<story><title>E-scooter startup Spin apparently uses RasPi 4s inside their scooters</title><url>https://abolish.social/@_/110828271798284741</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>notatoad</author><text>developing for esp32 is &lt;i&gt;way&lt;/i&gt; more difficult than developing for raspi.  raspi lets you basically treat it like a normal computer, you can use standard python and sqlite and install whatever nonsense you want from pip and basically assume it will run whatever your laptop can.  it means you can hire kids straight out of school, or outsource to india, and whoever you get can work on it without really any concern - it&amp;#x27;ll run whatever crap you give it.&lt;p&gt;esp32 is embedded enough that you have to develop for it like you develop embedded software - you need to do things like think about how much ram you&amp;#x27;re using that you just don&amp;#x27;t have to on raspi.</text></item><item><author>xeckr</author><text>&amp;gt;RPIs are out of stock because they&amp;#x27;re useful - this company found a use for them.&lt;p&gt;While I sympathize with this sentiment, it should be noted that their use case could have been most likely accomplished with something like an ESP32, which is only slightly more difficult to work with but boasts a bulk price of $1-3 a pop.&lt;p&gt;Using a Raspberry Pi 4 for this is a bit like flying a private jet to get to the grocery store.</text></item><item><author>arcticbull</author><text>&amp;gt; When opportunists go to crack them open, they find a raspberry pi, an SBC created for educational and hobby purposes but has been infamously out of stock because larger companies want to vacuum them all up to use in their own products.&lt;p&gt;What a strange complaint. RPIs are out of stock because they&amp;#x27;re useful - this company found a use for them. Really the issue isn&amp;#x27;t one of who&amp;#x27;s buying, but rather an issue of the Foundation not making enough of their wildly successful product. Seems like a high-quality problem.&lt;p&gt;I can&amp;#x27;t imagine the Foundation being up in arms over someone finding a use for their product. The more users, the better the economy of scale, the cheaper the product is for everyone.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Then you wonder where all the engineering cost for these scooters went.&lt;p&gt;Well, into the backend, the integration, the mechanical engineering - the myriad other things that mark the difference between a fun thing you made at home and a product you sell to the public.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; After the presumably thousands of hours of labor that went into designing this, they went with a consumer grade, off the shelf product for an application that would have required a fraction of the power it was capable of?&lt;p&gt;Again, economics of scale. One product that&amp;#x27;s more capable than any one person needs - but has a bigger audience - is likely cheaper than a niche one that&amp;#x27;s &amp;#x27;right-sized.&amp;#x27;&lt;p&gt;Your remote control doesn&amp;#x27;t need a Cortex M0 but they&amp;#x27;re cheaper than an 8051 now.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Not to mention that Spin can be identified as one of offenders of why the raspberry pi is so goddamn hard to find.&lt;p&gt;So can anyone who hit &amp;#x27;add to cart.&amp;#x27; Especially since they only have like 500-1000 scooters per city in which they operate. That&amp;#x27;s not exactly Apple-scale orders.&lt;p&gt;The issue is supply, not demand.</text></item><item><author>samtho</author><text>This would be hilariously satirical if it were not true and it highlights much of what is wrong with tech.&lt;p&gt;A benture capital subsidized micro mobility startup pulls out of a major city ostensibly because threshold for potential profit has been crossed and they’ve determined they cannot adjust their pricing to get the right numbers on their spreadsheet (note: this likely part of the reason why so many of these companies have trouble converting people to yearly plans, why bother if your market can be dropped with such swift indifference?). After pulling out of the market they leave their trash, that were assets a few days previous, scattered amongst the city as technological blight strewn across the landscape, left to rust. When opportunists go to crack them open, they find a raspberry pi, an SBC created for educational and hobby purposes but has been infamously out of stock because larger companies want to vacuum them all up to use in their own products. Then you wonder where all the engineering cost for these scooters went. After the presumably thousands of hours of labor that went into designing this, they went with a consumer grade, off the shelf product for an application that would have required a fraction of the power it was capable of? Not to mention that Spin can be identified as one of offenders of why the raspberry pi is so goddamn hard to find.&lt;p&gt;This all makes me irrationally irritated.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>superdisk</author><text>Problem: We need to outsource the software to India.&lt;p&gt;Solution: Put a way overpowered computer in the product so they can program it.&lt;p&gt;Ridiculous problem with a ridiculous solution. Are they allergic to any level of correctness? Sometimes I&amp;#x27;m ashamed to be in this industry.</text></comment>
