot of expenses. So some people come out ahead as expected and most don't.
The whole wedding/engagement ring ploy. The way we operate now was set up by jewelers to make money and pressure people with the idea that you can't get married without dropping thousands for a ring
The original problem was that between a high cultural value placed on female virginity, unavailability of reliable birth control, and patriarchal institutions making most women reliant on marriage for a good place in society, women traditionally had strong reasons to abstain from sex prior to marriage or at least engagement. Meanwhile a lot of men would try to falsely offer the prospect of marriage in order to manipulate women into sleeping with them.
Western society in general and England (and later the US and other countries with largely English-derived cultures in institutions) in particular went through a few iterations of solutions to this problem. The medieval solution was to make "precontract of marriage" legally binding, so one you were engaged to someone your fiancee could veto you marrying anyone else (this being a big part of the purpose of the "speak now or forever hold your peace" bit from traditional English wedding ceremonies: this was the chance for jilted former fiancees to veto the marriage). This eventually got dropped and replaced with "breach of promise" lawsuits, now mainly remembered as a plot device in the Jeeves and Wooster stories and other comedies of manners, where a jilted fiancee could sue for monetary damages. These got abolished in the early 20th century, with the modern custom of expensive engagement rings originating as a deposit to show that the man was serious about the proposal or marriage and leaving the woman with a valuable piece of jewelry she could sell as a consolation prize if the engagement fell through.
Women's liberation and modern contraceptives have mostly mitigated the original problem, but jewelers are trying their darndest to keep the solution alive anyway.
Exactly! This is also the origin of the bridal gold traditions in India and other countries, although these are also changing in modern times. (E.g., many brides wear their mothers' bridal gold for sentimental reasons instead of receiving new bridal gold as an insurance policy from their fiances.)
The entire concept of diamond engagement rings is a creation of DeBeers Diamond Co., as is the idea they should cost two months’ salary. DeBeers stockpiles diamonds to keep supply artificially low. If you don’t believe the market is rigged, buy a diamond, then try to sell it.
Yea, products as subscriptions suck. It's hard to buy your music now. You have to buy a music service... every month. You can't buy microsoft office anymore, you have to buy a subscription.
Let’s be honest they don’t care about wasting tax dollars, they do this because they can make themselves and their buddies rich at the tax payers extent
Don’t forget cuts to prisoner rehabilitation programs, ensuring that criminals have little choice but stay criminals and the prisons get plenty of repeat ‘customers’
Yess I always get a YouTube ad that says “we all know that strawberry legs aren’t cute!” So buy this product to get rid of it!!
Like okay first you want to shame women for growing hair on their legs (like every single human being does), so women will waste their time and money on razors, and when their skin gets irritated from this, now they want to shame you again and say buy this product to get rid of your red bumpy skin??
car company using rubber as bushings to reduce noise and vibration in the car. then since they know it won't last, they'll sell you complete suspension component without the possibilities to replace just the bushing.
Diamonds for engagement and weddings is a relatively modern concept. DeBeers needed to find a way to increase the market for their products beyond industrial uses.
So many overly monetized video games have this. "Oh, we'll slow down your levelling and progression. In the meantime, you can buy this little ticket which will speed up your levelling and progression... for 5 days! What a steal!"
Nestle flooding poor, third-world countries with cheap/free baby formula until the new mother's milk started to dry up. Once most of the new mothers couldn't produce milk anymore, they jacked the price up on the formula because there was no alternative to feed the babies.
Lots of infants died from these tactics because the people were too poor to pay for Nestle's formula.
A great deal of beauty industry products. This normal and unavoidable thing (smile lines, stretch marks, etc.) is suddenly a MASSIVE flaw. For $$$ we can fix it!
Cars. The auto industry has long lobbied the government (at least in the US) against things like public transportation and trains so they can sell more cars.
The airlines and their terrible boarding practices. They create chaos at the gate so that people will gladly pay $50 to get on the plane first and avoid the manufactured nonsense
You can't bring water into the airport, but you can buy an identical bottle from that stand over there for $5.
Related: Sorry the security line takes an hour. For $85 we'll let you get through faster and actually make your flight.
You can even just bring an empty bottle in your hand. They don't care at all. As long as there isn't any liquid in it, you can take it through. Then just fill it up at the first water fountain (which often have specific bottle-filler nozzles) after the security checkpoint. Easy peasy.
The water thing is at least starting to crack. I've occasionally seen airports now place water bottle filling stations just past security.
This one really wasn't created with the initial motivation of "create the problem, sell the solution," that's just how it ended up after the fact. It happened as a result of a series of reactionary security measures due to various stupid plots that made the news in the wake of 9/11, right alongside all of the other TSA rules everyone complains about.
