h a l f b a k e r yBirth of a Notion.
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Get rid of minimarts and convenience stores by outcompeting them. Just have a thing where people had those luggage pods on the top of their cars carry snacks and beverages, anytime you see one you can aim your phone at it, open it up, get a snack and go on your way. People, or robots, could earn income
just from parking their cars. Using the handy app you would find a car pod with exactly what you want, for how much, everywhere. The mini-marts go out of business from having mediocre products at mini mart prices.
Perhaps Amazon could buy a driverless car company, they already bought a grocery store.
Various billion dollar taxi replacements like Uber could see if it is a viable revenue model. And of course anyone could put their cars and pods up on the map.
[link]
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I suggest this idea would go over better if you focused on
the positives of your new arrangement, rather than starting
from "I hate minimarts". |
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[pertinax], I accidentally found a mention of what appears to be a public site of yours at another idea, so I put it up, I hope that is ok. Perhaps [MaxwellBuchanan] has a personal site up, along with his company's that we could all have a look at. |
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Replying to your actual annotation, I fancied it up a little but left the mini-mart parts in. |
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I'm flattered to be confused with such a prolific author as
Eric, but I am not he. Which idea does the link come from? |
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//Perhaps [MaxwellBuchanan] has a personal site// I added
personal and company sites to my profile. |
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I keep reading this as "get rid of miniskirts".... |
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// mediocre products at mini mart prices. // |
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What's to stop the pod owners charging "what the market will stand" for the same products ? Ths is a business, not an altruistic social service. |
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What's to stop users opening a pod, taking the one item they have paid for, and having an accomplice grab a number of other items ? |
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// What's to stop the pod owners charging "what the
market will stand" for the same products ?// |
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Nothing. The idea is to enhance competition, thereby
reducing that price. |
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That's predicated on a misconception of how the competition mechanism operates in a free market of static size or low growth. |
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The new vendor has lower fixed costs than existing providers so can offer the same goods at a lower price or better goods at the same price. So they gain market share, driving out existing providers; but the inducement is always to maximise margins, and thus profit. Normalization then follows, such that the margins stabilize at just less than the barrier to entry for a new provider, thus keeping it unrewarding for additional capacity to develop. |
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In a relatively short time, in the absence of other factors i.e. technological change, the situation will be exactly as before. There are many examples throughout history of this process. |
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Competition per se does not reduce prices, it only stabilizes them at the minimum sustainable level. That is not to say that it isn't a good thing, but it's not a panacea, because the inexorable operation of the Law of Supply and Demand, as loathed and detested by socialists everywhere, always wins in the end. Always. |
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I now have this dystopic vision of millions of Uber drivers
loading their car pods with stale, curried, salty, extruded
soy flour, crispy treats that make you unbearably thirsty
then driving around every neighbourhood playing
Bollywood music to lure in victims, like the ice cream vans
of my childhood. |
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[pertinax] I could not find it again, so I deleted the link |
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//inexorable operation of the Law of Supply and Demand....
...wins in the end.// |
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The law is powerful but open to influence. Often the
supply/demand ratio can be dramatically altered should one
supplier invest in security personnel. Supply is greatly
inhibited by carefully applied security. |
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// the Law of Supply and Demand, as loathed and
detested by socialists everywhere // |
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Excuse you, [8th]. Market socialism is a thing. |
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