The Nobility Should Act Nobly, Right?

Show Notes:
Links:
Micromort
Noblesse oblige
Josh's dotfiles
GitHub Code Spaces

Full Transcript:
Ben:
Yeah. I've been holding out for the new MacBook Pros. The M1 is pretty tempting, but I want whatever comes next. I want the 16-inch new hotness that's apparently supposed to be launching in November, but I've been waiting for it so patiently for so long now.

Josh:
Will they have the M2?

Ben:
Yeah, either or that or M1X. People are kind of unsure what the odds are.

Starr:
Why do they do that? Why did they make an M1 if they can't make an M2? Why do they have to keep... You just started, people. You can just have a normal naming scheme that just increments. Why not?

Josh:
M1.1?

Ben:
That would be awesome.

Starr:
Oh, Lord.

Josh:
Yeah, it would.

Ben:
M1A, Beachfront Avenue.

Starr:
So last week we did an Ask Me Anything on Indie Hackers, and that was a lot of fun.

Josh:
It was a lot of fun.

Starr:
I don't know. One of the most interesting questions on there was some guy was just like, "Are you rich?" I started thinking about it. I was like, "I literally have no idea." It reminded me of when I used to live in New York briefly in the '90s or, no, the early '00s. There was a Village Voice article in which they found... They started out with somebody not making very much money, and they're like, "Hey, what is rich to you?" Then that person described that. Then they went and found a person who had that level of income and stuff and they asked them, and it just kept going up long past the point where... Basically, nobody ever was like, "Yeah, I'm rich."

Josh:
Yeah. At the end, they're like, "Jeff Bezos, what is rich? What is rich to you?"

Starr:
Yeah.

Josh:
He's like, "Own your own star system."

Starr:
So, yeah, I don't know. I feel like I'm doing pretty good for myself because I went to fill up my car with gas the other day and I just didn't even look at the price. The other day, I wanted to snack, so I just got a whole bag of cashews, and I was just chowing down on those. I didn't need to save that. I could always get another bag of cashews.

Ben:
Cashews are my arch nemesis, man. I can't pass up the cashews. As far as the nut kingdom, man, they are my weakness.

Starr:
I know. It's the subtle sweetness.

Ben:
It's so good. The buttery goodness.

Starr:
Yeah, the smoothness of the texture, the subtle sweetness, it's all there.

Ben:
That and pistachios. I could die eating cashews and pistachios.

Josh:
There you go. I like pistachios.

Ben:
Speaking of being rich, did you see Patrick McKenzie's tweet about noblesse oblige?

Josh:
No. Tell me.

Ben:
Yeah, we'll have to link it up in the show notes. But, basically, the idea is when you reach a certain level of richness, I guess, when you feel kind of rich, you should be super generous, right? So noblesse oblige is the notion that nobility should act nobly. If you have been entrusted with this respect of the community and you're a noble, then you ought to act a certain way. You got to act like a noble, right? You should be respectful and et cetera. So Patio was applying this to modern day, and he's like, "Well, we should bring this back," like if you're a well-paid software developer living in the United States of America, you go and you purchase something, let's say a coffee, that has basically zero impact on your budget, right? You don't notice that $10 or whatever that you're spending. Then just normalize giving a 100% tip because you will hardly feel it, but the person you're giving it to, that'll just make their day, right? So doing things like that. I was like, "Oh, that's"-

Josh:
Being generous.

Ben:
Yeah, it's being generous. Yeah. So I like that idea.

Josh:
That's cool.

Ben:
So-

Starr:
So it's okay to be rich as long as you're not a rich asshole.

Ben:
Exactly. Exactly. That's a good way to bring it forward there, Starr.

Starr:
There you go. I don't know. Yeah. I think there's some historical... I don't know. The phrase noblesse oblige kind of grates at me a little bit in a way that I can't quite articulate in this moment, but I'll think about that, and I will get back with you.

Josh:
Wait. Are you saying you don't identify as part of the nobility?

Starr:
No.

Ben:
I mean, I think there's a lot of things from the regency period that we should bring back, like governesses, because who wants to send your child to school in the middle of a COVID pandemic? So just bring the teacher home, right?

Starr:
Yeah. That's pretty sexist. Why does it have to be gendered? Anyway.

Ben:
Okay, it could be a governor, but you might get a little misunderstanding. All of a sudden, you've got Jay Inslee showing up on your doorstep, "I heard you wanted me to come teach your kids."

Josh:
I don't know. I'll just take an algorithm in the home to teach my kids, just entrust them to it.

Starr:
Yeah. Oh, speaking of bringing things back, I told y'all, but I'll tell our podcast listeners. On Sunday, I'm driving to Tacoma to go to somebody's basement and look at a 100-year old printing press to possibly transport to Seattle and put in my office for no good reason that I can think of. It just seems to be something that I'm doing.

Josh:
Do you like that none of us actually asked you what you were intending to do with it? I was like, "Yeah, just let me know when you need to move it. I'm there." I just assumed you were going to do something cool with it, but ... Yeah.

Starr:
I appreciate that. I appreciate the support. I'm going to make little zines or something. I don't know.

Josh:
Yeah. If I get a lifetime subscription to your zine-

Starr:
Okay, awesome.

Josh:
... that would be payment.

Starr:
Done. Done.

Josh:
Cool.

Ben:
Yeah, sign me up, too. I'll be there.

Starr:
Well, I appreciate that.

Ben:
I mean, who could resist that invitation, right, because you get to... If you get to help with moving that thing, you get to see it, you get to touch it and play with it, but you don't have to keep it. It's somebody else's problem when you're done with the day, so sounds great to me.

Starr:
There you go. Well, I mean, if you read the forums about these things, this is one of the smaller ones, so people are just like, "Ah, no big deal. No big deal. It's okay." But I was happy to hear that there's no stairs involved.

Ben:
That is the deal-breaker. Yeah.

Josh:
Yeah. But it-

Ben:
If you ever get the friend helping you to move their piano, you always ask, "Okay, how many flights of steps," right?

Starr:
Yeah. Oh, I just thought of something I could do with it. I could make us all nice business card to hand out to nobody.

Ben:
Because we're not going anywhere.

Josh:
I just think of my last six attempts at having business cards. They're all still sitting in my closet, all six boxes of-

Starr:
I know. People look at you like, "What, really, a business card? What?"

Josh:
Yeah, like all six generations.

Starr:
Yeah.

Ben:
I hand out one or two per year. Yeah, just random people and like, "Hey, here's my phone number." It's an easy way to give it to somebody.

Josh:
Just people on the street?

Ben:
Exactly. Like a decent fellow, "Here you go." Thank you.

Josh:
Yea...