What’s behind the Sodastream diet cola syrup flavor shortage?

By spocko, on July 21st, 2023%

I know this isn’t a “New Coke ” story, where consumers rise up to demand a product that has been discontinued be returned, but I’m curious what the story is behind the shortage I’ve noticed for Sodastream’s diet cola mix. I’ve been looking for weeks now and as of July 21, 2023 it’s not available online in Sodastream’s store, Amazon, Target, or Walmart. I thought it might have something to do with ingredients, but Sodastream’s diet cola syrup doesn’t contain aspartame, it uses sucralose as a sweetener.

I don’t think the shortage is political, since after the controversy with Sodastream’s West Bank factory in 2015, Sodastream moved to Israel’s Negev Desert. SodaStream leaves West Bank as CEO says boycott antisemitic and pointless (Guardian Link) And Sodastream was purchased by PepsiCo in 2018 (Beverage Daily 12-05-2018)Then I wondered, is this another case of a consumer goods company saying there is a shortage related to supply lines and the pandemic which no longer applies, but they keep up the illusion to raise prices?

I know how big corporations have lots of methods to goose the quarterly earning numbers, could this be a gambit to raise the revenue for flavored . . . → Read More: What’s behind the Sodastream diet cola syrup flavor shortage?

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Threads Needs To Be Regulated. Being “Brand Safe” is good, but isn’t enough

By spocko, on July 17th, 2023%

Here’s my bold statement for 2023: Social media companies in the United States need to be regulated.

Before you start agreeing and explain why it’ll never happen… you should know Meta didn’t launch Threads in the EU. Because of the EU’s REGULATION. It would have led to massive NEW fines and Meta doesn’t want MORE massive fines. It was recently hit with an order to stop sending EU users data to the US for processing and was fined almost $1.3BN for breaching the GDPR’s requirements on data export.

When companies’ actions or inactions harm the public, the public demands something be done. In the EU they’ve recognized the harm being done by social media companies and enacted regulation. Short term, companies pay the fine and change their behavior to stop new fines. This is what we want, what the public deserves. Protection from harm.

Here’s a good piece by Natasha Lomas’ in Tech Cruch that spells out Meta’s current privacy problems and reminds us of the General Data Protection Regulation, the Digital Services Act and Digital Markets Act. Some regulations are currently in effect others are coming on August 25, 2023.

Meta’s Threads app is a privacy nightmare . . . → Read More: Threads Needs To Be Regulated. Being “Brand Safe” is good, but isn’t enough

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