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Comments · 7
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Re:Good question.
Go on, do the math. And by that I mean the full chain, for both. Getting the fuel, transporting it, storing it, and so on, and so forth. It does happen that if you do that, the "green" suddenly isn't so green any longer.
[citation needed]
This is all hard to follow, but I take it that AC is trying to say that the transport and storage of fuels to be used for EV somehow make them less green than the transport and storage of fuels, then burning them in vehicles designed to burn those fuels?
Well, if that is the case, we always have to remember that the electrics tend to get pretty good MPGe. the Nissan Leaf gets an equivalent 112 mpg https://www.autobytel.com/top-...
In addition, we can charge the EV via a home solar system, negating the transport and storage issue altogether. https://news.energysage.com/so...
But the way I like to look at it is let us assume instead of the present situation, Electric cars are dominant.
So someone comes along with this idea that we should all convert to internal combustion engines with all of their complexity, and install a nationwide system of trains and trucks to deliver fuel to neighborhood refueling stations - to create an infrastructure of an immense amount of transport of flammable materials.
All this to replace plugging our vehicles into an electric outlet. All to replace a multiplicity of energy sources. Solar/wind/nuc/coal/hydro can produce the energy for EVs; with a very specific energy source of petrofuel - with a very minor ethanol component.
Whoever came up with that idea would be laughed out of town.
Yet we have people defending that very system as somehow superior.
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Re:Not going to be mainstream
The cost of getting into the air is not that high.
What are you comparing it to? The cost of the cheapest helicopter is $250,000. That would put it at the number 4 slot in this list of "most expensive luxury cars".
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I fear a big fiasco
GM can shut down any Onstar-equipped vehicle anywhere. Currently, it's being heralded as a good thing http://www.autobytel.com/auto-...
But, as Aldredge Ames and Jonathon Pollard proved, there will always be turncoats willing to sell extremely sensitive info. So you're Al Qaeda or ISIS, with connections to Saudi oil money. Or China or Russia or whoever. You need to buy, or blackmail, the info on how it's done. Here's a doomsday scenario...
The date is a December or January in the next few years. The forecast calls for major snowstorm in the US Northeast, followed by a brutal cold front. 6-to-10 hours before the storm is due to hit, the bad guys throw the switch in the middle of afternoon rush hour. The roads are clogged with stalled cars. There are so many stalled cars, that any "immune" vehicles wouldn't be able to get anywhere anyways. The smart drivers get out and try to find shelter in stores/hotels/wherever. The slower thinkers freeze to death in their cars.
Because the roads are clogged with dead cars, and the US is heavily into JIT (Just-In-Time) supply chains, grocery stores, supermarkets, convenience stores, etc, are soon running out of goods. Minor issues in the power grid go unfixed, because utility workers can't get from home to the dispatch site to the problem area. More and more of the US Northeast loses electricity, and people start freezing and starving to death. The president declares martial law, but thousands, if not millions, of people die in the ensuing chaos before order is restored.
Similar scenarios apply to anything that can be shut down "from the cloud". Imagine if Microsoft's authentication systems suddenly decided that your copy of Windows, and everybody else's, was bogus. The US shuts down. Taking over Nest thermostats durning a cold spell or a heat wave could also cause many thousands of casualties, and major chaos. It's eff-ing stupid to allow any one authority that much power, because they *WILL* get hacked, and the power *WILL* be used for evil. It's only a matter of time.
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Re:and then what?
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Re:Easy Solution.
Evidently the Prius has a "breaking system" as well -- the model's on its third recall.
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AutoWeb and AutoByTel
First off I've got to reiterate that you need to check out Edmunds. An amazing resource.
I used www.autoweb.com a few years ago to find a used Miata. The ability to basically grep the classifieds is very cool. I found a long list of the exact car I was after and the price was fair.
