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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 8th, 2023

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  • Half of the scenarios you noted are not ones I have ever heard of (and I would bet are totally made up). Why would WalMart shoppers be exempt from sales tax?

    You are right that advertising price with tax may be unreasonable. That does not preclude the store from putting the price with tax on the shelf. Out of all the scenarios you described, the only one that this would not cover is having an item be taxed differently if bought in conjunction with another item, but that can be noted in the same way that stores note a bundle or a bulk sales price ($1 each or 5 for $4).

    There is difficulty in the case of a charge in tax rate (how often do those happen? Once every few years) or if there is a tax holiday (I see plenty of clothing stores have a sign for “15% off the marked price”). Those can be handled by having computer controlled shelf prices, which have existed for at least 20 years but never caught on much.






  • Teleconference is, at best, good enough and will never have the quality of in person discussion.

    I am not aware of any teleconference software that uses perfectly lossless audio. Those small losses, though hard to hear, can increase the cognitive load of participants. Even with expensive headsets and good software, audio volumes will vary from speaker to speaker. Automatic volume leveling loses even more audio fidelity.

    Due to physics (i.e. we cannot send a signal faster than the speed of light) and processing, there will be additional delay. It makes it hard for people to talk without speaking over each other. It makes discussions trickier since people are hesitant to talk right after one another. Instead of interrupting with questions, they will hold questions until the end, when the context may be forgotten, or don’t ask questions at all.

    Even assuming that everyone has good lighting and has their camera pointed perfectly, body language is often lost. Every meeting software I have used hesitates to switch the focused speaker too often. If two people are talking back and forth, one will be religtated to a thumbnail video. When someone is presenting, they cannot easily scan the room to see reactions.

    So, when talking on a meeting, the participants hear (almost) everything being said, but they miss out on all of the non-verbal communication and even some subtleties of the sound.


  • Sure, but many are probably locked into long leases. These leases also cover things like server rooms, show rooms, and storage areas. All of that can be moved, but there is cost (and risk) in moving them. Plus, it is convenient to have work areas for employees to use between meetings.

    Also, some people, like me, prefer to work outside of their home, so it is good to have us in a single place so we can have impromptu meetings.

    Some companies are reducing office space, taking desks away from employees that come in rarely or even switching to a hot bunk model (several employees share the same office and come in on different days) or a hotel model (employees sit in any open office and are expected to take all personal items home at the end of the day).