This article is written almost entirely from the seller's point of view, of course seller does not want to pay any fees. Some of the claims that buyer get same level of protection without chargeback is hilarious, it might be true that the author get special treatment as a foreigner in China from the government (the 12315 statement), but that's far from a typical customer experience.
"Chinese consumer law also gives buyers stronger remedies when a merchant knowingly commits fraud, including damages above the purchase price."
There is no small claim court or equivalent in China, 12315 is likely the closest but they can only provide recommendations, they cannot freeze assets or issue demands like a court. In absence of chargeback, the buyer owns the burden of gather evidence and proof, which usually includes paid test reports from trusted government agencies that the item is defect. In practice, a seller ships junk or nothing often get to keep the money and close the shop before you can get the money back.
You can't chargeback on debit cards which most of the world uses so this point is moot for most people. I've never owned a credit card in my life and while it's not exactly a hot topic of conversation I don't think most of my friends or family have either (European). I rely on EU consumer protection laws rather than chargebacks, and those wouldn't change if I was paying by a QR code instead of Visa.
You absolutely can do chargebacks on debit cards. I say this as an european, having done chargebacks myself and having advised friends in doing the same, with debit cards. I can only say this for Visa/MasterCard branded cards though; rules may be different in national networks.
I just looked it up and you're right, but chargeback is like a fraud dispute then? I did have to make a dispute on a completely fake charge on my card once, through visa, and it took weeks, they denied it once, then they threatened me that if I appealed that and it got denied again there was going to be a ~€500 charge for the failed appeal. Given that the actual fraud was about €650 that was a bad deal but I risked it since it was such clear fraud (someone ordered a bunch of stuff from the ios store, I don't own a single Apple device or have an apple account, and the email address was someone else's). Luckily it went through the second time and I got the money back but if that's what counts for "consumer protection" I'll go for EU laws in future, thanks.
If there are 12 sellers, and some claim to be from your country (but you won't find the truth out until you buy), and some are clearly from China, and all have few or no recommendations, and the product isn't available locally to you... how do you determine "unreputable"?
"Reputable" is, and always has been (since at least 1750 BCE), a trust call. It is easier than ever before to appear to be reputable - the business you are buying from may be nothing more than one of many fronts for a business. If it's an older, known brand, it may have been bought recently and squeezed for profit extraction.
iPhones sold in China have that in settings, you can block both WLAN(Wi-Fi) and Cellular data per app. Why that turned out to be a nightmare is a different story
Assume the numbers are correct, Pi spent $100 for a PCB with some components; Neo's hardware includes keyboard, 13 inch display, aluminum chassis, battery, charger. You remove the costs of the above from that $500.
The terminal and CLI app within ran locally on a smartphone, which was the premise of the experiments within the linked post.
They also weren't comparing a Swift app on an iPhone with their Android run, they were comparing both against "... the system in the research paper that originally introduced vectorized query processing[.]"
The microchip stores nothing but a serial number. I don’t quite understand the design that you would need a vendor to maintain a database between the serial and owner information, why not just store owner phone number like a traditional dog tag?
It's a permanent primary key into "an" owner database. Unfortunately, there are 40+ databases as there are that many registration companies. I don't even know if there's a unified interface to query all of them simultaneously. Does anyone know how the queries work if a pet be registered in some small or obscure registry that's not supported by every shelter/agency?
Beyond some size, antique items become less valuable, because of the sheer headaches of moving and storing them. This thing qualifies. Antique Teletype machines are not very expensive. People have bought Linotype machines for $200. Trying to find a home for a locomotive is very tough. (When the Pacific Locomotive Society lost their lease at Hunter's Point Naval Station, they had a big problem. Most of their fleet is now stored at Brightside on the Niles Canyon Railway.)
Like pianos. Unless they are very good, their value tends to go in the negative numbers with time, as you have to move them somehow.
In my parents place, an apartment in a second floor, there's an upright Yamaha that my dad bought in the late 70s or early 80s. I think they brought them in through the stairs, but like 10 years ago an elevator was added to the building lobby, and I don't think there is enough space to move it around. I think the piano will remain with the apartment forever :D
Pianos also have a shelf life. It’s usually a couple of decades depending on use and maintenance levels, but eventually maintaining it turns into just building a whole new piano in the same box
I get the value over time, but the original store owner bought it when it was brand new, so I wonder if Sony didn't have a lot of sales even in Japan, and this one guy was the only one who had the money and that one Sony guy got insanely lucky it was exactly what they wanted. I'm trying to read between the lines of how the previous owner is describing it and the fact that this TV was so rare some people thought it was fake.
"Chinese consumer law also gives buyers stronger remedies when a merchant knowingly commits fraud, including damages above the purchase price."
There is no small claim court or equivalent in China, 12315 is likely the closest but they can only provide recommendations, they cannot freeze assets or issue demands like a court. In absence of chargeback, the buyer owns the burden of gather evidence and proof, which usually includes paid test reports from trusted government agencies that the item is defect. In practice, a seller ships junk or nothing often get to keep the money and close the shop before you can get the money back.