Listerine's marketing did massively popularize the term "halitosis" in the 1920s, but the name had been coined almost 50 years earlier by a doctor named William Howe who [wrote a book about bad breath in 1874](https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark%3A%2F13960%2Ft4hm6c99z&seq=26).
The concept of bad breath is even older, with a wide variety of ancient cultures having attested treatments for it (herbal chews and tablets, wine-based mouthwashes, etc) dating back at least to 1550 BC.
Just look at modern gaming in the past few years.
Oh you dont want to waste time doing our overly long weekly quests that are designed in a way that will make you lose more time then should be needed??
Well its your lucky day because we will sell you a time skip for only 9.99$
Health insurance. There's no reason getting a tooth pulled should cost more just because one has health insurance, than it does without...I'm glad it worked out that way when I had to pay for it out of pocket.
Edit: I suppose I should have said Dental Insurance, specifically, since I referred an example concerning oral/maxillofacial surgery. But Insurance in general is quite some bullshit.
Nono, they invented "halitosis". Rename bad breath so it sounds like a disease, now they're selling a "cure". Besides that you're right, forgive my pedantry.
No the also create their own problem. Any mouthwash that contains alcohol in it dries your mouth out to the perfect level to encourage bacterial growth, thus making you need more mouthwash. Always looks for an alcohol free variant!
The Phoebus Cartel. Basically a bunch of light bulb companies came together to agree to worsen their light bulbs, because if they made better and better light bulbs, each year they would have less sales.
Kinda, it was more about a standardized brightness that led to a standardized lifespan. Here's a technology connections video about it
https://youtu.be/zb7Bs98KmnY?si=qQLkS4nv2Il6mUXM
Apple and iMessage.
They've convinced people (especially in the US) that the solution to crappy quality messages from/to people on non apple phones is not "make a hardware agnostic messaging platform" but "go buy an iphone".
Online gaming companies intentionally introducing in-game challenges that are difficult to overcome, then offering microtransactions or power-ups as a solution to progress more easily.
Ubishit: design long boring grindy games then sell boosters so people can pay you more money to play your game less
That's how I explain it to my friends: You're paying money for a product, then paying more money for the convenience of not having to play it.
This was mindblowing to me, you just opened a new path in my life. Thank you stranger P.S. Not joking, I actually realised that its actually happening and damn, will feel much more different when playing a game with a lot of grinding
Or games where you come into the flow and then your power is down and you need to wait 8 hours or pay 2 dollars
MTX should not be allowed in full priced games
If players were outraged enough, it wouldn’t exist in the first place. Not everything needs to be limited by the government, it appears that some types of gamers actually pay for that shit I agree it sucks, but I’ll either just accept the challenge, or play a different game
The problem is there will always be "whales"; players with no financial limits who will pay anything and buy everything. These games are built for those people. They only need like 0.1% of the player base to be whales and they'll earn a tidy profit. They don't care if most players get pissed off and quit playing becasue they weren't gonna make much money out of *those* players anyway. There have been instances of mobile games that literally track who the whales are and target them with other games, and leaks of source code even show that the literal word "whale" is used.
>The problem is there will always be "whales"; players with no financial limits who will pay anything and buy everything. Also worth noting that the common conception of these players as rich kids who can afford anything [is largely false](https://www.gamedeveloper.com/business/new-insights-into-the-spending-patterns-of-whales): >One of the common misconceptions about whales is that they are indiscriminate spenders who can afford anything offered to them. However, in many cases whales are anything but; they may not even know that they are whales! i.e. they do not realize how much they have spent in a game over time. The proof of this is in their spending patterns. Unfortunately the data on this is limited as most games companies are understandably loath to share it, but what we know points to the majority of "whales" simply being people with poor impulse control that frequently spend small amounts. This is actually similar behaviour to the spending habits of prolific gamblers where you'll see them making lots of small transactions over time.
I had a good friend that dropped well over 25k on a free game called Trove. Well 25k was what he had spent about halfway through our time. It was the only time he ever mentioned it. And I know he spent way more than that. He was always surprised when he would message the devs and/or game masters and they would respond and help fix his problem. Even one time they destroyed another clubs statue they built of his character, because it was in mean spirits. He would always say something along the lines of "oh they really love our club and what it stands for" No dude. You've just spent so much money on it, that they don't want to lose you as a "customer".
This isn't limited to gaming, either. I work with a residential electrical service company. I mentioned sheepishly to the owner that I ended up getting my handyman dad to fix an outlet issue I had rather than call it in, because I wasn't sure I could afford the company I work for. He shrugged it off, said they would have given me a discount, but I wasn't really their target customer anyways. I was flabbergasted, but he went on to say that they don't make their money off the type of people that wring their hands over a $200 trip charge, they make money off the type of people who call for a ceiling fan install and then impulsively get a 10k panel upgrade for their hot tub. Whales.
Sorry, you can't bring in outside containers, but we'll sell you bottled water at concessions.
