HN Explorer

Ask HN: Citizen “Temporary Service Interruption”

1 points by cvccvroomvroom ↗ HN
"Temporary Service Disruption Citizen is temporarily reducing coverage in your area. You will still receive notifications for major safety-related incidents happening in your city and can speak to a trained Safety Agent 24/7 with Citizen Premium."

Sounds like a social venture public utility becoming for-profit firefighters standing around while someone's house burns because they don't have funds. So is this some sort of corporate decline?

3 comments

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Terr_
I don't understand, WTF is this even referring to? Is this some random app or service or company called "Citizen" somewhere in the world?

Alternately, who are these Temporary Service Interruption Citizens, and what makes them different from regular people? It almost sounds like someone fell asleep reading a dystopian corporatocracy cyberpunk novel, and then while still half-awake blurted a question to some kind of voice-assistant device that posted it to HN...

sp332
Yes it is an app called "Citizen", but learning about it won't sound any less dystopian. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen_(app)
HarryHirsch
One does wonder - did the founders read about 1984 and "Citizen Smith"? Also - did the founder of Palantir read about the original palantíri in the Lord of the Rings and consider how they are just not good for you - data without context can be deceiving (a data scientist would probably use the word "underdetermined")? Asking for a friend.