I don’t try to avoid Amazon at all and I only avoid Walmart because I don’t like the shopping experience there, not because they are evil. I have neither the privilege or knowledge I need to feel confident in avoiding them. The best solution is to consume less regardless of where it’s bought and I struggle with that as well.
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Walmart a definite no. Have never stepped foot into one. They’ve taken over town after town, pay super low wages and beat their suppliers to give rock bottom prices. Not interested.
Does anyone wonder why the US produces about zero of anything these days?
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I try not to shop Amazon, Walmart, Home Depot or non-unionized chain grocery stores.
Understood that “individual” boycotts don’t change a company’s treatment of their employees or where the owners send their political money.
One of my kids made the switch to buying local whenever possible. They have a farm share, a local butcher, a shop that makes toiletries, and just found what we used to call a dressmaker. Much fewer but better made clothes. They used to have a closet bulging with fast fashion from H&M or wherever, so I think it’s pretty cool. Also they know all these folks personally. They’re in a big city where that’s easier to do.
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There are plenty of restaurants that aren’t fast food joints that are using QR codes for menus. It’s a simple add-on to their POS as well.
#truth
This is a common practice in other countries. My first time solo backpacking through New Zealand I asked for water in a relatively fancy restaurant and received an eye-roll and was pointed to the table with water glasses and pitchers. Along with a sotto voce “Americans!”
There’s NO excuse in 2021 to not be tech savvy. I see it in all age groups and there’s a perverse pride in their Luddite mentality. The origins of this tech go back to the early 1900s. ZERO tolerance for ignorance.
One cannot navigate day-to-day life (in the US at least) without a working knowledge of technology.
This is a struggle! I’ve implemented this rule for buying new clothes (from shoes/socks to tees, dresses, etc). Buy 1 Get Rid of 3. It doesn’t matter if I buy 1 purse and get rid of 3 tees, although I prefer to get rid of 3 complementary items (1 purse, get rid of 2 wallets and a clutch). There’s a Buy Nothing group here and I leave boxes on the front porch for pickup and donate what I don’t use.
My small town has all this and a cobbler (English!) as well. I love shopping with my neighbors.
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You should get out more. There are people who survive just fine without smart phones or computers.
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Wow. Just… wow. Hostile much?
I get out plenty. And own a web-based software development company and train people to use their tech.
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Hostile??? No. You put forth the notion that people can’t get along in their daily life without using modern tech. As the owner of a software development company, it doesn’t surprise me that you would think that.
Perhaps… but you cannot book or use airbnb without online internet. If they do not have a smartphone when traveling, they will have a lot of problems with airbnb - for example, airbnb asks that all messaging go thru the app. To change a reservation, for example, they would need to find a computer to make the request.
I for one have zero sympathy for Luddites in 2021. Too much denial and notenough cooperation…
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Of course one has to use a computer or smart phone to book a place through an online platform. But I’ve had several guests who either didn’t use smart phones, or whose phones didn’t work out of their home country. They got to my place no problem, and I’ve never had someone want to change a reservation between the time they left wherever they travelled from and the time they arrived. They certainly didn’t have “a lot of problems” because they weren’t using the Airbnb app.
Luddite is a deragatory term referring to people who are opposed to new technology. Just because someone has no interest in learning their way around computers and smart phones doesn’t mean they are “opposed” to them and stubbornly refuse to learn. Their daily lives don’t require it, and they really have no interest.
Long before I got my “smart” phone, I had my smart laptop and it’s traveled with me in and out of the US.
Have to say, I may avoid the app if I can. My brain’s getting clogged.
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Yes, of course. It’s ‘passive’. But they become ‘active Luddites’ when they say things like “I will not patronize a vendor because he asks me to use technology”.
Another thing: what was considered important in providing services always changes. Remembering your ‘good old days’ when (for instance) a waiter comes and hovers by you and smiles and converses while you verbally give them your order may be ‘classy’ to some, but to adults these days it smacks of peonage or at least being ordered around. And as we move forward into having a living wage and elimination of tipping (a situation where the waiter performs a dance in the hopes of getting a good tip rather than just doing a good job) and as us boomers disappear off the face of the earth, being servile to make a living will go away too…
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Wow, just wow…. I’ve always seen their (the wait person’s) job as being someone who provides information not as someone is who there to be ordered around! I almost always have questions, especially if it’s a fine dining place where I have not eaten before, about the food, about what they personally recommend, etc. I’ve never seen them as peons to be ordered around. If that’s how they see their job, I’m not surprised by dining places going to QR codes because they can’t get waitstaff.
I’ve got nothing against QR codes but I’m darned if I’m going to eat at a fine dining place where the only human contact comes when they bring out the food and drinks. QR codes have their place—I’d be fine with them at Applebee’s, for instance—but at upscale restaurants?
I can see you’d need fewer wait staff if their only job is to bus food and drinks between the kitchen and the table, but if fine dining comes to this, I predict fewer people will bother to eat at these places.
I have a smart phone and would be lost without it. But, it seems to me, life is getting much more impersonal as the phones and technology replace things that used to require actual human interaction to do.
