Empty shopfronts on rise in BA as retail crisis deepens

[Alby]

There certainly is a generational shift...One of the primary reasons to enter a ferreteria wasn't just finding a widget insofar as asking for some advice on how to fix something. The new generation is happy to order it online and seek the answer on youtube.

Wait til they wake up to the fact that by photographing/filming your precise problem and loading the images to AI, you can step through a tailored solution, as if the guy from the ferret shop had come home with you, without having to infer from generic videos. The same goes for car repairs and servicing, IT hardware and software glitches, and all manner of other practical problems.

 

[Rich One]

You bring us lots of blue sky , seven shops open three close, your balance is positive business is thriving . You surely heard of the journalists "ensobrados"

 

[Paige55]

You bring us lots of blue sky , seven shops open three close, your balance is positive business is thriving . You surely heard of the journalists "ensobrados"

Dread sells, and the news relies on conjuring that dread for clickbait. It's been this way for decades...I clearly remember the saying when I was in journalism school, "if it bleeds, it leads." It's been near impossible to find true news in the years since. Ethics, and facts, and reporting several sides to every story is out the window. It's been replaced largely with propaganda and the 'think piece.'

It's a real shame. Humans weren't meant to be deluged with this much negativity and no way to parse it, or fix such compounding woes. It's a form a psychological warfare from the whole upper echelon (no matter their political affiliation), to keep those of us who might seek to change the status quo too busy and fatigued.

I try to find the levity where it obviously exists. In my years on earth every business that shutters is quickly replaced with something new. I really think the churn is based more on trends than on some nefarious new government, though I'm not a fan of Milei. It's always been really hard to open a business here in the city. Even through the prior leftist and moderate right-leaning governments, who strapped owners with so much red tape it seemed comical to even think of branching out into a business career at all. I don't think any 'side' of government is friendly to small businesses they can't siphon off of in the long-term. That's capitalism in a nutshell. Our labor sets up a fine life for a select few...and we're left with depreciating spending capabilities year-on-year while those select few issue themselves high payouts and get to toy around with stocks and passive income. I don't know. It all stinks, but there's more to life than my opinion, and my experience, so I tend to seek out as many possibilities for the storefront purge as possible. It comes down to more than just 'Milei bad." And using the one-prong excuse for a problem that is a lot more complicated ensures a problem never gets solved...and just kicked down the path until there is nobody left to point a finger at.

 

[LuckyLuke]

Wait til they wake up to the fact that by photographing/filming your precise problem and loading the images to AI, you can step through a tailored solution, as if the guy from the ferret shop had come home with you, without having to infer from generic videos. The same goes for car repairs and servicing, IT hardware and software glitches, and all manner of other practical problems.

I could see this to some extent but with application limits. I recently ordered a trail hitch kit for my Cronos only to discover that Fiat manufactured it without any pre-drilled holes. I didn't have a car lift, the drill bits or the welding tools to install it myself. It would have been much more expensive and time consuming than simply hiring someone dedicated to that craft.

 

[Ries]

Wait til they wake up to the fact that by photographing/filming your precise problem and loading the images to AI, you can step through a tailored solution, as if the guy from the ferret shop had come home with you, without having to infer from generic videos. The same goes for car repairs and servicing, IT hardware and software glitches, and all manner of other practical problems.

this works with some things- figuring out how to turn off the child proof lock on your washing machine, say.
But many things are a bit more complicated.
Generally speaking, common mass produced consumer items can be diagnosed up to a point by youtube videos.
and then you have 150 years of Argentine technology, layer upon layer.
There are five different types of very similar window latches, dating to 1900, and there is a shop on Sarimiento that stocks 3, and can tell you which ones are not repairable and need replacement.
There is ONE type of variable switch for table lamps stocked in BA, and easy youtube videos showing you how to replace 4 types that are not available here.
Many repairs require tools, or experience, and just watching a video does not make you an electrician or a plumber.

But, sure, I watch em all the time- I learned the neat trick of using my forklift to lift the entire bed off my Ford pickup, to much more easily replace the faulty fuel pump. Which is great, if like me, you have a forklift...

 

[Alby]

My point was quite different. I was trying to say that YouTube videos are too generic for many specific problems, whereas filming your unique problem and loading it to AI can lead to spectacular results. I was never able to fix or service anything with a Youtube video (am not particilarly handy, and an IT technophobe), but since AI came along have had the machine diagnose and solve for me various household, vehicle and IT matters simply by loading images of the problem (and then more images of the fix the machine develops as the process unfolds step by step).

 

[SlowWalker]

My point was quite different. I was trying to say that YouTube videos are too generic for many specific problems, whereas filming your unique problem and loading it to AI can lead to spectacular results. I was never able to fix or service anything with a Youtube video (am not particilarly handy, and an IT technophobe), but since AI came along have had the machine diagnose and solve for me various household, vehicle and IT matters simply by loading images of the problem (and then more images of the fix the machine develops as the process unfolds step by step).

That's really cool.

I struggle to actually find uses for it so it's cool to hear practical examples.

 

[Ale65]

AI can be helpful. I asked it to structurally evaluate a house I was looking at and it taught me a couple of useful tricks.

 

[LuckyLuke]

My point was quite different. I was trying to say that YouTube videos are too generic for many specific problems, whereas filming your unique problem and loading it to AI can lead to spectacular results. I was never able to fix or service anything with a Youtube video (am not particilarly handy, and an IT technophobe), but since AI came along have had the machine diagnose and solve for me various household, vehicle and IT matters simply by loading images of the problem (and then more images of the fix the machine develops as the process unfolds step by step).

Great little tip there Alby. My wife has been talking about her plant looking sad and with a photo it was able to make a few recommendations.

 

[SlowWalker]

I've asked to give me a list of names and to generate a logo for a food service. But other than that it's mainly just been short summaries at the top of a Google search.

A friend was doing inventory by counting items in boxes in shelves and I was wondering if you could just take photos and upload it and have it do the inventory exercise for you and output a table, but I didn't try.

I'll definitely keep it in mind when faced with a problem.