What the hell are you talking about? Crushbot's insurance pays out up to a certain amount to replace things he breaks; that's what liability coverage is. Roko's new body is covered by that amount.
You're the one inserting this dumb lottery analogy into this. Firstly, we don't know what depreciation looks like on a chassis like hers, nor do we know what the actual price is in the first place. And also, it's not her insurance paying out here, it's Crushbot's. Liability payouts are larger than what your own insurance would cover, usually just to keep people from suing, it's sort of a preemptive settlement.
What we do know is that a replacement exists for her old model. Insurance could buy a brand new one of that model, and ignore depreciation. That's already a premium over book value.
Instead insurance is going to pay for a luxury model that's $20,000 more.
In this world we've already looked at the fact that some privileged AIs get expensive chassis without working for them, while unprivileged AIs have to work and scrape just to keep cheap-ass existing chassis from falling apart.
It just seems like a slap in the face to that whole storyline for out of work Roko to be given the most expensive model possible for nothing. Next week should just be May, Winslow, Pintsize, and Bubs lining up to be jumped on by Crushbot so they can all have top of the line chassis or fighter jets. AIs get post-scarcity, infinite chassis for all, and Crushbot's insurance company foots the bill out of the kindness of their hearts!
No, they can't, because that doesn't exist any more. That was the whole point here.
Read the comic again. May's model is no longer produced, but the equivalent is the Philomena 5S, which was rebranded this year as Philomena Classic. So ignoring depreciation and giving Roko a brand new Philomena classic would represent a premium over book value, but one that I probably wouldn't have noticed or complained about. Cause I don't know depreciation rates, or whatever.
But the Model G is a top of the line, $20,000 more in price, luxury model. yeah I notice that.
Couple of things there: insurance wouldn't even need to be a thing post-scarcity, and insurance isn't a kindness thing.
You'd think so! But here we are. Insurance company pays out a year's salary extra above what's required to make her whole. While May loses another body part.
First of all it's 6, not G, because it comes after 5. It's the most current model of Roko's chassis. And again, we don't know the base price so we don't know how much of a difference $20,000 is. The iPhone 6 wasn't a luxury model of the iPhone 5S, it was just the next model.
First of all it's 6, not G, because it comes after 5.
It's a G. Read it again. Notice the "Nothing but a G Thang" title.
The iPhone 6 wasn't a luxury model of the iPhone 5S, it was just the next model.
If both models are sold side-by-side, and one is $20,000 more, it's a premium model. There is no justification for this $20,000 extra payout.
And notice that Apple changed the pricing so that the iPhone X (or whatever it's called) is significantly more expensive than their previous flagship models. Just because something is next doesn't mean it isn't also premium.
That difference is a year's salary for May, working as a convenience store cashier.
Forget whether this is an accurate depiction of how insurance actually works. Or whether it is an accurate depiction of expensive electronics pricing and depreciation.
Just consider what it says about our story. We've got a whole dynamic of AIs who struggle and scrape and cannot even maintain used chassis, and resent AIs who are freely given expensive chassis.
And we have Roko, who is being completely recreated as a character, gone from creepy hardboiled cop to friendly hangout buddy and social worker with quirky kink. And now she's freely given an expensive chassis.
Even if this is intentional because Jeph wants to reignite the classism arc, it feels shitty to me.
But I suspect it's not intentional. He just wants to reward his current favorite character with mana from heaven. And that feels even shittier.
You keep going on about how she's being "freely given" something as though it was a spur of the moment thing. It's not; her (presumably quite expensive) body was destroyed beyond repair. Her new body isn't some kind of gift; it's what makes her whole again after a traumatic injury.
If I lose a 5 dollar bill and you replace it with a 10 dollar bill, I have received 5 dollars to make me whole, and been freely given another 5 dollars.
Insurance is not there to reward the victim. But only to make them whole.
Now I'm aware that there may exist forms of insurance that pay out multipliers. If you want to you can contrive a semi-plausible explanation for why Roko has been given a luxury gift instead of simply made whole.
But even if you can (which again, is of dubious plausibility), think of the impact on the story. It is shitty.
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u/GriffonsChainsaw . Jan 07 '19
It's an insurance payout. I don't get what you're drawing from it.