They could probably manage to release a "30th anniversary edition" mac that wouldn't be a dud, if they designed/built/and marketed it properly. How about a limited edition 30th anniversary mac, they're only making 3,000 of them, they've got their best hardware and a 30" cinema display all wrapped up in an only mildly efficient but incredibly cool looking chunk of aluminum and plastic. Oh, and it also comes with a limted edition aluminum ipod or whatever, that can only be purchased as part of this system.
Apple charges $8,000 bucks for it, the guts are just a repackaged powermac so there's less R&D, and they easily sell out the limited stock to collectors and fanatics. Having this special ipod automatically makes you ultra cool, so some people buy it all just for that.
Even if Apple doesn't make money/loses a little on it all, they get a bunch more press, get to show off some cool looking stuff, and improve their brand futher. They'd be selling cool more than they'd be selling a computer, but there are people who'd buy it.
It probably won't happen, I'm sure they've got better things to spend their time on, but it could work if they tried it.
I've got a Scotts Classic. It was $120 at home depot, it's adjustable height, feels plenty solid, and according to my quick and dirty internet research, is reasonably well regarded. It's worked well enough for me, although I have no prior reel mower experience to base my opinion on.
Basic maintenence consists of rinsing it off with a hose, and then spraying it down with WD-40 after each use. The blades will eventually need to be sharpened, and since they're complicated curves, it's supposedly hard enough to do that you're better off having a professional do it with the proper jig. I forget how much you can cut before they suggest you get that done, but I did the math for my small yard, and it ended up being like 3 years worth of mowing for me. Score.
Yeah, sadly I still need to use a noisy weed eater for edging and such. I'm going to go with something battery powered one of these days, although currently I'm using a crappy second-hand wired one. I am entirely sheep-less.
I bought a push reel mower for $100. My yard is pretty small, and it takes me about a half an hour to cut the grass, from the time I walk to the garage to grab the mower until the end when I clean and put it away. But that's ok because I enjoy cutting the grass. It's a half hour where I can be outside, turn half my brain off, and relax a little, while still being mildly productive and making my yard look better. A bonus for the push reel mower, it's better for the grass, it doesn't require fuel, and it doesn't have a noisy motor, so I end up finding it all pretty relaxing.
I guess my main point is, if you don't like cutting the grass, then you shouldn't have spent so much on your walk-behind mower. You aren't the market that Jim Wier is targeting. He believes that there are enough people who want to cut their own grass and enjoy it that he can make money just serving them.
My second point is that if you've got a small enough yard to make it feasible, push reel mowers are quite nice.
You're not getting conned, you're getting something for nothing. Sure, your something isn't as nice as the something given to people who are paying, and sure they're only giving it to you hoping it'll increase your desire for the non-free product, but so what? It's not like they're being underhanded about it.
If you're the least bit interested in Planetside, now you can try it out for free for a while. If you like it and want to pay to get more out of it, great! Everyone's happy. If you don't like it, then remove it from your hard drive, and you don't have to wonder about it anymore. SOE goes on with their business as usual as well.
I don't know what the world needs from Vista, but if Microsoft wants to actually be the innovation powerhouse that they sometimes pretend to be, they should figure it out. They've got money to hire some bright people to think up new things that we'll find useful. Fifteen years ago, I didn't know I'd need a web browser, and now I spend hours per day in one. Ten years ago I didn't know I needed an IM client, and now I use one constantly. Et cetera and so on. And let's not forget better security.
I know the pace of development for the industry has been crazy for the past decade, and I don't mind if it slows down a little. But I'm certain that Operating Systems have plenty of more room to grow, and I'm sure there are plenty of people out there with ideas. MS has the resources, and should have the motivation, to get those people together and help them move things forwards.
It doesn't have to be every year. But come on, 5 years is a long time now-a-days.
But comeon...WoW would be so much easier if I could bring in a tank from Battlefield 2. And Battlefield 2 would be much easier if I could bring in a few spacecraft from Star Wars. Technology is supposed to make our lives easier. Why are you so resistant to change? You luddites make me sick.
As one of those architects designing houses for people, I'm going to agree with the grandparent comment at least in that regards. While I know that real estate agents can work pretty hard, designing houses is generally much harder.
