I do not completely agree with the usage of the term, as Locust economies are economies like in China. When they do not have enough resources of themselves, they will swarm and find these abroad and cause lots of issues. For example with the needed infant formula (milk powder, esp after the milk problems in China with melanine) they will swarm to foreign countries and buy these in massive amounts and cause shortages in the country of origin. This even concerns building materials (steel), energy resources (oil), etc etc.
The milk powder issue for example happened in the Netherlands and in many other countries; partly caused by producers not knowing how to deal with this, but also by people within the country shipping large amounts (seen as smuggling), selling on Taobao.com. Just google for "Dutch milk powder China". This is just one of the examples... There are now even export restrictions between Hong Kong and China for the amount of cans you can take across the border. Just look at some of the pictures on http://badcanto.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/hong-kong-netizens-... related to this.
Note: relating to the article I believe the vision is narrow since it only talks about Groupon... Also, his point is not a survival means as the grasshopper/locust metaphor would indicate.
The more interesting story there is the sort of corruption which allows for a) government-controlled/connected baby formula plant to get away with selling poison while b) being sufficiently protected by import regulations and government interference such that black market importation of baby formula one box at a time is cheaper than Johnson and Johnson hitting them with a container ship full of the stuff to take advantage of the market opportunity.
Government-control kicked in now and they demand 'cheaper' milk powder as the prices had actually been kept unnaturally high due to cartel. Prices have been lowered, Netherlands have been asked to open factories in China (or do quality checks). It is now cheaper, but I still import my Nutrilon from back home to feed my baby-child; cheaper and more trustworthy. Because even the package says Dumex and looks same as in the Netherlands, it is local milk and I am not so sure about the 'real or fake' question.
Take the term "locust" (and Venkatesh's writing style in general) with a grain of salt.
Long-time Ribbon Farm readers know that he tends to declare "local variables" with his terminology, pegging down certain metaphors for the purposes a specific discussion. That need not collide with or invalidate other uses of the same word or idea.
When someone uses a specific, pejorative, widely associated with disaster (plague of Biblical scale, no less) word for a "local variable" he's being intellectually dishonest, or manipulative, or both. One generally can't just read a word locust and think "harmless", "cute", "needed" and such as a first thought - and that's exactly what this rhetoric aims for. That's the reason why I won't read the article. It's perfectly possible to use neutral language for presenting a point convincingly; I can't be bothered to read authors that didn't even try to do so.
[shrug] It's a different writing style, is all. If you read Venkatesh's other essays, you come away with the impression that he would wear the label "manipulative" on his sleeve. All speech or writing is manipulative, and to pretend otherwise is intellectually dishonest. :)
The comments here, as usual :) It's a habit of mine to read through all the comments before reading the linked article to decide whether it's worth reading.
If you think that my conclusion is wrong and you can quote a bit of the article to back it up then that's good, too!
With regard to the word "locust" being used pejoratively, I think that's a bit off the mark. Fairly close to the top of the essay, the author says "I've used (and continue to use) these services and don't feel entirely terrible about having done so [...] Why? It's because, like most of the working class, I've developed a locust morality."
I'm not sure if this invalidates your conclusion, but hopefully shed a slightly different light on things.
Personally, I'm not greatly taken with this particular essay. My favourite essay on that site is from a few years back: "Strategy, Tactics, Operations and Doctrine: A decision language tutorial" (http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2007/09/24/strategy-tactics/) He makes a rather telling remark about his primary interest being in doctrine. This might explain some of his modus operandi: I suspect he devices theories and makes analogies more to see how they will turn out than because he believes them.
See that's the 1% vampire behaviour. Relying on HN readers to comment on an article before deciding to read it. So those of us who read the article would be the 90%. Aha who's the 9% then, mods?
The 9% would be the bloggers - in particular those that left 'real jobs' to become part of the new wave of commentators.
Yes, they can produce huge volumes of readers when they get an HN hit, but once they've thoroughly exhausted the pent-up ideas that had been percolating for the previous decade, they realize that the only way to sustain themselves is to become increasingly sensationalist (since it's almost impossible to have earth-shattering ideas on a strictly weekly basis).
The milk powder issue for example happened in the Netherlands and in many other countries; partly caused by producers not knowing how to deal with this, but also by people within the country shipping large amounts (seen as smuggling), selling on Taobao.com. Just google for "Dutch milk powder China". This is just one of the examples... There are now even export restrictions between Hong Kong and China for the amount of cans you can take across the border. Just look at some of the pictures on http://badcanto.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/hong-kong-netizens-... related to this.
Note: relating to the article I believe the vision is narrow since it only talks about Groupon... Also, his point is not a survival means as the grasshopper/locust metaphor would indicate.