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The irony is that companies that do everything China wants often get little in return. Look at Microsoft. They gave China the source code to their software. Gave them nearly free licensing of Windows and they hardly make any money there at all!

http://www.internetnews.com/ent-news/article.php/1832381/Gates-Lets-China-Peek-Through-Windows.htm

February 28, 2003
By Mark Berniker: More stories by this author:
Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates on a tour in China said his company will allow the Chinese government partial access to the source code of its Windows operating system.

Microsoft said it would only share some details about its proprietary source code, but it's considered a major win for Microsoft to have China join its Government Security Program (GSP). China is one of several countries, including Russia, NATO and the United Kingdom, participating in the recently launched Microsoft program aimed, at part, in trying to reverse negative perceptions of the company.

At issue, is whether Microsoft's software provides adequate security for governments, and their classified data. Piracy of Microsoft software in China is also a huge problem, and the Chinese government and Microsoft are keen to jointly stem its tide.

Microsoft has clearly made a decision that China, the world's biggest market with immense potential for growth over the next decade, is a place it will be putting considerable resources towards. Microsoft has said it will invest $750 million in China from 2003-2005.

and now in 2010....

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-05-24/microsoft-s-ballmer-says-china-piracy-is-a-problem-update1-.html

Lack of progress in protecting intellectual property has led China, which may overtake the U.S. as the world’s biggest personal-computer market in a year, to generate less revenue for Microsoft than India and South Korea, Ballmer said. China’s gross domestic product is twice the two economies combined.

If there are problems with the workforce, it is mostly among the youth who are far too easily distracted and don't commit themselves too much to their work. (once again, YMMV)

There might be a reason for their distractions. See this article from the Harvard Business Review which talks about the differences between the current and former generations when it comes to work.

Then there is this article from Bloomberg Businessweek which talks about the same issue. Both came about because of the Washington Post article which essentially said that the current generation has a lazy work ethic.

While it can be said the current generation (gees, does that make me sound old) doesn't seem to want to get their hands dirty (so to speak), they are willing to work on a problem until they find a resolution. Whether that is good or bad is up to the manager.

Take a look at Iridium's 10-Q filing where they state that one of the challenges and uncertainties is related to their "ability to maintain ... relationship with U.S. government customers, particularly the DoD."

There is an entire paragraph devoted to their Government Services Revenues:

"Government services revenue increased by 3.0% to $19.0 million for the three months ended March 31, 2010 from $18.5 million for the three months ended March 31, 2009, due to voice subscriber growth and growth related to Netted Iridium introduced in late 2009 and an increase in M2M data revenue driven primarily by subscriber growth. The voice average revenue per unit, or ARPU, decreased slightly by $1 to $151 for the three months ended March 31, 2010 due to an increase in billable subscribers on lower tiered pricing plans. We expect total government revenue to be slightly lower in 2010 as compared to 2009 as engineering and support services contract work is expected to decrease in 2010 as work curtails. Also, future growth in voice and M2M data subscribers and revenue may be negatively affected by changes in U.S. defense spending, the current administration’s plans to reduce troops and a corresponding decrease in usage under our agreements with the U.S. government. This is revenue accounts for a majority of our government services revenue and is subject to annual renewals."

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-06-14/fannie-freddie-fix-at-160-billion-with-1-trillion-worst-case.html

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2010/03/nokia_revises_m.html Nokia seems to have a THIRD of the worlds market share. I dont care if they dont sell a single phone here in the US.

"The third and by far most complex step (ERAM Release 1) is the replacement of the Host Computer System with new software and hardware ... national deployment begins in FY 2009 and concludes in FY 2011"

That's all well and good except for the part about it not lasting more than 6 days when they tried to use it in production. They may be *trying* to replace the old system. Whether they're succeeding at replacing it is a whole other question.

and considering the reality of china, where the state treats everyone like a slave, i can understand why so many in china would be addicted to video games. i would be too if i lived in china

there exists in china the lives of the rich in the coastal cities, who are able to afford some degree of freedom

but for the rest of the country, the majority, you have some sort of nightmare where the worst excesses of communist authoritarianism combine with completely unbridled capitalist rapaciousness, to produce a distinctly modern chinese breed of hell on earth for the poor in china. the state has no problem abusing you and propagandizing you, and the corporations have no problem working you like a mule, and will bribe the corrupt state authorities to get away with it

it really is not surprising that some workers are committing suicide in flocks:

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-06-08/foxconn-says-personal-issues-not-wages-led-workers-to-suicide.html

modern china is a brutal corporatist authoritarian nightmare, the worst of communism and capitalism, mushed together as a hybrid schizophrenic hell

But if people keep using more and more bandwidth, someone will have to pay for more and more infrastructure to support the ever growing usage.

