[LINK] e-Tomatoes

[Craig Sanders]

On Thu, Apr 29, 2010 at 08:52:53AM +1000, Jan Whitaker wrote:
> >Getting up early every day and going to bed late, he multiplies his 
> >profits quickly. After a short time he acquires a cart to transport 
> >several dozen boxes of tomatoes, only to have to trade it in again 
> >so that he can buy a pickup truck to support his expanding business. 

or he might have done so, if the managers of the local branches of
large corporate chain supermarkets didn't co-incidentally decide
to ramp up the competition between themselves and, in a further
extremely unforunate co-incidence, decide that tomatoes were the
crucial battlefront for their price war. these decisions being made,
co-incidentally, about the time he started making a noticable profit.


> > replies that he has no e-mail, the adviser is stunned. "What, you
> > don't have e-mail? How on earth have you managed to amass such
> > wealth without the internet, e-mail and e-commerce? Just imagine
> > where you could be now if you had been connected to the internet
> > from the very start!"
> >
> > "Well," replied the tomato millionaire, "I would be a janitor at
> > Microsoft!"

instead, now he's a bankrupt. and unemployable due to complete lack of
skill with modern technology.

bet he just loves what being a neo-luddite has done for him.


> >By definition, a fable must have a moral. This one has four:
> >
> >    1. The internet, e-mail and e-commerce do not need to rule your
> >    life.
> >
> >    2. If you don't have e-mail, but work hard, you can still become
> > a millionaire.

but not in groceries. the only chance people not born into the ownership
classes have of becoming seriously wealthy are when disruptive
technologies (like computers, like the internet) come along - and even
then, only for the first few years before the slow-moving corporate
behemoths leverage their existing wealth and power to take control.


> >    3. Since you found this story on the Internet, you may be closer 
> > to becoming a janitor than you are to becoming a millionaire.
> >
> >    4. If you do have a computer and e-mail, you have probably 
> > already helped a bunch of other guys at Microsoft get rich.

and the "rich microsoft guys" are probably shareholders in the
supermarkets too.

craig

ps: i really despise the american self-made man and equality of
opportunity/level playing field myths. they're about as contemptible as
religions brainwashing the down-trodden to just accept their miserable
lot in this life because they'll surely be rewarded in the next.

-- 
craig sanders <cas at taz.net.au>