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Sir,

    You also forgot to factor in the cost of money. I.e., if you banked the $5000 instead, you'd have that much more money at the end of the car ownership period. In 10 years at 7%, that $5000 becomes almost $10,000 (depending on how you compound the interest.)

Yeah... um.... I don't think you should be using 7% for personal finance TVM calculations right now.

http://finance.yahoo.com/bonds/composite_bond_rates

The NYC subway system is also getting WiFi and cellular phone repeaters throughout the system. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nf/20100803/bs_nf/74586 In about six years...

Given this was 9 shot not this mythical 40 shot spoken above, what is that? dust?

http://in.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090313044828AAvUOoT

http://www.firearmstactical.com/briefs10.htm

He states this as if there's nothing anyone can do about it - when google itself is the one of the worst offenders by storing FULL IP addresses for half a year. And even that was sold as a concession to privacy. I still don't know why it's allowed to do that in germany, where even the BKA (FBI-equivalent) is not allowed to store it's website visitors IP addresses

That's even worse in the US since I think that unlike in germany there are no restrictions on how long your provider can store your data (max. 7 days here).

Oh, and don't give me the "I'd rather have google have my data than the government" argument. Everything google has, your government has should it choose so. It doesn't have to do more than ask, google made that clear several times iirc.

If you really feel that way, then vote with your business and use Yahoo Search. if enough people dumped them over this they might have second thoughts, and at the very least you would be standing up for your principles and supporting an underdog. Yahoo Search is really good now, especially the "More" tab (that is the little tab below the search box after you've run a query) which not only gives you common words added to your search like Google, but related concepts, such as searching for "Dark Knight" will give you Chris Nolan, Heath Ledger, etc.

As for TFA, can we all agree that "Do No Evil" bullshit is officially shot to hell? It was good PR spin while it lasted, but short of hanging puppies from the Google offices I can't see how they can get more evil as an Internet company than to screw the web by turning against Net Neutrality, especially considering now that Google has done it every other big player will be cutting backroom deals to jump on the bandwagon.

True. As recent published research demonstrates: The WaPo, NYTimes, and LATimes all do not deserve our eyeballs (Warning: PDF Publications).

Source

The result is a tax system that exempts almost half the country from paying for programs that benefit everyone, including national defense, public safety, infrastructure and education. It is a system in which the top 10 percent of earners -- households making an average of $366,400 in 2006 -- paid about 73 percent of the income taxes collected by the federal government.

The bottom 40 percent, on average, make a profit from the federal income tax, meaning they get more money in tax credits than they would otherwise owe in taxes. For those people, the government sends them a payment.

What you say is true, however there is a Caveat

The vast majority of people who escape federal income taxes still pay other taxes, including federal payroll taxes that fund Social Security and Medicare, and excise taxes on gasoline, aviation, alcohol and cigarettes. Many also pay state or local taxes on sales, income and property.

For example, Social Security and Medicare are 15.3% of your income (until you hit the cap for social security).

Same could be said about the Prius but look how well they're selling.

2010 Prius MSRP = $22800 to $28070

2010 Corolla MSRP = $15,450 to $20,150

Price difference = $7350 to $7920 = $7635 average

Prius mpg = 51/48 = 49.5 mpg average

Corolla mpg = 26/34 = 30 mpg average

First, you can't really average MPG's together like that. You have to convert to gallons used for some distance, average that, then convert back to MPG, or you'll be wrong.

Second, Notice the the HUGE difference in city mileage. Your improper average assumes an equal measure of city and highway driving. Further, traffic jams throw everything out the window: the Prius uses zero gas while at a stop, while the Corolla uses gas continuously (if you expect to have AC or heat, etc).

So basically, you'd have to drive 195,000 miles in a Prius to break even compared to the price of a Corolla. Until you surpass 195,000 miles the Corolla would have saved money.

You also miss other factors. For example, Prius brake pads last nearly forever because the majority of braking is done with regenerative braking (i.e. spinning the electric motor backwards, recovering energy and slowing the car), not mechanical braking. In fact, the Prius gasoline engine is not even running much of the time when you're driving, saving on engine wear-n-tear. And the Prius has a converter that works like a continuously-variable transmission with a fraction of the complexity of the Corolla's automatic transmission, yielding two more wins: 1) more reliable, and 2) the gasoline engine, when it does run, runs in its optimal rpm range. Not to mention that the gasoline/electric mix lets each piece do what it does best: electric engine for low-end torque, gasoline engine for highway speeds.

