Your example silly, because you pushed all the way to the end of the spectrum to a million bucks. Try this instead:
"It would be no different if a new act went to a regular bank, and convinced them to loan $25,000 (which could easily happen depending on credit rating) for 'production costs and marketing'. All but 'some tiny percentage' would go directly back to the bank to pay off the loan."
This is how all small businesses start, and it's really not difficult to secure the startup funds, if you're not ridiculous about it or go in with a few trusted members (hmm, maybe your bass player and drummer?). The hard part is having a good enough product (in this case, music) AND the ability to market that product (in this case, concerts, air time, etc) to expand from there, and if you don't, well... you either find a new product to sell (change the band up, write new and more popular stuff, change genres, etc) or get a job.
I don't claim to know if this would work for musical artists, but I know for sure that it works for a vast amount of other entrepreneurs.
The most ridiculous thing is that in the music industry, these big old huge scary label companies are really just performing the services that normal businesses (small or large) have plain old marketing departments on the payroll for. Why on EARTH would you ever want a *marketing department* completely in charge your product, from R&D to shipping? Seems like it would lead to selling only the products that are easy to market instead of coming up with innovative and terrific products that could be tricky to sell at first.... oh, wait a minute here....
There were also the key phases "pro photography" and "as a business" used in that post. In the case of the second usage of "consumer", it was used as an implicit comparison between consumer and business grade hardware, as in "this is consumer gear, so I'm only guaranteed....". I'm pretty sure I understood the post as well or better than you; at least the part I was responding to.
The second part of his post specifically tells us a pro photographer "should have little to no problem forking out the ~$800 a month..." when in fact I doubt ANY business (or individual, for that matter) would want to spend $800/month (or, $9600 a year) on something they don't need. Feel free to use whatever currency and bandwidth units/amounts pertain to your country; the fact remains that until/unless you can upload a large amount of ultra-high resolution photos to cloud storage faster and cheaper than I can back up to disk, I'll continue backing up to disk and then store or ship the drives (and yes, your country probably does have better internet connections than mine. Great job!)
Well, that's true. Maybe I should have used a fine-dining restaurant as my example, and used atmosphere/service/etc. Or, even better, a bar. I'll just drink at home if the bar treats me like shit, but I'll happily pay for their booze instead if I'm having good time. The point is, if you don't take care of your customers, they'll go somewhere else, and when that "somewhere else" is free, you have a lot of "taking care of" to do. Instead, software corps bitch-slap their customers for short term gain and long term alienation.
I wonder if I could just go around slapping people until they pay me to stop. That'd be pretty sweet.
The MPAA would probably sue me for stealing their business model, or something. Guess I'll just have to keep working hard to make my customers happy, instead. Stupid reality and it's stupid applying to me.
I, like most people, like analogies. When we discuss copyright and the various conventions used to protect IP, I find myself comparing how it would work in other industries.
Let's say a buddy of mine (let's call him "The Scene" and pretend he's from Jersey) knows how to make a McDonald's cheeseburger exactly the way they do, and he can do it for 1% of the price. McDonald's, on the other hand, would rather sell me one for a 200% markup on the ingredients (duh). Would I have my buddy come by to make cheeseburgers at home, hoping he's got the latest Big Mac recipe now, or would I just cruise through the drive-through, happy to spend 4 bucks for the convenience? Hell yes! Drive-through for sure! This ready-to-roll type of convenience is worth a shit-ton to me, much as I love my buddy.
But if McDonald's made their cheeseburgers so they tasted like shit if I leave the restaurant, or required I fill out periodic surveys proving I paid for the cheeseburger as it travels through my digestive system, lest I get food poisoning... well, that's a little bit different, isn't it? I'll get em from my buddy and tell McDonald's to fuck right off.
This is the spot so many people find themselves in, and copyright has gotten us here. Faced with this type of bullshit, is it any wonder that piracy is steadily increasing? The law being wrong is barely relevant; it doesn't matter if it is or not, because people are proving they won't put up with being treated like thieves from the very point of purchase, even if the only way to circumvent it is to commit low-risk illegal acts. What needs to change is the idiotic corporate mentality that says "Protect profits at all costs!" instead of "Give customers excellent service, appreciation, products, and delivery!".
