One of the better metrics I've seen for the level of greed and money/power consolidation is the ratio of executive pay to average salary in companies. While it used to be ~10x, last I looked it was more like 100x.
One can also look at the 1%-ers (and even the 5-10%-ers) and the enormously disproportionate amount of the global finances they control.
The 30 year guess is kind of ironic to me personally. Somewhere between 25 and 30 years ago I 'discovered' robots and all the amazing things they could do in factories...replacing people or at least large parts of their jobs. I was excited and in my naive young mind though 'oh wow, with all these robots to do the work people will get to work less but make the same money because the company can make the same amount of things for less work and people have more time to do things with their family'... I believe I wrote a short essay about it for some english class even.
Fast forward almost the 30 predicted years this article mentions and... we're in exactly the OPPOSITE position (at least in the US). People are working substantially MORE hours and generally being paid LESS. A MUCH larger portion of the country is receiving welfare in one sort or another all while healthcare costs are ballooning and things like pensions simply don't exist outside of government jobs.
I'm not sure where the cliff in the graph is, but the power consolidation has immensely accelerated in the past few decades to the point that there's zero chance of this prediction coming true unless some great calamity changes things.
You read too many jilted newspapers and fail to understand market dynamics.
Oil is cheap now because of an oversupply.
Discover of new oil sources isn't driving the over-supply. Instead, it's new technology (and the previously much higher value of oil) driving the exploitation of existing, known fields that were previously not economical to tap.
It's also removal of some restrictions on new wells, fracking, and other techniques.
Combine that with a newfound US refusal to depend so heavily on oil from OPEC has led to a price war in essence. OPEC upped their production to force over-supply and a reduction in prices which was intended to drive the North American producers (which typically have significantly higher production expenses per barrel) out of business. Unfortunately for them, many of those producers already invested the large capital and instead dug in their heels and worked to be more cost efficient. They generally succeeded. Now even as OPEC reduces output to try and bring the prices back up, they're on the losing side of the game after having been used to virtually limitless income in the prior years.
Even with that in mind, the move to renewables is well underway. If people would get un-stupid, we'd combine that with nuclear and call it a day for powering the grid and work to replace our ICE vehicles more rapidly with EVs.
Well when people are trying to criminalize 'hate speech' then yes, you do need to refer back to the constitution.
There's no hate speech. There's just stuff some people don't want to hear so they've tried to force their views onto others and restrict speech illegally.
If your definition is so broad that it encompasses a large portion of speech already, then perhaps some existing definitions are better suited and the term is useless. Kind of like 'assault weapon'
My point was 'hate speech' is completely arbitrary to the point of non-existence (or conversely virtually anything would be hate speech).
The concept may exist, but is fatally flawed in that it relies on totally subjective 'logic'. What differs hate speech from saying mean things? Uncomfortable things? etc.
If one wants to have a new descriptive term, then it needs to be defined.
Granted, if the definition is "any speech that is negatively directed towards black people" then I will cede the point (and promptly consider anyone using that definition a racist and bigot.)
Hate speech most certainly does exist. Just because it's protected by the first amendment doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
There is ONLY speech....how you perceive it is completely your opinion.
This. And I've spent countless hours trying to bang it into peoples' heads.
You can disagree or dislike what someone says, but they can say the same about you. One can (easily IMHO) argue that all the 'if you support trump you're an idiot/bigot/rapist/etc.' is hate speech. It's directly targeting and disparaging a group of people who share a different personal view of something. No one gets to decide what kind of speech is good vs. bad and still have freedom of speech. It can't exist that way.
Yes, there are some obvious call-outs to like that such as screaming 'fire' when there isn't one...but frankly you could still consider that free speech then charge the person with reckless endangerment or something.
I hate black people and think they should all be euthanized. Hate speech? Substitute 'black people' for cattle ranchers and now you're PETA promoting animal welfare. Substitute for pit bulls and you're politicians promoting safety for children. The examples are endless. I might think you're scum for some of your opinions but I'll still support your right to share them. Oh, and no, I don't support the 'righteous' morons who think violence is an acceptable response to speech they disagree with.
If you're going to describe something objective measurable, don't use subjective wording. 60-70% efficiency is what Qi is reported as having.
