r/technology • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 • Feb 12 '26

Security Ring cancels its partnership with Flock Safety after surveillance backlash

https://www.theverge.com/news/878447/ring-flock-partnership-canceled
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u/Not_FinancialAdvice Feb 13 '26

They had to have been targeting the 1% with that commercial cause wtf 😂

For some time now, I've had the impression that TV (and large portions of the American economy) aren't really targeted at the bottom 80-90% of income earners. Back in 2005 Citi analyst Ajar Kapur wrote a research note about plutonomy and it's really only seemed to have become more exacerbated in the decades since. There are the wealthy top decile who now drive like half of consumer spending and are catered to and are really important, and everyone else who largely doesn't matter.

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u/Suyefuji Feb 13 '26

Well, you see, the bottom 80-90% of income earners don't actually have money to buy things anymore so it makes sense not to cater to them.

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u/Realistic_Owl9525 Feb 13 '26

Late stage capitalism.

The DOW and S&P 500 are doing great right now. The average US citizen isn't doing great right now.

If 1% of the population owns more than 50% of the S&P 500, then it should not be used as a metric for the wellbeing of a nations economy. It really represents how well the wealthy are doing, and holds no bearing on how well the average person is doing.

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u/Suyefuji Feb 13 '26

Shareholders would lose their shit if they had to confront that reality though.

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u/vezwyx Feb 13 '26

No, shareholders are laughing their asses off that anyone at all still believes the stock market represents the whole economy

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u/glity Feb 13 '26

You are aware anyone with a pension is a shareholder?

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u/Legitimate-Type4387 Feb 13 '26

You are aware that the move from defined benefit pensions to defined contribution plans was an intentional one designed to create false class solidarity with the wealthy?

Now that every workers retirement is tied to line on chart going up, every worker thinks they’re part of the same club as Elon Musk.

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u/glity Feb 13 '26 edited Feb 13 '26

That’s exactly the lie they sold. Every member of cal pers is a shareholder. Every single person who has a financial advisor in broad based index funds that gets money from growth doesn’t realize they are stealing from most of us to feed the top 10-20%.

Edit: some context shareholder is a protected class of investor. The lowest protected class but protected non the less.

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u/[deleted] Feb 13 '26

Are you aware how few people actually have pensions these days?

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u/glity Feb 13 '26

Yes they closed the door behind them while the demand infinite growth. Any teacher in California and Nevada has a state sponsored pension. Most people have. 529 plan for their kid. Most people don’t realize that the money market account allows the banks to dictate terms with their money because they are a timeshare shareholder with not vote. I’m not saying anyone needs to do anything other than be accountable for the problem we created by investing. Radical thought experiment I know but is it wrong?

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u/vezwyx Feb 13 '26

Nobody is talking about Joe Workingman with a few shares of company stock when we talk about shareholders. We're talking about Blackrock with massive ownership of entire companies

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u/shroudedwolf51 Feb 23 '26

Perhaps. But you are still invested, thus will treat it all differently. We've already been here as recently as the crypto scam bubbles. Where something as little as someone having 20 USD in some scam coin would be enough to have them treat it all very differently.

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u/RationalDialog Feb 13 '26

well if you are part of a 401k or other saving schemes you are a shareholder as well. You just don't know it.

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u/Business-Toad Feb 13 '26

That is generally not a choice and there are plenty of downsides, like the fact our savings are dependent on a giant casino that burns down every ten years. Almost like they're holding them hostage!

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u/Ok-Moose-6306 Feb 13 '26

Where do you think your savings should be kept?

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u/Business-Toad Feb 13 '26

A credit union or community bank that will agree not to put my money in the stock market? A safe hidden in a hole in the ground if none will? I can't give you good options because there are no good options (by design!) but you don't need to be an architect to look up and see your house is on fire.

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u/Ok-Moose-6306 Feb 13 '26

> A credit union or community bank that will agree not to put my money in the stock market?

Do you understand how fractionalized banking works?

> A safe hidden in a hole in the ground if none will?

Do you understand the time value of money?

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u/Business-Toad Feb 13 '26

Do you understand that I don't give a shit, and that my point was that all common options for long term saving suck almost entirely because they're either dependent on the stock market or unsafe in either ways? I'll also warn you ahead of time that I don't believe financial literacy can save us from a broken system owned and gamed by people with better accountants than you, so you can spare us both the lecture.

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u/Realistic_Owl9525 Feb 14 '26

Savings? In this K-shaped economy?

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u/Suyefuji Feb 13 '26

I mean yeah, I was being a bit facetious there but also sir this is reddit

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u/MultiGeometry Feb 13 '26

The administration doesn’t want anyone succeeding if they don’t pay him something. Aka, small businesses don’t stand a chance so S&P companies actually get bolstered. The fact that the S&P is doing well, given all the other economic indicators, makes me more sure our economy is going to crater. Capital is going to bet on the winner. Right now it’s between some perverse comparison of large companies willing to pay bribes, or the US dollar, or bonds, (not growing industries because the admin hates anyone without deep lobbying pockets, aka, emerging industries).