Gosh, maybe "someone" who posted billions in profits last quarter, even exceeding predictions could pay for the increased infrastructure?

Android and the idea around it came out a year after and probably because of the iPhone and the design of its OS.

Android -- an existing mobile company -- was bought by Google in 2005.

So how, exactly, do you rationalize seriously saying that it came about because of the iPhone?

No doubt Google has stolen some elements from the iPhone, just as the iPhone stole from many other devices. Yet it is infuriating seeing history rewritten, North Korea-style, until Steve Jobs invented the Internet, the stars and heavens, and so on.

BTW - You should send Google some thanks, as a wide range of features queued up for the iPhone 4 OS were cribbed directly from Android.

They did sue. The settlement, however, was for a pathetic $8M according to this source.

My chief gripe with Cablevision is not that they have bad service (at least from a TV technical standpoint, as they have a ton of channels that rarely drop if at all), or even that they try to maintain their monopoly on coverage area and programming while trying to avoid carrying broadcast stations, but that they wield monopoly power in other areas and make Comcast and Microsoft look utterly inept at it, and it barely registers on Slashdot.

Sadly, I know people that, in their words, "need" these vile cowards' cable. It's like I have a truth mom on my back.

The USA's movie and music scenes are the biggest in the world because most of the world wants to consume our media.

Depends on how you measure "scene".

Bollywood films, for example, sell more tickets. As for music, there's a fair number of international (read "foreign to the US") artists who routinely sell more records than any of our local pop stars.

Internet access helps alleviate poverty in the same way that cell phones: by removing intermediaries and giving farmers access to up-to-date pricing information and buyers..

Funny. How did we in the US handle this issue? Simple. We'd listen to the daily farm and market reports on the radio.

Don't fall for the lie that Internet access is needed for success. Broadcast radio is much, much cheaper and effective for this sort of thing.

Internet access helps alleviate poverty in the same way that cell phones: by removing intermediaries and giving farmers access to up-to-date pricing information and buyers.

This is what that "internet access" (which was actually a broker and micro-loan program) did:
http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-122219-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html
http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/5877.html

The epilogue to this project is not good. One year after the follow-up data were
collected, the exporter refused to continue buying the crops from DrumNet farmers since
none of the SHGs had obtained EurepGap certification. DrumNet lost money on its loan
to the farmers and collapsed, but equally importantly farmers were forced to sell to
middlemen, sometimes leaving a harvest to rot. As reported to us by DrumNet, the
farmers were outraged but powerless, and subsequently returned to growing what they
had been growing before (e.g., local crops such as maize).

As for the "cell phones" link, you don't have to go farther than the article itself:

Most of these unconnected masses live in rural areas that are much poorer and more remote than Muruguru.
Now cell-phone makers and service providers understand that they can make money by bringing cell-phone service within reach of people who live on $2 a day.
Users buy new phones for as little as $20--and secondhand models for far less--as well as airtime in increments of just 75 cents in Kenya, enough for nearly 10 minutes of off-peak calling.
.
They increased their profits by an average of 8% after they began using mobile phones to find out which coastal marketplaces were offering the best prices for sardines. Yet consumer prices for fish dropped 4% because the fishermen no longer had to throw away the catch they couldn't sell when they sailed into a port after all the buyers had left.
"That's what economic efficiencies are about--everyone is better off," says Jensen.

It is simply wonderful seeing such selective blindness.

A mobile phone costs as little as 1000% of your daily costs.
10 minutes (charged by a minute, so that is less than 10 calls) of mobile-credit costs you 37.5% of your daily costs.
And to even that out, your income has increased by 8%.

So, on average, that one 10-minute charge eats up that 8% increase in profit five out of seven days a weak.
But all is not so dark and dreary - if they work 7 days a weak, they will earn 0.32$ of extra profit each weak.
That way, they get to pay off that 20$ phone of theirs in only 1.2 years. Not accounting for interests.

After that - the sky is the limit!

 
Sure. For some people in developing nations mobile phones are providing A phone for the first time.
For some even a way of long distance communication of any kind for the first time.
And there are bound to be benefits from that as well as some measurable increases of quality of life.

But attaching the "it alleviates poverty" label on the mobile phone is way off the target.
Only people whose poverty is alleviated are mobile-phone merchants and local telecommunication companies (that practice the best kinds of monopolies - uncontrolled and rampant).
For a "regular Joe" they are more of a resource drain than a "poverty alleviation".

Internet access helps alleviate poverty in the same way that cell phones: by removing intermediaries and giving farmers access to up-to-date pricing information and buyers.

