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"You find two-stroke engines in poorer countries because they're cheap,"

No, you find two-stroke engines in applications where you need high power but extremely low weight. Their cheapness is simply a byproduct of their simplicity (hence, weight savings). There are plenty of applications where a 4-stroke engine simply wouldn't work because it would weigh too much (leaf blowers, chain saws, etc) or would be too bulky (mopeds, model airplanes, lawnmowers, etc). Sure their efficiency needs some work, or replacement if a viable alternative is created, but at the moment there are several applications where 4-stroke engines or battery power simply wouldn't work.

the power-to-weight ratio gap is very small these days in the 1hp+ market. engines like the honda GX25 have something like 7lbs making 1hp, perfect for a handheld blower. honda even bolts a perfectly good leaf blower to it, but they only sell it in the european market for some reason, i have no idea why they don't bring it into north america: http://www.honda.co.uk/lawn-an...

Yeah, but that's probably the Civic you're hearing, not the vinyl. :)

Obligatory Honda Civic Choir links

http://www.honda.co.uk/civic/

http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=honda+civic+ choir

They have a copy of the advert they had on TV on their website. It's a very catchy cartoon song which managed to convince thousands of brits that Honda are these really cool engineers who love revolutionising things and are all-round really nice, cool guys. And then it made them walk into work every morning singing "hate something, change something make something betterrrrrrr!!". Very effective technique.

There are rather a lot of internal combustion engines out there, it's lots of hundreds of millions. How much land will we need to grow all of that biomass to produce a sustainable, continuous yield?
How much energy will we need to support the growth? Pesticides and fertilisers are clearly going to be needed, but are both generally made from oil and natural gas, things we're supposed to be replacing because it's mostly going to get more expensive in the medium term and then keen on climbing until it runs out. So they are out and we are back to pre 1940s growth yields, requiring more land.
How much energy will it take to harvest and process the unimaginable amounts of corn needed just to fuel north america. The fundemental question is how much land and how much net total energy does it take to produce our daily and future equivalent biodiesel needs? I'm pretty sure physics prevents this from being very scalable because it's not a very efficient process. Surely that means it can only ever work on a small, local scale? in which case our economy is going to be in trouble when the biodiesel price is high due to lack of supply and shipping truck companies are going out of business and families can't afford to live in the suburbs because biodiesel is too expensive to use enough a day to move a few tons of metal a hundred miles or more. So diesel may not require any new infrastructure, but it will probably lead to the abandoning a lot of what we do have and can't be a graceful move. Oil and natural gas are just too cheap, very little else can be obtained in the same quantities - literally because stuff doesn't just spring up out of the ground anymore ;)
You can buy civics in diesel, at least you can across the range here in the UK (and it only weighs 1.3 tons ;). I'm not sure if this url will work, but it's on honda.co.uk if not: diesel civic

Want a small, efficient four seater? Try a Honda Jazz or Renault Modus.

Civic Type-R

I'll agree the analogy is not perfect, but the point is that there is are a lot of factors besides engine size or CPU frequency to consider.

Oh, and the Type R Civic displaces more (trivially) than the S2000, and is slower in both pickup and top speed. While they top out similarly, the .6 seconds faster from 0-60 means if both cars are stock, the Civic gets smoked.

Civic Type R
displacement: 1998 cc
top speed : 146 mph
0 - 60 : 6.8 seconds

S2000
displacement: 1997 cc
top speed : 150 mph
0 - 60 : 6.2 seconds

I'll agree the analogy is not perfect, but the point is that there is are a lot of factors besides engine size or CPU frequency to consider.

Oh, and the Type R Civic displaces more (trivially) than the S2000, and is slower in both pickup and top speed. While they top out similarly, the .6 seconds faster from 0-60 means if both cars are stock, the Civic gets smoked.

Civic Type R
displacement: 1998 cc
top speed : 146 mph
0 - 60 : 6.8 seconds

S2000
displacement: 1997 cc
top speed : 150 mph
0 - 60 : 6.2 seconds

Personally, it isn't the blogs that bother me on google nearly so much as the forums and discussion boards. I've experienced a bit of blog noise, and my blog has even reaped the benefits of it...when I look through my http referrers, I get lots of hits from google for current topics that I just happen to mention. For example, when the new honda commercial came out, I was one of the first couple spots on google for related searched. I can see this as a problem, because I'm just an indirect link to the real source

However, I have a bigger problem with searching for something and getting piles of forums in the responses. If we can turn blogs off, I'd certainly like to be able to turn forums and discussions off...they're even worse than blogs because a lot of time they're blog like responses to a blog like post. I agree, it would be way nicer to have blogs turned off, but if we're gonna do that...I think forums are also a major item that should be checked out.

On another topic...I think that accusing blogs as idle chatter is a little off the mark. While I'm sure a lot are, I think a lot of people are trying to take it seriously and post their thoughts about life and current events. I don't consider that idle chatter, I consider that simply a different perspective.

It's presumably still limited to the UK, but it looks like this DVD can now be ordered online too.

here is the link... Honda

...suitable for mirroring: http://www.honda.co.uk/newcars/300k.swf (4.1 meg or so)

('course, it's slashdotted now.)