Corporations: People don't just pay you for their product because your box is so fancy that you deserve to be paid; people pay you because your product makes it easier, more fun, faster, more professional, less expensive, etc than doing a thing all by themselves. This is true in ALL cases, going back to the very first time a dude gave another dude 6 potatoes for a clay pot*. I guaran-fucking-tee that any successful shop that can conduct business and then actually shake hands with their customers knows this, and exceptional customer service and convenience are really the only way to compete in a price war. Hmm? Well, actually... yes... you are most DEFINITELY engaged in the mother of all price wars, and denial won't change that. I do hate to be the bearer of such bad news.
I'm amused, sometimes, to think that these huge corporations that have gone stomping through the market, setting prices and taking names for decades, find themselves faced with the ultimate price war (free!) and they don't remember how to compete. They think they're big enough to keep stomping and stomping, while the rest of the consumer world just looks on with pity. I sure hope there are up and coming tech companies that DO remember how to give customers a red carpet treatment, and can swoop in fill their shoes.
*Strictly speaking, I don't know the current potato/pot exchange rate, so don't take this as investment advice.
I think the biggest problem is a lack of the usual compromise between a customer and a vendor. Of COURSE piracy has gone up; any mass produced, commercially polished applications I've purchased legally in the past year phones home so often that my laptop is literally useless for many purposes without a wi-fi connection.
It's becoming a case of cutting off a nose to spite the face, and it's a real problem. I don't want to see companies that make good, useful products go out of business, but the bullshit DRM coming out of the software sector is simply ludicrous. Everything from various operating systems the latest games needs to phone home periodically these days; and some applications need *constant* reassurance from daddy that there's no stranger-danger from the big bad user.... it's enough say "Fuck it all; piracy's easier."
I wonder if the big corps are doing it on purpose, so when piracy reaches more than 95% of users, they can ask for a bail-out and even MORE draconian laws. Oh, and so the leaders can float to the Bahamas on golden parachutes.
Yeah; it's funny to me that they call "shipping disks" the "oldest answer, but still the right one". As if the other options have ever been even marginally realistic...
"Bringing a shipping container in from Tokyo? While you *could* dog-paddle it home on your back, the oldest option - sending it by ship - is still the right one."
Just because you take pro pictures at 80MP doesn't mean your business has an extra $10,000 per year laying around for a business grade gigabit pipe; as the sole employee of my company, that'd mean I'm paying myself $20,000 a year instead of $30,000 (TBH, I'm lucky to be in the black, period, with only two years in). I store my images at my studio, back them up daily to a removable disk, and bring in a 3rd removable to copy them over once per week. All told? $500 for the 2 drives and a striped array on my studio PC. The self-storage backup technique works well for me.
Realistically, though, if I want to I can just upload them all to home or a cloud storage in batches overnight, the same way I download 10 gigabyte files at home. It's just plain easier to cart em around, though.
I agree! Some of my best trips were to take my cruiser to a campsite, bust out a tent from the saddlebags, get into an altered state of some kind, and stare at the stars.
My point was that people are gonna do what they're gonna do, and increasing efficiency makes it easier for us to do them. That doesn't always mean that people will consume so much more that the benefits from these efficiency gains are lost.
But if this is enacted, how many successful businessmen - who are competent - will want to abandon their businesses for 4 years?
None. Those that have mega-corps typically don't get there by abandoning their posts for long stretches.
This means that the candidate will be automatically coming from a wealthy class
Mountains of supporting evidence of this, going back to 1790.
It sure would be nice, though. It's kind of like imagining I drive a Ferrari instead of my Passat. I like being wistful sometimes.
P.S.
Spartacus may have been a good leader of an insurrection, but would he be a wise king?
No, because his palace would turn into a venue for softcore porn and every time anybody stood up or walked around corners, things would go all slow-motion with sprays of blood flying about, defying the laws of physics. I've seen that show.
I agree with you, and I'm in that position myself. I use my 30 mpg VW for puttering around town and my 12 mpg Dodge for moving or pulling a friend's snowmobiles or sometimes when I just have a hankering for flouncy-bouncing about while grunting like a pig. The car could easily be electric; maybe someday the truck could be too.
The problem is, I still have no intention of switching my VW to an electric or hybrid until A) I can buy one used for about 6 grand (this is what I paid for my 2000 VW back in 2005) and/or B) the VW completely shits the bed on me and I'm forced to buy something.
I, and a lot of people like me, would prefer to drive their cars into the ground (I'm going on 12 years with the dodge, 6 with the VW, and expecting at least 6 more each), unless a switch can be done at reasonable cost - in both money and aggravation.
