As many of you know (because I won't shut up about it) I've gotten back into enjoying bikes after a brief two-decade hiatus
During that time, youtube was invented, and bike mechanics are on it, and oof mate I watched a video the other day
Dude was complaining about bikes being a durable good and there being so many bikes around and the manufacturers have to come up with new things or they won't sell any bikes anymore and that'll be bad for the industry and this was just such an illuminating look into the other end of how people approach these machines
Like, bikes are free. They cost nothing. There are so many of them. People put them out on the kerb on bin night. People chuck them in skips. The river's full of them. Once you've scrubbed the rust off and spent a few quid on new tubes etc a bike that you found waiting for the bin van still goes as fast as a brand new bike from today because they're powered by sandwiches that you were gonna eat anyway. Zooming around on trash night laughing your arse off on a bike that still has the "FREE BIKE" sign flapping in the wind feels like sticking your middle finger up at capitalism