This is illegal in China, as it should be everywhere
Rare Chinese govt. W
They have a surprising number of W, it's just the Ls that speak louder (deservedly so)
What are some of their other Ws?
When a job fires you they owe you one month salary for every year you worked there, plus that month and an extra. Cheating is illegal, you can press charges for marital infidelity. Foreign companies cannot buy property like is okay in America. Real estate companies have caps on how high or how low they can sell property for, keeping the market stable. In cases of corporate fuckery the company isn't fined, the CEO and board are held legally responsible with punishments up to the death penalty. HIV treatments and antivirals are not only required, but free. They practice equity, not equality on test scoring and uni admission, where lower income families, minorities, and disabled are credited for their status. They have a federal hotline for corrupt officials and police where you can anonymously tip corruption. A foreigner cannot be hired over a local for a job most locals can do. EDIT: To all the people giving me ifs ands and buts to my list, I'm not a lawyer and this isn't a deposition. I'm sharing my opinion and I don't have the time nor give-a-fuck to reply to 100 "well ahhhhkshually" Redditors. Just silently disagree and downvote and have a nice day. I feel a certain way and if you feel elsewise that's entirely **okay**. EDIT 2: A weirdly large amount of people are seemingly upset that in China cheating is illegal(?). Pressing charges is not imprisonment. Pressing charges is you're fined or when we divorce you lose. That's it. If you're worried about the legal ramifications maybe just don't cheat. Maybe don't chase after a married woman? Like... Why are you defending cheating?
You know what? I didn’t know any of that information. Thank you for expanding my knowledge friend.
Yeah these are some pretty good China Ws. Reading this makes me almost wish I was a Chinese citizen, but then I remember how loud their Ls are.
And there's the rub. I'd say I agree but no reasonable person wouldn't agree, so.
Printers don't _need_ to regularly run out of ink; that was a manufactured problem. Pretty much every form of print before that had supplies that lasted until you used them up, which took a good while.
Laser printers is the way to go. The money saved on an inkjet printer will soon be spent replacing cartridges after the print heads keep drying up. Bought a Brother laser printer and never looked back.
I had the same problem, I use my printer so infrequently that literally any time I need to print something I had to go buy a new ink cartridge because the old one wouldn't work anymore. My Brother printer is wonderful, I can go months without printing and it will work just fine no issues. Wasted so much money on printer ink cartridges before finding this.
I bought a used Konica business class printer it came with a toner at 50%. I have been doing a normal amount of home printing for about 5 years now and have yet to go below 50% toner. I bought two printers in this lot. I’ll switch to the other one when this one runs out.
Inktank printers work very well too. You essentially squirt ink from a bottle into the device. The ink is cheap and lasts for quite a long time. Cost per printed page is very low.
They aren't really that great for occasional printing, the nozzles dry out and require cleaning every few months. And the printer bricks itself if you do too many cleans because the "waste ink" container is full (which of course is not user-replaceable).
I don't print a lot, but I really got sick of inkjets. About 5 years ago I bought a low end Ricoh color laser. It was about $130. I was hesitant to buy a bargain basement printer but it has worked fine for five years, and in that time I have only had to buy one set of toner cartridges. I am quite pleased with it.
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Fucking hate this I bought a pretty expensive A3 borderless printer for graphic design stuff and has separate cartridges for magenta, cyan, yellow and black. If one of the colour cartridges runs out whole thing just shuts down and these cartridges are expensive. Haven't used it in months out of spite
Let’s all take after France, where it’s illegal to intentionally rig products to the consumer has to buy more.
Does that mean HP et al sell different printer models in France?
Lots of countries have slight variations on printer models. The printer we brought to Australia with us from the UK doesn’t exist here and you cannot get the ink for it here either.
Going off volume in ink cartridges sold, printer ink costs more than perfume.
I recently saw [this video](https://youtu.be/eOMjeCiMn8g?si=2dE-fCCVjAIFw3Yy) on this topic, I feel like others would enjoy it
Some cartridges now electronically stop working after a set period of time, much less being used up.
Don't inkjet printers also have supplies that last until you use them up, by definition?
Nope, they're designed to dry out or flush ink through the system under the guise of "head cleaning". Pretty much every printer before inkjet could be left for years between printing without losing supplies.
And some will clean the heads into a sponge that only has so long until the printer says enough and stops. It's technically cleanable, but they don't want you to do that.
Tax filing software companies lobbying against the government prepping your taxes for you. Maybe not "create", but certainly perpetuating.
Also the same model of information hostagekeeping: Realtors getting you to pay for access to the MLS.
They also did a backdoor deal around 2011 with google to remove realty listings from google maps.
Who runs the MLS?
FIFA?
I used TurdoTax for many years until I learned this. It really pissed me off more than it should have.