People need to keep in mind, also, that switching a gas car out for an electric one doesn't necessarily help the environment, anyway, if the old gasoline car is still on the road with a new owner inside. The only way a switch helps is if the old car goes into a crusher, at which point I lose my investment in it (less a couple hundred bucks for the scrap metal). I really can't stomach the idea of tossing my old cars into the waste-basket to feel better about my carbon footprint, at least until they're officially not worth fixing (value of vehicle is less than the lowest possible cost to fix). In my case, it's very likely a new owner will drive it MORE than me anyway, resulting in a net loss to the environment.
So, I think it's very important to improve gasoline efficiency on existing cars (for example, I'd happily refit my Dodge's exhaust, or maybe even engine, for a 10 mpg efficiency increase, as long as the refit is less than what the truck is worth), wherever possible. I also think it's important to make the upgrade path to an electric car as easy, efficient, and cost-effective as possible. Maybe by getting an immediate tax break (sales tax? registration fees?) on the new car when you trade in your old one for demolition, or something. What I do know is if the switch isn't made easy and financially sound, not very many people will want to do it until it's time to buy a new car anyway.
Ah. I misread your take on things. I thought you meant that only gasoline engines use catalytic converters, and so are MORE expensive. Now I see; your take is since they are basically similar in cost that it's not a factor. Thank you for making me slightly smarter today, good sir.:)
They probably used the new chips to evaluate the statistical data.
Actually, I wonder. If we use "mistake-y" chips to evaluate the performance of new "mistake-y" chips, and so on and so forth ad nauseum, wouldn't our computers end up working just like that kid who ate all the paste in 2nd grade?
Might even still be the correct radius, even, depending on how the circle's constructed.
If you make it using a center point, a fixed radius, and then draw a curved line that is precisely R distance from the center at all times PI could be 100,000, and still make a circle (albeit a very, very dark one:). A section of the circumference would just overlap. In that case, if you had a 1 inch radius (piRsquared; yay easy math!), your pencil would just go around the center point for 100,000 inches worth of circles (whoa). On the other hand, if Pi is rounded to a radius:circumference ratio smaller than 3.159... that'd be would be a non-circle, because the curve would never close.
If you think resellers should be able to purchase used games for 10$, re-price them for $30-40 and take in double the profit compared to brand new game you're insane.
Uh, yeah.... then I'm insane. Or, at least, have an insane desire to be able to sell old stuff I don't use; perhaps on Craigslist or for store credit at a Gamestop clone. Whatever; it's my item, so it's my rules.
Or, are YOU insane for thinking it's ok for products to be purchased once, and from that point on have absolutely zero (not depreciated... but ZERO) monetary value? Hmm. If I bought a lawnmower, but then moved to a place without grass, I guess I'd still be insane for wanting to sell my lawn mower to a store that re-sells used lawn mowers, yeah?
Sorry; should clarify. Truck is diesel, Hyundai is gasoline. But the prices vary across the board for converter replacements, whether diesel or gasoline.
Diesel engines use catalytic converters too. They are called Diesel Oxidation Catalysts, and run about the same prices, depending on the vehicle (which vary widely; my truck has one, and it cost $250, but my wife's Hyundai has two, replacing both was $800 [yeah, on a Hyundai! Fuck that noise.]).
Diesel vehicles here tend to be viewed as smelly, underpowered beasts by the masses. A diesel engine means a big old monster truck with stacks, based on the TV ads, or a VW Golf with no oomph based on the puttering around town.
Also, a comfortable bed will make people sleep more, a cheaper cell phone plan will just make people buy two plans, and less expensive dog food will make people feed their dogs more.
All plausible, perhaps, for some people, and more so for some products, but for most of us, we'll just keep consuming the same we always have, reaping the efficiency, price or comfort improvements.
Or need to be in a car sharing program, or rent a different vehicle for the 1-5% of the time you need one.
This is just not going to happen. It's a great idea, but a great many people WANT their own vehicle to do these things, and right or wrong, that fact isn't going to change; at least not abruptly. Rather than fight human nature (at least some humans' nature, anyway) it's better to provide a gradual path to change that still gives people what they want.
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Your example silly, because you pushed all the way to the end of the spectrum to a million bucks. Try this instead:
"It would be no different if a new act went to a regular bank, and convinced them to loan $25,000 (which could easily happen depending on credit rating) for 'production costs and marketing'. All but 'some tiny percentage' would go directly back to the bank to pay off the loan."
This is how all small businesses start, and it's really not difficult to secure the startup funds, if you're not ridiculous about it or go in with a few trusted members (hmm, maybe your bass player and drummer?). The hard part is having a good enough product (in this case, music) AND the ability to market that product (in this case, concerts, air time, etc) to expand from there, and if you don't, well... you either find a new product to sell (change the band up, write new and more popular stuff, change genres, etc) or get a job.
