Does anyone remember what happened to Radio Shack?

They started out selling niche electronics supplies. Capacitors and transformers and shit. This was never the most popular thing, but they had an audience, one that they had a real lock on. No one else was doing that, so all the electronics geeks had to go to them, back in the days before online ordering. They branched out into other electronics too, but kept doing the electronic components.

Eventually they realize that they are making more money selling cell phones and remote control cars than they were with those electronic components. After all, everyone needs a cellphone and some electronic toys, but how many people need a multimeter and some resistors?

So they pivoted, and started only selling that stuff. All cellphones, all remote control cars, stop wasting store space on this niche shit.

And then Walmart and Target and Circuit City and Best Buy ate their lunch. Those companies were already running big stores that sold cellphones and remote control cars, and they had more leverage to get lower prices and selling more stuff meant they had more reasons to go in there, and they couldn't compete. Without the niche electronics stuff that had been their core brand, there was no reason to go to their stores. Everything they sold, you could get elsewhere, and almost always for cheaper, and probably you could buy 5 other things you needed while you were there, stuff Radio Shack didn't sell.

And Radio Shack is gone now. They had a small but loyal customer base that they were never going to lose, but they decided to switch to a bigger but more fickle customer base, one that would go somewhere else for convenience or a bargain. Rather than stick with what they were great at (and only they could do), they switched to something they were only okay at... putting them in a bigger pond with a lot of bigger fish who promptly out-competed them.

If Radio Shack had stayed with their core audience, who knows what would have happened? Maybe they wouldn't have made a billion dollars, but maybe they would still be around, still serving that community, still getting by. They may have had a small audience, but they had basically no competition for that audience. But yeah, we only know for sure what would happen if they decided to attempt to go more mainstream: They fail and die. We know for sure because that's what they did.

I don't know why I keep thinking about the story of what happened to Radio Shack. It just keeps feeling relevant for some reason.

Time shifting

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I wanted this but the original poster is transphobic

If you're newish to cooking and not sure what to do with your vegetables, toss them in oil, salt, and pepper and roast the everloving shit out of them. Cauliflower, Brussel sprouts, carrots, tomatoes, onions, parsnips, roast those little fuckers.

Grating a little parmesan over them afterward is entirely up to you.

Vegebul good. Vegebul with cheese better.

It's strange to see anyone surprised by Universal using a tactic as cruel as denying even shade to picket line members, in the heat-based hellscape that is Los Angeles. So let's try to condense the explanation.

By and large, executives are people who already come from wealth and privilege, and have that wealth and privilege protected throughout their life as they're escorted through whatever levels of education and then into employment.

Most of them have never received any kind of culture shock to make them aware of the struggles of 'lessers'. Their parents and peers had a vested interest in keeping the then-children from mixing with 'those people'.

They are insulated enough from daily life that they no longer see anyone outside their immediate wealth and influence bracket as human.

So a strike, to them, is not "people who want enough money to live and work in health", it's "The machine that makes us money is broken, get those workers back into their jobs so we can keep making money."

So the executives treat the strike like they would a broken machine or a disobedient pet. Hit it until it works, and replace it if it breaks.

And don't doubt for one minute that this wasn't at the advice of a Pinkerton or similar union-busting agency consultant. This is more than just petty; this is tactical cruely.

Obsessed with the DC tourist asking for clubs with a “no ugly people allowed” policy that plays house

Is this person NYC or LA? Place your bets

#if sir Walter elliot used reddit (@spookyohan)

oh my god this is me. i was addicted to designer amphetamines and completely delusional at the time of writing this. i had lost forty pounds and thought i was hot shit. i thought i was the reincarnation of Kurt Vonnegut. this was serious, and my friends laughed when they saw this go viral on twitter. it made me realize i had issues and im sober now. im also shocked i managed to stay employed at that time. To answer your question: im from LA but I grew up all around. I was living between Baltimore and NYC at the time. My mom is a beautiful Italian woman (Milan by way of Bolzano) and my dad is an insufferable Mexican from Montreal.

fwiw, my Reddit was suspended for this, im doing a lot better now, life is good, and im really happy :)

this is the most viscerally effective anti-drug PSA i've ever seen, not least because i think it's plausibly true, unlike the ones i normally see

rats live on no evil star

kings supporting kings

method acting as himbos

vote now !

no tags . this post 4 my followers

maybe i shouldn't have made it a week

no why is this getting reblogs my sample size nooooo

Well, I just followed you, so now I have a stake in this 😈😈😈😈😈

this is tumblr, the horny on main website and app

Diversity win! The mercenary assassinating you for union organization is bisexual!

We're proud to hire diverse unionbusters from all communities - as it makes infiltrating labour organisations much easier

THE LIBS WANT TO TAKE AWAY YOUR FERMENTED MEATBEER

looking out for his drummer

Good grief1 For a group that one thought might want to at least be seen trying to take the moral high ground, the Studio Execs do seem to be careening towards "Captain Planet baddy" levels of villainy rather faster than expected. Are they growing moustaches so they can twirl them?

I can't believe they did this the day before the New Jersey Onceler's new day in court, that the Tree Law-hungry portion of the internet had been anticipating for a whole month.

The curse of modern fandom is that it has allowed fans to get even closer to artists, but they won't view the artists as people.

Human limits, human mistakes, human feelings, human needs, are never ascribed to artists, and when other fans rightfully point out, "hey, humans are making this, maybe don't harass them or demand they cater to your personal tastes," it gets shut down under, "uh, people who make popular mainstream things are automatically Public Figures who are also probably rich, so eat the rich and destroy artists over every perceived minor fault. <3"

Even though there's, y'know, a really big strike currently going on because those artists are very much not rich or influential or in control of the bullshit.

The more friends I make in the various facets of the entertainment industry, and the more widely my own art gets shared, the more I realize that a lot of y'all genuinely don't see artists as human beings if they meet some arbitrary standard of Being Known Online.

There is no amount of online fame that makes someone subhuman and a valid target for blatant disrespect and harassment.

Contrary to popular belief, you do not actually own and control a piece of art just because you like it a lot. The artists are not subject to your personal whims and tastes. They owe you nothing.

↳ 4th time is a charm

watching people on tiktok consume borax is uh. something.

having to say “don’t eat borax” was not on my 2023 bingo

@the-puffinry

Can’t believe in the year 2023 we have to say: do not consume borax. It will not provide a “parasite cleanse”, it does not combat the “evil fluoride” in your water, and it is not a super mineral. It will damage your organs. Also, it’s not rated for human consumption so frankly, who knows what it’s cross-contaminated with (my personal bet would be arsenic).

static when you put on a wool sweater in the winter

watercolour on arches paper