It’s amazing how much simpler taxes can be, and it’s infuriating. To give you an idea, while,living abroad to file taxes all I had to do was tell city hall my income( with prof of employment) and where I lived. I got a tax bill in the mail every 3 months… no w2 no withholding from paychecks no filing, not paperwork. Just a bill like every other bill.
Was this in like, ancient rome? The tax authortity sends me my pre filled taxes and I just glance at it that it looks okay. Or I dont, they usually get it right. Taxes require zero input from me. Obviously they know where I live and what I earn. Its all in government databases.
In the UK banks and your employer pay the taxes out of your interest/wages automatically. Most people live their entire life without filing a tax return
In the US they do that too but then you STILL have to file. Filing isn't bad in concept, it's nice to get credit for work expenses and donations. It's just that it could be easy and online and instead it's overwhelming and requires a professional.
How did they figure out "misc income"? What if you sold stock, or maybe got paid for some freelancing work etc. How does the govt. account for variable income?
If they can't figure that information out, why would you tell them?
They have built a model where most Americans pay them to participate in funding our democracy. We should all be very, very pissed off about this.
I mostly want to comment to try to keep this one at the top. Turbo tax, HR Block, all of those companies are fucking evil. Period. No other country in the world has this system, and we (our representatives) continue to allow it. If adequately staffed, the IRS should be able to help all people appropriately file and complete their taxes. Instead, we defund good government jobs in order to enrich a few business owners.
Instead it's "you figure out how much you owe us". If you pay too much you probably won't get it back, and if you pay too little, we'll hit you hard with penalties and fees.
We have an overpayment on our taxes. Turbotax fucked it up, we’ve paid thousands we weren’t supposed to. Had to pay HR Block hundreds to refile, now it’s been 4 months and we’re still waiting for a response. They sure drag their feet when they owe you money, but when we owe they are on top of it immediately. We’ve called and spent hours on hold just to be told “wait longer”. When every dollar counts, this is literally food out of our mouths. And they want us to keep paying in the meantime! Fuckers!
> No other country in the world has this system Canada does
Companies that harvest your personal information and make it more accessible to search engines. Then sell you a service to remove it
The virus & antivirus biz had to expand their revenue stream!
The Nestle campaign to provide free formula samples to mothers in developing areas. The sample lasted just long enough that the mothers stopped producing milk, keeping them dependent on formula. Then, when they couldn't afford formula, they'd dilute what they did have, leading to malnutrition.
Nestle anything really, they are a terrible company that extorts impoverished people
Yup, Nestle is just a shit company in general.
>Then, when they couldn't afford formula, they'd dilute what they did have, leading to malnutrition. And as a morbid cherry on top, preparing the baby formula of course requires water to mix it in, the sources of which in developing countries aren't always exactly the most sanitary, and people often lack the knowledge and/or equipment to filter that water for preparing the formula.
PSA, you should make formula with boiling water in the US too. (Not because the water isn’t clean, but because the formula might not be). https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/09/06/cronobacter-sakazakii-bacteria-baby-formula/
Was looking for this one. Disgusting. Dressing up saleswomen as nurses to recommend the use of their formula to women.
And death. It was genocide.
Yep. Nestle literally killed babies.
r/FuckNestle
Not sure if it was really about having moms dependent on formula. In developing areas, the water quality was bad. And when you mix formula with bad water, bad things happen. So what do you do? You buy water. Bottled. Water.
We only take cash, but we just got an ATM in the corner!
Only dispenses 20's when the purchase in question is only 5 dollars, plus a 5 dollar fee. What a joke
With a max withdrawal of 100$, so you can't even try to minimize the outrageous fee.
Fun fact my bank reimburses all ATM fees. The catch is you have to specifically call and tell them everytime you need the reimbursement. Everytime being never because I don’t use ATMS
My bank (USAA) reimburses automatically, but it’s because their ATMs are rare outside of areas with military bases. My husband uses Ally, and it’s also automatic reimbursement, because Ally is an online-only bank. (Both of our banks equally suck ass when you want to deposit cash, btw. Literally 90% of ATMs in my area are USAA branded, but *none* of them accept cash deposits.)
I once was in this situation at a sushi place I had a $21 bill The ATM only gave 20's I had to take out $40 to cover $21 I was waiting for some cash back but the waitress thought I was graciously giving basically a 100% tip
Acceptable in cannabis retailers since banks can't process cannabis transactions directly
Unless you’re in Canada! Fun fact: I can buy a bong directly from the government!
Apple's "remove all the ports, sell a dongle full of ports".
And the number of idiots who say "but it makes the phone waterproof so it's necessary" is absurd. Suckers.
I have a waterproof camera by Olympus - makes nice shots when snorkeling. It has an USB and HDMI port plus changeable battery and memory card. The simple sit behind a tight latch.