70% isn't the same as a wire's high 90's% but at low ~5-10w power levels it's not anything to lose sleep over. The power 'cost' is minimal vs. the convenience gained for those who care of such things.
Also, you do understand that transformers (and lots of other "ancient" tech) have progressed since their original invention I hope. Hint: No laws of physics broken, but better understanding of them and ways to apply them generally results in things working better.
Oh, and the volume taken by the receiver coil is negligible. Changing that for battery might get you 1-2% if you're lucky
Rapid charge - benefits in regard to time, negative in regard to needing cables, data-loss risk, potential damage from people plugging into random power supplies
wireless charging - benefits in regard to simplicity of use (assuming your phone supports), greatly reduced data loss risk, greatly reduced risk of damage from charger. negative is the much lower number of wireless charging stations available and providing your own requires a cable + charge pad.
Each serves their own nice. I'd love being able to drop my phone on the console in my car and have it charge. I also love being able to get 50+% charge while sitting in an hour meeting.
Wireless charging is an age old technology that has been abandoned every time it has been tried. It's the flying car of charging techniques.
Samsung may disagree with you there.
While I do usually charge via wire, it's awfully handy to plot my phone down in mcdonalds, starbucks, and elsewhere on a charge pad and let it charge while i eat/drink/use my phone...without having to bring a wire or deal with the (inevitably broken, data-risk) cables/charger provided by someone else.
Only if every auto accident is an argument to ban automobiles...
You're comparing an accident with a transportation device with an attempted homicide with a purpose built weapon. Automobiles have plenty of uses besides killing something. Firearms are purpose built weapons. Comparing the two is a false equivalency.
Or one can twist things in the opposite direction to support their point: You're comparing the illegal use of something to the legal use of something else. False premise.
The legal uses of guns (home defense, police shootings) kill fewer people than the legal uses of cars (accidents). If you consider DUI/speeding/reckless driving/etc. (which are all illegal after all) to be illegal uses of cars then I'd argue that illegal uses of both result in more deaths from vehicles as well.
Gun death statistics only really 'shine' when you include suicide. That's a mental health issue not a gun issue - no matter how much people want to drone on about how guns 'make suicide an easy impulse action'
Trolling aside, if you don't encrypt and a certain file gets flagged as kiddie-pron then it's extremely simple for google to hash files and look to see who else also has that illegal file.
It certainly simplifies warrantless searching if you upload all your files to a company that specializes in...search.
Actually, if google is smart (and they usually are) they would de-dupe on a massive scale...while still replicating multiple copies for speed/redundancy.
That vastly lowers their required storage (oddly enough you aren't the only one with biggestboobz.mp4) and lets them continue offering more 'space' that doesn't cost them nearly as much as it looks like it would.
Which is not especially convenient when you want to use those files.
When google drive supports encryption seamlessly WITHOUT keeping the keys themselves then I'll gladly give them hard drive images. Granted that makes using their storage tool much less useful to THEM. (which is kind of the point)
We're actually going through something very similar at work right now. We want to use cloud based storage and distribution of files, but need to be able to (more or less seamlessly) encrypt ourselves and not give the hosting provider our keys. That's the sticking point and has been rather difficult to properly implement.
Why Trump... totally relevant to $25k "trees" preventing pollution:)
But consider this anyhow: maybe, just maybe, people are actually less sensitive than the sensational news reporters would have us believe. Maybe, just maybe! many people don't actually give a crap about offhand comments when they endlessly see politicians outright stealing, lying, cheating, bribing, etc. and doing it all mainly NOT for the voters but instead for corporate greed. Maybe people being bullied into voting hillary (trump supporters aren't my friends/are idiots/should die/shame on them/etc.) had the opposite effect and people really hated being told that they couldn't even consider trump openly and thus they decided that the hillary camp and propaganda was too much, too far, and actually far more oppressive than the issues from the trump camp. It's actually possible that people are less fragile then the media would have us believe and don't actually mind someone who's callous and unforgiving because they saw the opportunity for change...and for something, ANYTHING to get done differently than the endless propaganda machine and corruption.
$25,000 'trees'? Are you kidding me? Seems utterly ridiculous.
On 3 June 2017, the CRS-11 capsule largely assembled from previously flown components from the CRS-4 mission in September 2014 was launched again for the first time, with the hull, structural elements, thrusters, harnesses, propellant tanks, plumbing and many of the avionics reused while the heat shield, batteries and components exposed to sea water upon splashdown for recovery were replaced.
