Kiwi Self Improvement: Consoomerism edition

[Billy Beer]

You've rowed back quite a long way from the initial invocation! Old media that you haven't seen in a while is a fair bit different from 'every piece of digital media you can'.

Maybe i should have clarified a little bit. 'every piece of digital media you can' wasn't meant to sound like i wanted everyone to go on the internet and download everything for the sake of it. More like, if you want to watch a tv show or film, there's no reason to buy it.

It's undoubtedly a judgement, for all of us. I've copied CDs, downloaded old games, etc without any sense of guilt. But I don't disregard that a) IP is important, for creative industries and for the wider economy as a whole, and b) when I don't pay, its likely the person at the bottom of the chain who will lose out, not the big corporate that sits in the middle.

I agree with that, but i just don't care to be honest. The world owes me nothing, i owe it fuck all in return. (IP is important when it comes to physical things like Ipads or Engineering tech)

Don't spend your life consuming digital media, whether you paid for it or not.

Good point.

I have so little respect for people who wont just admit they want something without contributing. Or pretend they don't understand that the cost of reproducing something isn't the sole cost of creating something. A lot of people get together and invest their money into producing something they want (customers buying the production run of a car, retro-actively paying for it after production through the magic of debt and credit). The cost of the car to each of them is divided by the number buying it. Then someone piggy backs on their investment by taking the rewards without contributing. Stealing.

A car isn't a piece of digital media, already paid for. If your analogy is correct, once the cost of something is paid for, with a little profit as reward, that thing should then be free and i agree with you. TV shows from the 80's and films from the 50's should be free

I mean frankly, if you have to use the somewhat dodgy metaphor of a car in the first place to understand intellectual property instead of just discussing it directly, you probably shouldn't be discussing this anyway as you're either dishonest or a retard. So which is it? Dishonest or retard?

The dodgy metaphor of the car was a direct reference to the "FBI WARNING!!!!!!" at the start of DVD's. The tag lines were:

"You wouldn't steal a car, you wouldn't steal a purse, don't copy this film, it's stealing". The retarded thing about it is, no, i wouldn't steal a car, but yes i would make an exact replica of my neighbours car, for free.

Cue the usual pirate-fag response to such counter-arguments of "I wouldn't have bought it anyway," "It's not worth paying for" and "If they weren't so greedy and asked for a fair amount I would buy it." Don't simultaneously try to argue that something doesn't have value but that you also want it. It makes you look like a tit.

How does it? I wouldn't have bought half the shit anyway, because it was shite. Stuff like John Wick though? I downloaded that because the pirate version had better quality than the version that was on Netflix. I've paid to view JW through my netflix sub, why wouldn't i download the better version for 'free' seems as i already paid for it?

Oh, what's the other popular one? The movie was already finished so everyone involved as already got paid and my piracy doesn't cost them anything. Tragedy of the Fucking Commons - movies are financed by investors and if they don't make a good investment back they don't invest as much in the next one. There're few things dumber than someone advocating piracy because the wages of people involved in producing the media are "shit". (Which you haven't bothered to look up or know before spouting off, I guarantee).

I haven't looked it up, because i don't give a fuck.

Just say it for me: "I steal stuff and justify it with retarded 90's semantics games". You'll feel a sense of liberation as self-awareness always brings, I promise.

Again, not stealing. Stealing is taking a possession of somebody and robbing them of the ownership of it. Suck corporate cock harder.

Have many professions seen radical changes in pay relative to other professions? No. They all just trip along chasing inflation the same as everyone. Hey Mr. Baker - I'm just going to take this bread without paying because your profession hasn't seen a huge pay rise in the last twenty years. I mean, how exactly do you think the economy works? Also, bullshit can you tell me what the average pay for a grip on a big movie is today vs. 2001 without going and searching for it.

Now who's the retard? You cannot compare the digital copying of a digital line of code, with a physical product.

Again, i don't give a fuck what some tosser holding a stick gets paid. If it makes you feel any better i think all fast food joints should be banned/illegal for anyone under 21 to eat there. I wouldn't give a shit about the burger flipper losing their job.

Yeah, we all do that. I grab things that I know simply aren't available in my country so I literally can't buy it. But here's the thing - nobody is criticizing you about that. Nor is it representative. You look on torrent sites and tell me whether the top 90% of downloads are obscure 80 year old films or the latest blockbusters. It's the latter. This is more of the retarded bullshit rationalisations that 90's kids used to use in arguments with the MPAA. Spoiler - nobody here is the MPAA going to be stunned by your brilliant fake implications that piracy is anything other than 99% about current media that is easily purchasable throughout the West. Once again - this bullshit logic of attacking the value of something to support taking it. If it doesn't have value to you then you wouldn't want it.

