#rentseeking — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #rentseeking, aggregated by home.social.
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I got back from a fabulous trip to Montréal a week ago. One thing that has been bugging me: we took our electric car, and upon arrival we needed to charge. The hotel had car charging provided by a local service called HyperCharge. This did not allow me to just stick a credit card in the charger, but required me to download their app and put $10 on it. We needed more than that, so I had to put another $10 when that first one ran out. But they still have $5, because our charge completed before we ran out of money again. And as far as I know they'll have it forever, unless I drive to Montréal again. In what way is this not theft?
Maybe I could have done some investigation and found a different service in a different location that would just take a credit card rather than the whole app and prepay thing. So maybe I'm just paying for the convenience of charging at the hotel. Still, annoying.
There are several US-based charging services which also have a small amount of my money, but I'm more likely to actually get to use that.
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@christianschwaegerl Frau Reiche ist eben die verlängerte Werkbank ihrer früheren Arbeitgeber und für das #rentseeking des #trumpeltier …Ich finde, sie und Herr #spahn sind ein perfect match….
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mo98p0ziJvQ
Fuck the #rentSeeking tech giants
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I try to avoid LinkedIn unless I have to go there. But an AgTech investment post celebrating the "Monsanto playbook" as a model to replicate got under my nose badly enough that I had to write about it.
Nobody who knows my work would call me anti-tech. But there's a hard line between technology that increases farmer capability and technology that engineers farmer dependency. The Monsanto playbook is the second kind.
The playbook: own the genetics, bundle the chemicals, capture the data, engineer the debt. Charge the farmer for all of it. Call it innovation.
Also in there: corporate capture of agricultural knowledge, India's farmer suicide crisis, Dark Emu and native grass seeds, and why a loaf of bread can be a political act.
Tech4Good means the farmer gets more capable. Not more dependent.
https://gaggl.com/blogs/2026-06-26-monocultures-dumb-by-design/
#RegenerativeAgriculture #AgTech #Tech4Good #Monocultures #FoodSovereignty #RentSeeking #FoodSystems #RuralAustralia #SlowFood
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RE: https://social.vivaldi.net/@jpl99/116701763295155738
If you can't decouple from big tech, you will pay them a monthly rent.
AI has brought the rent-seeking model from enterprise and SaaS customers to every single individual user of big tech software.
And rents only ever go up.
When big tech commits hundreds of billions to capex for data centers, the only way to satisfy wall street margins is to squeeze the captive tenant.
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And for those that have time to watch the details last nights ABC's #4corners program has the detail and is worth the watch:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-05-25/the-bhp-files/106720178
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Sadly, it's just stating the obvious for most people that have an interest in #renewables - but can't be shared widely enough for the people that have their News Limited ;-)
Should be criminal negligence by now, but we all know how the gas&mining lobby pays both sides of politics
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The screeching from the usual reactionaries and the boomer fear merchants has already started even though the budget has not even been announced:
https://www.skynews.com.au/australia-news/politics/budget-2026-labor-pitting-australians-against-australians-through-divisive-changes-to-negative-gearing-cgt-expert-warns/news-story/01c5f974228277801b8d46fcf06d4c42Of course, the same crowd that also opposes any fair revenue from the gas industry ripping off the country.
Just remember, today is as good as any to start to finally start the #BoycottMurdoch you've been planning.
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God gave the land to the people!
#land #georgism #economics #theland #landreform #naturallaw #wealthinequality #rentseeking #naturalresources #landvaluetax -
@nini @ChrisMayLA6 I don't hold with calling voters "idiots". I can't see any merit in that.
Just at the simplest human level, calling people idiots alienates them. Badly. #HilaryClinton tried that, and it didn't work out well for her.
But also, sneering at voters distracts from building the routes to change. How to counter the propaganda of the billionaire media? How to teach people about #imperialism and #RentSeeking and #neoliberalism?
Better to help people rethink than to sneer.
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Aussie #PSA - should be compulsory viewing:
Japanese Government makes more revenue taxing its imports of Australian gas than the Australian Government makes from the export of our gas.
Not only has Australia been literally giving more than half of the gas we export away for free, we now learn that the same Japanese Government that is opposed to us putting a tax on our gas and coal exports, has been raking in billions of dollars per year via their own tax on gas and coal imports.
