cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/38101225

Imagine this: you walk into a public restroom in China, but instead of just grabbing toilet paper… you have to scan a QR code and watch an ad first 😅. Only then will the machine dispense a tiny sheet of tissue. Don’t feel like watching? You can also pay 0.5 RMB (about $0.07) for a bit more paper 💸. This system is designed to cut down waste — some people would abuse free paper before. Now, it’s all about “watch an ad or pay a coin.” Would you sit through an ad for free toilet paper, or just drop the 0.5 yuan? 👀 . . .

Source: China Insider on Instagram.

Comments
        • acosmichippo@lemmy.worldEnglish
          01·
          3 months ago

          disagree, they are entirely different operating models. reddit was privately funded and eventually snehittified to become profitable. Lemmy is free, but still needs funds to operate. Might as well make it fun and rewaring to participation rather than just annoying banners whenever things get tight.

          • Rai@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            1·
            3 months ago

            I will very happily never read “Thanks for the award, kind stranger!” or a string of cringy award speech edits again. I’m so happy they don’t exist here.

  • kikutwo@lemmy.worldEnglish
    19·
    3 months ago

    How is this any different than Germany where oftentimes the entrance itself is behind a paywall?

      • guy_threepwood@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        3 months ago

        Berlin Hbf. They have a single set of toilets about half the size of what you’d get in a shopping center which cost €2 with turnstyle access for a station the size of a cathedral with something like 20 platforms. 🙈

    • es_eskaliert@feddit.orgEnglish
      41·
      3 months ago

      Dropping in a coin vs what seems to be downloading some sort of an app or at least opening some shady websites on your fucking phone over your fucking mobile data is where I see it. Even if you used the payment option, you’d have to disclose your online payment information to the provider. Privacy nightmare.

      • es_eskaliert@feddit.orgEnglish
        1·
        3 months ago

        Or simply imagine you just took your most violent shit of the century and then have an ad for hot mexican food or something.

    • Porco@feddit.orgEnglish
      1·
      3 months ago

      It sets precedent. You could extend that on anything. Doesn’t make the German pay or piss yourself thing any better though.

  • hddsx@lemmy.caEnglish
    172·
    3 months ago

    Bring your own toilet paper?

    Also China public bathrooms smell like absolute crap I have no idea why. I had to pee in China and walked into a public bathroom on the side of the road. I almost puked

    • perishthethought@piefed.socialEnglish
      111·
      3 months ago

      Many are just ‘squatty potties’ - is a hole in the floor and a tank below.

      And yah, tourists are told to bring TP already since some bathrooms don’t have any.

      😶

      • hddsx@lemmy.caEnglish
        2·
        3 months ago

        What do you mean by a tank below? For flushing or…?

        All the squatty potties I encountered in Asia were plumbed the way a toilet in the US would be plumbed so the poop gets flushed elsewhere.

        I hope the ones in China weren’t basically permanent porta potties….

    • CubitOom@infosec.pubEnglish
      10·
      3 months ago

      Yeah, most people in china already bring their own. The only time I’ve ever seen it offered for free was in a crazy high end shopping mall.

  • Quilotoa@lemmy.caEnglish
    11·
    3 months ago

    Many countries have pay per use public restrooms. Sometimes there’s someone sitting outside handing out toilet paper after you pay. Sometimes it a coin insert turnstile. Us oldsters call them Johnny Cash.

  • oyo@lemmy.zipEnglish
    4·
    3 months ago

    Waiting for .ml to tell me how this was all part of Mao’s plan.

  • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
    2·
    3 months ago

    As someone who lived in China for 7 years, the alternative is that the next best person who enters the bathroom takes all available paper home.

    In my entire time there, I can count the number of times where paper was available on a single hand, with spare fingers.

    Naturally, everybody carries a box of tissues at all times.

      • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
        4·
        3 months ago

        China is prosperous, don’t let anybody fool you. But people are deeply, inherently selfish and love money more than everything (yay, communism!), so if they can save 30 cents by taking a roll of toilet paper home, they will.

  • MountingSuspicion@reddthat.comEnglish
    53·
    3 months ago

    I don’t know what all the hate is about. This is not in every restroom there, but even so, we don’t really have a lot of “public” restrooms in the US. All over Europe there are 1 euro turnstiles or other barriers to go to the restroom in the first place. Ideally we live in luxury gay space communism, but in the interim at least having access to a restroom is nice. I’d love it to be free everywhere, but it’s not always free in Europe either and at least in this example you can access it for free if you bring your own or are able to watch an ad, and in the US you may not realistically have access to one at all. This also ensures that the people accessing the service are the ones paying for it, so it’s not like someone in a small town with less access to government subsidized resources are being taxed so that these people can have free TP. I don’t love the idea, but it’s not novel or any more dystopian than what we have everywhere else.

    • witheyeandclaw@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
      4·
      3 months ago

      Multiple replies in here from people saying they’d wipe their poo on the bathroom fixtures. I don’t think reasoning is going to work.

      • MountingSuspicion@reddthat.comEnglish
        3·
        3 months ago

        Yea, I didn’t address that directly but what an insane take. That’s like coming to the US and being upset that tax isn’t integrated into the listed price so refusing to pay it and just stealing, but also worse and grosser because now someone has to clean that up or use it after you. Even if it was the norm over there, which to my understanding it is not, that’s then what you should follow as a guest in a foreign country. I can only imagine/hope these people are not Americans with passports. We get a bad enough reputation as is.

  • Geodad@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    3 months ago

    I do NOT touch my phone after I start wiping.

    I guess there would just be shit smeared on the walls of that stall.

    • surph_ninja@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      How do you figure? In what way does this imply concentration of wealth?

      I swear some of y’all think simply selling something is capitalist. Astounding how successful they’ve been at producing undereducated people in the west.

        • surph_ninja@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          3 months ago

          What is being advertised?

          It’s not markets that make a country capitalist. It’s the concentration of the wealth from those markets. And China has been jailing/executing their billionaires.

          • captainlezbian@lemmy.worldEnglish
            11·
            3 months ago

            Markets don’t make something capitalist but when markets drive consumption rather than consumption driving markets that’s a sign that capital is gaining power over social welfare. Ad proliferation should be seen as a warning sign towards the social ecosystem.

            But you are correct if those ads are promoting socially beneficial choices they may not be a sign of capitalism. Ads that promote healthy choices or taking public transit over driving have their places in socialist societies. I just doubt that they’re the whole of what’s being advertised in exchange for toilet paper. I suspect companies are finding their way in.

            And if the companies were workers cooperatives that would be a different problem but Dengist reforms ensured capitalist participation in the Chinese market so I’d believe it if I saw it but I’m not assuming it’s only coops advertising

      • Alloi@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        3 months ago

        i thought it was pretty self explanitory but having to pay to wipe your ass in a public washroom, or watch ads to fuel more consumption seems pretty capitalistic in practice.

        and undereducated? ill have you know i have a university degree, where i majored in porkin’ yer mum, and i minored in holding my nose and mouth closed while i did it.