Would you prefer if i put a mirror up so you could argue with that? You keep saying i'm a 90's kid....

I don't give a fuck about modern media. The last modern media i downloaded was the latest season of family guy spoiler alert : it's shit, The Joker and IW/EG and spoiler alert they were shite. If i had seen Joker or IW/EG in cinemas, i would have walked out and asked for my money back. I would have seen the film, for free.

And if you do spend your life consuming digital media, at least don't pretend it's somehow better because you don't pay for it. They™ don't care if you sit there masturbating over vidya that you paid for or if it's vidya that you didn't. They™ only care that you're sitting at home rather than out there doing something politically inconvenient.

So if they don't care why does it matter? It doesn't. They don't give a fuck, I don't give a fuck so who cares?

Politically inconvenient? Shit, they've got me! If it wasn't for me pirating 'Wings' i would be the next rosa parks/mlk/hitler/stalin/mao. Come on.

Payment or not isn't the point of Consooming. It's about the effect it has on you and...

agree 100%

...about social conformity.

Retarded.

 

[Slowboat to China]

Dunno if this strictly counts as consoomer behavior, but I know too many people who just discard or donate their clothes once they get ripped or need patching. Clothes, especially cheap clothes, are very disposable these days and create a lot of churn in the market. That's not even touching the issue of what's in or out this season (God only knows).

Learning to sew, even just a plain straight line, will save you a lot of time and grief (and money). Patch old clothes and take in seams when you lose weight. Don't go buy a sewing machine, either, if simple fixes are all you're planning on doing. A plain old needle and thread absolutely does the job.

If plaid is in this season and you absolutely MUST be on trend, don't go buy a brand-new plaid handbag; get some tag-ends of plaid fabric at JoAnn's and make it into a scarf or something. And if old clothes are absolutely shot but the fabric itself is OK, you can turn the remnants into cleaning rags and dish towels.

And if the fashion is stupid this season, don't wear it. Dumb fashion is peak consoomer.

 

[Benzo Samurai]

Manchild retard consoomerism, of one flavor or another, is a significant multi-faceted hindrance on the path of life. Not only is it a waste of resources like time or money. It also spoils and dulls the mind through its easy shallow yet addictive rewards. Over time, by nerfing your wallet and cucking your brain, one experiences an overarching degeneration of one's life-trajectory. While the consoomerism we see today keeps evolving into novel forms, it is the age-old cucker of life known as addiction.

In my experience, the many forms of addictions constituting modern consoomerism can be trickier to deal with than drugs. You spend resources, either without spending any effort, or spending effort in a tailored enjoyable way(like jerking it, playing dark souls.)

In return you get some mechanical positive reinforcement from the world such as "you just coomed to very hot girl on the screen" or "you now have a cool phone" and it becomes a reliable way of getting positive feedback from the world. Way less emotionally turbulent and/or boring compared to learning mandarin, joining army, working, caring about family, and shit like that(healthy and rewarding yet difficult high effort/patience activities compared to pokemon and pornhub).

The other part of the problem of consoomerism, why it is hard to quit, is that to consoom itself is deeply integrated into the image of what it means to be a normal person today. Consooming, in moderate amounts, is socially acceptable, maybe even expected, and so heavy consoomers who wish to change have no choice but to exercise untiring vigilance in the face of a myriad of temptations.

This is very difficult. Addicts who want to get clean often talk about the importance of getting away from sources of temptation, but if your addiction is to the internet you have no choice but to exercise moderation in your inevitable interaction with it. You can log off and only use your browser for your bank-shit, but we all know that nobody who's knee-deep in online soy consoomer culture ever does that. If they had the balls to do that they wouldn't be slaves of consoomption in the first place.

And "balls", that is what I believe to be the answer for a person finding themselves in the grips of consoomerism. That's what you have to have when it comes to any addiction. Tough it out, zucc it up. X out your dumb browser, don't buy the degenerate toy and save your money, quit watching your youtube-video, you can live without it.

If you just spend long enough thinking about how retarded it is to consoom dumb shit in excess you simply cannot do it anymore. Thankfully, if you can just moderate your consoomption the withdrawals aren't that bad(try drugs, coward) and you can have your cake and eat it too, like a normal person.

 

[need shoeonhead nudes]

Some quick things about sleep.