Now, you could be correct that they outright lied about that but I fail to see why they would. Furthermore, that's the dragon capsule not the booster itself.
Yes, exact/recurring refurb costs are still being figured for the boosters but what gives you belief that those costs are going to be similar to building the thing from scratch? Even if it's 50% less, that reduces their capital costs per launch by half leaving fuel (negligible) and support costs (significant, but not exceptional).
Thinking that they can't turn a profit is nonsense though. Sat launching is most certainly profitable. I say that simply because 1) companies are launching satellites and 2) other companies are paying for those launches and then making a profit off having them up there. If the cost to launch exceeded what companies could afford to pay, there wouldn't be launches. Instead the bottleneck isn't paying customers, it's how fast the very limited number of launching companies can blast shit into the sky.
Yes, there's money going into R&D for the next generation (and evolution) of launch platforms. That's what you do when you want to ensure your company has a future. (oh, and your species too if you want to include that viewpoint)
1) Just because someone (actually several someones) did something fundamentally similar before you means they forever have claim to every derivative work. Furthermore, NASA is a government funded entity. It's R&D (among other things) is for the good of the country and its citizens which include Elon and the SpaceX investors. NASA did, and does, amazing things. SpaceX also does amazing things including some very impressive R&D. Would the situation be different without NASA? Sure. But that's basically asking "so if the USA never had a space exploration program..." then SpaceX very well might be a russian company. (oh wait, who's been doing a lot of our launches?)
2) This is simple misdirection. NASA absolutely funds relevant development efforts but that's not even the case here. NASA bought (committed to) launches from SpaceX. That's not support, that's purchasing services that NASA currently requires and has no means to execute themselves. Was it immensely helpful to SpaceX? Absolutely. Did it save the company? In a manner of speaking but SpaceX still had to be a viable supplier. It was not a gimmie/bail-out at all.
NASA gets a lot of credit for building the US Space program, though a large portion of their work was outsourced so even claiming it all as 'theirs' is a fundamentally flawed argument. They just paid for a bunch of genius engineers to build things that were at (or beyond) the material science of the time. SpaceX has a much easier time of it now with the history of design that the US and USSR went through years back...but that's not to say modern science couldn't recreate much of that work for far, far less effort today.
In this and the other citation provided, the crash happened because the pilots fought the autopilot (and made plenty of other mistakes). Had they NOT tried to compensate for a situation they didn't fully understand, they might have had a rough time until the auto-systems got them on a level flightpath but they'd be alive.
The difficulty here isn't skill loss due to automated systems, it's pilots and autopilots not being able to interpret what the other is doing. If the pilots in this example had simply let the plane go it would have (presumably) just not landed. The would have had to explain the aborted landing but... no dead people DESPITE incorrectly setting and auto-system.
In the other, it's almost exactly the same. A child playing in the cockpit during flight (idiot pilot/father there) did what's necessary to disengage some of the auto-flight systems. The resulting situation was greatly exacerbated by the pilot not knowing what was happening and him fighting with the auto-systems caused the crash.
You can't have two masters in a system. Despite these autopilots NOT being designed to overcome gross stupidity, they WOULD have handled both accidental caused situations if they had been allowed to (based on the reports and conclusions therein). Similarly, had the pilots been prepared (and able) to completely remove all flight automation they probably could have recovered the planes as well.
Plus autopilots don't get bad ideas of inviting children to cockpits or flipping the wrong switch in a moment of tired/stupid/drink/bored/sick/unconscious.
Clearly that system is poorly designed and implemented. Funny how everything in aviation needs to be tested to the 3rd degree yet some obviously broken things still pass muster.
I don't think (or hope!) that anyone here is suggesting taking a brain dead 'automation/decision tree computer' and letting it fly a plane without a pilot.
But a properly designed system? That's different. Heck, you could probably use some of the machine learning from IBM Watson and let it watch a few million hours of pilots flying and it could extrapolate almost any conceivable flight situation with the best response. Use that response set to program your new flight computer:)
IANAP (pilot) but I've done a small bit of flying in the cockpit of small planes. As I understand it, flying is technically complex, but generally quite rigid and structured (i.e. straight-forward with a given body of knowledge). Driving, as best as I can interpolate, has FAR more variables and many of those are much less predictable. I'm curious on your take regarding the comparison.