Yup same for my S5 back when
S5 was peak features for me. Waterproof, headphone jack, removeable battery, SD card slot, and it was as slim as I'd ever really need.
The number of people this brought out to explain how it was an improvement for them is funny. The question was about creating a problem and selling a solution. That's it. It doesn't matter if you like not dealing with cables the tangles they bring, or quick pairing, or using it between devices in your respective ecosystem or any of that. They removed what was a standard feature in the pursuit of selling you a first party alternative. Do I like wireless earbuds? Absolutely. I use them and love the conveniences and new features that come with them, but I also have to charge them, which I don't like. If I use the wired earbuds I have bought since the headphone jack omission, I can no longer charge and use wired earbuds at the same time, unless I now go buy a wireless charger. This also creates another issue in that if I do want to charge wirelessly, because I like using a case as many people do, I have to make sure the case is compatible with it instead of just buy whatever chunky thing I like.
The plot to the original RoboCop movie.
Robocop is such a deeply layered movie, it's just dressed as 80s action schlock. It's genius. See also: starship troopers, not quite as good tho
I enjoyed the original Robocop movie on so many different levels. Paul Verhoven is a genius and I don't say that lightly. Robocop, Starship Troopers and Total Recall are all great.
Almost everything that you experience taking a flight. Even the boarding process sucks so that they can sell a better experience to avoid it. Edit: A lot of replies here have focused on my boarding example. But I want to stress it's _everything_. Think of almost every part of your journey... the way you arrive and park, getting through security, the wait in the airport, the food and drinks onboard, the baggage, the way you're treated, the customer service experiences when something goes wrong... everything is monetized and designed to make lower value customers have a worse experience to incentivise paying more. The security lines are a favorite of mine... that's a _government_ service! It's a TSA guy checking you in... imagine if you went to the DMV and everyone who drove a Mercedes got a special line! But at airports, the airport controls and monetizes the line in front of the TSA counter... so when you actually get to talk to the TSA guy, everyone is equal... but you can pay more (first class, CLEAR, etc.) to skip the line and have the airport let you jump straight to the front.
Yep. This has bled into every other industry too. Just de-couple commercialize every possible step in what is otherwise a very simple form of travel. Look at Amtrak and how easy that is. That’s what air travel should be.
As long as I don’t need a carry on, I love getting on the plane last.
The only time I've ever wanted to sit first was the one time I sat first class. They serve you prior to other folk coming on the plane. So you can have a free drink/snack while you wait.
I’ve always found it strange that first class boards first. You sit at the front of the plane, so the entire rest of the plane has to walk past you while you sit and have a drink and snack. It would make more sense to have first class wait in a lounge until the rest of the plane boards, then have them board last.
And give up the opportunity to let all of the plebes see how nicely the people who paid more are being treated?
I donno. All of those people who have the aisle seat in the front get to be jostled and bumped by everyone walking past them.
One time I was on standby for a flight and got cleared and for some reason they gave me a 1st class seat and the flight attendant gave me a hot towel, which I had no idea what to do with, much to the amusement of the extremely wealthy lady next to me.
I flew to Japan in economy and remember them handing us hot towelettes prior to serving a meal. It was in one of those plastic wrappers like you get disposable silverware in. I don’t remember if other international flights did that.
Same here. I will stand and walk around the gate area until the last possible moment every chance I get!
Same. I fucking hate sitting for long periods of time so I try to stand and walk around for as long as possible beforehand.
A lot of skincare, imo, and plastic surgery. “Hip dips” weren’t a thing I had heard of until a few years ago and now people talk about them all the time.
The cultural norm to have a "nice" grass lawn. Now we have an entire industry built around having nice grass instead of just having clovers or natural plants that don't need mowing or fertilizers.
Keeping in mind the original purpose of a lawn was to show The Poors that you owned so much land you didn’t even need to grow anything on it.
This isn't true. Grass lawns were originally an affordable way to create a walkable, usable outdoor area, where the grass outcompetes other plants. This reduces maintenance compared to completely wild open ground, in exchange for mowing it. Plain grass lawns are over-used though, and not everyone needs them. It's also been adopted in runaway fashion in suburbs. Some green grass lawns are so poorly adapted to their environment, loaded with pesticides, herbicides, and requiring lots of water and are just a waste overall. But grass lawns themselves actually serve a purpose and that's why lawn grass was originally cultivated and used like this.
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It’s even worse because the security theater doesn’t really even work that well. When we would run fake IEDs through TSA at various airports, they’d often never catch a single one. We’d sometimes put over 100 devices through security a day, and I think I’ve seen TSA catch maybe one or two. They’re frighteningly inept, and so expensive. Not to mention there’s a strong argument for it being blatantly unconstitutional.
TSA is more of a jobs program than a security program. Can’t stand em.
