I’m not going to hate the company for trying, but if you’re a building admin using these instead of Oasis or Elkay fill stations you’re a huge fucking asshole.
I don’t see why this kind of behavior should be excused if exhibited by a company vs. an individual. Would you also not fault your friends “for trying” to be an asshole to you in day to day life? Are humans not making the strategic decisions for that company?
I mean people can develop and sell whatever product they want at the price they want. Usually I’d recommend voting with your wallet, but presumably this would be up to facility management to install these for a captive audience, who wouldn’t have much choice in the matter.
The company’s not trying to be an asshole it’s trying to make some money
But with all the money they’re saving, they’ll be able to renovate the admin building for the first time in two years, or have a nice dinner for the big donors, or give even more money to the football team.
Edit: assuming this is a uni. If not: won’t someone please think of the investors?
That’s how corporations nickel and dime you. I resist subscription services almost completely (I pay for cloud backup storage for my phone in case of breakage/theft and that’s it) because as well as being a constant financial drain they inevitably degrade and enshittify, often even removing things you paid for
“Your water subscription has increased by $1, thanks for being our customer. Reminder, creation of public fountains and bottle sharing activities are punishable by law!”
You sigh and delete the email. They send out the same message every month.
Damn, Power And Water cracked down on bottle-sharing now? /s
I would rather take the tap water than trust the maintenance of whatever filter they put in there.
i find it weird people don’t drink tap water, but i live in toronto so our tapwater is safe.
In America, tap water is either “Fine, maybe a little odd if you’re used to bottle water, but probably fine.” to “It’s not safe to drink this shit.”
Yeah I grew up trusting my local tap water which I drank regularly, and then I saw what happened in Flint and I became a little more wary. I always filter my water at home now.
You can typically look up your city’s water test results and see what’s in there or do your own testing. The vast majority of municipal water is plenty safe, and most issues with stuff like elevated lead come from the home/building itself, not the municipality.
Drinks water from gallon jugs because the faucet spews well water from limestone near an oil refinery
I know people who can’t tell the difference between the well and spring water, they are not my homies.
I can tell the difference between my cities perfectly adequate and safe tap water, and water that’s from a Brita.
There’s literally nothing wrong with my tap water at all. I use a Brita because I don’t like the taste of my tap water.
I know exactly zero other people who can tell the difference.
I started using a water filter because my cities water reeked of chlorine. Funnily enough a few months later a job listing appeared for a new water facility person and the water has not since smelled nor tasted bad, and that was about 5 years ago now
I live in the Phoenix area. Our tap water won’t kill you, but it tastes nasty. That’s because aside from the hardness, it’s so full of chlorine to kill the bacteria, amoebas, and fungus that might kill you otherwise, it’s like drinking swimming pool water. Anyone who can afford it has a reverse osmosis filter for drinking water. Anyone who can’t afford it buys bottled water, which is probably why they can’t afford the filter…
Protip: if it’s only chlorine and not chloramine you can gas it off. Fill a jug in the fridge and let it sit. Chloramine won’t allow this to happen because ammonia has been bonded to the chloride to make it stable i.e last longer in transport to customers. If that still makes it taste bad, I guess a filter or Brita type device is all I can say. Bottled water is horrible for you.
You actually can use a Brita and similar filter system for that. Here’s a pretty comprehensive video review of retail filters that one can buy. Had some fairly surprising results. And this guy is coming from your area as well.
But then you’ll miss out on the extra microplastics!
My balls are full, despite my best efforts.
Yes the capitalist dystopia is when some company provides free water to people, so they can make money on a refrigeration upsell.
The horror.
“Provides free water to people” is an amazing way to pretend they’re doing something valuable instead of inventing drinking fountains with a subscription.
Is it still a thing? The website doesn’t go anywhere and I can’t find the app. All I can actually find are a few articles talking about how ridiculous it is to have a $2 subscription service on water fountains.
All I could find were articles from 2017 and I haven’t heard of it before, so I’m gonna say it’s not a thing any more.