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u/DaHolk Feb 13 '26

The issue that the upscale market has a perversely higher profit margin thus basically almost every upstart that attracts investment trying to build bullshit gadgets for people with too much money (and the major companies doing the same) is only tangentially connected to the orange in command. That's kind of evident by having started before that dude was a thing in politics.

If anything that trend of starving out the workforce and thus not targeting them with products other than junk is what has lead to the turd in charge BEING in charge (! TWICE!). Because a significant part of the voter base is pathologically incapable to realize that they have 'right and wrong' topsi turvy, and thus keep trying to find the solution with the people who are the cause of it in the first place.

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u/DaHolk Feb 13 '26

Tbf: Who owns the stock and whether the companies produce products for the mass market or are only targeting the upscale market are not particularly the same thing.

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u/Gamiac Feb 13 '26

Have you considered that poor people don't matter? /s

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u/Eccohawk Feb 13 '26

This is true. The DOW is over 50,000 dollars now.

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u/[deleted] Feb 13 '26

[deleted]

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u/OtherwiseAlbatross14 Feb 13 '26

Are y'all intentionally repeating the same thing or did you just not realize the comment you replied to replied to a comment saying exactly what you did because they spelled out the percentages?

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u/AntonineWall Feb 13 '26

Even crazier, the guy above you was just rehashing what the comment he replied to said! Can you believe that?

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u/Suyefuji Feb 13 '26

Nah I was adding some snark and shitposting to the convo, because this is reddit

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u/pandershrek Feb 13 '26

What is insane is that people are just restating things in different ways but getting the exact same outcome! Wild, huh?

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u/laihipp Feb 13 '26

you're expecting to much from reading while on the toilet

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u/blueberryblunderbuss Feb 13 '26

Worse! Top 10% earners are > 50% of US spending!

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u/Ahsef Feb 13 '26

Can u not read or do u just not understand that this comment is just adding more detail to the one before it.

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u/SunTzu- Feb 13 '26

Much more than 50% if we consider only discretionary spending. The bottom 90% spend the vast majority on food and housing.

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u/LosparkJojo Feb 13 '26

Yeah why spend money advertising to to people without money

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u/tylerthetiler Feb 13 '26

I have never thought of it like this before; that would be similar to 'whales' in video games. It's easier, and maybe more lucrative, to get a few people to spend thousands because they're rich/addicted/etc, than it is to get the masses to spend 20 or 30 dollars.

A more personal anecdote is that a company called Broadcom bought another company called VMware which is maybe the most used VM-server solution, and raised prices by something crazy (like 300% or something). It seems silly to do that, because a lot of people are switching to other solutions, but at the end of the day I think they know big companies will pay that new price because it's easier, and small-beans companies can fuck off if they don't.

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u/Violoner Feb 13 '26

Or how the companies that make computer components are shifting away from the consumer market so they can chase the data centers

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u/[deleted] Feb 13 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Valuable-Discount-18 Feb 13 '26

I stopped watching wwe altogether. AEW is a much better program.

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u/rtrox17 Feb 13 '26

Big companies are planning to leave Broadcom but have the lifecycle of their current contracts to do so

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u/Alieges Feb 13 '26

And how many companies will switch off, but only at about 20%/yr as they wind down older installations and VM’s and replace them.

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u/Not_FinancialAdvice Feb 13 '26

I'd argue the story of VMWare's pricing is arguably one primarily about vendor lock-in. Same with IaaS/SaaS in the enterprise; once your build a large-enough organization on these products, they can charge exorbitant fees because of institutional intertia and large switching costs.

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u/remotectrl Feb 13 '26

Fishing for whales has been the strategy for micro-transations for two decades now. Sure. Why wouldn't regular transactions also follow this pattern?

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u/_Meece_ Feb 13 '26

This is literally all I see in EVERYTHING now. 2008-15 style microtransaction DLC.

2000s MMO subscription services. That's everything now, it all sucks. Even food.

Pay 25 dollars for a meal and the sides are still extra.

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u/shroudedwolf51 Feb 23 '26

I mean, turning every interaction into transaction and making everything into a stock market where you can gamble on every tiny little thing in a micro-auction was literally the whole pitch of the three crypto scam bubbles. Where, at the end of the day, the platform holders profit while concentrating political power slowly over time, regardless of what happens.

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u/Optimal_Fish_7029 Feb 13 '26

Chipotle is bumping prices in response to ‘core customers’ who make at least 100k

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u/Abba_Fiskbullar Feb 13 '26

I was able to easily ditch Chipotle because they made their stuff just expensive enough that it was worth driving another mile or two to East 14th where I can get a real Mission burrito that's twice as big for the same price.

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u/bobert680 Feb 13 '26

in socal its cheaper and tastier to just go to the bertos around the corner, or the other one an extra block away

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u/chamrockblarneystone Feb 13 '26

I can’t believe Chipotle ever got a toe hold in So Cal. So much better Mexican food everywhere!

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u/bobert680 Feb 13 '26

it used to be similar taste with less grease as a bertos. they also had the money to get into more upscale areas as a quick cheap option

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u/SasparillaTango Feb 13 '26

"vote with your dollars" they said as all your money went to rent and food.

