"...but in the meantime, you can help as an individual. I recommend that you refuse to buy as much as a guitar pick from any company currently owned by a private equity firm, or any financial entity that does not come from the music industry itself."
Well, ok, but how many people really pay attention to the ownership structure of companies they purchase products from?
I know that 'vote with your dollars' is a typical answer to problems like this. On average, I suppose I purchase ~5 individual items each day. I don't really have the time to make sure that each of these companies that make these products conduct themselves in a manner that I consider ethically sound.
Scan a bar code before you buy a product and see either a big red "EVIL" banner or a big green "GOOD" banner, depending on the ownership structure of the company who makes the product.
Version 2 could let you configure what things you consider evil (owned by private equity, venture-backed, owned by cigarette companies, etc.)
I used to work in Investment Management, primarily with wealthy clients.
Some clients would request that portions of their portfolio be devoted to 'Ethical', 'Socially Responsible', 'Green', etc. companies or funds. Ask them to elaborate on what exactly constitutes a 'Socially Responsible' company, and you get wildly different answers.
I guess what I am getting at is any definition of 'EVIL' or 'GOOD' is highly subjective. For example, not everyone would consider cigarette companies to be 'EVIL' ;)
This happens on its own and is helped along by brand positioning, because people's attention spans are quite limited and they're generally fighting yesterday's battle. Witness the wildly differing attitudes towards Walmart vs Target, when they're basically the same thing.
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"...but in the meantime, you can help as an individual. I recommend that you refuse to buy as much as a guitar pick from any company currently owned by a private equity firm, or any financial entity that does not come from the music industry itself."
Well, ok, but how many people really pay attention to the ownership structure of companies they purchase products from?
I know that 'vote with your dollars' is a typical answer to problems like this. On average, I suppose I purchase ~5 individual items each day. I don't really have the time to make sure that each of these companies that make these products conduct themselves in a manner that I consider ethically sound.
There's an app idea in the making:
Scan a bar code before you buy a product and see either a big red "EVIL" banner or a big green "GOOD" banner, depending on the ownership structure of the company who makes the product.
Version 2 could let you configure what things you consider evil (owned by private equity, venture-backed, owned by cigarette companies, etc.)
I used to work in Investment Management, primarily with wealthy clients.
Some clients would request that portions of their portfolio be devoted to 'Ethical', 'Socially Responsible', 'Green', etc. companies or funds. Ask them to elaborate on what exactly constitutes a 'Socially Responsible' company, and you get wildly different answers.
I guess what I am getting at is any definition of 'EVIL' or 'GOOD' is highly subjective. For example, not everyone would consider cigarette companies to be 'EVIL' ;)
Easy, just set a number of traits for each company/product and let the user decide what doesn't they want to buy.
Add info about country of origin, political affiliation of owner, or things like that, and you have a nice tool for boycotts.
Didn't something like this already exist?
This app exists, it's called Buycott: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.buycott.an...
And version 3 you monetize by selling GOOD banners evil companies. Genius.
This happens on its own and is helped along by brand positioning, because people's attention spans are quite limited and they're generally fighting yesterday's battle. Witness the wildly differing attitudes towards Walmart vs Target, when they're basically the same thing.