The military has been using remote piloted and autonomous drones for a while now.
Also consider that most large, modern plans include Autopilot Autoland Autobrake
I don't know of any auto-takeoff but as I understand it that's a simple process (full thrust, maintain heading, when speed > preset, rotate and ascend) with the typical emergency-abort criteria.
Mainly what pilots seem to do is make announcements, talk to towers, and request a flight path change if there's turbulence. None of this is especially complex to automate. Oh, and if you DO automate the planes then you open up the option of automating some (though not all) of the tower operations...which are known to be the most stressful, demanding, and difficult jobs in aviation.
Now...i'm still stupefied as to why the MTA (NYC Subway etc) and other cities trains still run things completely manually.
Actually, I think a large portion is #3: because piracy (arrrr!) is actually easier and works better.
To wit: you have multiple streaming platforms with some intersection of content and lots of 'exclusives'. It's a pain to go through 4 or 5 different services to find one movie you want to watch (not to mention paying for them or signing up for yet another if that's all that has your content). Compare that to using torrents where the only exclusivity is private trackers, but virtually any reasonably popular content is readily available.
And...then you have it to do with as you wish. Time-shift. Device-shift. Cut clips for amusement or making gifs. Loading up a huge playlist because you're going to be stuck on a plane for 18 hours and the in-flight music service is horrible.
The cost driver is more relevant when you're talking about recent releases that want $5-10 to download/stream, not content that's part of a $10/month service.
The thrill? That's only a very small number of people - the ones who 'produce' the bulk of the pirated content mainly.
The terms you're looking for are 'good-faith' and 'bad-faith'.
Even if it's a shitty lawsuit, if she *in good faith* believed or had evidence to support her claims, it's a meritorious lawsuit and she is protected from retaliation. Firing her after complaining about harassment, discrimination, etc. is an extremely clear example of retaliation. How good or bad her case is doesn't matter and neither does winning or losing.
However if she acted in bad faith - she had legitimate reason to believe her lawsuit was NOT based on actual facts or was intentionally fabricating false information - then those protections go out the window. If, she claimed some employee harassed her and it was clearly documented that they never crossed paths and she made the whole thing up, then her protections potentially go out the window.
You need a VERY clear path to establish bad-faith. That's why so many obviously BS lawsuits get to continue and no one gets in trouble. As long as you can show an even vaguely reasonable chance that you believed the BS when you started it all, you are generally protected.
For those living in cities and/or without cars, lugging 10+ bags of groceries isn't especially convenient. Or those who can't carry them at all. Or those who work odd hours. Or those who have no interest in wandering a grocery store but can click through a website during lunch/work/commute/etc.
There's PLENTY of reasons for grocery delivery beyond just pure laziness...oh, and that's still a valid reason too.
Anecdotal evidence on both sides...but I've had prime for years and order at least a couple things a month.
It's very rare that something shows up late.
The only exception is the stupid USPS Smartpost thing they used for a while. A package would be 'delivered' per tracking but what they really meant was delivered to the local post office. It almost always was at my door a day later, 2 at most. But that's 1-2 days over their guaranteed 2-day delivery. Luckily they don't seem to be using that anymore (or at least for me).
So with the one exception which doesn't happen anymore. I get my amazon stuff in 2 days, sometimes 1, occasionally ~2 hours.
What still confuses me is how some things are prime via some sellers and not via others. It's the same product, in the same (intermixed inventory) bins.
Any of them who elect to carry a package for Wal-Mart will have no insurance at least between the time when they leave work, and the time when they deliver the last package they're carrying.
I double checked for a/sarcasm tag but nope.
Of course w-mart will get an umbrella policy that covers it's drivers while they're on the clock delivering packages. It's stupid to think they wouldn't for many reasons. Just like they will be covered by the various insurances covering on-the-job injuries etc. These people are actively working while making a delivery (even if it's conveniently routed so it's on their way home) so all the normal work protections apply. When you but an insurance policy for (if this takes off) 10s to 100's of thousands of part time drivers/delivery people you get some pretty nice rates.