Or did technology that dramatically improves communication suddenly cease to be useful because you don't have derivatives to sell?

What are consumers meant to do to avoid this? I would gladly pay whatever extra for my devices, if I knew the people making them had a decent standard of living. But its not an option. It's not something that can be like those phony "carbon credits" I've heard airlines offering http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/mar2008/db20080321_437700.htm . I dont think the solution is to "ask for a tip" just as you walk out the door with your iPad.

See, we complain about laws "arrgh, the government has all these regulations and red tape..." but living without them seems just awful.

What can the world outside China (and similar countries mind you) do to help the workers? We cant just make up some "weapons of mass destruction" and invade the joint. Do we just have to keep putting up with these shame stories? "Oh look! You know how popular and cool Apple are with their hit products! Look at the workers! Shame on Apple! Yeah, yeah, Apple is bad, oooh, they are evil!"

Paper currency is easily manufactured, but the guy who makes it isn't guaranteed to win anymore than everybody else is guaranteed to lose.

Really? Perhaps in a perfect world where the government prints money and circulates it to small businesses via noble banks, you might be correct.

Except you probably wouldn't be. The government does whatever it can to maximise unofficial inflation at the expense of official inflation. This allows them to pay off their debts while so-called "inflation-indexed" social security obligations are reduced. It's a zero-sum game, where the rich stock-invested people gain at the benefit of the poorer fixed-income people, such as the elderly.

So, no, inflation doesn't "lose" value...it transfers it from the poor to the rich.

And that's still in the "perfect world" scenario of printing money. In reality, what's happening today is that the Federal Reserve is printing large sums of money, loaning it to banks at 0% interest, who turn around and buy Treasuries with a 3% risk, and pocket the profits from the difference. They're not investing in "businesses" - that would be (gasp!) risky! This is why Goldman Sachs just had three whole months without a single day of trading losses. So this money is explicitly going into investment bankers' bonuses, Warren Buffett's 10% yield bonds, and other Goldman investors. This isn't a conspiracy theory - it's in the press releases!

So, yes, those of us who see the value of the gold standard don't necessarily do so to reduce volatility - we do so to reduce the bias towards the transfer of wealth to the rich and the well-connected.

There was an interesting BusinessWeek article about the blessing and the curse that AT&T got when it got the iPhone. It was a blessing as it got many new, exclusive customers and moved itself into the front of US cellphone carriers. The curse was that the capabilities of the iPhone was overwhelming their data network. Part of the problem was that users of the iPhone were actually using it to surf the web like they would at home and the proliferation of apps meant that iPhone users could be constant 3G usage when they were not surfing whether they were syncing data or apps.

I am guessing this is the main reason that tethering hasn't been allowed. AT&T's network would be in more serious trouble if it allowed it at this point. While this affects AT&T's network now, it will become more of a problem for all carriers as more and more consumers are buying smart phones. If Verizon got exclusivity with the iPhone everyone right now would be complaining of the same issues of Verizon.

Current rollout of renewables is clearly not sufficient because carbon emissions continue to rise at the top end of IPCC projections. And new coal fired facilities are still being built (and not just in China).

Of course new coal power plants are still being built, because they pass external costs to others they are still the cheapest power source for those whop build them. If however caps or carbon taxes were placed on coal then the picture would be different. Of course some accuse cap and trade or similar ideas of harming the poor. That can be mitigated though, the average increase on people's utility bill can be offset by reducing their income tax the same amount. And for those who do not pay income tax then a credit could be given to them. Say for instance the average residential power bill went up $1000 a year they could be given a check for $1000 at the beginning of the year. Or so they won't spend it all on something else at once, they can be given $120 a month. It can even be included on their EBT card.

Besides China India is also building coal fired power plants fast. Kyoto exempted both nations from carbon emission limits. However China is doing more than just using coal. China is the world's fastest, largest, green energy market. Notice that that link is to an article on Bloomberg Businessweek's website and Bloomberg isn't exactly known as an environmental hotbed.

The problems with wind and solar are that they are not base load

I have already addressed the baseload. One, geothermal can be used as the baseload. Two, because Natural Gas fired power plants can quickly be ramped up or slowed down, unlike both coal and nuclear power, they can be used for the baseload until cleaner alternatives emerge.

When the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine they don't produce power.

