I don't quite understand the degree of negativity given this is someone's personal project. They state that English is not their native language, so it's reasonable to me to leverage machine translation tools. For a work in progress, it seems good and I'm glad they are able to share it. You have to start somewhere, and getting it out there helps get more people involved.
We're still in the AI-use-is-black-and-white phase. Most people still think it's more than just a tool still, cuz it still seems like magic to them. We'll get there, and then it will just be a tool like any other. Hopefully then we'll start holding the people behind it accountable when appropriate, instead of allowing it to be used as a scapegoat, as if it has agency.
Just to add some context to the Phoebus Cartel and incandescent bulb lifetime in general, there is an inherent trade off between efficiency/brightness vs lifetime in incandescent bulbs. Longer life bulbs are proportionally less efficient, which can end up costing the user more money in the long run than replacing efficient shorter life bulbs more often. There's no doubt that the cartel was limiting lifetimes for the wrong reasons (profit), but the result for consumers wasn't necessarily the wrong one.
Modern LED bulb lifetime is the result of similar factors: wanting more profit. But I think this is being achieved more through aggressively reducing manufacturing cost rather than planned obsolescence.
I think the answer is in the question. They're not playing to win money. They're playing because whatever rewards that have been engineered into the game suck them in. Social aspects, FOMO, "winning" at a game, etc.
Different people crave different rewards. Some people may care more about the financial reward, but they're out playing some other gambling game that caters to them.
That's key because it shows how money isn't the only reward that can encourage unhealthy gambling behavior. It sounds like the victims express feeling of a sunk cost, knowing that if they don't maintain their status with additional purchases, all the previous money spent will have been wasted. If it took them $10k to get there, why throw it all away (and disappoint their "club") if you can keep it rolling for another $100?
Aren't they referring to the person designing the addictive game, not the players? Justifying any methods by starting with "let's put ethics aside" is incredibly callous.
Edit: Based on partitioned's later comments, it looks like I was probably wrong about their intent. Either way, it is certainly a crass comment.
It's a poem advocating empathy, people, not an edict on border control policy. Are people really so sensitive that they can't handle being reminded that other people may think differently than them?
I grant you, it is a confusing time line, but let me clear this up. Cree sold its consumer lighting products business (think LED light bulbs with "Cree" stamped on them) to Ideal Industries. Then, as the company expanded into other semiconductor areas, they rebranded as Wolfspeed. Finally, Wolfspeed sold the LED components division (think tiny LED chips that go into products) to SGH, effectively spinning it off as a new company called "Cree-LED".
How in god's name do you obtain this kind of intel? Putting together these kinds of corporate merger/acquisition narratives is always a major pain for me!
This seems to stretch the meaning of "discovered." Hey look, I just discovered a dinosaur at the natural history museum! It's older than they thought it was!
Certainly it is a significant contribution, but I have to admit that my mental image when reading someone dicovered an ancient sword is of someone digging it out of the ground.
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