Oh that’s funny. I still see these things installed in some buildings but it’s not like I ever saw anyone bother with the “premium water” but also now sodastream is getting in on it for I think a higher cost actually…
Ugh. Please let this whole concept of selling tap water die.
I found this indiegogo link from 7 years ago which gives a little more background. Its not quite as horrible as the picture suggests, I think.
There’s some FAQ and Comments that give some background, like this one:
Rier Esor 7 years ago I’ve been asked by a few people: why do we need reefill water stations when there are water fountains around NYC (if you look hard enough!) and we >all have tap water at home? What’s my best answer?
Patrick Connorton 7 years ago PROJECT OWNER We’re also working with New York City and the Port Authority to map free public bottle filling stations around town – these are usually in or near >parks but, unfortunately, need to be off six months a year to avoid freezing and can be challenging to maintain. Reefill is a natural complement to >these fountains, filling in the gaps in parts of town where it is impractical or cost-prohibitive to install a water fountain.
So it doesn’t sound like these were replacing existing free water fountains, but instead offering free (and paid) water in places never offered before by generating revenue from the paid water to support the installation of any water (including new free water) in places that had none before.
It also looks like the project died in 2019.
filling in the gaps in parts of town where it is impractical or cost-prohibitive to install a water fountain.
As usual, if it’s a gap in our public services, the answer is not “let a private company do it” it’s “tax the fucking rich and use that money to improve our public services”.
Those water fountains didn’t even need to be water fountains. This was basically just a bastardized version of what they do in the UK. There’s a program over there called Refill, that businesses and public places participate in. You use a free app that shows you the locations of participating places, and those places have refill points, all for free.
This person probably saw that and thought “let’s ditch the free and the volunteer participation part, build unnecessary fountains in unsustainable areas, and try and make some money off that sweet public utility”
Smear something gross on the torment nexus button.
Jokes on you; I torrent my water!
I stream it
Leave.
I just cry myself a river.
A torrent of water, if you will.
And plenty of leachers.
What a bunch of seeders.
Those who buy into this shit lose their right to complain that they can’t afford to live.
Honestly, I expect nothing less than perfection. On drugs? Death. Playing xbox? Death. $2/mo water filtration? Death. If they just had more willpower, then they wouldn’t be homeless!
The guys who replaced public water fountains with plastic bottles are cool though.
Drill a fucking hole in that motherfucker and siphon it off. Or just drink tap water. It’s fine. At least where I live. But still drill a hole in there to fuck with them.
Actually… It’s straight up not safe to drink from here.
That feels like a boring dystopia in and of itself.
It’s a failed crowdfunding campaign, their last tweet is from 2017
Yup
Yeah this a meme. Thankfully common sense, common decency, and the market won out
I wonder if they returned the $40K
This is why we hack.
The best part about this is that the thumbnail makes the device like a face that’s very fed up with this shit.
Here’s something that could be provided for free. Instead of innovating, I’m going to invent a shit version of this thing, give you free access to that, and then charge for the original version.
Cooling and filtering water is hardly free, nor is the added maintenance. I don’t know the context here but it may be something the building should be paying for.
Anything that requires an app for payment is something I never use. No exceptions so far.
Even if it was free, opening an app to get water is bullshit.
Edit: Let the record show, I was referring to the chilled water.
It clearly says that you can push the button to get water.
It “clearly” says, “USE APP TO ACCESS”, so no, you can’t just push the button. It has to verify your subscription first.
Free what is obviously app less though.
It only requires the app for chilled and filtered. The regular tap water is still available.
@ch00f@lemmy.world said, “Even if it was free…” which implies he’s talking specifically about the paid button on the right and not the free button on the left.
The implication being even if the chilled and filtered water was also free, having to open an app for the button to work would be bullshit.
I think OP needs to explain because i also disagree with you.
Meh, he says, “opening an app to get water.” I think there’s some fudging going on here.
Water is available with no app.
Certain processed water is offered with an app.
Put me down on team “even if it was free…”
Keep fighting the good fight, it turns out words mean things.