How do you figure the cost savings from these features? To be honest, I don't have a clue... it's pretty complex. But there are definite savings and greater reliability involved in the Prius than in the Corolla.

In summary, the new Corolla will always be better than the new Prius. Of course this is assuming you're deciding between the two cars comparing gas prices only, not size of vehicle, status, smugness, etc.

Um, no. The Corolla is inferior to the Prius in most every respect. The Corolla's only advantage is up-front cash expended.

On top of of that, how do you even begin to value the quietness of a Prius at a stoplight? The fun from driving a vehicle with a gasoline engine, two electric motor-generators, and with a huge battery in the back? How about running your AC with the engine off? How about the engine not starting when you decide to pull the car up a bit more into the parking space after turning it off?

You certainly lose your Geek Cred when you reject a car that you push a button to put it in Ready mode, not even starting the gasoline engine (one of three motors in the car).

Same could be said about the Prius but look how well they're selling.

2010 Prius MSRP = $22800 to $28070

2010 Corolla MSRP = $15,450 to $20,150

Price difference = $7350 to $7920 = $7635 average

Prius mpg = 51/48 = 49.5 mpg average

Corolla mpg = 26/34 = 30 mpg average

First, you can't really average MPG's together like that. You have to convert to gallons used for some distance, average that, then convert back to MPG, or you'll be wrong.

Second, Notice the the HUGE difference in city mileage. Your improper average assumes an equal measure of city and highway driving. Further, traffic jams throw everything out the window: the Prius uses zero gas while at a stop, while the Corolla uses gas continuously (if you expect to have AC or heat, etc).

So basically, you'd have to drive 195,000 miles in a Prius to break even compared to the price of a Corolla. Until you surpass 195,000 miles the Corolla would have saved money.

You also miss other factors. For example, Prius brake pads last nearly forever because the majority of braking is done with regenerative braking (i.e. spinning the electric motor backwards, recovering energy and slowing the car), not mechanical braking. In fact, the Prius gasoline engine is not even running much of the time when you're driving, saving on engine wear-n-tear. And the Prius has a converter that works like a continuously-variable transmission with a fraction of the complexity of the Corolla's automatic transmission, yielding two more wins: 1) more reliable, and 2) the gasoline engine, when it does run, runs in its optimal rpm range. Not to mention that the gasoline/electric mix lets each piece do what it does best: electric engine for low-end torque, gasoline engine for highway speeds.

How do you figure the cost savings from these features? To be honest, I don't have a clue... it's pretty complex. But there are definite savings and greater reliability involved in the Prius than in the Corolla.

In summary, the new Corolla will always be better than the new Prius. Of course this is assuming you're deciding between the two cars comparing gas prices only, not size of vehicle, status, smugness, etc.

Um, no. The Corolla is inferior to the Prius in most every respect. The Corolla's only advantage is up-front cash expended.

On top of of that, how do you even begin to value the quietness of a Prius at a stoplight? The fun from driving a vehicle with a gasoline engine, two electric motor-generators, and with a huge battery in the back? How about running your AC with the engine off? How about the engine not starting when you decide to pull the car up a bit more into the parking space after turning it off?

You certainly lose your Geek Cred when you reject a car that you push a button to put it in Ready mode, not even starting the gasoline engine (one of three motors in the car).

Check this out:
http://members.cox.net/tfangrow/hissdrive.html

Otherwise, barn door mounts:
http://www.mikeoates.org/mas/projects/scotch/
http://www.astunit.com/tonkinsastro/atm/projects/scotch.htm
http://www.davetrott.com/DoubleArmBarnDoor.html

Equatorial platforms:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/eqplatforms/

Lots of other links:
http://members.ziggo.nl/jhm.vangastel/Astronomy/links.htm

"Even if the car is electric, they still will not save money in terms of the total cost of ownership, over buying a regular old car that's fuel efficient. Look at things like the Chevy Volt versus a Toyota Corolla. Even assuming no gas, ever, the Corolla is still more affordable."

Same could be said about the Prius but look how well they're selling.
2010 Prius MSRP = $22800 to $28070
2010 Corolla MSRP = $15,450 to $20,150

Price difference = $7350 to $7920 = $7635 average

Prius mpg = 51/48 = 49.5 mpg average
Corolla mpg = 26/34 = 30 mpg average

195,000 miles / 49.5mpg x $3 average per gallon = $11,818 dollars
195,000 miles / 30mpg x $3 average per gallon = $19,500 dollars
$19,500 - $11,818 = $7682.