I have considered installing smart locks at my AirBnBs but I haven’t yet. I still used the old-fashioned combination lockboxes with a physical key inside and I try always to meet my guests, if possible. More than once, when staying at an AirBnB, I’ve had trouble with smart locks. The last time it happened was rather scary. The smart lock didn’t work; I was by myself; it was a very small town and it was about 10 pm, and there was no one around. I felt quite uneasy and rather vulnerable. What was unforgivable was the host (who was remote) knew the smart lock was tricky and admitted even his housekeeper had trouble getting in sometimes because the door would stick and then the smart lock wouldn’t work so he had a combination lock box (like mine) as a backup. However, to get to the backup key, I had to go through a narrow, dark alley. Sometimes, folks, technology just doesn’t cut it.
I’m older (yes, a boomer) but I dislike this impersonal direction things seem to be going in. I’m going to try, as an experiment sometime, to see if I can go through an entire day—one that involves grocery shopping, banking, running errands, eating out, etc., without actually speaking to another human being. I bet it’s not only possible, but easy to do. How sad will that be?
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Ho does having a menu via QR code change any of this? You can still interact with the server.
Lock technology has improved immensely over the last year or two, and not having access via code is now becoming something that is undesirable. Your experience with a faulty lock and a host who left it there rather than upgrade to a better lock shouldn’t discourage you.
[quote=“Keugenia, post:52, topic:49684”]
I’m going to try, as an experiment sometime, to see if I can go through an entire day—one that involves grocery shopping, banking, running errands, eating out, etc., without actually speaking to another human being. I bet it’s not only possible, but easy to do.
This is 2021. But you can easily spend the time you spent waiting in line to speak to someone at the bank, waiting in line to check out your groceries, and other errands interacting with your friends.
This happened two months ago, and it was an August smart lock, which I understand is top of the line.
Honestly, if not having a smart lock is undesirable, too bad, my potential guests will have to get over it or book elsewhere. As I said, I’ve had difficulty with them as a guest, and it was very disconcerting not to be able to get into a place where I had a reservation. It’s especially bad when you are arriving and tired after traveling and it’s dark and late and you are by yourself.
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Anecdotal. August locks have been on the market for many years and this one might be an older model - in this case the door was misadjusted so NO lock would work - August is certainly not ‘top of the line’ but popular. If this host has a lock of any vintage that is finicky, it is not about the lock (using one single experience with an August lock extrapolated to ALL August locks is crazy) it is about the host who does not keep his airbnb working properly. For me, if any of my locks start being unreliable, I immediately change them so that guests do not have problems. The tired response shows the HOST is not worthy of a good rating:
These kinds of experiences are up there with hosts who turn their phones off so that the guest cannot contact them, or hosts that come on this forum and complain that they got a negative review despite their admission that the place was dirty, or something was broken, or in this case the door was not working correctly. It is up to the host to provide a good experience. BTW, a working smart lock simply opens the door. No magic here.
Brand new August lock, just installed this year. The host just bought the place this year.
True, it’s the host not the lock. BUT, my houses are 100+ years old, with the original solid wood exterior doors and our climate is very humid so there is always the chance the door may swell and cause a problem. The smart locks only work if everything is perfectly aligned. Whereas you can make a keyed lock work, even if the door lock is slightly misaligned to due humidity.
ETA: I am not extrapolating to all smart locks, even August smart locks. I am noting what happens with smart locks when the WiFi goes out, or the doorlock becomes misaligned because of humidity, warping, etc. Smart locks can fail to work, is the point I’m making, whereas a combination lockbox with a physical key is fairly fail proof.
If the door is maladjusted it is not the case that no lock would work—it is only the case that no smart lock would work.
Mine too. Not relevant
ALL locks work well when everything is aligned perfectly. it is up to the host to make sure the door is not sticking. The door does not know what kind of lock it has - and the ‘alignment’ of the strike on a door does not become more critical based on whether it is a smart lock or a dumb one.
Wifi does not have to be active for any smart lock to work.
Again, the mechanics of the strike have nothing to do with the lock.
This opens up an interesting discussion, that is way off topic 
To a certain extent it is similar in Andalucía, where almost every government or local authority dept, including health, are heavily weighted towards tech users.
Digital signatures and digital certificates are the order of the day to carry out many tasks. Two factor authentication is common place to allow access from smartphone apps, especially for health.
I’ve no empirical evidence to back this up, but many of the older generations here have grasped new technology with a vengeance!
A few days ago I was in Carrefour and watched this old woman, looked about ninety and not wearing well, whip out her mobile, register her shopping on her virtual store card then pay by NFC.
As an ex IT professional, it’s good to see.
JF
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Amazing. Good for you.
I was just in Marfa, TX which is decidedly not a big city. They have amazing stuff there. Custom clothes, a seller of locally grown meats, a coffee roaster, a grocery store with plenty of the organic and niche brands. OTOH most of the tradespeople, hardware and feed store owners etc are straight up Trump loving, immigrant and abortion hating, GOP voters. So putting money in their pockets would be just as unpleasant to contemplate as giving Amazon my money.
I think it’s much more about money than anything else. I’m envious of people with the disposable income and the other means to shop/consume in a certain fashion. I could do more but I’m also able to sleep at night with the choices I’ve made and will make at the end of my life.
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Everyone here is using “high tech” on a forum of all things regarding online booking services for STR.
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@casailinglady is 100% correct.
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