guys, i've got an amazing idea that will make us all rich!

now - hear me out - we start putting publicly available scooters in major cities around the world

these scooters are ingeneous and differentiate us from any competition because they are yellow instead of green or blue!!!

we're hiring now!!! who wants to join me?!?!? we're a dynamic, motivated, and hard working team. we don't have amazing benefits, a relocation bonus, an office, a tech gear stipend just yet, or a salary, but we do offer a generous 0.5% equity and our series A is just around the corner - promised - within a few weeks time! we're looking for a candidate with 10+ years experience in all of the following: PHP, MySQL, TypeScript, JavaScript, Python, C#, C++, Rust, Go, and Fortran. Additional skills, but not totally required include blockchain development, prompt engineering, and building GPT sized LLMs. DM me for details!

The publicly available scooters. Damn what a concept. Removed from my city already.

Insta with all weird stuff done those things: https://instagram.com/strooiscooter...==

Such an innovative concept! I‘d like to apply but devRant doesn't have DM. 🤡

What about public bicycles?

Username checks out.

And…

We put mf rockets on them

@iiii or street legal karts. Let there be chaos. (With data-tracking and adds all over the place for research purpose only of course)

@fullstackclown, those are all just soft skills... where are the master degrees in robotics and mechanical industry ?

Already got the green version. and yellow. Neon pink?

@iiii something something somebody's mom

it's always the best, when the years of experience are bigger than the age of the actual languages used.

@retoor > "Removed from my city already."

Same here (college town)

Typical liberal/socialist event cycle

- City complains about too many cars, parking, etc (blaming the university, save the environment etc).

- Bird scooters come in, almost overnight, parking problems *disappear*. Even made the front page.

- Bird scooters everywhere, tax free, and city realizes, nobody is taking the bus, paying parking meters, city garages, etc. Decide that scooters are a safety hazard and ban the company. Photos of city workers purposely putting the scooters in the middle of sidewalks, etc. and grandstanding "Look! Scooters are unsafe!!". College town, lots of phones+cameras, not sure how the city thought they could get away with it

- Public backlash, car+parking problems are back, city decides to charge Bird $100 for every scooter, a special 'use-tax', and a big fine for every scooter in their special 'no scooter' zones

- Bird decides this city is too expensive to operate and leaves

@PaperTrail you live up to your user name. ;-)

@PaperTrail in NL they made it a hobby to place scooters at weird areas like in an elevator or top of building. See the insta in my post, it's funny

@retoor > Insta is blocked at work, I'll take a look when the empire isn't watching.

Yea, the WTFs were never ending. Our local newspapers would have full page spreads showing the 'dangers' of the scooters in the middle of sidewalks, handicap spots, etc (which I'm sure was a small problem) and did not fail to mention Bird is one of those 'evil' billion dollar corporations with no ties to the local community. Coal generated electricity to charge the scooters was harming the environment, no accountability for the safe disposal of batteries, etc..etc.

Next, a full page ad promoting the new environmental friendly natural gas powered buses nobody asked for, construction+expansion of new downtown garages, etc. Funny they didn't mention the near 5% increase in taxes for all this.. yea...funny.

Fast forward ~5 years, the bus system (6 or so buses) is down to one bus, and using one of the original diesel engine buses.

@PaperTrail haha, amazing story

@retoor And there is more.

These were nice, state-of-the-art buses. Comfy seats, fully handicap accessible, free wifi, and the city decided to 'help the poor' by offering free+unlimited bus passes for those who qualified. That, of course, included the homeless. It wouldn't be unusual to for 10~20 homeless folks to go round and round until they got kicked off (which was viewed as racist and bus drivers getting fired) and/or simply switched buses until the buses stopped running their routes. Winter time was especially bad. No bathroom faculties on these buses, so there was a problem with individuals urinating on the floor, defecating in the seats, and general harassment of paying customers.

As one can guess, 6 buses go to 5, routes are closed, 5 goes to 4, more closed routes, etc. You'd never know because the local news outlets wouldn't report it, only the local conservative radio stations would report the current state of the system.

Yellow is the best color for lowest accident rates I hear.

You know you need a fleet of big trucks to go around and collect them all up and deliver them back to the starting points. :-)

Or you could just give folk credit/cash for taking them to specific locations, the further away, the more credit you can earn !