So basically, you'd have to drive 195,000 miles in a Prius to break even compared to the price of a Corolla. Until you surpass 195,000 miles the Corolla would have saved money.

This also doesn't figure the interest you could make on $7,682 while you're driving your Prius to reach 195,000 miles. If it takes 10 years to reach 195,000 miles that $7,682 at 5% interest would be $12,513.17.

In summary, the new Corolla will always be better than the new Prius. Of course this is assuming you're deciding between the two cars comparing gas prices only, not size of vehicle, status, smugness, etc.

"Even if the car is electric, they still will not save money in terms of the total cost of ownership, over buying a regular old car that's fuel efficient. Look at things like the Chevy Volt versus a Toyota Corolla. Even assuming no gas, ever, the Corolla is still more affordable."

Same could be said about the Prius but look how well they're selling.
2010 Prius MSRP = $22800 to $28070
2010 Corolla MSRP = $15,450 to $20,150

Price difference = $7350 to $7920 = $7635 average

Prius mpg = 51/48 = 49.5 mpg average
Corolla mpg = 26/34 = 30 mpg average

195,000 miles / 49.5mpg x $3 average per gallon = $11,818 dollars
195,000 miles / 30mpg x $3 average per gallon = $19,500 dollars
$19,500 - $11,818 = $7682.

So basically, you'd have to drive 195,000 miles in a Prius to break even compared to the price of a Corolla. Until you surpass 195,000 miles the Corolla would have saved money.

This also doesn't figure the interest you could make on $7,682 while you're driving your Prius to reach 195,000 miles. If it takes 10 years to reach 195,000 miles that $7,682 at 5% interest would be $12,513.17.

In summary, the new Corolla will always be better than the new Prius. Of course this is assuming you're deciding between the two cars comparing gas prices only, not size of vehicle, status, smugness, etc.

widespread devastation? you may want to read the latest reports concerning on the oil leak... apparently (as with global warming) it may have been blown out of proportion cause they can't seem to find the oil...

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2007202,00.html

http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2010/07/so-has-anyone-seen-the-oil-that-spilled-into-the-gulf.html

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews_excl/ynews_excl_sc3270

Well, according to one source 26% of the cars in Europe are black. Now the original article says that about 26% of the cars stolen in the Netherlands are black (see Figure 2).

Bravo, Mr. Obvious!

How come such an article is on /., and not even in the idle section!?

Sure, the probability or transit decreases with greater orbital periods

...yes, and with the orbital angle of the planet in question -- out of an entirely rotated set of orbital possibilities, only a few intercept the path to the telescope; and the further out the planet is, the less chance. That's why the close in ones are easy, and the ones in earthlike orbits are not.

and you're kidding yourself about continents or clouds

No, sir, I am not.

Briefly, the resolution achievable using interferometry is proportional to the observing frequency and the distance between the antennas farthest apart in the array. In space, the distance between the antennas, the number of antennas, and the size of the antennas are all matters of raw materials, no more. Once we can manufacture *in* space using materials gleaned from asteroids, there's hardly any limit at all to the size of the synthesized aperture.

The only limitation is the usual one - the data is as old as it is distant.

Believe me, pal, we haven't even begun to construct telescopes of the capabilities our current technologies can enable. We're just putting the money in incredibly stupid places. As today, we just stuffed another fifty nine billion dollars down the Pentagon's automated money disposal. Not to mention the 8.7 billion they "lost."

I don't know about research, but when can I get the elusive $35 tablet?

Of course, they want notarized proof if your sick and need to change planes.

Don't worry, getting sick will soon be an Act of God.

Also, a xeroxed copy of His driver's license or passport proving His identity. And His signature, which must match the signature card from a local bank.

I wonder if any deities have tried to open bank accounts after being denied trading accounts? http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/100717/oddities/india_stocks_religion_hindu_offbeat

> blinders on how?

Well, she has censored certain facts (and anyone who tried to discuss them on Groklaw). Like when she deleted a post showing that Red Hat is a CCIA member, or the PDF to text of the four letters between TH and IBM (formerly available as the parent of this post, but that link will just give you a blank page). Somehow, she STILL makes it out that TH brought this upon themselves when IBM FUDed them in letter 2 by raising the specter of Hercules itself being an "infringing platform", when all TH had asked prior to that was if it was possible to do business with them. But letters 3 and 4 came out first, so it's understandable that many people are confused.