Saying an architect can just turn around and produce another design is simplifying things a bit much. A building is a very complicated thing. Houses are, in many ways, just as difficult to design as larger structures. They've got all the same stuff(structure, electrical, plumbing, site conditions) as a big commercial structure, plus you're competing with developers and dinky websites selling floor plans for $250. If you don't keep your client incredibly happy and convinced that the money they're paying you is well spent, it's very easy for them to fire you and get a house built another way. Will you still get paid for all the work you already did for them? Maybe some of it. A large percentage of the projects that go through the office that I work at end up not getting built. It's the nature of the profession.
But yeah, architects in general are severely underpaid. It kind of sucks. Just thought I'd share.
Using/. as an example doesn't mean we don't like the way it looks. It just means that it's not beautiful. There's definately a difference there.
As a large community website with thousands of people participating in discussions, this website does pretty well. It's efficient, fairly straight forward, and not horrendously ugly. But I don't consider it to be particularly attractive in any visual sense. But that's ok, because that's not why I'm here. Slashdot does not try to attract or woo visitors with its appearance, instead the layout and design serves the content, which is primarily text. I appreciate that, and as such I appreciate the look. But I don't consider it beautiful in a visual sense.
I imagine that with some thoughtful design, Slashdot could be prettier, yet still retain its functionality and efficiency. For a number of reasons, that isn't a priority of the site maintainers, and that's fine.
Hell yeah. You can also just leave it in your pocket when you wash your clothes, and it will act as a fabric softener. It's a good thing Microsoft has been stealing all those talented engineers away from Google, and finally letting them work on something new and exciting.
Uhh...yeah..I was totally being serious. No sarcasm at all. I don't think it's the least bit unreasonable to expect a software/electronics company to release a device that plays music and cures AIDS. Nothing in my original post was meant in jest, and I stand by my words until the end.
I realize that text doesn't transmit inflection and body language and all of that, so some times it can be a little hard to see things like sarcasm. But come on, I said I wouldn't be surprised if the device replaced fossil fuels. You couldn't have possibly thought I was serious...could you?
Actually, I thought that the PSP was supposed to be the iPod/DS killer. So if MS kills the PSP before it gets a chance to kill the iPod and the DS, then it's just wasting energy, cause it'll have to go kill them itself. It'd be much more efficient and cheaper for MS to wait until Sony finishes killing the iPod and the DS, and then just go whack the PSP. And then wait for Google to release a small electronic device, and then go kill that too.
I think that the "* killer" tag has pretty much become one of those laughable buzzwords; where when a PR guy says it, you know he's got no idea about what's really going on, and when someone knowledgeable uses it, it's in a sort of sarcastic mocking tone. Basically, any time I see a slashdot headline talking about a "killer", I can be confident that the comments will 95% be people stating lots of reasons why it obviously won't work that way. Let the marketing people have their cute little terms, no one besides themselves is fooled.
Pfft, Quiet you naysayer! I don't think they're being ambitious enough! This is Microsoft we're talking about! The greatest of all great companies in the greatest of all great nations! Not only will this device accomplish all that has been listed, but following in the usual Microsoft tradition, incredible new features will likely be added between now and the eventual, ontime release of this device. Don't be surprised if this device solves our fossil fuel dependence problems. It may very well cure AIDS. And then we can give copies of the device to everyone in the middle east, so they'll stop being angry towards the USA.
Come on, we're not talking about a tiny hardware company like Apple, or a rowdy upstart like Google. We're talking about Microsoft, a hard working bunch of people who have, through sheer innovation and stringent quality standards, created the technological paradise which most of us live in every day. Show a little respect to the company that gave us marvels such as text editors, web browsers, and beautiful graphical interfaces.
If the Xbox has taught us anything, it's that Microsoft's hardware will be at least as slick as their software, and all of their products share an impressive efficiency in terms of resource usage. The future truly is now, and you're lucky to be alive during these exciting times.
Once you've buy a computer, you can get a lot of use out of it with minimal extra expense. I guess an internet connection is the only significant reoccurring cost, but it's not too bad. Electricity also, but you're going to be going through it pretty quickly with a woodshop as well, so we'll just ignore that. But anyways, creating software(or graphics/music/writing/whatever) yourself requires only time and focus, there are plenty of free tools, and you can write 5 lines of code or 500,000 without spending any more money if you so desire.