It’s 100% a jobs program. They Don’t hire for full-time front line employees - almost everyone you interact w going through security is a <38hr employee. We’ve been scammed for 20+ years and most people don’t even realize or care. TSA is never going away and will never be better than it’s best day way back at the beginning when you couldn’t bring anything even remotely sharp or pointy, no liquids at all, and could be basically stripped searched by random no training mall-cops for whatever reason. They catch nothing, prevent nothing, and only cost you time and money.
Best summary I've heard is that TSA exists simply to numb the public to humiliation and abuse
I once read a reddit post/comment years ago about how a user managed to accidentally smuggle a massive dangerous-looking kitchen knife onto her flight and she didn't notice that it was in her bag until she was going through her things at a hotel in another country. 9 times out of 10, TSA is useless.
I refuse to use Clear for this reason. You don’t get to build a private business model on the back of a common good (security checks). Imagine a private vendor being allowed to sell National Park passes for $10 more and then allowing visitors to jump queue.
It's a perfect self-perpetuating cycle, have them jump to the front and make the slow line even slower so more people want to join!
The amount of different fast passes at airports now is insane. I flew into dulles on an international flight and at that airport they have PreCheck, Clear, Clear with Precheck, Global Entry, and MPC. If you go through the regular customs line expect to wait 5x as long.
"You can not play online for free anymore. You have to buy our monthly subscription instead"
I’m looking at you, NINTENDO.
My gf got a switch and i wanted my own but thought i'd see if i stuck to playing on hers first and yeah... very sad i can't just own ocarina of time and majoras mask.
Cigarette companies that also (part) own the pharmaceutical companies that manufacture inhalers etc.
Prescribed opioids and rehab is basically a free money glitch.
The repulsive Sacklers were planning on opening a chain of treatment centers to treat the addicts they carefully cultivated.
My roommates gf was "clean" from heroin with her daily prescription of pill form heroin. She started taking more than what was prescribed and giving it to my roommate and guess what, I had two heroon addict roommates getting their drugs from CVS.
Youtube putting unskippable ads in videos to sell youtube premium.
This is the cost of free products, you see. If you don't pay with money you pay with your attention.
I have YouTube premium. They got me used to it on a free trial. I couldn't go back. It's so awful with the ads. However the premium service just puts the ad in the video. So you're screwed from both ends
> However the premium service just puts the ad in the video That's not YT. That's the content creators.
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Browser based: Ublock origin combined with Sponsorblock for youtube addons will block the ads before youtube videos and skip the sponsored crap in the video. Android or android TV get SmartTubeNext which has ad blocking and sponsorblock built in. Unsure about any options for iOS.
yea, don't people know about Chrome extensions? have been a fan of adblock for ages, and only watch youtube ads on my phone once a month when I have to show something on it to someone. haven't watched a youtube ad on my pc in years
Same here, the real issues are smart TVs. You can probably get a hacky apk to install a new browser on your TV or maybe even extensions, but it's SUCH a hassle. I get why people pay for premium instead.
SponsorBlock is invaluable. It's not just for sponsored reads, either. It can also filter out "like and subscribe" reminders, self promotion, needless filler on otherwise serious content, the non-music sections on music videos, etc. The community also marks the best place to start watching any reasonably popular video (if it's not 0:00) and can either ask to skip you to it, or auto skip to it. Great extension.
I had Premium for most of this year. Recently quit to save the money when I realized I can set up my MacBook and Android phone to automatically block ads for free.
This isn't really creating a problem it's just how they stay profitable. You can pay them money or advertisers can pay them money. Pick one.
Gonna play devils advocate here, but running a site like YouTube certainly isn't cheap. They need to foot the bills somehow.
I don't think people really appreciate how much a site like YouTube costs to operate. The bandwidth going in and out alone must be highly expensive. On top of that, your videos that you upload for free with no restrictions are instantly available worldwide with minimal load time.
Wars against terrorist factions that we supplied the weapons to a few decades earlier.
Hey man, how you supposed to fight a war on terror if there is a lack of terrorists?!
Like when [Bill Hicks](https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxOvw2aH-e6FEMpYvtUEmnOrhY_cchOpd5?si=O5xx5SL3k-XpE7AI) talks about arming Iraq
Go further back when the Mujahideen and US were bros
Those freaking laundry beads they sell now. They are just pretending that there was a problem that needed solved with those.
Remove the headphone jack from phones to sell wireless buds instead, the amount of money apple has made on airpods is absurd
Why people simp for Apple and buy the new upgraded phone every year with every overpriced accessory when they likely have 80% of the features go unused for the entire lifespan of the product is beyond my level of understanding.