The sun is always shining somewhere and the wind is always blowing somewhere. As I have also stated power blackouts costs US businesses almost $100 Billion a year, according to a sidebar to SciAm's A Solar Grand Plan businesses loss $80 Billion a year from blackouts. The US National Grid is old and failing so it needs to be rebuilt period. Rebuilt it can use High-voltage direct current or HVDC powerlines from coast to coast and north to south. HVDC loses less energy over long distances than AC does, of course there is power loss from conversion from AC to DC then back but it's not as much as the loss from AC transmission over long distances. And while Concentrated Solar Power may need to be converted, depending on whether steam or something else is used to drive a generator, PVs don't.

I was referring to enhanced or engineered geothermal

Okay, however geothermal is being used commercially. Just not "enhanced or engineered geothermal" whatever those are, all those plants where it is used requires enhancements and engineering.

As to whether nuclear appeals to state planners or businesses, even if that assertion is true (which it may or may not be) who cares? What we want is the best decision.

If it takes state planners likely it's not a good idea. Government has to support nuclear power because businesses won't, it's too risky. Mind you I'm not saying everything government does is bad, there are areas where it does well relatively, but it can do better in areas by making sure others pay all their costs, keeping a level playing field, and regulating monopolies. Businesses though are investing in and supporting solar and wind power as well as geothermal, tidal, and other energy

> Typical of Gates, that he's investing into a speculative solution into solving a problem he has a large responsibility for

OK I'll bite.

1) He's in the IT industry, so he certainly doesn't have a large personal responsibility for the global warming problem, there are far more who have a higher responsibility.
2) He's also funding research into better nuclear reactors[1] this is probably his main bet
3) This seawater stuff is probably more of a contingency plan or side bet - e.g. the nuclear stuff doesn't work or is thwarted by idiots, and nobody else has come up with a viable alternative.

[1] http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/next/archives/2010/02/bill_gates_goes_nuclear.html

That wouldn't happen because of zoning.

Much of Texas is not limited by zoning regulations. Take Houston for example. Outside the cities, who cares? In smaller towns, the mayor and city council members are your neighbors and really don't care to bother you unless someone else complains about something. Even then, you probably know who the busy body is so there's not a whole hell of a lot of that going on. No zoning works in Houston because no one is going to build a wind farm in a big city because land is too expensive. People build houses where people want to live and they build businesses where people want to work or shop. It's how free markets work. Besides, you can build your wind farm on leased land in that small town I was talking about where the people there welcome you and enjoy the investment instead of filing complaints over some endangered fly that has been spotted 50 miles away.

There are lines that you cannot legally cross, and Apple very well may have done so.

They do it indiscriminately; who cares? They even have their own iPolice to raid into blogger's homes.

Now awaiting for the john gruber wannabe acolyte zombies (see above) to mod me

Classic case of innovator's dilemma. This is a great excerpt from the authoritative book on the topic:
http://www.businessweek.com/chapter/christensen.htm/

Gates applauds Indian rich guy for sharing wealth: 4.2010 - saying that the norm in the US is 20% and that US benefactors need to give more along the lines of 40% ~ 50% while not mentioning that he & Melinda give along the lines of 1% ~ 2%.

Please provide a reference for your claim.

According to Businessweek, Bill Gates has given $28 billion out of a net worth of $59 billion, placing him second on the list after Warren Buffett. That appears to be considerably higher than 1-2%.

Sodium.

http://www.nrn.com/breakingNews.aspx?id=382296

http://www.reading.ac.uk/foodlaw/additive.htm

http://www.newsmeat.com/news/meat.php?articleId=74056755&channelId=2951&buyerId=newsmeatcom&buid=3281

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-02/processed-foods-may-need-u-s-rule-to-limit-salt-cdc-chief-says.html

The Romans controlled salt for centuries without a war or revolt over it.

I love how you guys manage to blame it all on Clinton, and even Carter! But for the sake of argument, suppose it is their fault. Then why didn't Reagan, Bush, and Bush 2 fix it? W. even had majorities in both houses of Congress for most of his presidency. Instead, the Republicans added fuel to the fire. Neither Democrats nor Republicans stopped the madness.

Now, perhaps the Democrats can be excused on grounds of incompetence. After all, they're the party of blue collar workers. Finance isn't their strength, supposedly. But the Republicans-- they're supposed to be the financially responsible and savvy people. They sure don't look it, despite this recent revival of budget concerns over the new health care program and the costs of bailouts. In 2003 the neo-cons spent our wealth on their own agenda. That "War of Choice" did more damage to the budget than the bailouts and health care combined. They thought it could cost as little as $30 billion. Instead, the minimum cost of the Iraq War to the US is estimated to be $3 trillion. How could they have got it so wrong? In contrast, cost of the new health care bill and the bailouts, and stimulus spending is estimated to be $940 billion, $109 billion, and $862 billion respectively.

