Well, if the market so undervalues that stuff, the logical step would be to go buy other people’s beanie babies for cheap, before people realize how much they are actually worth. And then sell heaps of them for profit, once people come to their senses.

That’s obviously a very stupid idea, that you could pose to her, and let her argue why she doesn’t do that. Maybe it triggers a realization about how value is constructed.
But maybe it’s not worth the risk of her taking up on this very stupid idea.

If all you need is one single mug of hot water, a microwave is the way to go.

Are you talking about the major java/jre repackaging issue, that was announced (proposed update procedure included) on the archlinux news-page, that you are supposed to check before an update?

If so, then you can’t really blame the distro, if you don’t follow basic best practice guidelines.
And then you’d also be pretty late to that update and should run updates more frequently. Once a week to at least once a month is a good idea. That’s the idea of a kinda bleeding edge, rolling release distro.

I do get, why people dislike GIMP. It has a bit of a steep learning curve. And approaches things uniquely.

But for a FOSS paint equivalent: have you tried Pinta? It’s much less complicated, and the UI isn’t too bad.

Lucky you!

McCartney and Swift ‘exploit’ tons of people as well. They might flagship their music artist operation themselves and kind of ‘be’ the product (or rather the brand), but there are lots and lots of people involved to make tours and shows possible, recording, production and especially distribution of music and merch involves labour as well.

In addition to that: I don’t think they store all that money on a nice little heap in their backyard. It usually gets invested into some sorts of corporations, be it through the stock market, where it will accrue revenue, that comes as the result of more exploitation.

That being said: the term ‘exploitation’ carries a much more negative connotation than would be beneficial for the conversation. It’s concept of marxist economics, and the term ‘Ausbeutung’ = exploitation was used by Marx himself to describe how capitalists benefit from the surplus that workers produce. I like the term ‘reaping the surplus’ better because it doesn’t carry as much of a negative connotation. The criticism of capitalism shouldn’t barely rely on the fact that surplus is being taken away from the workers, but from the consequences to society and the political system that inevitably follow when that wealth is concentrated in the hands of a minority.

You’re missing the point. The risk might not be very high on average, but if they don’t want to end up on the streets, regular people still have to kind of function inside the system somehow and continuously work for regular income. The will to survive is part of what drives them to do so.

Billionaires on the other hand, wouldn’t even have to lift a finger to be able to live comfortably for the rest of their lives. On the contrary, they’d have to try really hard to get rid of all that wealth. Major fuck-ps and intentional money burning excluded, the chance that they end up having trouble getting their basic needs fulfilled is miniscule. THAT is the difference.

I use, errr, I mean Steam Deck uses Arch, btw.

In that case, I guess it’s time to get educated about Linux. At least to the point, where you understand, that what I’m referring to, should actually be called “GNU/Linux”.

*“I recognize Google” is also not Google itself, but specifically the Chrome Logo that refers to Chrome OS in this case.