by Blender Dumbass

Aka: J.Y. Amihud. A Jewish by blood, multifaceted artist with experience in film-making, visual effects, programming, game development, music and more. A philosopher at heart. An activist for freedom and privacy. Anti-Paternalist. A user of Libre Software. Speaking at least 3 human languages. The writer and director of the 2023 film "Moria's Race" and the lead developer of it's game sequel "Dani's Race".

It was one of those nights that 79th didn't sleep. He and Pito Sage were working on a robot named Bill in Pito's home. It was illegal for 79th to be there. But non of them cared about it. 79th was glad to get out of his usual prison in the Kids Market. And Pito generally didn't care about anything illegal. For example, by law, in the place and time where they lived, connecting an artificial intelligence to an unfiltered internet was illegal. But Pito planned to do just that when Bill will be finished.

79th sipped his Blender Energy drink. A very interesting chemical marvel. It's not a drink we used to today. Not a caffeine + taurine mixture. Something much wilder. Something that even if would be explained to me in the most minute details would still leave me confused. Therefor I will not try to explain it. But the effect of which are so powerful that drinking one can of this drink makes for a good substitute of sleep. Not merely masking the effects of being tired. With the Blender Energy Drink you aren't tired at all.

So this was the day where they constructed the legs. A torso + head of Bill was laying on the table. And one of the legs was printing in a rather cheap looking 3D printer.

Suddenly, on the main screen, an ad popped up. It went - "On earth you got the law. On earth you got the gravity. In space say blip to law, say blip to gravity. Fidget space! Only with OPSA".

lbry://@BlenderDumbassImagesHostingForTextArticels#c/fidget_space_opsa#2

"This is a scam!" - exclaimed Pito. Even though wearing an OPSA hoodie. 79th came to him from behind and tapped him on the shoulder. When Pito looked around, 79th gestured him something with his hands. It was sign language. And it meant - "Well why then you don't install an ad blocker, you dumbass?".

Pito sat down and frowned to himself. He said - "Well then I would be a scam. I make money now only from ads on my various publications. If I'd block ads coming my way, what does it make me? It makes me a hypocrite.". 79th was a young kid. He didn't know yet what "hypocrite" means. So he asked what it means using his hands.

"Dude, I know you can talk! Why don't you talk?". Pito was angry at something. Perhaps he remembered OPSA. Or remembered why he was fired from there. 79th saw that Pito was saddened. So he came closer and gave him a hug. Pito looked at 79th and said - "Sorry, you don't want to talk, it's fine. Hypocrite is a ..."

Before I will continue the story I want you to pay attention to something else. A project of mine. Quite frankly this time the text will be minimal. There will be a short video instead.

lbry://@blenderdumbass#f/morias-race-teaser-01#f

... COME TO THE LIVESTREAM !!! ...

Click on my dumb face to get to the livestream

"Hypocrite is a person that says he believes one thing but with actions proves that he believes a different thing. Or something like this." - said Pito.

79th drew another chair to sit right in front of Pito. He gestured - "Okay, but why do you think OPSA is a scam?".

"Because there are interplanetary laws. And they say that in space, there is no law."

"Correction. They say 'in space, say blip to law'. They are telling you to say something to the law, not that it doesn't exist."

"What are you, their lawyer? They worded it in such a way that people assume that in space you can do whatever you want."

"And you can't do anything you want in space?"

"No! There is law!"

"But there is no police."

"So what? Somebody else, perhaps a captain of the ship might... wait the second. You are right. If there was no law, other people can still hurt you for doing things they do not like. Hm..."

"See, not a scam."

"Still a scam! They charge way too much."

79th sighed. He looked into his mind and tried to formulate the next sentence that he is going to gesture - "Pito, I sit a lot in the Kids Market alone and have nothing to do. I think about the world a lot. I think that it's not bad that for you their price is too high."

"Everybody says that their price is too high. It's not only me."

"Well, they are still in Business. Meaning they make more money than what it costs them."

"They make more money since their price is too high. Nobody going to buy from them at such ludicrous price."

"Is this 'hypocrite'?"

"What?"

"You just confirmed that they make money and then said that nobody buys from them. Those are contradictory ideas."

Pito pretended to think about something smart. While in reality he thought about what he just said. And how stupid it was. He frowned at himself. Then he said - "So you are telling me that I'm too poor to buy an OPSA flight?"

"I didn't get to that yet."

"You wanted to say that I'm..."

79th waved his hands to stop Pito from talking and then gestured - "Sorry. I meant to say. I didn't get to my point yet."

Pito suddenly looked like an offended child. His cheeks inflated. He looked to the side with his arms crossed. 79th needed to walk over so Pito would see him gesturing. As soon as he stood in front of Pito, Pito looked the other way. Suddenly, Pito himself started talking - "I have the money for their god damned flight!".

79th, after a few tries of catching up with Pito, gave up trying and said with a very silent whisper - "Why then you never flew with OPSA?".

"See! I told you, you can talk!" - Pito suddenly forgot about everything and was pointing his finger right at 79th face.