And the returns that we got on all this spending? It was hoped that the Iraq War would trigger a domino effect that would spread democracy throughout the Middle East and the Arab and Islamic worlds. This has got to be stupidest pie-in-the-sky, cavalier, woolly, misty, calf-eyed dreaming engaged in by politicians in at least 2 generations. I expect that sort of thinking from innocent 1st graders, not from canny, experienced, and supposedly intelligent politicians. I expect they'd damn well better do their homework. Find out everything they can and be damn sure they get it right before committing trillions of the nation's dollars and the lives of our soldiers to such a risky and provocative course of action. And they didn't do that. To learn that the allegations over WMD had been "sexed up" and were just flat wrong was embarrassing and damaging. And to see how Bush's government was treating analysis that didn't shore up what they wanted to think was shameful, disgusting, and scary. Not only didn't they do their due diligence, they arrogantly dismissed the work and reports of those who tried. That's how they could get an estimate not off by 2 or 3 times, but 100 times too low. I call that rampant and reckless disregard of the facts. That's the sort of crap I expect from stupid dictatorships, not from democracies. Dictatorships are the sorts of governments that are suckers for the sort of impressive seeming gigantic projects that cause more damage than good, ignoring all contrary analysis, or even branding such as treason. As for the rest of the world, none of the other troublesome nations have been frightened into making changes, and Iraq itself is still in danger of tearing itself apart in a bloody civil war, splitting into Kurd, Sunny, and Shiite areas. Indeed Iran is behaving worse than ever. Seems they might be figuring that Iraq cost us so much in both money and good will that we may be unwilling or unable to spend what it would take and rally a coalition to deal with them militarily, if it comes to that. We already had Afghanistan on our plate, there was no need to start another war just to "show the flag". There's the idea that we did it for the oil. Perhaps, but if so, that also was a strategic mistake. If invested in renewable energy, that money could have done much to eliminate our dependence upon foreign oil. And there's this little problem of Cli

Google purchased Android in 2005. You will notice this report is public information, unlike any iPhones plans at the time, which may not have even been known to the board.

This is why they can't give the iPhone away in Japan, because without the hype, the iPhone isn't really all that great compared to the competition.

Really? Are you sure about that?

Umm...I think Apple may argue otherwise

"Having seen what the Mumbai slums look like" -- where? In a movie?

The poor in Mumbai aren't all beggars waiting for a handout. Dharavi in Mumbai is the largest slum in Asia, but it is also one of the most productive places in the city, generating a revenue of a billion dollars a year.

Also 85% of its households have a television.

Glenn Also pointed to this story about how Obama would veto a budget bill if it included money to reinvestigate the 2001 anthrax attacks.

Transparency, this is not.

It's going to be really really hard to convince me that Asian electronics manufacturers aren't engaged in price fixing en masse against the rest of the world whenever a technology cost remains unnaturally high. Hell, after realizing how many times I was the victim of it with LCDs I pretty much expect it.

I mean, really, I feel like a moron for ever knowing that they allowed price fixing -- even promoted it -- inside their borders and then believing that stopped at the rim of the continent. Right now the only question is how many markets is this happening in? They're obviously very good about it, little chance the regulators in other countries will catch it let alone the easily bribed authorities isntalled there.

Here are some examples from today's headlines. And by today I mean this week!

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/04/17/alec-massey-mine/

Yesterday, the AP reported that Marlene Griffith, a widow of William Griffith, one of the 29 men killed in last week’s explosion at a coal mine in West Virginia, is suing Massey Energy, the owner of the mine. Griffith filed a wrongful death lawsuit in Raleigh County Circuit Court, arguing that Massey’s handling of work conditions at the mine plus its history of safety violations amounted to aggravated conduct that rises above the level of ordinary negligence.

...

Responding to the lawsuit, Nathan Coffey, the Public Affairs Coordinator of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), took to Twitter yesterday to mock Marlene Griffith. Coffey posted a link to the AP story about Marlene Griffith, sarcastically commenting that “Everyone wants free money!”