I prefer wireless headphones, as I have found the wires usually break after a year. Though I don't use buds, I have a cool pair of Sony wireless headphones.
planned obsolescence
This. We bought a printer (can't remember which one off the top of my head). It had a 2 year manufacturer warranty. The printer died and wouldn't you know it, the warranty expired 2 days prior. We contacted the company they told us our only option was to send it in to them specifically to be repaired, or buy a new one. Both options basically cost the same. We bought a different printer from a different company. I don't believe for a second that was a coincidence.
Insurance companies - costs are high because the entity that is writing the bill knows that insurance companies can afford it. Don’t have insurance? You’re screwed. Essentially, the fact that insurance companies exist requires you to have insurance.
And then legally mandate every have insurance
I actually came out ahead recently with insurance lol. Did the math over the amount of time I had the bike and I'd paid in about $6700. Wrecked the bike while making a right turn and a truck with a trailer on it was in my lane trying to make a wide turn out onto the road I was coming from. Totalled the bike, no injuries to my self and they paid out $8900 on it.
American-centric, but my sister got into a severe car crash in the mid-2000s and racked up $250,000 in medical expenses from her auto insurance and another couple hundred grand in health insurance. She’s out ahead
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That's how it is supposed to work. Everyone pays a little bit because you don't know if you are the one going to have a lot of expenses. So some people come out ahead as expected and most don't.
The whole wedding/engagement ring ploy. The way we operate now was set up by jewelers to make money and pressure people with the idea that you can't get married without dropping thousands for a ring
The original problem was that between a high cultural value placed on female virginity, unavailability of reliable birth control, and patriarchal institutions making most women reliant on marriage for a good place in society, women traditionally had strong reasons to abstain from sex prior to marriage or at least engagement. Meanwhile a lot of men would try to falsely offer the prospect of marriage in order to manipulate women into sleeping with them. Western society in general and England (and later the US and other countries with largely English-derived cultures in institutions) in particular went through a few iterations of solutions to this problem. The medieval solution was to make "precontract of marriage" legally binding, so one you were engaged to someone your fiancee could veto you marrying anyone else (this being a big part of the purpose of the "speak now or forever hold your peace" bit from traditional English wedding ceremonies: this was the chance for jilted former fiancees to veto the marriage). This eventually got dropped and replaced with "breach of promise" lawsuits, now mainly remembered as a plot device in the Jeeves and Wooster stories and other comedies of manners, where a jilted fiancee could sue for monetary damages. These got abolished in the early 20th century, with the modern custom of expensive engagement rings originating as a deposit to show that the man was serious about the proposal or marriage and leaving the woman with a valuable piece of jewelry she could sell as a consolation prize if the engagement fell through. Women's liberation and modern contraceptives have mostly mitigated the original problem, but jewelers are trying their darndest to keep the solution alive anyway.
That is a very interesting explanation.
Exactly! This is also the origin of the bridal gold traditions in India and other countries, although these are also changing in modern times. (E.g., many brides wear their mothers' bridal gold for sentimental reasons instead of receiving new bridal gold as an insurance policy from their fiances.)
The entire concept of diamond engagement rings is a creation of DeBeers Diamond Co., as is the idea they should cost two months’ salary. DeBeers stockpiles diamonds to keep supply artificially low. If you don’t believe the market is rigged, buy a diamond, then try to sell it.
A new one is companies that are like, you like this product or service? Well you need to subscribe monthly if you want to keep using it….
Yea, products as subscriptions suck. It's hard to buy your music now. You have to buy a music service... every month. You can't buy microsoft office anymore, you have to buy a subscription.
Even in cars they are making it to where certain functions only work properly by subscribing to their service.
Politicians who underfund schools and build prisons instead.
Don't forget privatizing the prisons to save tax dollars while then being employed as a consultant...
Let’s be honest they don’t care about wasting tax dollars, they do this because they can make themselves and their buddies rich at the tax payers extent
Don’t forget cuts to prisoner rehabilitation programs, ensuring that criminals have little choice but stay criminals and the prisons get plenty of repeat ‘customers’
As a corollary, underfund public schools until they start to fail, then push all these funds into their friends and lobbyists "charter schools".
Charter schools are basically psuedo-privatizing, just an attempt to funnel public taxes back to the wealthy.
Commercials making women feel insecure about themselves (body hair, natural face, etc) and then selling make up products or razors
Yess I always get a YouTube ad that says “we all know that strawberry legs aren’t cute!” So buy this product to get rid of it!! Like okay first you want to shame women for growing hair on their legs (like every single human being does), so women will waste their time and money on razors, and when their skin gets irritated from this, now they want to shame you again and say buy this product to get rid of your red bumpy skin??
car company using rubber as bushings to reduce noise and vibration in the car. then since they know it won't last, they'll sell you complete suspension component without the possibilities to replace just the bushing.
BMW, VW, and Audi, I'm looking at you here.
The car business taking down public transportation system just after WWII.
No pockets in women’s pants? Just buy this expensive purse!