• Most people don't get enough sleep. Try to give yourself at least 9 hours of "sleep opportunity" every day.
• Sleeping pills don't work. Even if they "put you to sleep" what happens in your brain is functionally different.
• Not all sleep is the same. You can't just cut sleep short because NREM is front-loaded and REM occurs later in the night, so if you don't go through enough sleep cycles every night your brain isn't actually able to complete the work its supposed to do during sleep.

View attachment 2185241

have you ever tried melatonin? that really helps you fix your sleep cycles. same with vitamin D if you're too much of a shutin to get sun, which tires us out naturally.

 

[Feline Supremacist]

Dunno if this strictly counts as consoomer behavior, but I know too many people who just discard or donate their clothes once they get ripped or need patching. Clothes, especially cheap clothes, are very disposable these days and create a lot of churn in the market. That's not even touching the issue of what's in or out this season (God only knows).

Learning to sew, even just a plain straight line, will save you a lot of time and grief (and money). Patch old clothes and take in seams when you lose weight. Don't go buy a sewing machine, either, if simple fixes are all you're planning on doing. A plain old needle and thread absolutely does the job.

If plaid is in this season and you absolutely MUST be on trend, don't go buy a brand-new plaid handbag; get some tag-ends of plaid fabric at JoAnn's and make it into a scarf or something. And if old clothes are absolutely shot but the fabric itself is OK, you can turn the remnants into cleaning rags and dish towels.

And if the fashion is stupid this season, don't wear it. Dumb fashion is peak consoomer.

People give away sewing machines all the time in freecycle groups, they're great for replacing zippers.

 

[NoReturn]

have you ever tried melatonin? that really helps you fix your sleep cycles. same with vitamin D if you're too much of a shutin to get sun, which tires us out naturally.

I recently read Why We Sleep and it has a great section on melatonin. Turns out it's great for getting you "back on schedule" (e.g. trying to fix a wonky schedule or to address jet-lag) but shouldn't be used long-term.

 

[the fall of man]

have you ever tried melatonin? that really helps you fix your sleep cycles. same with vitamin D if you're too much of a shutin to get sun, which tires us out naturally.

but don’t take vitamin d too late at night, take magnesium near bedtime and d in the mornings

 

[AdmiralRenae]

I would like to talk about Apple Products and the company behind it.

Apple consoomers can seethe all they want but Iphones, Macs, and other products are produced using Forced labor from Uyghur Muslims.

 

[Justtocheck]

I don't want to be like that guy from Vagrant Holiday, holy shit, but for crying out loud, tourist, STOP GIVING MONEY TO JUNK PEDDLERS. They are annoying, they harrass and they ruin the fun of a place. I blame boomer tourists tho, you guys are sure too cool for it.

 

[Vingle]

I would like to talk about Apple Products and the company behind it.

Apple consoomers can seethe all they want but Iphones, Macs, and other products are produced using Forced labor from Uyghur Muslims.

It's why I'm using it. Two things I despise, niggers and muslims.

 

[LinkinParkxNaruto[AMV]]

they'd have dropped JK Rowling like a stone if the book didn't sell well

That would have been great, actually. What a cool timeline.

Forced labor from Uyghur Muslims.

ummm, point for Apple here, bullying muslims is based

 

[stupid frog]

I don't give a fuck about modern media. The last modern media i downloaded was the latest season of family guy spoiler alert : it's shit, The Joker and IW/EG and spoiler alert they were shite. If i had seen Joker or IW/EG in cinemas, i would have walked out and asked for my money back. I would have seen the film, for free.

based skitzo consoomer

 

[Windows XP Home Edition]

If you're thinking of picking up photography, I wouldn't invest in film and I consider it to be a massive waste of money. It's flimsy and one minor mistake can ruin an entire film roll whether you've not inserted it correctly to accidentally exposing it. I've noticed many photographers picking up the film format and thinking it's really trendy only to find out they have absolutely no money left because of how difficult it is to find somewhere that develops them and the overall cost. It's a bit of a nostalgia fad like many other 2010s trends in my opinion. Film offers no career purposes considering all the experts in the photography industry all virtually use digital now. The process of developing the film strips is a pain in the arse if you do it manually and sometimes developers mess it up.

 

[AbyssStarer]

Get a budget planner book and use it is a big one for me. Before you spend money on something either write it in the book before purchase or think of how you will feel about it when you add it to the book.

 

[Sped Xing]

Go live in a tent for a year. Then figure out how to make do without the tent. Then get by with just a bowl. Then realize you can make a bowl with your hands.