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-04-18/goldman-s-staged-explosion-deserves-apology-roger-lowenstein.html

As only someone from Mars doesn’t know by now, Goldman allegedly sold collateralized debt obligation, or bonds backed by mortgage securities, to institutional investors without disclosing that the specific securities were handpicked by hedge-fund manager John Paulson. Paulson was betting on the securities to fall and, for that reason, structured the securities to include losers -- not winners.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/yesterday-germany-today-uk-tomorrow-world-goldmans-response-lawsuits-everyone-q1-stub-bonuse

As expected, the line of people preparing to sue Goldman is now longer than the posers who bought the iPad on launch day. Reuters reports that British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who himself has been in hot water over his much lamented decision to sell UK's gold despite protests from the BOE and likely under the guidance of Goldman and JPM, wants an investigation into the Goldman affair by the FSA, and is saying that impacted UK banks will be considering legal action. Furthermore, GB slammed Goldman after the TimesOnline reported that Goldman will pay $5.6 billion in bonuses for just three months work, including 600 million pounds for London-based staff.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetar_Capital

According to reports by ProPublica/National Public Radio/This American Life that came out in early April 2010, Magnetar "sponsored" mortgage-backed collateralized debt obligations by agreeing to buy the worst tranche (portion) of the CDO, the "equity tranche". The reports claim that Magnetar then shorted (bet against) those CDOs by buying credit default swaps that insured the CDOs. If the CDOs failed, Magnetar would get back many times its initial investment in the equity tranche by receiving the insurance payoff.[2][4]

Yes, because everything that has a wikipedia entry and a book published about it is absolutely TRUE!

Needless to say, the issue is not as black and white as the anti-IBM folks would have us believe.

So to all those that willing to dismiss these three well educated, extremely brillant, and wise men I just want you to think about it long and hard.

But you're willing to dismiss Buzz Aldrin who has his Sc D degree in Astronautics from MIT.

As for Neil Armstrong, he worked for Morton Thiokol. Morton Thiokol made the Space Shuttle booster's O-ring, the one that caused the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. And Morton Thiokol stands to lose when the Ares I launch vehicle and Project Constellation are cut. So I wouldn't say Armstrong is impartial.

Falcon

If he's opening his mouth now, Obama's proposal must have rubbed him the wrong way in a really, really big way.

The second man on the moon, Buzz Aldrin, disagrees. He said "the strategy will allow NASA and other space agencies to send humans to Mars and other destinations 'as quickly as possible.'"

Myself, I support space programs. By businesses and such not by the federal government. Here in the US the federal government does not have the constitutional authority to institute NASA.

Falcon

Bob Moffat ( http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-03-29/robert-moffat-pleads-guilty-in-galleon-group-case-update1-.html )

Calling someone a liar, because you redefined their words to suit your needs, is kind of a douchebag move.

http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20100405/apple-300000-ipads-sold-on-first-day/
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=ipad+first+day+sales

The industry uses the term "sold" pretty consistently to cover both direct distribution to end-users and distribution to retail channels. Again, you don't get to decide what the words mean. In the context it was used, the figure is absolutely correct.

Also, 450k in one WEEK* is also a LOT different than 400k in one MONTH. If you're going to go around being an asshole, at least be accurate.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-04-08/apple-unveils-iphone-program-says-450-000-ipads-sold-update1-.html

* - By week, of course I mean 5 days. Note the date on the article. Redefining words is FUN :)

this -> "The European Union has a population larger than the United States and yet it manages just fine."..past history man, I'm talking about going forward. I really suggest you take the blinders off and LOOK at some in depth economic analysis, get beyond the headlines and read some contrarian economists. Oh heck, here's one, the darlingest of your ultra far left rich dudes, soros, argue with him why doncha about the future status of your dream welfare union.. the EU is right behind the US with the debt bomb realities. http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-04-09/soros-says-greece-needs-cheaper-loans-to-avoid-death-circle-.html

More recent events and analysis

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/markets-rally-as-greek-debt-crisis-eases-1943155.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/7583304/Euphoria-over-Greek-rescue-fades-as-first-cracks-appear.html

Here is a short overview of the US debt situation as it is today

Let this one sink in a bit...

http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article18393.html

These are the outright thieves "in charge" of our economic situation

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/32906678/looting_main_street/print

really, ^^^^ those dudes right there run things. In and out of government, the musical chairs with thieves and liars in government, in the Fed, back to their Wall Street gangster lairs, lather rinse repeat, and it hasn't mattered a whit which imperial leader or group of goofballs in our congress we have had, D or R next to their name, it's those same dudes always *really* in charge behind the scenes....

Now see why we aren't going to be having any welfare state here, or even a credible economy soon? The system is already broken, we've been "corporate raided" on a huge scale, and even the "change" government is just more of the same tired old BS.

Your central banker pigs are just as much thieves as ours have been, you'll see... just wait. Your welfare states are going to be crumbling because you don't understand simple basic math, plus time travel, you can't live in the past and expect that to be the future or..along those lines, ain't happening. What was then, was then, in the future.....? I am old enough to remember when the US had a very decent real economy, we were the largest creditor nation, not the biggest borrower, and healthcare was cheap, affordable for most people. Even the crappiest jobs had free or cheap coverage, or you could buy it on the side for cheap. But then the corporate looting really began, along with the ludicrous expansion of government based on lying promises of something for nothing...now 35 years later, poofed, gone, we are sunk without borrowing money all the time, and we have no credible plans to pay back what we have already borrowed.