Then she has an awful lot of hate for Florian personally and anyone else who tries to correct her. In fact, she's downright nasty when she disagrees. That's how AllParadox left. Nobody is free to disagree with her. You can be polite and well-mannered as you wish. You can cite facts and sources. But she'll just disappear them if she disagrees. And she's removed more than a few accounts, like on this story, where you can see that she would delete the account of someone who is only trying to help. Ask yourself: if that person was really a troll, why would they be contributing to Groklaw? Exactly what did their account get deleted for? Can you imagine the people who post Goatse here turning over a new leaf and deciding to help the site? But Slashdot uses transparent moderation: you know if you're at -1 or not. But you won't even know you've been moderated on Groklaw unless you know how her invisible moderation works: I can still see my own posts, but nobody else can (unless they replied before I got vanished). You have to use a proxy or something to see if your posts still exist.

That would be great if she were moderating the Goatse guy out of existence. But exactly why is it necessary to vanish someone who gives citations proving that many of her facts are in error? Shouldn't Groklaw post ALL the facts? And AllParadox isn't the only person to question her censorship of people merely for disagreeing.

This isn't new. It's been going on for ages. Plenty Groklaw supporters have gotten fed up. Or are you going to accuse several people who have written for Groklaw, moderated for Groklaw, and promoted Groklaw on Slashdot of all being anti-Groklaw trolls?

That's what she does, right? The only way someone could disagree with her is if they were paid to or if they're trolling, at least in her mind. Never mind the fact that I can find plenty of people who have worked closely with her only to get fed up. Yeah, I knew her. Her real email (past the filter) is pj2@groklaw.net (she can change it again if she wants to).

But I guess she can call all this "trolling." As we all know, anyone who disagrees with her is a troll. It doesn't matter how much they try to cite their sources or argue that something is a mistake. No, if they disagree, they're clearly being paid by someone or something or question her. But it's always okay when she speculates wildly about people's motives.

Just for the record, lest people accuse me of holding all sorts of beliefs that I do not hold, I say that Darl & SCO can die in a fire as far as I'm concerned. I believe that PJ is a real person (a retired paralegal in Connecticut, if I'm not mistak

You do realize that the banking industry is probably still the most heavily regulated industry in America... right?

And you realize that despite those regulations, AIG just paid out a big settlement to get rid of allegations of

anti-competitive market division, accounting violations, and stock price manipulation by AIG between October 1999 and April 2005.

You know -- On one hand they're selling something to consumers and saying "oh, this is a great idea". On the other hand they were selling something to brokerage houses as something to bet against this exact thing -- asset backed commodities were useless crap, but they managed to sell it to consumers as an investment vehicle. This to cover up the fact that they'd been giving mortgages with no sound financial reasoning for most of a decade, and were holding a lot of worthless debt and mostly wanted to offload that onto someone else.

This is an industry which recently ran into troubles because their computerized stock sellers got a little twitchy and triggered a panic. Nothing to do with anything, but the computer program which was designed to milk as much money from the system as possible went a little glitchy.

I never said the financial and banking industry was unregulated. I said they're as close to unregulated as they've been able to manage, and they're usually lobbying to have existing regulations removed.

I think in this, and in many other segments, we need far more regulation than we have now. I don't have faith in them to adhere to the existing rules, let alone trying to exploit things that nobody has made a rule about.

Then, after their big bailout, they're back to record profits and executive bonuses in a startlingly small amount of time. Mostly because they clammed up and did things like saying "well, since our profits have been down we're increasing service fees".

A truly 'free market' would only make more things worse in the long run, not better. If they could rape and pillage the economy even more, they would in a heartbeat.

You do realize that the banking industry is probably still the most heavily regulated industry in America... right?

And you realize that despite those regulations, AIG just paid out a big settlement to get rid of allegations of

anti-competitive market division, accounting violations, and stock price manipulation by AIG between October 1999 and April 2005.

You know -- On one hand they're selling something to consumers and saying "oh, this is a great idea". On the other hand they were selling something to brokerage houses as something to bet against this exact thing -- asset backed commodities were useless crap, but they managed to sell it to consumers as an investment vehicle. This to cover up the fact that they'd been giving mortgages with no sound financial reasoning for most of a decade, and were holding a lot of worthless debt and mostly wanted to offload that onto someone else.

