Taking The Place Of…
John Ink2Quill
www.ink2quill.com

Taking the place of … what? Everything gets replaced. In the office you see technology replaced every other week, or so it seems. New computers, software, chairs, desks are all things that change in the office every so often. But we’re used to that. We change our clothes, replace old clothes with new ones, buy the latest shoes or pants and throw away the old and worn clothes. But, again, we’re used to that.

So much of our economy relies on us, the consumer, buying the latest thing. I heard that in the old days people used to say that luxury goods last forever. You buy a pair of luxury, bespoke shoes and you have them forever. You can resole those worn soles and give them old bespoke shoes a shine and presto… they are good to go. Luxury used to mean quality and beauty. But today luxury just means beauty, temporary beauty. As in something to be replaced when the fashion trends change. Luxury is no longer synonymous with quality anymore. Quality is almost a bad word these days. And what are some of the luxury goods that people buy and expect to have forever? Let’s go down the list.

There are diamonds and jewels for starters. Jewels, expensive jewels, can be cleaned and reset but in essence should last forever. Their sparkle never fades. And they do sparkle forever. But, but, but. There is the emergence of fake precious stones and even machine made precious stones. The emergence of man made precious stones is threatening the precious stones market. Pretty soon precious stones will become a “fake” luxury item, machine made, and replaceable every so often because of the sinking price. So, the organic, nature made is being replaced with the synthetic.

What about fashion? Well people are always buying new clothes and some people buy luxury, expensive clothes often. But, but, but. In fashion there is the emergence of fake, fraudulent name brands that sell for cheaper. And, and, and. The quality is no longer there in nearly all cases. You need only look on the sidewalks of New York City around 34th street, Canal street and abroad in the Philippines, Thailand, Korea, India and many more places which boast brand fakes that will fool most people. All these types of crimes erode the luxury brand markets and I think the worst hit is the luxury watch market which continues to slide in price and worth. The say that digital watches, particularly Apple watches, earn more money then all the other analog watch brands combined. The analog, luxury watch market seems to be collapsing. In this case we have replaced analog with digital.

The most legitimate replacement I can think of is technology. Having machines that work faster with bigger memory, better images and more software is a good replacement. What about AI? Is that a good replacement? When our machines can do certain tasks faster than us can we call that a good replacement of the old and outdated? Even if the emerging AI gets some tasks wrong or gets the buyer of their services in trouble for stolen or plagiarized work many would still call its use a bargain. And if we slant the courts and laws in favor of the AI there is even more profit to be made. Get rid of those pesky anti-trust laws and copyright, individual ownership laws and a robber baron could make a killing with this new sidekick. Since when do the replaced get a voice?

John Ink2Quill

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