I have lots of problems with this article's arguments. He uses several simplified examples to show the "cost" of convenience.

> When you can skip the line and buy concert tickets on your phone, waiting in line to vote in an election is irritating. This is especially true for those who have never had to wait in lines (which may help explain the low rate at which young people vote).

The youth vote has been on decline since the 1980's, long before Ticketmaster ever came along (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youth_vote_in_the_United_State...).

> We are willing to pay a premium for convenience, of course — more than we often realize we are willing to pay. During the late 1990s, for example, technologies of music distribution like Napster made it possible to get music online at no cost, and lots of people availed themselves of the option. But though it remains easy to get music free, no one really does it anymore. Why? Because the introduction of the iTunes store in 2003 made buying music even more convenient than illegally downloading it. Convenient beat out free.

This argument blows my mind how simplified it is. There are plenty of reasons someone would prefer iTunes over Napster, not illegal and more user friendly to name the two biggest. Why not use the example of a record store versus iTunes or even Napster? To show how conveniency can beat in human experiences or make you bend your morals to steal music?

> Americans say they prize competition, a proliferation of choices, the little guy. Yet our taste for convenience begets more convenience, through a combination of the economics of scale and the power of habit. The easier it is to use Amazon, the more powerful Amazon becomes — and thus the easier it becomes to use Amazon. Convenience and monopoly seem to be natural bedfellows.

This argument totally neglects that Amazon was ever a "little guy." Amazon's growth is the embodiment of American's prizing competition. Without competition, Amazon would never have been able to steal customers from Barnes and Noble, Walmart, Kroger, etc. Also, Amazon's framework allows for "little guy" shops to start up with low cost.

> However mundane it seems now, convenience, the great liberator of humankind from labor, was a utopian ideal. By saving time and eliminating drudgery, it would create the possibility of leisure. And with leisure would come the possibility of devoting time to learning, hobbies or whatever else might really matter to us.

If this was a "utopian ideal", then we would not be able to read this article on the internet. There is a reason that only the wealthy elites were scientists in the past. It's because they didn't have to spend their majority of the day doing laborious tasks. Without conveniency, there would be a lot less engineers, scientists, writers, artists, gamers, etc.

This article has no leg to stand on. You can swap out the word conveniency for innovation at many points, which is completely counter-intuitive to human philosophy. I understand that the writer is saying it's nice to take things slow. To not multi-task your brain to death. What he should be arguing for is to practice patience not to wash your clothes by hand.

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created:	August 1, 2017
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