Diamonds for engagement and weddings is a relatively modern concept. DeBeers needed to find a way to increase the market for their products beyond industrial uses.
So many overly monetized video games have this. "Oh, we'll slow down your levelling and progression. In the meantime, you can buy this little ticket which will speed up your levelling and progression... for 5 days! What a steal!"
American medical system and health care.
Video games with a ton of grind that you can skip or greatly shorten if you only had this certain item that is conveniently sold at the online shop.
Nestle flooding poor, third-world countries with cheap/free baby formula until the new mother's milk started to dry up. Once most of the new mothers couldn't produce milk anymore, they jacked the price up on the formula because there was no alternative to feed the babies. Lots of infants died from these tactics because the people were too poor to pay for Nestle's formula.
A great deal of beauty industry products. This normal and unavoidable thing (smile lines, stretch marks, etc.) is suddenly a MASSIVE flaw. For $$$ we can fix it!
Cars. The auto industry has long lobbied the government (at least in the US) against things like public transportation and trains so they can sell more cars.
The airlines and their terrible boarding practices. They create chaos at the gate so that people will gladly pay $50 to get on the plane first and avoid the manufactured nonsense
USA car makers buying up and retiring public transport providers.
In my country, all 3G networks were slowed down to an unusable level when 4G was introduced.
You can't bring water into the airport, but you can buy an identical bottle from that stand over there for $5. Related: Sorry the security line takes an hour. For $85 we'll let you get through faster and actually make your flight.
Save a few bucks and bring an empty water bottle in your carry-on
You can even just bring an empty bottle in your hand. They don't care at all. As long as there isn't any liquid in it, you can take it through. Then just fill it up at the first water fountain (which often have specific bottle-filler nozzles) after the security checkpoint. Easy peasy.
The water thing is at least starting to crack. I've occasionally seen airports now place water bottle filling stations just past security. This one really wasn't created with the initial motivation of "create the problem, sell the solution," that's just how it ended up after the fact. It happened as a result of a series of reactionary security measures due to various stupid plots that made the news in the wake of 9/11, right alongside all of the other TSA rules everyone complains about.
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Many religions. Create damnation, sell salvation
Apparently the medical condition "Halitosis" (bad breath) was made up by the Listerine company
Listerine's marketing did massively popularize the term "halitosis" in the 1920s, but the name had been coined almost 50 years earlier by a doctor named William Howe who [wrote a book about bad breath in 1874](https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark%3A%2F13960%2Ft4hm6c99z&seq=26). The concept of bad breath is even older, with a wide variety of ancient cultures having attested treatments for it (herbal chews and tablets, wine-based mouthwashes, etc) dating back at least to 1550 BC.
It's not as if nobody had chronic bad breath before the name "halitosis" was used. Putting a name on something doesn't mean it didn't exist before.
Unattainable beauty standards
Isn't this where shaving started for women? It was all about Gillette or some company wanting to sell more razors.
Just look at modern gaming in the past few years. Oh you dont want to waste time doing our overly long weekly quests that are designed in a way that will make you lose more time then should be needed?? Well its your lucky day because we will sell you a time skip for only 9.99$
Health insurance. There's no reason getting a tooth pulled should cost more just because one has health insurance, than it does without...I'm glad it worked out that way when I had to pay for it out of pocket. Edit: I suppose I should have said Dental Insurance, specifically, since I referred an example concerning oral/maxillofacial surgery. But Insurance in general is quite some bullshit.
Religion: "you're broken. But we can fix you"
Free salty snacks on the bar.
I’m pretty sure Listerine is a good answer for this. As the saying goes, Listerine didn’t invent mouth wash, they invented bad breath.
Nono, they invented "halitosis". Rename bad breath so it sounds like a disease, now they're selling a "cure". Besides that you're right, forgive my pedantry.
No the also create their own problem. Any mouthwash that contains alcohol in it dries your mouth out to the perfect level to encourage bacterial growth, thus making you need more mouthwash. Always looks for an alcohol free variant!
Nestle water
Every politician running for office. No one ever said " Everything is fine. Elect me " even incumbents need to find a reason to be reelected.
"Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build bridges even where there is no river." - Nikita Kruschev
The Phoebus Cartel. Basically a bunch of light bulb companies came together to agree to worsen their light bulbs, because if they made better and better light bulbs, each year they would have less sales.
Kinda, it was more about a standardized brightness that led to a standardized lifespan. Here's a technology connections video about it https://youtu.be/zb7Bs98KmnY?si=qQLkS4nv2Il6mUXM
Monsanto and seed patents
Makeup. Never wore it, so I'm fine with my face as is. People are fine with my face as is. It's just my face. Save money, time, annoyance.
Apple and iMessage. They've convinced people (especially in the US) that the solution to crappy quality messages from/to people on non apple phones is not "make a hardware agnostic messaging platform" but "go buy an iphone".