 

[Finder]

If you're thinking of picking up photography, I wouldn't invest in film and I consider it to be a massive waste of money. It's flimsy and one minor mistake can ruin an entire film roll whether you've not inserted it correctly to accidentally exposing it. I've noticed many photographers picking up the film format and thinking it's really trendy only to find out they have absolutely no money left because of how difficult it is to find somewhere that develops them and the overall cost. It's a bit of a nostalgia fad like many other 2010s trends in my opinion. Film offers no career purposes considering all the experts in the photography industry all virtually use digital now. The process of developing the film strips is a pain in the arse if you do it manually and sometimes developers mess it up.

I’ve been shooting/developing my own film for years and I can count the number of ruined rolls on one hand.

I do agree it has come back as a fad among younger people though and generally isn’t worth picking up if you’re new to photography. If one isn’t willing to learn how to develop it themselves they’ll actually go broke.

I really dislike the consumerist side of the modern film industry, people spending tons of money on absolute shit trying to get “the film” look. I can’t think of many other industries where you can sell *intentionally bad* products for hundreds of dollars and have people pay it.

It seems like a lot of these people are taking intentionally bad, banal, photos. I’ve noticed many don’t even learn basic composition rules.

I also dislike how hardware focused people are. People lust after cameras and they never have enough gear to be satisfied. A lot of people into it are very elitist about hardware and I’ve noticed people thinking better cameras will improve their ability to take photos.

For me though it’s a hobby, not something I’m trying to build a career out of. I don’t like this idea that things need to be transferable into a career. It’s one of the few things left in this world I actually enjoy doing. I love every aspect, from taking photos, to the chemistry side.

So well some might accuse me of being a consoomer for partaking at all, I think you can partake without getting into the crazy consumerist aspect of it.

 

[Windows XP Home Edition]

I’ve been shooting/developing my own film for years and I can count the number of ruined rolls on one hand.

I do agree it has come back as a fad among younger people though and generally isn’t worth picking up if you’re new to photography. If one isn’t willing to learn how to develop it themselves they’ll actually go broke.

I really dislike the consumerist side of the modern film industry, people spending tons of money on absolute shit trying to get “the film” look. I can’t think of many other industries where you can sell *intentionally bad* products for hundreds of dollars and have people pay it.

It seems like a lot of these people are taking intentionally bad, banal, photos. I’ve noticed many don’t even learn basic composition rules.

I also dislike how hardware focused people are. People lust after cameras and they never have enough gear to be satisfied. A lot of people into it are very elitist about hardware and I’ve noticed people thinking better cameras will improve their ability to take photos.

For me though it’s a hobby, not something I’m trying to build a career out of. I don’t like this idea that things need to be transferable into a career. It’s one of the few things left in this world I actually enjoy doing. I love every aspect, from taking photos, to the chemistry side.

So well some might accuse me of being a consoomer for partaking at all, I think you can partake without getting into the crazy consumerist aspect of it.

I view photography as both a career and a hobby. I have a couple of cameras myself but I believe it's foolish to buy the newest cameras on the market. You're far better off buying last year's models or ones from a couple of years ago. You can also buy refurbished models at half the price and they still work as new.

 

[Pina Colada]

Go by the famous "Three Episode Rule" and see if you personally enjoy a certain show enough to continue. This is not exclusive to anime; it applies to most visual media that can be pirated online (or if you search hard enough). Look up "Storytimes" on Desuarchive and you'll have a field day with comics/manga/scanlations! There's nothing wrong with buying a physical volume or two if you prefer tangible reading, although this'll save ya a hell of a lot of shelf space.

Are you a gamer? Go make some popcorn and watch a YouTube playthrough! It's a great way to experience a game before plunking down 60-80 dollars at your local GameStop. Your mileage may vary with the YouTuber themselves, but there's also a massive library of silent playthroughs if you'd rather not listen to lame jokes, memes XD, or Pigroach noises (unless they're TIHYDPs).

 

[Sped Xing]

Alternatively: go outside.

 

[Finder]

Consumption a trap, one that can be hard to avoid. Resisting it takes a lot of willpower, especially when the whole of society tells you not to resist.

I really want something new, but I know the novelty will wear off. My existing thing more or less works fine, but telling myself not to buy the new thing is hard. You start coming up with these stupid reasons to justify it too.

I’m an adult that can control myself so I won’t buy it, but I’m not surprised weak minded, stupid, or depressed people can’t.