This is an industry which recently ran into troubles because their computerized stock sellers got a little twitchy and triggered a panic. Nothing to do with anything, but the computer program which was designed to milk as much money from the system as possible went a little glitchy.

I never said the financial and banking industry was unregulated. I said they're as close to unregulated as they've been able to manage, and they're usually lobbying to have existing regulations removed.

I think in this, and in many other segments, we need far more regulation than we have now. I don't have faith in them to adhere to the existing rules, let alone trying to exploit things that nobody has made a rule about.

Then, after their big bailout, they're back to record profits and executive bonuses in a startlingly small amount of time. Mostly because they clammed up and did things like saying "well, since our profits have been down we're increasing service fees".

A truly 'free market' would only make more things worse in the long run, not better. If they could rape and pillage the economy even more, they would in a heartbeat.

Asian websites seem to reflect pictures of downtown areas of major asian cities - Tokyo, Hong Kong, parts of Beijing, Vietnam, etc. Shockingly, their major cities don't look terribly different from western megalopolises like NYC and London. Their colorful ads just happen to have asian character sets, which have a lot more lines and end up looking more busy to the western eye. Have you looked at yahoo.com/ or amazon.com lately? I mean, Yahoo has cleaned up their image some, but it's still very cluttered and messy. I can only imagine what Google News.jp or .cn looks like, or heaven forbid, the japanese translated version of Wunderground.com?? Just add some purple and yellow rounded corner rectangles in the background and it looks like every other stereotypical asian website out there.
 
Anyways, my point is, websites are driven by advertising. Websites of local languages are going to look similar to the Times Squares and Piccadilly Circuses of the world, in their local languages and alphabets. Certain color combinations might make certain alphabets stand out better. Helveltica (and all the child fonts it's spawned over the years) happens to look really good in Red, White or Blue on a White or dark colored background, which is probably why western advertising all looks the same for the most part. People tend to use more asian color schemes for party invitiations when using Comic Sans, and that font everyone loves to hate, Papyrus, tends to look best Black on white on tan.

http://mora.jp/artist/80307744/80006846/?cpid=sony.co.jp

This example has a design no more complicated than an English website serving similar purpose (in this case, music retail). It mere appears to be more cluttered because the Japanese writing system is more complex.

A similar observation can be made with regards to Chinese, which is even more compact than Japanese due to the lack of a phonetic alphabet. Take a look at Yahoo:
http://www.yahoo.com/
http://www.yahoo.com.cn/
http://www.yahoo.co.jp/

The hanzi/kanji writing system simply does not lend itself to minimalistic designs in the same way that can be achieved by the Roman alphabet. This is partially why many modern brands in Japan make liberal use of English in their designs and typesets.

That said, it is also true that Chinese and Japanese web designers appear to follow a set of standards rather different from the Web 2.0 design philosophies. Many of them still like to use <TABLE> to format their layouts.

This. Best answerer had good intentions, but everything after the first two words was pretty like throwing a plasma grenade straight up and then deciding to snipe.

It seems to me that the wealth accumulation could be explained by less wealthy people having more children and wealthy people having less children. See, e.g., http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic-economic_paradox. Thus, if we assume any correlation between the wealth of the parent and the wealth of their child, the proportion of children of the less wealthy will grow relative to children of the wealthy.

These modern times may be the first time where the tyranny-of-the-majority democratic government is officially the tyranny of the less-wealthy, taxing the wealthy to transfer wealth to the bottom half of the wealth spectrum. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Nearly-half-of-US-households-apf-1105567323.html?x=0&.v=1. If taxes increase, at some point, the wealthy productive members of society will move to a more tax friendly country.

By the way, why do you think CEOs do in fact make as much money as they do? I for one wouldn't trade my life for theirs. Do you have any idea of how many hours most CEOs work? There are not a lot of people smart enough to run a company who are willing to make such tremendous personal sacrifices. It makes sense that you would have to bid up their salaries to compete for such a limited supply. Alternatively, is it really that hard to fathom that productivity is distributed quasi-normally, and the CEOs are the producers on the far right?

Basically the entire computer's assembled in a sweatshop by barely literate people who are being paid jack-shit to assemble a "rich-boy toy" for some perceived fat cat in the US who sleeps on piles of money.