I don't claim to know if this would work for musical artists, but I know for sure that it works for a vast amount of other entrepreneurs.
The most ridiculous thing is that in the music industry, these big old huge scary label companies are really just performing the services that normal businesses (small or large) have plain old marketing departments on the payroll for. Why on EARTH would you ever want a *marketing department* completely in charge your product, from R&D to shipping? Seems like it would lead to selling only the products that are easy to market instead of coming up with innovative and terrific products that could be tricky to sell at first.... oh, wait a minute here....
No. He split the year. If he left in August, he'd pay US taxes from August to December, but Canada taxes from January to August.
There were also the key phases "pro photography" and "as a business" used in that post. In the case of the second usage of "consumer", it was used as an implicit comparison between consumer and business grade hardware, as in "this is consumer gear, so I'm only guaranteed....". I'm pretty sure I understood the post as well or better than you; at least the part I was responding to.
The second part of his post specifically tells us a pro photographer "should have little to no problem forking out the ~$800 a month..." when in fact I doubt ANY business (or individual, for that matter) would want to spend $800/month (or, $9600 a year) on something they don't need. Feel free to use whatever currency and bandwidth units/amounts pertain to your country; the fact remains that until/unless you can upload a large amount of ultra-high resolution photos to cloud storage faster and cheaper than I can back up to disk, I'll continue backing up to disk and then store or ship the drives (and yes, your country probably does have better internet connections than mine. Great job!)
Well, that's true. Maybe I should have used a fine-dining restaurant as my example, and used atmosphere/service/etc. Or, even better, a bar. I'll just drink at home if the bar treats me like shit, but I'll happily pay for their booze instead if I'm having good time. The point is, if you don't take care of your customers, they'll go somewhere else, and when that "somewhere else" is free, you have a lot of "taking care of" to do. Instead, software corps bitch-slap their customers for short term gain and long term alienation.
Next thing you know laws will be privatized for the highest bidder in a location.
Ha! It's only funny because it's been happening for years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobbying_in_the_United_States
I wonder if I could just go around slapping people until they pay me to stop. That'd be pretty sweet.
The MPAA would probably sue me for stealing their business model, or something. Guess I'll just have to keep working hard to make my customers happy, instead. Stupid reality and it's stupid applying to me.
I, like most people, like analogies. When we discuss copyright and the various conventions used to protect IP, I find myself comparing how it would work in other industries.
Let's say a buddy of mine (let's call him "The Scene" and pretend he's from Jersey) knows how to make a McDonald's cheeseburger exactly the way they do, and he can do it for 1% of the price. McDonald's, on the other hand, would rather sell me one for a 200% markup on the ingredients (duh). Would I have my buddy come by to make cheeseburgers at home, hoping he's got the latest Big Mac recipe now, or would I just cruise through the drive-through, happy to spend 4 bucks for the convenience? Hell yes! Drive-through for sure! This ready-to-roll type of convenience is worth a shit-ton to me, much as I love my buddy.
But if McDonald's made their cheeseburgers so they tasted like shit if I leave the restaurant, or required I fill out periodic surveys proving I paid for the cheeseburger as it travels through my digestive system, lest I get food poisoning... well, that's a little bit different, isn't it? I'll get em from my buddy and tell McDonald's to fuck right off.
This is the spot so many people find themselves in, and copyright has gotten us here. Faced with this type of bullshit, is it any wonder that piracy is steadily increasing? The law being wrong is barely relevant; it doesn't matter if it is or not, because people are proving they won't put up with being treated like thieves from the very point of purchase, even if the only way to circumvent it is to commit low-risk illegal acts. What needs to change is the idiotic corporate mentality that says "Protect profits at all costs!" instead of "Give customers excellent service, appreciation, products, and delivery!".
Corporations: People don't just pay you for their product because your box is so fancy that you deserve to be paid; people pay you because your product makes it easier, more fun, faster, more professional, less expensive, etc than doing a thing all by themselves. This is true in ALL cases, going back to the very first time a dude gave another dude 6 potatoes for a clay pot*. I guaran-fucking-tee that any successful shop that can conduct business and then actually shake hands with their customers knows this, and exceptional customer service and convenience are really the only way to compete in a price war. Hmm? Well, actually... yes... you are most DEFINITELY engaged in the mother of all price wars, and denial won't change that. I do hate to be the bearer of such bad news.