Decent wood can very quickly get very expensive. If you make a mistake, you can ruin a piece of stock, and there's no easy undo's. Not to mention I find it much easier to hurt myself when I'm building furniture than I do messing around with my webpage.
It's not always possible, but one of the best ways to do this, build it outside. If you're careful about how you do it, you can shape an outdoor space just as well as any interior room, and even control the "microclimate" to a surprising degree. Plants are generally a huge part of such a space, and what better way to forget about technology then to surround yourself with some nature.
One thing that I've seen a little of is floorboards and trim and such with channels carved into the back of it for running cables along. It seems like a pretty decent idea, since most rooms have it anyways, it runs the whole perimeter of spaces, and it can look like whatever you want.
Also, Windows are sometimes double-hung, but the ceilings you're talking about are generally referred to as just plain hung ceilings (or suspended or drop in). Minor nitpick though;)
Raised flooring seems like a better bet in terms of aesthetics than a suspended ceiling, but substantially more expensive.
The thing is, Apple can probably manage to do a lot of those branding things anyways, without making huge acquisitions and throwing around giant gobs of cash. Even ignoring the fact that Steve Jobs is now on Disney's board, Apple has one of the best brands out there at the moment, I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who would like to ride those coattails. Cross-licensing brands and content would help both sides, it's not like Apple should have to pony up serious cash or make buy outs just to get people interested.
Sure, there are a few companies that might be reluctant. You mentioned Nintendo, which is generally pretty independent. But I'd imagine if Nintendo was going to work out that sort of deal with anyone, Apple would be a likely candidate. It's easy to draw comparisons between them. They've even got the same two major "enemies", Sony and MS.
Yeah, and look how well it's worked out for Sony in the long run. You've got conflict between the content producing side and the electronics side that has pretty much handicapped both in terms of new innovations, and that's a big part of what allowed Apple to have so much success as of late. And now Sony's big cash cow is their video games division, which is propping up their ailing consumer electronics and media divisions.
Agreed, specifically in regards to Apple. The iPod has been a huge success for them, no doubt, and I'm sure they're glad to have that money. But even before the iPod came about, Apple had done a pretty good job of turning around their computer business. They were making profit, OSX was up and coming, and the iMacs, iBooks, and Powerbooks were all well received. Sure, they weren't outselling Dell, but a lot of people forget that you don't have to completely dominate a market to have a successful business.
I don't see what Apple really has to gain from buying Disney that Jobs probably can't negotiate out of Disney already. Rights to put Disney content and pixar content on iTMS? I'm willing to bet that was already talked over heavily during the pixar deal. Does any one think that Apple wants to worry about running theme parks? Even if they could manage to afford it, it doesn't seem like Apple has much to gain by buying them.
It's a lesson that may not translate exactly, but has some value.
If you want to really get things done, you're going to spend a lot of time doing it. It doesn't matter what you're doing, or how efficient you are, there are certain levels that can only be reached by putting in a whole lot of time.
An individual may be content putting in 8 hours per day and then going home and doing whatever. That's fine, you can live a happy and productive life that way. If, however, you feel the need to accomplish more, running your own business for example, and you really want to be successful, you're going to have to put in a lot of hours, no matter how efficient you are with your time. Because the truth of it is, there's bound to be at least one other person out there just as good as you, and willing to put those extra hours in. If you want to compete, you have to work hard.
I know some people like to pretend that a GUI is just the pictures that someone decides to display, but there's really a lot more involved in it than that. Believe it or not, but most of the people using a computer are far more interested in the interface than the underlying OS. The "particular style" of OSX goes well beyond the colors they chose for the scroll bars, and has always been the essence of what makes a mac a mac. While OSX shares many features and lots of code with BSD, it's still quite different and unique in appealing ways. If not, then why has anyone bought it?
Apple also makes a bunch of other software, much of which is highly regarded. That's nice too.
Following a little further off topic, you're hinting at the biggest problem we have with the whole Global Warming debate. There are two extremes, either we're totally wrecking the planet, or it's all a natural cycle that we're too insignificant to affect. The loudest voices in the debate are generally arguing one of the two extremes, and neither extreme position is terribly useful for collecting good data or presenting real solutions.
And the truth is probably somewhere in between. Why a more realistic and sensible look at the available information doesn't seem to motivate anyone is a mystery to me.
