Might be worth noting that I tend towards the depressed side already so my point of view might be a bit skewed. But when I watch Office Space or other works by Mike Judge, I realize I'm not exactly alone at least.
And keep in mind that this article is about a Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) type business - what about that is all that revolutionary? I'm sure the leadership wrapped it up as "empowering people to purchase goods they need today" or something else, but everyone knows they're selling people baubles like TVs with predatory lending, right?
I searched the VIN number in the state’s DMV car registration database. Well well. The car had an expired tag and had high thousands of dollars of unpaid taxes, fees and penalties against it. The owner had never bothered to pay any taxes and fees over the years. I would have to pay all those when doing the car transfer at DMV.
I was kind of pissed and disgusted. I then searched the VIN number on the web. Found the VIN in a post in a car forum for an attempt to sell the car. It had a phone number!
I searched the phone number. Got the name of the guy and his company. He was the founder and CEO of a startup.
...why are these are on the car and not on the person?
I talked to another car dealer and asked him about it. He said this kind of car was usually sold to people in another states, where their DMV won't enforce California's taxes and fines.
The lesson here is be sure to check for a clear title on the car, including DMV fees and fines, before making a purchase.
Well, thi is understandable but it doesn't explain why these fines are on the item and not on the person [who disn't paid the taxes]
Exactly. I've seen a lot of media coverage on Klarna (I'm Swedish), often with the angle "wow, innovation". The question I've too often wished journalist had asked is "Why?", what's the benefit of what you do? Except being more shiny.
Lot of waste in the tech sector. Sad how many skilled people work endlessly on more effective ways of pushing ads and loans, to make us desire and buy things we don't need with money we don't have.
No user account creation, no entering of address and credit card number. Just click purchase and confirm with BankID. I also like that they retain neatly organized purchase history across all vendors, including permanent storage of the product images.
I prefer klarna so much, that I occassionally simply go to another etailer if there is no Klarna checkout option in the first place I try to buy something.
Why not just use something like Swish?
The transaction is finished immediately. No need to de-select any "Pay later" options etc. No need to install their app on your phone.
No need to share your purchase history with some third party with an yet unknown (undetermined) monetization model. Swish is owned by your bank, and you already trust them with your transaction history.
Seems more convenient to me.
Perhaps Klarna really is better, but then again maybe that's why they're hemorrhaging money at such an impressive rate.
If a company doesn't make money, cash flow and / or profits (preferably both), it is just under cutting the competition (if smart) or on its way into bancrupcy (if not so smart) or both.
That is crazy if true. My fear is that there are a ton of tech companies like that, just chasing future profits or an acquisition, but not actually creating anything of value (at least in terms of profit).
I don't know. It just doesn't sit well with me knowing that a lot of products we build don't actually make any money. We're all just part of some weird system of money re-allocation and the software is just there as a signal that money should change hands.