You have to make money to spend it, FIRST, on welfare or whatever, and no, running printing presses is not making money. You can't keep pouring six gallons of stuff from a five gallon bucket, and accounting and bookkeeping tricks only work so long. You don't make money by exporting jobs, them other fellas make the money then. And you certainly don't make money by letting your central casino bankers run rampant and steal everything that ain't nailed down, and especially when you run those thieves in and out of official government positions where they get to *set policy*.

Now some of the nations there in the EU just might squeak by over the

I don't know where you get your info from but Exxon did pay taxes to the US Gov, according to Business Week http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/may2008/db2008051_596535.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_news+%2B+analysis & the Securities & Exchange Commission filings Exxon paid an effective tax rate of 34% to the US Gov in 2007 which is 1% below the Corp tax in the US and well above the 24% Avg paid by all Corps in US.

It is funny how the CO that pays the highest rate in the US is accused of not paying ANY taxes and at the same time is harped on for overseas operations that they are forced into in large part because they can't drill here so they have to built massive operations overseas to provide oil to the US and in some cases having to pay Russia up to 90% of revenues generated by the oil they drill.

But let us all be honest, Exxon really does not pay any taxes at all, you are right, we do, the consumers! To top that off the Gov collects in taxes 4 times as much per gallon of gas sold in the US than the Oil COs make in profits.

I would be interested in learning one industry in the US that the Gov collects more taxes from than Gas and Oil?

you have zero voice in any corporation, no matter whether you work for it or not.

Isn't that why God created Shareholders?
And CEOs do get fired.

We are heading into an interesting phase of history where more wealth and commodities are held by corporations instead of the state and the church. But I think the last five years have taught everyone that giants of industry can and (inevitably) do crumble, slower because of obsolescence or outstripping resources, or faster when resulting from wrong decisions. They then turn to the governments for reparation, since governments normally can't crumble, unless it's from the right decisions.

I know this is not the best place to say good things about Bill Gates, but ask yourself if anything else can change the world better and faster than the efficiency and financial resources of industry, mixed with the philanthropy of good government. Wealth has to come from somewhere, just as it has to go somewhere. It's worth taking note when it goes to the right places, even if it didn't seem like it at the time.

The company saw revenue rise by 25% year-on-year to EUR 1.95 billion in the year, while net profit jumped 75.2% year-on-year to EUR 175.9 million in 2009

Although I immensely respect math PhDs for their understanding and accomplishments, I'm not sure having a PhD in math grants expertise in computer and network security. My guess is their expertise is used largely in encryption efforts. Insofar as that is useful for network security, fine and great, but there's a lot more to network security than just encryption.

I really see no evidence that the NSA has scooped up the smartest math PhDs. In fact, the age of Google is making it harder for the NSA to attract mathematical talent. They simply cannot compete in wages, for example, though they may be able to compete on lifestyle issues. Here's an article that addresses the issue: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_04/b3968007.htm

Any time corporate ethics come up, someone inevitably posts ths "IBM Nazi" thing like it is some kind of established fact. Unfortunately it is not nearly as clear as Edwin Black and his supporters make it out to be. First of all, not every historian even agrees with the breathless claims made in the book, but few are willing to put up with the claims of anti-semitism that are inevitably raised when someone questions Mr Black's research.

Secondly, even assuming the company and everyone who ever was associated with it is guilty of being a Nazi, Edwin Black himself did a huge amount of business with IBM, so his moral lecturing rings a little hollow.

Thirdly, how could anyone believe that the launch of the book and the class action lawsuit (timed to happen simultaneously, and immediately thrown out of court never to be heard from again) was a co-incidence?

Mod Parent down. India has way more red tape and labour is more expensive than China. Any comparative article e.g. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_34/b3948401.htm talks of India's red tape and labour (union) protection making things difficult for manufacturers (just google economy India China red tape). Dell could be moving because of any of a thousand reasons from threat of losing information espionage to just not wanting to keep all eggs in one basket, but the parent's reasons are just ludicrous.

Right. A democratic constitutional republic. NOT a democracy.

Not a direct democracy.

Recall that the breakup of AT&T is widely regarded as a mistake.

By who, AT&T shareholders?

No improvement has been registered there as a result of government intervention.

You liked having high prices and paying a monthly rental for a $10 phone? When has a non-heavily-regulated monopoly ever provided low prices to a captive market?