Slashdot Mirror
They could probably manage to release a "30th anniversary edition" mac that wouldn't be a dud, if they designed/built/and marketed it properly. How about a limited edition 30th anniversary mac, they're only making 3,000 of them, they've got their best hardware and a 30" cinema display all wrapped up in an only mildly efficient but incredibly cool looking chunk of aluminum and plastic. Oh, and it also comes with a limted edition aluminum ipod or whatever, that can only be purchased as part of this system.
Apple charges $8,000 bucks for it, the guts are just a repackaged powermac so there's less R&D, and they easily sell out the limited stock to collectors and fanatics. Having this special ipod automatically makes you ultra cool, so some people buy it all just for that.
Even if Apple doesn't make money/loses a little on it all, they get a bunch more press, get to show off some cool looking stuff, and improve their brand futher. They'd be selling cool more than they'd be selling a computer, but there are people who'd buy it.
It probably won't happen, I'm sure they've got better things to spend their time on, but it could work if they tried it.
I've got a Scotts Classic. It was $120 at home depot, it's adjustable height, feels plenty solid, and according to my quick and dirty internet research, is reasonably well regarded. It's worked well enough for me, although I have no prior reel mower experience to base my opinion on.
Basic maintenence consists of rinsing it off with a hose, and then spraying it down with WD-40 after each use. The blades will eventually need to be sharpened, and since they're complicated curves, it's supposedly hard enough to do that you're better off having a professional do it with the proper jig. I forget how much you can cut before they suggest you get that done, but I did the math for my small yard, and it ended up being like 3 years worth of mowing for me. Score.
Yeah, sadly I still need to use a noisy weed eater for edging and such. I'm going to go with something battery powered one of these days, although currently I'm using a crappy second-hand wired one. I am entirely sheep-less.
I bought a push reel mower for $100. My yard is pretty small, and it takes me about a half an hour to cut the grass, from the time I walk to the garage to grab the mower until the end when I clean and put it away. But that's ok because I enjoy cutting the grass. It's a half hour where I can be outside, turn half my brain off, and relax a little, while still being mildly productive and making my yard look better. A bonus for the push reel mower, it's better for the grass, it doesn't require fuel, and it doesn't have a noisy motor, so I end up finding it all pretty relaxing.
I guess my main point is, if you don't like cutting the grass, then you shouldn't have spent so much on your walk-behind mower. You aren't the market that Jim Wier is targeting. He believes that there are enough people who want to cut their own grass and enjoy it that he can make money just serving them.
My second point is that if you've got a small enough yard to make it feasible, push reel mowers are quite nice.
You're not getting conned, you're getting something for nothing. Sure, your something isn't as nice as the something given to people who are paying, and sure they're only giving it to you hoping it'll increase your desire for the non-free product, but so what? It's not like they're being underhanded about it.
If you're the least bit interested in Planetside, now you can try it out for free for a while. If you like it and want to pay to get more out of it, great! Everyone's happy. If you don't like it, then remove it from your hard drive, and you don't have to wonder about it anymore. SOE goes on with their business as usual as well.
What exactly is the problem here?
I don't know what the world needs from Vista, but if Microsoft wants to actually be the innovation powerhouse that they sometimes pretend to be, they should figure it out. They've got money to hire some bright people to think up new things that we'll find useful. Fifteen years ago, I didn't know I'd need a web browser, and now I spend hours per day in one. Ten years ago I didn't know I needed an IM client, and now I use one constantly. Et cetera and so on. And let's not forget better security.
I know the pace of development for the industry has been crazy for the past decade, and I don't mind if it slows down a little. But I'm certain that Operating Systems have plenty of more room to grow, and I'm sure there are plenty of people out there with ideas. MS has the resources, and should have the motivation, to get those people together and help them move things forwards.
It doesn't have to be every year. But come on, 5 years is a long time now-a-days.
But comeon...WoW would be so much easier if I could bring in a tank from Battlefield 2. And Battlefield 2 would be much easier if I could bring in a few spacecraft from Star Wars. Technology is supposed to make our lives easier. Why are you so resistant to change? You luddites make me sick.
As one of those architects designing houses for people, I'm going to agree with the grandparent comment at least in that regards. While I know that real estate agents can work pretty hard, designing houses is generally much harder.