People talk about Detroit autoworkers exactly the same way. Doesn't mean much, really.

Talk about them that way -- okay; they're not exactly in the same league though.

UAW autoworkers earn, on average, $28 per hour. That's average, some get much more. http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070924073107AAuGk8O

Chinese sweat shop labor, e.g. at Foxconn, make about $168-176 per month. http://www.china.org.cn/china/2010-06/07/content_20199987.htm

I would love to know why I got modded down when this whole article is about Google having to lock down JavaScript in their email clinet. I use ABP and Nscript, but what I use doesn't matter. As the PC repair guy that has to deal with cleaning your aunt Edna's PC when she gets pwned, what matters is what happens when SHE surfs. And unfortunately when she surfs she is running IE or some other browser and thanks to JavaScript, along with Reader and Flash, she most likely WILL get infected. I mean when you type JavaScript malware and get over 12 MILLION hits in Yahoo? That tells me maybe another approach needs to be taken.

You yourself pointed out that the sandbox jails frequently have to be broken out of to do interesting JavaScript interactive websites, and that is my point. We should be able to develop a language that allows you to do those interactive websites easily without risking exploitation or risk to data on the underlying machine. JavaScript I believe just as ActiveX will be discarded in time, simply because the risks will continue to grow while the hacks like sandboxes will hamper legitimate website builders more and more. What we need is a new language built from the ground up to allow those cool websites without allowing exploitation. Perhaps using the stream processors built into every PC nowadays to render without allowing access to the underlying PC?

All I know is just by blocking JavaScript ads via ABP I cut down my customers infection rate by a good 75%-85%. Now as you know those ads are required by many websites to stay afloat, but I can't in good conscience allow them. If more and more do as I do something has to give, and I believe what will eventually give will be JavaScript, for something built with security in mind.

Awww, did I confuse your itty bitty brain using such big words as Allodial Title...

http://www.google.com/search?q=allodial+title

Yup, guess Texas and Nevada must be dumb for allowing "Allodial Title"...
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071205134703AA2nVPJ

> You literally win the dumbest comment on slashdot award for today.

Too bad you are still a loser... but then again I shouldn't respond to anonymous cowards who have to resort to Ad hominem without adding anything interesting, informative, or insightful to the discussion at hand.

Especially The NYT, WashPost, and LATimes all do not deserve our eyeballs. Young journalists, do yourselves a favor... and go elsewhere.

quotes were 15-20 minute delayed, not hours, for the better part of the last decade. you can get free real time quotes now (and for the past couple years), no problemo. try: http://finance.yahoo.com/ http://www.yfinanceblog.com/blog/2008/05/28/free-real-time-ecn-quotes-launched/

Research shows that you are better off just dumping NYT/WashPost/other similar players in the news market if you care at all about balanced and accurate reporting. By denying them our collective eyeballs, they might actually adjust their arrogance down a tad and revert to better journalistic standards.

Is it possible yet to filter out Slashdot stories sourced from certain press channels? That would be a great feature - I'd like to vote my disapproval for these kinds of dismal journalistic practices by filtering _any_ stories based on these rotten apples as a source.

http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/socialism
http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/socialism
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/socialism
http://www.collinslanguage.com/results.aspx?context=3&reversed=False&action=define&homonym=-1&text=socialism
http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/features/dictionary/DictionaryResults.aspx?refid=1861709575
http://www.yourdictionary.com/socialism
http://www.wordsmyth.net/?ent=socialism

All say that government owns the means of production. Aka government run.

Means nothing. If a resource is available in the US thats not or not timely available here, the system will pay for the patient to get care in the US. If someone wants to pay for a US service, then they are free to do that as well.

it means something if you die waiting. It means something if your town has lottery to determine who gets a family doctor. It means something if your life threatening illness is somehow classified as optional.

All of which are very real scenarios in canada.

And I've never stated that the US system was a good system. Well, it was 70 years ago or so. right now, the US lacks almost any market forces to get prices low.

I have a right to grow my own food if I like. I dont have to buy food if I dont want to. I can also pick up free food at the food bank if I wanted.

I can make clothes or get free clothes from charities. Water is free since it falls from the sky. Electricity is a commodity, not a right, but I can go off grid and make my own from wind or solar.

Which is my point. You don't have a right to those things. You don't have a right to other people's services.