Can you be more specific about "blowing up the world's economy" every few decades?

Stock market bubbles and the inevitable collapses. See: 1929, 1987, 2008. Why didn't we have a collapse between 1929 and 1987? Because of regulations that created firewalls and limited risky practices.

Recall that the current worldwide economic crisis was driven by the housing sector in the US.

No, it was driven by credit default swaps, that took out insurance and made bets on loans, all bundled up as AAA rated securities.

Specifically by the unwise lending of money to people who should not have been considered good credit risks.

Specifically, that's deliberate misdirection. You could have bought out every one of those mortgages for less than the cost of TARP. It wasn't poor people or the CRA that created a bubble just about equal to the monetary supply of the entire planet.

More specifically still, lending that was mandated by the federal government.

More specifically, a well debunked lie you're repeating:

The Community Reinvestment Act, passed in 1977, requires banks to lend in the low-income neighborhoods where they take deposits. Just the idea that a lending crisis created from 2004 to 2007 was caused by a 1977 law is silly. But it's even more ridiculous when you consider that most subprime loans were made by firms that aren't subject to the CRA. University of Michigan law professor Michael Barr testified back in February before the House Committee on Financial Services that 50% of subprime loans were made by mortgage service companies not subject comprehensive federal supervision and another 30% were made by affiliates of banks or thrifts which are not subject to routine supervision or examinations. As former Fed Governor Ned Gramlich said in an August, 2007, speech shortly before he passed away: "In the subprime market where we badly need supervision, a majority of loans are made with very little supervision. It is like a city with a murder law, but no cops on the beat."

Not surprisingly given the higher degree of supervision, loans made under the CRA program were made in a more responsible way than other subprime loans. CRA loans carried lower rates than other subprime loans and were less likely to end up securitized into the mortgage-backed securities that have caused so many losses, according to a recent study by the law firm Traiger & Hinckley (PDF file here).

Then of course, there's all the hand waving involved in pretending that the CRA was a horrible law that caused a massive crisis - but took 30 years for it to happen.

It is not the right that ever has or ever will favor application of a religious test for office.

Of course it will be, since it's the free market jihadists that made a marriage of convenience with those that believe the Earth is 6,000 years old and put up museums showing humans riding dinosaurs.

Recall that atheism/secularism is as much a religion as any other

I'll recall you like to pretend that polar opposites are the same thing.

Yes, of course, no one even mentions energy efficiency, which is why the Obama administration has been pushing for more energy efficient lighting, applicances, homes, automobiles, and industry. But don't tell anyone I mentioned it. It's a secret!

Can't agree more. American's have some bizarre opposition to it based what appears to be nonsense reasons. The single biggest, sane, argument I've heard is the question of how would you pay for it? That it a very good question and one worthy of asking, but there is so much crap flying around that people are stuck talking about the wrong question.

For me and for large parts of the world, healthcare is a right, not a privilege. I believe everyone is entitled to the same healthcare possibilities, personal wealth should not be an influencing factor in someone making a health related decision. How primitive is a society if who gets proper medical care is based on who is the strongest financially? I hate to make this personal for Americans, but if you can't think of the poorest among your nation, if you can't be that selfless that you can think of the homeless, the unemployed or the downtrodden of your society then think of it like this, how can you personally afford the costs of your healthcare when the number one reason for declaring bankruptcy in America is medical costs and 78% of those HAD insurance.

For me the question is not about me personally. In Ireland, where I am from, I can get insurance which will cover me for almost every eventuality. But I don't. Not because I can't afford it, not because I don't want to pay it, because believe me I would like to have the comfort of knowing I'm cover in all eventualities, but the reason I choose not to get insurance, is because I don't want to put myself in front of anyone else. Why should I be put ahead in a waiting line simply because I can afford. The person who can't afford it is no worse than I am, nor is the person who has insurance who skips the line better than I.

This brings me back to the question at the start. How can we afford it? If the humanitarian argument doesn't sit well with you, think about this economic, financial angle. When you consider the lost money involved in bankruptcy, the lost income generated by the person while they suffer from inadequate healthcare and potentially death because of it, the costs of this lack luster healthcare system add up. When you combine that with preventative measures that could be taken if people were not concerned with how much it would cost them, the long term costs of medicine drops dramatically.

The question then becomes, how can we afford not to...

In a natural monopoly like utilities, roads, bridges, etc, you're going to pay through the nose if privately owned. http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=4213016

I can't tell if you think you're supporting his claim or not. What, exactly, is that link supposed to prove?

In a natural monopoly like utilities, roads, bridges, etc, you're going to pay through the nose if privately owned.

http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=4213016