I'm amused, sometimes, to think that these huge corporations that have gone stomping through the market, setting prices and taking names for decades, find themselves faced with the ultimate price war (free!) and they don't remember how to compete. They think they're big enough to keep stomping and stomping, while the rest of the consumer world just looks on with pity. I sure hope there are up and coming tech companies that DO remember how to give customers a red carpet treatment, and can swoop in fill their shoes.
*Strictly speaking, I don't know the current potato/pot exchange rate, so don't take this as investment advice.
I think the biggest problem is a lack of the usual compromise between a customer and a vendor. Of COURSE piracy has gone up; any mass produced, commercially polished applications I've purchased legally in the past year phones home so often that my laptop is literally useless for many purposes without a wi-fi connection.
It's becoming a case of cutting off a nose to spite the face, and it's a real problem. I don't want to see companies that make good, useful products go out of business, but the bullshit DRM coming out of the software sector is simply ludicrous. Everything from various operating systems the latest games needs to phone home periodically these days; and some applications need *constant* reassurance from daddy that there's no stranger-danger from the big bad user.... it's enough say "Fuck it all; piracy's easier."
I wonder if the big corps are doing it on purpose, so when piracy reaches more than 95% of users, they can ask for a bail-out and even MORE draconian laws. Oh, and so the leaders can float to the Bahamas on golden parachutes.
I wonder if they conducted the survey on September 19th.
"Tell me, sir, do you still pirate software?"
Yarrr!
"So you admit that you USED to pirate software?"
Aye, we sea dogs ALL be bit buccanneers!
"So you admit you pirate software now, but didn't used to?"
Avast! Ye already have yer answer, ye lily livered cur!
"So how often do you beat your wife?"
Every time i be seein' one o' them in port!
Yeah; it's funny to me that they call "shipping disks" the "oldest answer, but still the right one". As if the other options have ever been even marginally realistic... "Bringing a shipping container in from Tokyo? While you *could* dog-paddle it home on your back, the oldest option - sending it by ship - is still the right one."
Just because you take pro pictures at 80MP doesn't mean your business has an extra $10,000 per year laying around for a business grade gigabit pipe; as the sole employee of my company, that'd mean I'm paying myself $20,000 a year instead of $30,000 (TBH, I'm lucky to be in the black, period, with only two years in). I store my images at my studio, back them up daily to a removable disk, and bring in a 3rd removable to copy them over once per week. All told? $500 for the 2 drives and a striped array on my studio PC. The self-storage backup technique works well for me.
Realistically, though, if I want to I can just upload them all to home or a cloud storage in batches overnight, the same way I download 10 gigabyte files at home. It's just plain easier to cart em around, though.
I agree! Some of my best trips were to take my cruiser to a campsite, bust out a tent from the saddlebags, get into an altered state of some kind, and stare at the stars.
My point was that people are gonna do what they're gonna do, and increasing efficiency makes it easier for us to do them. That doesn't always mean that people will consume so much more that the benefits from these efficiency gains are lost.
...such men do not exist.
I know.
But if this is enacted, how many successful businessmen - who are competent - will want to abandon their businesses for 4 years?
None. Those that have mega-corps typically don't get there by abandoning their posts for long stretches.
This means that the candidate will be automatically coming from a wealthy class
Mountains of supporting evidence of this, going back to 1790.
It sure would be nice, though. It's kind of like imagining I drive a Ferrari instead of my Passat. I like being wistful sometimes.
P.S.
Spartacus may have been a good leader of an insurrection, but would he be a wise king?
No, because his palace would turn into a venue for softcore porn and every time anybody stood up or walked around corners, things would go all slow-motion with sprays of blood flying about, defying the laws of physics. I've seen that show.
I agree with you, and I'm in that position myself. I use my 30 mpg VW for puttering around town and my 12 mpg Dodge for moving or pulling a friend's snowmobiles or sometimes when I just have a hankering for flouncy-bouncing about while grunting like a pig. The car could easily be electric; maybe someday the truck could be too.
The problem is, I still have no intention of switching my VW to an electric or hybrid until A) I can buy one used for about 6 grand (this is what I paid for my 2000 VW back in 2005) and/or B) the VW completely shits the bed on me and I'm forced to buy something.
I, and a lot of people like me, would prefer to drive their cars into the ground (I'm going on 12 years with the dodge, 6 with the VW, and expecting at least 6 more each), unless a switch can be done at reasonable cost - in both money and aggravation.