You realize that eye surgery was perfected in communist Russia (almost no Russians wear glasses) and the biggest Lasik company is Canadian?

And that changes what? We get lots of things from outside the US.. the prices don't go down in other areas of healthcare.

Yes, I know there are free stock listing all over the place, but you'll notice that all of them have a time delay of at least several hours.

Whatchu talking about, Willis?

According to http://help.yahoo.com/l/us/yahoo/finance/quotes/fitadelay.html, the quotes are from real time to 30 minutes, depending upon the exchange. Nowhere near "several hours".

They already have lasers that can often stop death. You'll find them in hospitals; lasers are used in all sorts of surgeries. My retina specialist used one on me that stopped blindness, although I later had to undergo traditional surgery (a vitrectomy) when the retina detached. I journaled about it here.

Wow, how many ways can you be wrong in a single post???

First, you're wrong about this being the first ever BOP failure. As another poster has already noted, the IXTOC disaster in 1979 was also (at least partially) the result of a BOP failure. Furthermore, BOP failures are evidently not such a rare event. Apparently, they fail frequently enough during routine tests that at least a couple studies have been done on BOP failure. From this article:

Indeed, more than a year before Pleasant's frantic efforts to stop an inferno, a large study of BOP reliability in the Gulf of Mexico had warned industry experts and federal safety officials that balky control systems were by far the most common cause of BOP failure – and apparently getting worse. Altogether, 63 percent of blowout preventer test failures cited in that 2009 study, a joint effort by the industry and the regulatory US Minerals Management Service (MMS), involved control systems. By contrast, a similar study a decade earlier had found control systems were responsible for 51 percent of BOP failures.

And from this article:

Hard data about the reliability of blowout preventers is hard to come by. But back in 2002, West Engineering conducted a test of seven BOPs "at the most demanding conditions to be expected." Five were successful in sealing the pipes, but two failed.

So although BOP failures may indeed be rare events, and full-blown catastrophes resulting from BOP failures may be even rarer, they still do fail frequently enough to merit some serious consideration, especially given the possible consequences when one does fail.

The probability of a massive catastrophe caused by a BOP failure is dozens of orders of magnitude greater than the probability of North America sinking into the ocean. It's much more akin to the probability that your house will burn down, and although having one's house burn down is an extremely rare event, it happens frequently enough, and the consequences are severe enough, that it absolutely justifies taking preventative measures and having contingency plans. That's why most of us have smoke alarms and at least one fire extinguisher in our homes.

Anecdotally speaking, I'm 37 years old, and my house has never burned down (or even caught fire), but in that same time there have been TWO major catastrophic oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico caused by BOP failures.

Having a real contingency plan (complete with actual equipment, materials and personnel in place) when you're drilling 5000 ft. under the ocean is not like trying to plan for North America sinking into the ocean. It's a necessary and prudent safety measure.

When you're talking about contingency plans for an accident that has the potential to cause large-scale ecological AND economic disaster, it's not a question of whether or not it will be a "smooth operation". Your implication is that if we don't have a contingency plan that is guaranteed to go off without a hitch, then we shouldn't bother having one at all. That's the dumbest thing I've heard all day.

More than that. Blow out preventers have something like a 40% failure rate according to recent statistics released.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20100713/ts_csm/313442

(I honestly don't know if it has the 40% figure, but dig for it, it was all over the news if you need a citation that badly)

Common practice is to have a backup BOP to eliminate the single point of failure. The BOP is not nearly as reliable as oil companies would like to make it out to be.

"the majority of those who trade stocks are still very emotional"

Not true. The major owners in Apple, as any major company on the stock market, are mutual funds and institutional holders with 72% of the stocks. Maybe the majority of the small time investors are emotional, I don't know, but that is a completely different thing since they can only affect the stock price so much.

You don't know about the pension fund manager (IIRC) from New York who keeps suing Apple every time the stock drops (and he sold in panic before it shot up again)?

Not that anyone else on the "news" is correct either, but Glenn Beck is a pretty consistent liar.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090801235203AAgK2ig

"the majority of those who trade stocks are still very emotional"

Not true. The major owners in Apple, as any major company on the stock market, are mutual funds and institutional holders with 72% of the stocks. Maybe the majority of the small time investors are emotional, I don't know, but that is a completely different thing since they can only affect the stock price so much.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100624/ap_on_en_tv/us_immigration_take_our_jobs

Frankly, you have no idea what you're talking about. http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=YHOO+Key+Statistics

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100707/ap_on_re_us/us_drug_war_agriculture
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/apr/01/violent-mexican-drug-gangs-pose-rising-risk-to-ame/
http://www.elpasotimes.com/ci_15405948

There's been a war going on for quite some time. Apparently, either willful ignorance or your politics have blinded you to reality.

