China expands its system of tracking a citizen’s behavior with a social credit score, and limiting his freedoms if it goes negative. Your neighbor reports you smoking a cigarette at your house, and when you try to fly to Hong Kong the flight attendant says, your score is too low, get off the plane. Is this just a dystopian nightmare spawned by communism, or could measures taken by American companies to nudge consumer behavior lead to such a scenario in the land of the free?
As Uber stands at the doorstep of its initial public offering (IPO), Uber drivers cry out: “They treat us like crap!” If the face of your company complains to your customers that they’re poor and mistreated, why should investors pour $90 billion into an business that has vigorous competition from Lyft and others, and virtually no barrier to entry, since it’s essentially just an app? And what does this say about capitalism itself?
As Lyft, the ride-sharing company, prepares to go public, it announces its intention to kill personal car ownership, boasting that some 300,000 people have already kicked the car habit thanks to Lyft. What does America gain and lose in the transportation as a service economy?
Is four minutes the new eternity? That’s what many think when it comes to internet video, but has the average attention span fallen so far that it’s become nearly impossible to train the next generation of engineers? The men of Right Angle examine a phenomenon that poses a threat to our entire educational system. Right […]
Is the age of ownership ending? From ride sharing, to music, and furniture sets, its now more accessible than ever to rent common luxuries than to own. The guys take a look at the growing culture of an on-demand economy.