<story><title>E-scooter startup Spin apparently uses RasPi 4s inside their scooters</title><url>https://abolish.social/@_/110828271798284741</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>notatoad</author><text>developing for esp32 is &lt;i&gt;way&lt;/i&gt; more difficult than developing for raspi.  raspi lets you basically treat it like a normal computer, you can use standard python and sqlite and install whatever nonsense you want from pip and basically assume it will run whatever your laptop can.  it means you can hire kids straight out of school, or outsource to india, and whoever you get can work on it without really any concern - it&amp;#x27;ll run whatever crap you give it.&lt;p&gt;esp32 is embedded enough that you have to develop for it like you develop embedded software - you need to do things like think about how much ram you&amp;#x27;re using that you just don&amp;#x27;t have to on raspi.</text></item><item><author>xeckr</author><text>&amp;gt;RPIs are out of stock because they&amp;#x27;re useful - this company found a use for them.&lt;p&gt;While I sympathize with this sentiment, it should be noted that their use case could have been most likely accomplished with something like an ESP32, which is only slightly more difficult to work with but boasts a bulk price of $1-3 a pop.&lt;p&gt;Using a Raspberry Pi 4 for this is a bit like flying a private jet to get to the grocery store.</text></item><item><author>arcticbull</author><text>&amp;gt; When opportunists go to crack them open, they find a raspberry pi, an SBC created for educational and hobby purposes but has been infamously out of stock because larger companies want to vacuum them all up to use in their own products.&lt;p&gt;What a strange complaint. RPIs are out of stock because they&amp;#x27;re useful - this company found a use for them. Really the issue isn&amp;#x27;t one of who&amp;#x27;s buying, but rather an issue of the Foundation not making enough of their wildly successful product. Seems like a high-quality problem.&lt;p&gt;I can&amp;#x27;t imagine the Foundation being up in arms over someone finding a use for their product. The more users, the better the economy of scale, the cheaper the product is for everyone.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Then you wonder where all the engineering cost for these scooters went.&lt;p&gt;Well, into the backend, the integration, the mechanical engineering - the myriad other things that mark the difference between a fun thing you made at home and a product you sell to the public.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; After the presumably thousands of hours of labor that went into designing this, they went with a consumer grade, off the shelf product for an application that would have required a fraction of the power it was capable of?&lt;p&gt;Again, economics of scale. One product that&amp;#x27;s more capable than any one person needs - but has a bigger audience - is likely cheaper than a niche one that&amp;#x27;s &amp;#x27;right-sized.&amp;#x27;&lt;p&gt;Your remote control doesn&amp;#x27;t need a Cortex M0 but they&amp;#x27;re cheaper than an 8051 now.&lt;p&gt;&amp;gt; Not to mention that Spin can be identified as one of offenders of why the raspberry pi is so goddamn hard to find.&lt;p&gt;So can anyone who hit &amp;#x27;add to cart.&amp;#x27; Especially since they only have like 500-1000 scooters per city in which they operate. That&amp;#x27;s not exactly Apple-scale orders.&lt;p&gt;The issue is supply, not demand.</text></item><item><author>samtho</author><text>This would be hilariously satirical if it were not true and it highlights much of what is wrong with tech.&lt;p&gt;A benture capital subsidized micro mobility startup pulls out of a major city ostensibly because threshold for potential profit has been crossed and they’ve determined they cannot adjust their pricing to get the right numbers on their spreadsheet (note: this likely part of the reason why so many of these companies have trouble converting people to yearly plans, why bother if your market can be dropped with such swift indifference?). After pulling out of the market they leave their trash, that were assets a few days previous, scattered amongst the city as technological blight strewn across the landscape, left to rust. When opportunists go to crack them open, they find a raspberry pi, an SBC created for educational and hobby purposes but has been infamously out of stock because larger companies want to vacuum them all up to use in their own products. Then you wonder where all the engineering cost for these scooters went. After the presumably thousands of hours of labor that went into designing this, they went with a consumer grade, off the shelf product for an application that would have required a fraction of the power it was capable of? Not to mention that Spin can be identified as one of offenders of why the raspberry pi is so goddamn hard to find.&lt;p&gt;This all makes me irrationally irritated.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>LordShredda</author><text>Take the money from the raspis and put it in a decent developer, then fire him once you unleash the scooters and break even after a couple months?
The issue here is the months long wait I assume</text></comment>