Disclaimer: The mechanism is the same, but the numbers are prolly off. Also, red blood cells are good at keeping oxygen; my calculation assumes dilution in liquids, not proper blood.
Again: The figures are off, but this is the correct mechanism.

Let's assume you are breathing normal air at 1 bar.

1 bar * 21% oxygen = 0.21 bar oxygen

As you know, you exhale about 17% oxygen; let's assume your oxygen level in returning blood is about 13% (I am not sure, sorry. Yet that fits the 12% figure from earlier). As your body needs about a minute to pump all 5 liters of blood through your body when at rest, you arrive at the usual maximum of one minute. Though again, the rising panic you feel when you hold your breath is rising level of CO_2, not dimishing O_2.

Now, take a lung-full of 0% oxygen. Your blood arrives with 13% oxygen in it and leaves with 6.5%. As your blood takes the fast (and thick) lane to your brain, the effect happens fast.

To all doctors etc: If you have better figures, _please_ correct me.

To anyone speaking German: http://www.gtuem.org/984/Tauchmedizin/O2-Mangel.html
Babelfish: http://babelfish.yahoo.com/translate_url?doit=done&tt=url&intl=1&fr=bf-home&trurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gtuem.org%2F984%2FTauchmedizin%2FO2-Mangel.html&lp=de_en&btnTrUrl=Translate

Scoxq.pk was trading for about $0.03 a share last week, and not it's trading for about $0.09 a share.

http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=SCOXQ.PK+Interactive#chart1:symbol=scoxq.pk;range=5d;indicator=volume;charttype=line;crosshair=on;ohlcvalues=0;logscale=on;source=undefined

Via Yahoo's Pipes would probably be the easiest way:

http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/pipe.run?Exclude=kdawson&_id=925e9a8c43cad8992f1d949b228f01d9&_render=rss

http://www.fool.com/investing/international/2010/06/18/can-anything-save-nokia.aspx

http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/nokia-warns-on-handset-profits-ftimes-edf08c1a77e7.html

so the minority decides issues, and then the majority wakes up the next morning and goes "what happened?" example, gay rights: the social conservatives will come out in force and drown out the gay votes, and even though the majority is in favor of gay rights, they simply won't get off their asses and do the right thing and vote for what is right because their own selfish interests are not immediately and obviously threatened. again, a problem, not a fatal one, but a real problem with virtual democracy

Well, "gay rights" encompasses a lot of things. When this gets narrowed down to just one issue, say for example, "gay marriage," you might find that the majority does not agree with you. For example, an article today about Hawaii's governor vetoing "gay civil unions," while it sort of supports your point about politicians being in the way, also reports, "Nationwide, voters have consistently rejected same-sex marriage. Five states -- Iowa, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont -- and the District of Columbia allow same-sex marriage, through judicial or legislative actions."(See, http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100707/pl_nm/us_hawaii_gaymarriage )

So, in a state where the population has voted against gay marriage, but the judiciary has permitted it, is it the majority or the minority who is establishing the law over the objections of the other? How would the virtual representative have voted? I don't think that the "majority" is always as "progressive" as people imagine.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100330094003AA140Jg
Gives some numbers, very very big numbers ;)

Is MS losing money ?

"Microsoft reports first YoY revenue slide in company history"
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/04/24/microsoft-reports-first-yoy-revenue-slide-in-company-history/ ...so I guess that would be a "yes".

no longer the biggest software company in the world ?

As of close on Tuesday 6 Jul 2010:

Microsoft market cap: 208.75B
Apple market cap:226.24B

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/cq?d=v1&s=MSFT,AAPL ...so I'm guessing that one's a "yes", too...

retrenching ?

Well, you got me on this one. I guess if they were actually retrenching, they wouldn't be reporting losses in revenue or be only the second largest software company in the world. So that one's a "no".

Possibly they should get off their butts, and instead of throwing the chair they were sitting on, they should actually retrench.

-- Terry

Or combine your recycling idea and the submitter's plans to live in a fuselage?