This video is a clip from the Senate Select Committee on Taxation of Gas Resources, 21/04/2026
Speakers:
Dr Richard Denniss, co-CEO, the Australia Institute
Konrad Benjamin, Founder, Punter’s Politics -
"Lesson 1: There’s no such thing as a free lunch
Then: In the early 2020s, a series of cyberattacks linked to Russia, China and Iran left the federal government reeling. The Biden administration called on major tech companies to help the U.S. bolster its defenses. In response, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella pledged to give the government $150 million in technical services to help upgrade its digital security. It also offered a “free” security upgrade for government customers.Now: Last year, the Trump administration announced a raft of agreements with tech companies that were meant to help federal agencies “purchase enterprise AI tools at government-friendly pricing.” Agencies could use OpenAI’s ChatGPT for $1. Google’s Gemini for 47 cents. Grok by xAI for 42 cents. The administration hoped that the low-cost pricing would make it “easier for federal teams to acquire powerful AI capabilities … to enhance mission delivery and operational efficiency.”
The takeaway: Be wary of freebies. Our investigation into Microsoft’s seemingly straightforward commitment revealed a more complex, profit-driven agenda. After installing the upgrades, federal customers would be effectively locked in, because shifting to a competitor after the free trial would be cumbersome and costly. At that point, the customer would have little choice but to pay for the higher subscription fees. The plan worked: One former Microsoft salesperson told me “it was successful beyond what any of us could have imagined.”
(...)
Agencies looking to buy AI tools at discounted rates today must consider how the costs might balloon down the road. The General Services Administration warns that AI “usage costs can grow quickly without proper monitoring and management controls” and advises agencies to “set usage limits and regularly review consumption reports.”"https://www.propublica.org/article/federal-government-ai-cautionary-tales
#USA #FederalGovernment #BigTech #CyberSecurity #Microsoft #RentSeeking #LockIn
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🤡 Oh, the tragedy! The rent-seeking overlords are clutching their pearls as their empire of inefficiency crumbles under the weight of AI making dinner reservations. 🍽️ Who knew an algorithm could be the grim reaper for overpriced mediocrity? 📉
https://geohot.github.io//blog/jekyll/update/2026/02/26/the-last-gasps-of-the-rent-seeking-class.html #rentseeking #AIinnovation #dinnerreservations #overpricedmediocrity #techdisruption #HackerNews #ngated -
The Last Gasps of the Rent Seeking Class
#HackerNews #RentSeeking #Class #TheEconomy #Innovation #Disruption #EconomicJustice
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As usual great work from both #7AM podcast [Solstice Media]
Beer, gas and capital gains tax
https://podcastaddict.com/7am/episode/218143647 via @PodcastAddictand the Australia Institute
https://australiainstitute.org.au/report/tax-beer-drinkers-vs-gas-companies/
As the father of both a brewer and a winemaker I can relate to the analogy....
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"Copyright owners increasingly claim more draconian #copyright law and policy will fight back against big tech companies. In reality, copyright gives the most powerful companies even more control over creators and competitors. Today’s copyright policy concentrates power among a handful of corporate gatekeepers—at everyone else’s expense. "
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2026/01/copyright-kills-competition
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"There is abundant evidence that over the last 20 years, American firms have shifted from an innovation mindset to one that focuses more on rent seeking."
#innovation #vs #rentseeking #classic
https://greg-satell.medium.com/4-signs-your-industry-is-being-disrupted-70938259c344
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Apparently, rent seeking has been creeping into car features for a few years now.
Mercedes selling you a subscription to access your car's full acceleration has been one of the most blatant ones.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/23/23474969/mercedes-car-subscription-faster-acceleration-feature-priceThe BMW head-up display is also a subscription feature. And selling a "Traffic Camera Information" service is so on brand for BMW.
https://www.bmwusa.com/explore/connecteddrive.html -
Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow – No trackers, no ads. Black type, white background. Privacy policy: we don't collect or retain any data at all ever period. [Unofficial] @[email protected] ·Pluralistic: Where did the money go? (08 Jan 2026)
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/08/after-the-moneys-gone/
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RE: https://federate.social/@jik/115652076876325960
A month later, the guy at my Uncle's apartment management company who is responsible for tenant paperwork still hasn't sent me a corrected lease packet to sign. I just sent him another email message enumerating all of the errors in the previously sent packet and reiterating that we will not sign it until they are fixed.
#rentSeeking #landlords #rental
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My mouldy house will kill my sick baby | #RentSeeking
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ibivF9P3x14&pp=0gcJCR4Bo7VqN5tD
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My #mouldyhouse will kill my sick baby | #RentSeeking -
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High Court strikes down remote NT public housing rent rises https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-12-03/nt-remote-rents-high-court-overturns-increases-on-appeal/106094970 #HCA #auspol #auslaw #Housing #rent #rentseeking