TBH the hourly rate will be more than it probably costs for the delivery in some cases, but this isn't about w-mart saving on shipping. It's about them one-upping prime-now which has much more limited availability than w-mart would if they leverage this in most of their stores.
It will be interesting to see how they handle the hourly pay though. They can't pay less than minimum wage and they also have to reimburse for mileage. I wonder if instead they try to go around that and offer a fixed fee or something.
Slashdot Mirror
One of the better metrics I've seen for the level of greed and money/power consolidation is the ratio of executive pay to average salary in companies. While it used to be ~10x, last I looked it was more like 100x.
One can also look at the 1%-ers (and even the 5-10%-ers) and the enormously disproportionate amount of the global finances they control.
The 30 year guess is kind of ironic to me personally. Somewhere between 25 and 30 years ago I 'discovered' robots and all the amazing things they could do in factories...replacing people or at least large parts of their jobs. I was excited and in my naive young mind though 'oh wow, with all these robots to do the work people will get to work less but make the same money because the company can make the same amount of things for less work and people have more time to do things with their family' ... I believe I wrote a short essay about it for some english class even.
Fast forward almost the 30 predicted years this article mentions and ... we're in exactly the OPPOSITE position (at least in the US). People are working substantially MORE hours and generally being paid LESS. A MUCH larger portion of the country is receiving welfare in one sort or another all while healthcare costs are ballooning and things like pensions simply don't exist outside of government jobs.
I'm not sure where the cliff in the graph is, but the power consolidation has immensely accelerated in the past few decades to the point that there's zero chance of this prediction coming true unless some great calamity changes things.
You read too many jilted newspapers and fail to understand market dynamics.
Oil is cheap now because of an oversupply.
Discover of new oil sources isn't driving the over-supply. Instead, it's new technology (and the previously much higher value of oil) driving the exploitation of existing, known fields that were previously not economical to tap.
It's also removal of some restrictions on new wells, fracking, and other techniques.
Combine that with a newfound US refusal to depend so heavily on oil from OPEC has led to a price war in essence. OPEC upped their production to force over-supply and a reduction in prices which was intended to drive the North American producers (which typically have significantly higher production expenses per barrel) out of business. Unfortunately for them, many of those producers already invested the large capital and instead dug in their heels and worked to be more cost efficient. They generally succeeded. Now even as OPEC reduces output to try and bring the prices back up, they're on the losing side of the game after having been used to virtually limitless income in the prior years.
Even with that in mind, the move to renewables is well underway. If people would get un-stupid, we'd combine that with nuclear and call it a day for powering the grid and work to replace our ICE vehicles more rapidly with EVs.
Well when people are trying to criminalize 'hate speech' then yes, you do need to refer back to the constitution.
There's no hate speech. There's just stuff some people don't want to hear so they've tried to force their views onto others and restrict speech illegally.
If it exists, then clearly define it.
If your definition is so broad that it encompasses a large portion of speech already, then perhaps some existing definitions are better suited and the term is useless. Kind of like 'assault weapon'
My point was 'hate speech' is completely arbitrary to the point of non-existence (or conversely virtually anything would be hate speech).
The concept may exist, but is fatally flawed in that it relies on totally subjective 'logic'. What differs hate speech from saying mean things? Uncomfortable things? etc.
If one wants to have a new descriptive term, then it needs to be defined.
Granted, if the definition is "any speech that is negatively directed towards black people" then I will cede the point (and promptly consider anyone using that definition a racist and bigot.)
There is ONLY speech....how you perceive it is completely your opinion.
This. And I've spent countless hours trying to bang it into peoples' heads.
You can disagree or dislike what someone says, but they can say the same about you. One can (easily IMHO) argue that all the 'if you support trump you're an idiot/bigot/rapist/etc.' is hate speech. It's directly targeting and disparaging a group of people who share a different personal view of something. No one gets to decide what kind of speech is good vs. bad and still have freedom of speech. It can't exist that way.
Yes, there are some obvious call-outs to like that such as screaming 'fire' when there isn't one...but frankly you could still consider that free speech then charge the person with reckless endangerment or something.
I hate black people and think they should all be euthanized. Hate speech? Substitute 'black people' for cattle ranchers and now you're PETA promoting animal welfare. Substitute for pit bulls and you're politicians promoting safety for children. The examples are endless. I might think you're scum for some of your opinions but I'll still support your right to share them. Oh, and no, I don't support the 'righteous' morons who think violence is an acceptable response to speech they disagree with.