Saying an architect can just turn around and produce another design is simplifying things a bit much. A building is a very complicated thing. Houses are, in many ways, just as difficult to design as larger structures. They've got all the same stuff(structure, electrical, plumbing, site conditions) as a big commercial structure, plus you're competing with developers and dinky websites selling floor plans for $250. If you don't keep your client incredibly happy and convinced that the money they're paying you is well spent, it's very easy for them to fire you and get a house built another way. Will you still get paid for all the work you already did for them? Maybe some of it. A large percentage of the projects that go through the office that I work at end up not getting built. It's the nature of the profession.
But yeah, architects in general are severely underpaid. It kind of sucks. Just thought I'd share.
Using /. as an example doesn't mean we don't like the way it looks. It just means that it's not beautiful. There's definately a difference there.
As a large community website with thousands of people participating in discussions, this website does pretty well. It's efficient, fairly straight forward, and not horrendously ugly. But I don't consider it to be particularly attractive in any visual sense. But that's ok, because that's not why I'm here. Slashdot does not try to attract or woo visitors with its appearance, instead the layout and design serves the content, which is primarily text. I appreciate that, and as such I appreciate the look. But I don't consider it beautiful in a visual sense.
I imagine that with some thoughtful design, Slashdot could be prettier, yet still retain its functionality and efficiency. For a number of reasons, that isn't a priority of the site maintainers, and that's fine.
Hell yeah. You can also just leave it in your pocket when you wash your clothes, and it will act as a fabric softener. It's a good thing Microsoft has been stealing all those talented engineers away from Google, and finally letting them work on something new and exciting.
Uhh...yeah..I was totally being serious. No sarcasm at all. I don't think it's the least bit unreasonable to expect a software/electronics company to release a device that plays music and cures AIDS. Nothing in my original post was meant in jest, and I stand by my words until the end.
I realize that text doesn't transmit inflection and body language and all of that, so some times it can be a little hard to see things like sarcasm. But come on, I said I wouldn't be surprised if the device replaced fossil fuels. You couldn't have possibly thought I was serious...could you?
Actually, I thought that the PSP was supposed to be the iPod/DS killer. So if MS kills the PSP before it gets a chance to kill the iPod and the DS, then it's just wasting energy, cause it'll have to go kill them itself. It'd be much more efficient and cheaper for MS to wait until Sony finishes killing the iPod and the DS, and then just go whack the PSP. And then wait for Google to release a small electronic device, and then go kill that too.
I think that the "* killer" tag has pretty much become one of those laughable buzzwords; where when a PR guy says it, you know he's got no idea about what's really going on, and when someone knowledgeable uses it, it's in a sort of sarcastic mocking tone. Basically, any time I see a slashdot headline talking about a "killer", I can be confident that the comments will 95% be people stating lots of reasons why it obviously won't work that way. Let the marketing people have their cute little terms, no one besides themselves is fooled.
Pfft, Quiet you naysayer! I don't think they're being ambitious enough! This is Microsoft we're talking about! The greatest of all great companies in the greatest of all great nations! Not only will this device accomplish all that has been listed, but following in the usual Microsoft tradition, incredible new features will likely be added between now and the eventual, ontime release of this device. Don't be surprised if this device solves our fossil fuel dependence problems. It may very well cure AIDS. And then we can give copies of the device to everyone in the middle east, so they'll stop being angry towards the USA.
Come on, we're not talking about a tiny hardware company like Apple, or a rowdy upstart like Google. We're talking about Microsoft, a hard working bunch of people who have, through sheer innovation and stringent quality standards, created the technological paradise which most of us live in every day. Show a little respect to the company that gave us marvels such as text editors, web browsers, and beautiful graphical interfaces.
If the Xbox has taught us anything, it's that Microsoft's hardware will be at least as slick as their software, and all of their products share an impressive efficiency in terms of resource usage. The future truly is now, and you're lucky to be alive during these exciting times.
Once you've buy a computer, you can get a lot of use out of it with minimal extra expense. I guess an internet connection is the only significant reoccurring cost, but it's not too bad. Electricity also, but you're going to be going through it pretty quickly with a woodshop as well, so we'll just ignore that. But anyways, creating software(or graphics/music/writing/whatever) yourself requires only time and focus, there are plenty of free tools, and you can write 5 lines of code or 500,000 without spending any more money if you so desire.
Decent wood can very quickly get very expensive. If you make a mistake, you can ruin a piece of stock, and there's no easy undo's. Not to mention I find it much easier to hurt myself when I'm building furniture than I do messing around with my webpage.