Of course, it won't be the folk who use them in the first place, no it will be folk who want to earn credits/cash by returning countless transporting devices !

But why just scooters ?

Not very useful in the rain or snow..

How about cars ?

Could be a way of making a taxi cheaper..

@PaperTrail
Amazing story. Instead of trying to address the problem of homelessness and mental health help for people without means they decide to just cross out everything public. Bueno.

@Nanos Cars ? Seen them in Paris... they are even worse than scooters.

People don't care when it is not their own car. Tons have them were all beat-up and poor condition.

Steps too... they get stolen, or hacked (I don't think the group that was using them are the kind that pay their metro tickets...) doing stunts, jumps, crashes and when out of battery they dump it right there.

@msdsk > "Instead of trying to address the problem of homelessness"

I don't know the right answer. These folks have no interests in helping themselves (the city does have programs). Recently, the city cleared out 2 large homeless encampments with the usual suspects protesting, and as usual, offered no solution (just shouting)

One 'solution' was to build a 'community' with houses and facilities for the homeless outside of city limits. When they couldn't easily beg at street corners and steal from surrounding businesses, their representative rejected the proposal.

The individual who manages the homeless problem in this city makes $80,000+ a year, do you think he has any interest in 'solving' the problem?

@PaperTrail A lady was in CA to talk to the homeless to find out what would get them off the street. She found that many of them were choosing this as a lifestyle because the government is giving them free food and enabling their drug problems. Many of the homeless were there to get high and just exist like that. I know of people who are moving out of CA as a result. It is just getting worse.

Nice, classic classism.

@Demolishun Where I am, the homeless don't get free food, or free drugs !

The thing that would get them off the street would be a home, surprisingly !

Or lower rents that they might afford, if they could get a job.

Rent controls just increase rents to unaffordable levels in exchange for better housing conditions, and less homes. ( Because landlords don't, or can't afford to invest in improvements. )

Having lived in the cheapest ghetto housing out there, I was pretty happy using Duct Tape to hold the place together, until folk decided I needed better housing, and the rent doubled..

Then I couldn't afford it !

Now, getting a job..

Is a lot easier when you can lift 200lb sacks, as such, it would also help if homeless folk was given free food and gym membership so they might become strong enough to get a job.

Affordable homes you could own would also help people to avoid paying rent their entire working life. ( Or being homeless when they can't afford the rent.. )

@PaperTrail

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These folks have no interests in helping themselves

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One might say there are two basic groups of homeless folk, the ones that want to be, and the ones that don't.

I was reading an article the other day about a guy who saved on rent by being homeless, and is now worth $10 Million !

Interestingly, it seems pretty common among a lot of rich folk I've spoken to, either they had family or friends to sleep at on the couch, or lived on the streets to save on rent in the early days of their careers.

And there was me being stupid and renting a place when I was poor !

Though I've also been homeless too.

As such, I got to chat to a lot of folk from both groups.

I never gave up, but I've seen folk who did.

Currently not homeless, but how long that will last is another question !

I've yet to own my own home, or have a reliable enough income not to worry about tomorrow.

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city cleared out 2 large homeless encampments

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I remember one where they started to build homes. ( Mud huts.. )

As the site was next to a river, I suggested they build a boat instead ( There was lots of surplus wood around in the area as trash no one wanted. ) and then when the spot they was on got cleared, they could launch their boat beforehand and live on it!

Then they could move it someplace else.

Build more boats..

But no one was interested in doing that.

The site though did have a no alcohol or drugs rule which was nice.

But no forward planning !

Another group had the combined income to afford to buy a place, but didn't..

Meanwhile, one of the group, brought a cave and lived in that for a while. ( Before the government caught him and told him it was illegal ! )

Now owns 5 houses, but still lives in the garage of one whilst finishing off repairing the last house, taken him 20 years !

He worked with his own truck doing haulage.

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free+unlimited bus passes

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Reminds me of a country where they let children ride for free.

Suddenly crime on buses shot up !

Interestingly, one place I heard of, that ran a bus service, that wasn't making a profit..

Changed to instead giving folk free taxi rides !

And guess what, it was cheaper to run than the loss making bus service !

And people got door to door service, which you don't get with a bus..

Makes you think. :-)