"It's not pleasant for me to talk." - gestured 79th.

"I have the money to buy the damn flight. I just don't want to. I have no reason to go into space!"

"Exactly!"

"What exactly? You wanted to tell me that I'm too poor."

"No."

"What no?"

"No. I wanted to tell you that you don't want to fly into space."

"This does not prove anything!" - Pito said and got confused. He thought about that maybe that made him a hypocrite somehow. Even though he could not connect the dots on how exactly it could make him a hypocrite.

"Your value for the flight with OPSA is less than the price they offer."

"Yes, because their price is too high."

"No. It's because your value is low compared to their price."

"Because their price is too high!"

"For you, since your value is lower than their price."

"Yes! Their price is too high."

79th jumped around the room opening his mouth as if screaming. He walked to and fro for a little bit, trying to understand where did Pito failed to understand him and then calmed down and went in front of Pito again. All this time Pito was bewildered by 79th and questioned what he didn't understand. 79th seemed to be agreeing with him, but not agreeing with him. And it made little sense to him.

"Value is subjective." - finally gestured 79th.

This made Pito throw on a thoughtful look. He thought about it. And then he thought about it more. Then he turned to the screen where the ad played and said - "Computer, what's the price of OPSA's flight into space?". Computer said - "It's 399.99 new dollars.". "What's the estimated cost to perform a flight into space for one person today?" - said Pito with a very serious face. He was about to prove something. The computer answered - "On average, today's price of spaceflight is 2.45 new dollars per kilogram. With an average human weight of 90 kilograms it's 220.5 new dollars for one human."

"See?" - said Pito - "...their price is too high, almost a double."

"On average the humans want to go to space at about 400 dollars" - gestured 79th - "On average, because if there was no variations the whole 'money' idea would not work to begin with."

Pito got even more confused. What the hell did 79th just tried to say? He tried not to think too much about it. He said - "To produce a space flight of 1 kilogram of stuff you need 2.5 new dollars. You heard it yourself.".

"Let's say some dude wants to buy Bill here. He will ask you how much did it cost to make him. And will ask you how much did you work on it. And will provide the exact price. Would you sell?"

"No, I don't want to sell him."

"Why?"

"What why?"

"Because of the 'Bill' boy? Because it's personal?"

"Yes, because of the 'Bill' boy. And yes because it's personal. Are you jealous or something?"

"So you hold special value to the Bill that other people don't."

"Yes."

"Value is subjective."

Pito opened his mouth in an attempt to say something. But suddenly he realized that 79th didn't talk about price. But rather about value. And he claimed value to be subjective, not price.

"So, wait... what are you trying to say here?" - asked Pito thoughtfully.

79th gestured - "The flight with OPSA is valuable enough to enough people that they are willing to pay 400 new dollars to get onto the flight. You don't have as much reason to go flying into space. You want to stay on earth more. Therefor you don't hold a lot of value for this flight. Therefor for you it's seems ludicrous to pay 400 new dollars for it, even though you have 400 new dollars."

"Wow!" - said Pito with his jaw dropped - "It's like if I produce something that I don't really care about. But you do. I can give you it for something you don't care as much about but I do. That's profound. That's ingenious. That's soooo... coooool... Oh my god 79th... You are sooo.... smart! Holly craziness. Holy shit. Holy molly. Hell yeah. Holly hell. Wow..."

79th gestured him to stop.

"But wait!" - said Pito finally waking up from his "Holly mollies" - "It takes me for example 2 new dollars to produce something. Why wouldn't I just put a price a bit more than 2 new dollars. Perhaps 3 new dollars. And then I can get more people buying the thing. Isn't it?"

"Well, first of all not all people want to buy the thing. If I make copies of Bill for example, not everybody wants a Bill."

"Yeah, but, say, somebody has a desire to buy something but it's just not as important as, say, food to him. If you lower the price than he'll buy. No?"

"You are talking about sales?"

"Sales? Oh... sure! Sales! Hm... yeah, but those are done only when the thing kind of goes out of fashion, in a way."

"How many Bills can you produce?"

"What?" - Pito couldn't put together what 79th question was related to. But suddenly he realized what the question was about. Even if he wanted very hard, he could make only so many Bills per so much time. As any other business can produce only so many goods and so much service as they are capable of providing. No more. "So..." - he said - "...to reduce how much they need to work they put the price up?".

"To balance it." - gestured 79th.

"Oh yes, there is a balancing act here. Put the price too high and you can't sell to nobody."

"And you told me that nobody will buy from them."

"Oh... shut up!"

Pito tried thinking about it more, but his attention was grabbed by an alarm. The 3D printed just finished printing the leg. "The leg..." - he said and they both went towards it. By the morning the leg was fully assembled and 79th returned to his prison in the Kids Market 4211 block D. Pito on the other hand went to sleep. As he closed his eyes he remembered why OPSA rockets priced the way they are. He understood now. Everything was a scam. Everything was a scam for at least somebody.

Happy Hacking!



















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