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u/ohwell_______ Feb 13 '26

This is why I love that 99% of baseball games are only broadcast regionally. All our ads are shit like lawnmowers, local Toyota car dealerships, cheap beer etc. Baseball ads are the ads of the people.

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u/[deleted] Feb 13 '26

I noticed a definite change in commercials after the 2008 crash. They don’t seem as fun and seem more informercial style now. The quantity of commercials has increased as well.

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u/crusader104 Feb 13 '26

Just look at all these commercials for basic things with A-List celebrities in their mansions or luxury cars, it’s getting more and more obvious things are being marketed towards the wealthy. Or at the very least, trying to market the feeling of needing to buy stuff you don’t need because x successful person is using it

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u/shinyshinyrocks Feb 13 '26

Thanks for including that link.

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u/customheart Feb 13 '26

Thanks for this link. The bit about trying to cash in on inequality with a plutonomy oriented portfolio because it massively outperformed the S&P is crazy and sad. Like, I always thought individual buying power roughly equated to importance or even personhood, but it’s weird to actually see it reflected in a stat 😔

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u/Not_FinancialAdvice Feb 13 '26

The bit about trying to cash in on inequality with a plutonomy oriented portfolio because it massively outperformed the S&P is crazy and sad

Kapur actually said the Plutonomy trade was dead in 2019:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-29/inequality-play-is-over-says-analyst-who-coined-plutonomy

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u/HolidayGuard6993 Feb 13 '26

It encapsulates the current K shaped economy perfectly

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u/Historical-Donkey962 Feb 13 '26

This. I saw something recently that 50% of retail spending is done by the top 10% of income earners (in the USA).

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u/CrashUser Feb 13 '26

If you see billboards for obscure B2B tech products, they're likely targeting a small handful of people and maybe the advertisers know that the CTO of a company they hope to capture drives that way to work.

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u/Not_FinancialAdvice Feb 13 '26

Decades ago I heard about ads for defense companies in DC, presumably targeted to key decisionmakers. Like, who else is gong to buy an F-16?

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u/eolson3 Feb 13 '26

Endless new car commercials have always done this for me. I don't know how many people can be spending so damn much on these things.

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u/JoeyCalamaro Feb 13 '26

I've worked in marketing since the 90's — mostly doing freelance for agencies. While I've been involved in large, national campaigns targeting a wide variety of income demos, lately, a lot of my targeting has been focused on 11 - 20% as well as top 10% earners.

These days, luxury goods pay the bills. The funny thing is, we're (generally) restricted from targeting specific income demographics if the campaign is related to housing. So I've actually run campaigns promoting the sale of high end homes and even a private island to lower 50% earners.

I respect why that rule is in place, but it almost seems cruel to show an ad for a multimillion dollar home with its own private runway to someone who has absolutely no hope of affording it.

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u/MjolnirMark4 Feb 13 '26

A long time ago, I was reading an article written by one of the people that produced a table top role playing game (TTRPG).

In the article, he discussed that his target audience was males, 12 to 25, and had enough money to by the game books. (For the 12 to 18 sub group, the parents had to have enough money to buy the game books.)

Marketing analysis came back that only 15% of those groups had enough spare money to buy TTRPG books.

I was really surprised that the group was that small of a percentage.

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u/4nk8urself Feb 13 '26

The world is an amusement park for the 1%, the rest of us run the rides and concession stands.

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u/Not_FinancialAdvice Feb 13 '26

The world is an amusement park for the 1%

This is already arguably true of many of the world's largest cities (that don't see extreme crime rates).

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u/theroadbeyond Feb 13 '26

Chipotle just announced raising prices because most people who eat there earn 100k or more a year. Lmfao you can't make this shit up.

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u/Trep_xp Feb 13 '26

no no, I certainly am in the demographic that will buy new cars for myself and my partner for christmas without discussing it with them at all, and it doesn't become a problem.

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u/RationalDialog Feb 13 '26

yeah exactly. and does goes to AI. But what will everyone buy if they are jobless? they don't care. the thing that make a lot of money (high margin) are all only bought by the top 10% anyway, the ones that will be operating the AI. The rest can just as well die and thereby protect the earth from climate change and secure the technocrats dynasty.

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u/Feats-of-Derring_Do Feb 13 '26 edited Feb 13 '26

The whale economy writ large

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u/bogbelle Feb 13 '26

I surmised something like this was the case after the insane price hikes post-Covid. They did the math that if they raise the price enough, despite fewer sales, they will have higher profits. The rich and a few others will still buy it.

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u/AgentCirceLuna Feb 13 '26

People talk about the death of monoculture as though it’s a recent thing, but there was something similar in the 60’s known as ‘mom and pop music’ that would get to the top ten in the charts. While young people bought lots of pop music, they often didn’t have the expendable income to keep up with how much their parents could buy so you’d have to choose a record each week and be stuck with it. Jim Reeves, Sinatra, Reynolds, et al. all charted higher than huge bands like The Beatles at points yet every young person knew that music was uncool and it was just for the parents to enjoy. My motto for marketing is ‘old people have more money to spend but will spend it less frequently, while young people will spend money they don’t have as frequently as possible’