People need to keep in mind, also, that switching a gas car out for an electric one doesn't necessarily help the environment, anyway, if the old gasoline car is still on the road with a new owner inside. The only way a switch helps is if the old car goes into a crusher, at which point I lose my investment in it (less a couple hundred bucks for the scrap metal). I really can't stomach the idea of tossing my old cars into the waste-basket to feel better about my carbon footprint, at least until they're officially not worth fixing (value of vehicle is less than the lowest possible cost to fix). In my case, it's very likely a new owner will drive it MORE than me anyway, resulting in a net loss to the environment.
So, I think it's very important to improve gasoline efficiency on existing cars (for example, I'd happily refit my Dodge's exhaust, or maybe even engine, for a 10 mpg efficiency increase, as long as the refit is less than what the truck is worth), wherever possible. I also think it's important to make the upgrade path to an electric car as easy, efficient, and cost-effective as possible. Maybe by getting an immediate tax break (sales tax? registration fees?) on the new car when you trade in your old one for demolition, or something. What I do know is if the switch isn't made easy and financially sound, not very many people will want to do it until it's time to buy a new car anyway.
I should do this with crack. First rock is $99, and I'll remove the rat poison for another $49. Your call.
Ah. I misread your take on things. I thought you meant that only gasoline engines use catalytic converters, and so are MORE expensive. Now I see; your take is since they are basically similar in cost that it's not a factor. Thank you for making me slightly smarter today, good sir. :)
They probably used the new chips to evaluate the statistical data.
Actually, I wonder. If we use "mistake-y" chips to evaluate the performance of new "mistake-y" chips, and so on and so forth ad nauseum, wouldn't our computers end up working just like that kid who ate all the paste in 2nd grade?
Errr. 2piR. Opps.
Might even still be the correct radius, even, depending on how the circle's constructed.
:). A section of the circumference would just overlap. In that case, if you had a 1 inch radius (piRsquared; yay easy math!), your pencil would just go around the center point for 100,000 inches worth of circles (whoa). On the other hand, if Pi is rounded to a radius:circumference ratio smaller than 3.159... that'd be would be a non-circle, because the curve would never close.
If you make it using a center point, a fixed radius, and then draw a curved line that is precisely R distance from the center at all times PI could be 100,000, and still make a circle (albeit a very, very dark one
I think. Meh.
If you think resellers should be able to purchase used games for 10$, re-price them for $30-40 and take in double the profit compared to brand new game you're insane.
Uh, yeah.... then I'm insane. Or, at least, have an insane desire to be able to sell old stuff I don't use; perhaps on Craigslist or for store credit at a Gamestop clone. Whatever; it's my item, so it's my rules.
Or, are YOU insane for thinking it's ok for products to be purchased once, and from that point on have absolutely zero (not depreciated... but ZERO) monetary value? Hmm. If I bought a lawnmower, but then moved to a place without grass, I guess I'd still be insane for wanting to sell my lawn mower to a store that re-sells used lawn mowers, yeah?
Sorry; should clarify. Truck is diesel, Hyundai is gasoline. But the prices vary across the board for converter replacements, whether diesel or gasoline.
Diesel engines use catalytic converters too. They are called Diesel Oxidation Catalysts, and run about the same prices, depending on the vehicle (which vary widely; my truck has one, and it cost $250, but my wife's Hyundai has two, replacing both was $800 [yeah, on a Hyundai! Fuck that noise.]).
Diesel vehicles here tend to be viewed as smelly, underpowered beasts by the masses. A diesel engine means a big old monster truck with stacks, based on the TV ads, or a VW Golf with no oomph based on the puttering around town.
While this is not factual, that's where it's at. Someone needs to market sleek, speedy, sexy diesel vehicles on this side of the pond, much like a few of these (I'm lookin right at you, 3 Series.... hawt): http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/cars/article-2058914/Ten-best-used-diesel-cars.html
Also, a comfortable bed will make people sleep more, a cheaper cell phone plan will just make people buy two plans, and less expensive dog food will make people feed their dogs more.
All plausible, perhaps, for some people, and more so for some products, but for most of us, we'll just keep consuming the same we always have, reaping the efficiency, price or comfort improvements.
Or need to be in a car sharing program, or rent a different vehicle for the 1-5% of the time you need one.
This is just not going to happen. It's a great idea, but a great many people WANT their own vehicle to do these things, and right or wrong, that fact isn't going to change; at least not abruptly. Rather than fight human nature (at least some humans' nature, anyway) it's better to provide a gradual path to change that still gives people what they want.