It's not always possible, but one of the best ways to do this, build it outside. If you're careful about how you do it, you can shape an outdoor space just as well as any interior room, and even control the "microclimate" to a surprising degree. Plants are generally a huge part of such a space, and what better way to forget about technology then to surround yourself with some nature.
One thing that I've seen a little of is floorboards and trim and such with channels carved into the back of it for running cables along. It seems like a pretty decent idea, since most rooms have it anyways, it runs the whole perimeter of spaces, and it can look like whatever you want.
;)
Also, Windows are sometimes double-hung, but the ceilings you're talking about are generally referred to as just plain hung ceilings (or suspended or drop in). Minor nitpick though
Raised flooring seems like a better bet in terms of aesthetics than a suspended ceiling, but substantially more expensive.
The thing is, Apple can probably manage to do a lot of those branding things anyways, without making huge acquisitions and throwing around giant gobs of cash. Even ignoring the fact that Steve Jobs is now on Disney's board, Apple has one of the best brands out there at the moment, I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who would like to ride those coattails. Cross-licensing brands and content would help both sides, it's not like Apple should have to pony up serious cash or make buy outs just to get people interested.
Sure, there are a few companies that might be reluctant. You mentioned Nintendo, which is generally pretty independent. But I'd imagine if Nintendo was going to work out that sort of deal with anyone, Apple would be a likely candidate. It's easy to draw comparisons between them. They've even got the same two major "enemies", Sony and MS.
Yeah, and look how well it's worked out for Sony in the long run. You've got conflict between the content producing side and the electronics side that has pretty much handicapped both in terms of new innovations, and that's a big part of what allowed Apple to have so much success as of late. And now Sony's big cash cow is their video games division, which is propping up their ailing consumer electronics and media divisions.
I was bored. It quacked and threw it back.
Agreed, specifically in regards to Apple. The iPod has been a huge success for them, no doubt, and I'm sure they're glad to have that money. But even before the iPod came about, Apple had done a pretty good job of turning around their computer business. They were making profit, OSX was up and coming, and the iMacs, iBooks, and Powerbooks were all well received. Sure, they weren't outselling Dell, but a lot of people forget that you don't have to completely dominate a market to have a successful business.
I don't see what Apple really has to gain from buying Disney that Jobs probably can't negotiate out of Disney already. Rights to put Disney content and pixar content on iTMS? I'm willing to bet that was already talked over heavily during the pixar deal. Does any one think that Apple wants to worry about running theme parks? Even if they could manage to afford it, it doesn't seem like Apple has much to gain by buying them.
It's a lesson that may not translate exactly, but has some value.
If you want to really get things done, you're going to spend a lot of time doing it. It doesn't matter what you're doing, or how efficient you are, there are certain levels that can only be reached by putting in a whole lot of time.
An individual may be content putting in 8 hours per day and then going home and doing whatever. That's fine, you can live a happy and productive life that way. If, however, you feel the need to accomplish more, running your own business for example, and you really want to be successful, you're going to have to put in a lot of hours, no matter how efficient you are with your time. Because the truth of it is, there's bound to be at least one other person out there just as good as you, and willing to put those extra hours in. If you want to compete, you have to work hard.
I thought it looked better in person when I saw it at a store than it did in pictures. Although it's still not great. Ah well.
I know some people like to pretend that a GUI is just the pictures that someone decides to display, but there's really a lot more involved in it than that. Believe it or not, but most of the people using a computer are far more interested in the interface than the underlying OS. The "particular style" of OSX goes well beyond the colors they chose for the scroll bars, and has always been the essence of what makes a mac a mac. While OSX shares many features and lots of code with BSD, it's still quite different and unique in appealing ways. If not, then why has anyone bought it?
Apple also makes a bunch of other software, much of which is highly regarded. That's nice too.
Following a little further off topic, you're hinting at the biggest problem we have with the whole Global Warming debate. There are two extremes, either we're totally wrecking the planet, or it's all a natural cycle that we're too insignificant to affect. The loudest voices in the debate are generally arguing one of the two extremes, and neither extreme position is terribly useful for collecting good data or presenting real solutions.
And the truth is probably somewhere in between. Why a more realistic and sensible look at the available information doesn't seem to motivate anyone is a mystery to me.