More recently I tried www.autoweb.com and www.autobytel.com to find a new car. Within a few months I was looking at Honda Civic hatchbacks and Volkwagen Beetles and simply had a terrible time using both services. None of the local dealers that I was asssigned to ever contacted me. After a few days I would always get a note from the corporation asking if I'd been satisfied with the service. I always wrote back explaining that I hadn't heard anything and even then never was able to hook up with a dealer that was any help. Based on my experiences I passed on their stock when they both went public.
I saw CarsDirect.com at Comdex and it sounds like a good deal. They don't have to dump you in the hands of a local dealer, they control the entire process. I plan on giving them a shot next time I'm in the market to buy a car. -
I worked on thisWell, not really - I was an intern at the MetaCreations office where this technology was developed.
Let me tell you: This is some awesome shit.
DISCLAIMER: I no longer work for the company, and the following information is gathered from what I have found over the web and from asking people at the company.
History
The technology was initially pondered by a russian physicist - Alexander "Sasha" Migdal. He came to the United States a long time ago and did work at Princeton University in various fields (mostly in physics, I believe). After a while, he formed a company with his friends from Russia called "Real Time Geometry." Sasha is an insanely smart man. A little eccentric, but smart
RTG pioneered the technique of being able to dynamically set the number of polygons you want to render a model with. For instance, you could have a massive model of a helicopter render with full detail when it's close to the camera, and have it render with less detail when it's far away from the camera. This technology is now part of MetaCreations' MetaStream
The company was bought out by "MetaCreations" in (I think) 1997 (or thereabouts). MetaCreations was the merger of MetaTools and Fractal Design.
After this was when the technology that we're discussing now was beginning to be implemented.
Process
Although I have not performed the procedure myself, I have seen it done on many types of objects, from pottery to toys to PEOPLE'S FACES.
The object is placed in front of a black background with several lights around it with the aim at neutral lighting. The black background prevents a shadow from being interpreted as part of the object. The camera is usually placed about 3 meters away (not precise, just average or so...). For "in studio" objects, a laser was used to accurately calculate the distance to the subject. The technology has been refined a lot (obviously) and just when I was about to leave, they introduced this deal with Minolta in an All-Hands meeting.
Now, I see a post of 5, Interesting that states that one of the shots is a piece of pottery - how simple is that!
Well, it's not. The reason?? TEXTURES. The 3D imaging RECREATES the model so as to preserve not *only* the size/shape of the object, but ALSO the *look* of the object under certain circumstances - for instance, certain lighting environments.
That's why a pot ain't so easy. While the shape might be "easy" (you try extrapolating 3D data from 2D data), the texturing is even more difficult. I can remember seeing models where everything was great, except maybe when you look into the pot and you see a hole at the bottom and you think "Hurm, we hadn't thought of that, had we?"
In any case, that's the process. Now how does dynamic resolution and 3D imaging come together? Simple: The fact is that many objects (people for instance) have *curved surfaces*. Within the realm of polygonal 3D modelling, you *have* to throw out data, it's just not gonna all fit. While the camera/software figures out the 3D models, it is very difficult to render them in real time... MetaStream does a wonderful job of rendering huge objects in real time, even on a shitty computer.
Now, in this wonderful time of the web and stuff, MetaCreations (I think) is positioning this software/hardware for two things:
- Family Fun (share 3D images with your friends!)
- and E-Commerce (see what you want to buy in full 3D)
Of course, that means you need small files - full 3D models and textures the size of a GIF or two? Yep. It's pretty cool stuff. From what I know, it's a wavelet compression technique that compresses both the textures and the model data. Most models (of people's faces, toys, pots, whatever) are in between 50 and 200 K, which is pretty remarkable for the quality that you get from MetaStream.
Several web sites have already implemented this technology, and make quite good use of it. Here's a sampling:
- LEGO's MindStorms Site uses it to display what kind of robots you can make
- AutoByTel uses it to display cars
- And more... they are listed on MetaCreations' site
Sorry for the long post, but I hope I cleared up some information.
PS - Hi to Sasha, Victoria, Dmitry, Victor, Baga and everyone else! - Family Fun (share 3D images with your friends!)