But there was a catch: There were two different price levels for Plus, and how much you paid depended on how old you were. People under 30 get charged $9.99 per month, while those who have passed that birthday need to shell out double that, at $19.99. (In Europe, the age limit was 28, which I assume means they think Europeans are two years uglier than Americans.)

vicspacewalker/iStock
This is what wine and cigarettes does to the average 29-year-old Frenchwoman.

The company's co-founder explained the pricing difference by saying that they needed to charge younger people less since they have less money in general. But we all know that's bullshit, because it doesn't explain why they have to charge older people more. My theory? They are totally playing on the fears of people who have hit the big 3-0 and aren't married or in relationships. This is a dating app looking you in the eye, telling you that you are an old maid, and then making you pay for the privilege of hearing that.

You read the title, so of course it's not. According to two different studies, if the driver of a ridesharing app can figure out that the person they are a about to give a lift to is African-American (either through their name or picture), they are more likely to try to screw that person over.

One of the studies by MIT, Stanford University, and the University of Washington compared over 1,400 trips in Seattle and Boston using randomly selected times, days, and routes. No matter when or where the trip took place, African-American passengers were left to wait up to 35 percent longer before the driver arrived. That was if the driver picked them up at all, because black riders were also much more likely to have their car cancel on them after a pickup was confirmed. However, some drivers were sneaky in their racism. Since Uber and Lyft punish drivers who cancel too many rides, some of them would go to the wrong pickup point in order to try to get the rider to cancel out of frustration.

Parkwood Entertainment
I suggest using Beyonce's Lemonade technique.

Uber and Lyft drivers also manage to be extra creepy with women passengers. Unlike black passengers, male drivers were absolutely fine with having women in their cars ... to the point where they seemed unwilling to let them leave. Female passengers were subjected to longer trips than necessary, often going through the same intersection more than once or past their drop-off point. They also reported that male drivers were extremely chatty on these drives. Basically, some men see a woman in their car as a literal captive audience who must stay there and let him flirt with her until he's ready to drop her off or she decides to throw open the door and desperately roll into traffic. It would be pathetic if it wasn't for the fact that some drivers have actually kidnapped and assaulted women. It's almost as if a business of cars being driven by random strangers who never had to be fingerprinted or get a background check was a stupid idea.

We've told you before fo how Airbnb is a hotbed of racism. If you try to use the service while black, either as a renter or a rentee, you are going to find that people seem to think you are the King Midas of cooties, turning everything you touch into something icky. How else do you explain the fact that when black people try to rent out their homes of similar sizes in similar locations to white people, they have to charge 12 percent less to get anyone to bite? Or that when people with "stereotypical" black names apply to rent a place, they are turned down more often than people with "white" names? Renters would even rather let their houses sit empty, thus losing money, than rent to black people in some cases.

But it doesn't stop there. Even if a black person manages to get someone to rent to them, they can end up being the victim of discrimination once they show up. That's what Ronnia Cherry and Stefan Grant found when they got a place in Atlanta in 2014. Their vacation was suddenly interrupted by the appearance of cops at the front door, guns drawn. A neighbor had seen some black people entering the security code, had a flashback to everything their grandmother had told them in 1952, and assumed they must be thieves.

Photographee.eu
To be fair, they were dressed like this.

But it isn't just African-Americans who find themselves being discriminated against. The travel journalist Rafat Ali says he has been turned down for being "a brown Muslim guy." And sometimes race doesn't even have anything to do with it! Sometimes it is just good old-fashioned homophobia! That's what Buddy Fisher found out in August, when his host asked him why he was coming to Austin and he responded that he was attending the Pride festival. An hour later, his reservation was canceled, because the guy whose house he was going to stay at wanted "No LGBT people, please. I do not support people who are against humanity. Sorry."

(As an Austinite myself, I would just like to say that this guy is a douche who does not represent our lovely city. We love LGBT people, and please consider taking us with you when your liberal state secedes from the Union.)

universitycoop.com
We'll be like a really quirky West Berlin.

And then there is Shadi Petosky, who recently tweeted that she was turned down for a place because she is transgender. Right now, Airbnb removes hosts one by one if they get complaints, and they are constantly updating their nondiscrimination policy because people keep finding ways to be awful. It's like discrimination whack-a-mole. Next time, just pay the extra couple bucks and stay in a hotel.

That means that if you have never paid for something before and are having trouble beating a level, the game might suddenly slash the price on an item that will help you so that you don't get frustrated and stop playing. But if you are a "whale" who spends $50-$100 a month on the game, you might suddenly find yourself paying more for things like lives. Basically, in order to get more casual players who might one day turn into serious players who shell out hard cash, games punish those who are already serious players with higher prices. But hey, if you're paying, at least you get to be a complete dick to the poor customer support workers.