If you're going to describe something objective measurable, don't use subjective wording. 60-70% efficiency is what Qi is reported as having.
70% isn't the same as a wire's high 90's% but at low ~5-10w power levels it's not anything to lose sleep over. The power 'cost' is minimal vs. the convenience gained for those who care of such things.
Also, you do understand that transformers (and lots of other "ancient" tech) have progressed since their original invention I hope. Hint: No laws of physics broken, but better understanding of them and ways to apply them generally results in things working better.
Oh, and the volume taken by the receiver coil is negligible. Changing that for battery might get you 1-2% if you're lucky
Rapid charge - benefits in regard to time, negative in regard to needing cables, data-loss risk, potential damage from people plugging into random power supplies
wireless charging - benefits in regard to simplicity of use (assuming your phone supports), greatly reduced data loss risk, greatly reduced risk of damage from charger. negative is the much lower number of wireless charging stations available and providing your own requires a cable + charge pad.
Each serves their own nice. I'd love being able to drop my phone on the console in my car and have it charge. I also love being able to get 50+% charge while sitting in an hour meeting.
Wireless charging is an age old technology that has been abandoned every time it has been tried. It's the flying car of charging techniques.
Samsung may disagree with you there.
While I do usually charge via wire, it's awfully handy to plot my phone down in mcdonalds, starbucks, and elsewhere on a charge pad and let it charge while i eat/drink/use my phone...without having to bring a wire or deal with the (inevitably broken, data-risk) cables/charger provided by someone else.
Only if every auto accident is an argument to ban automobiles...
You're comparing an accident with a transportation device with an attempted homicide with a purpose built weapon. Automobiles have plenty of uses besides killing something. Firearms are purpose built weapons. Comparing the two is a false equivalency.
Or one can twist things in the opposite direction to support their point: You're comparing the illegal use of something to the legal use of something else. False premise.
The legal uses of guns (home defense, police shootings) kill fewer people than the legal uses of cars (accidents). If you consider DUI/speeding/reckless driving/etc. (which are all illegal after all) to be illegal uses of cars then I'd argue that illegal uses of both result in more deaths from vehicles as well.
Gun death statistics only really 'shine' when you include suicide. That's a mental health issue not a gun issue - no matter how much people want to drone on about how guns 'make suicide an easy impulse action'
Trolling aside, if you don't encrypt and a certain file gets flagged as kiddie-pron then it's extremely simple for google to hash files and look to see who else also has that illegal file.
It certainly simplifies warrantless searching if you upload all your files to a company that specializes in...search.
Actually, if google is smart (and they usually are) they would de-dupe on a massive scale...while still replicating multiple copies for speed/redundancy.
That vastly lowers their required storage (oddly enough you aren't the only one with biggestboobz.mp4) and lets them continue offering more 'space' that doesn't cost them nearly as much as it looks like it would.
Which is not especially convenient when you want to use those files.
When google drive supports encryption seamlessly WITHOUT keeping the keys themselves then I'll gladly give them hard drive images. Granted that makes using their storage tool much less useful to THEM. (which is kind of the point)
We're actually going through something very similar at work right now. We want to use cloud based storage and distribution of files, but need to be able to (more or less seamlessly) encrypt ourselves and not give the hosting provider our keys. That's the sticking point and has been rather difficult to properly implement.
Why Trump ... totally relevant to $25k "trees" preventing pollution :)
But consider this anyhow: maybe, just maybe, people are actually less sensitive than the sensational news reporters would have us believe. Maybe, just maybe! many people don't actually give a crap about offhand comments when they endlessly see politicians outright stealing, lying, cheating, bribing, etc. and doing it all mainly NOT for the voters but instead for corporate greed. Maybe people being bullied into voting hillary (trump supporters aren't my friends/are idiots/should die/shame on them/etc.) had the opposite effect and people really hated being told that they couldn't even consider trump openly and thus they decided that the hillary camp and propaganda was too much, too far, and actually far more oppressive than the issues from the trump camp. It's actually possible that people are less fragile then the media would have us believe and don't actually mind someone who's callous and unforgiving because they saw the opportunity for change...and for something, ANYTHING to get done differently than the endless propaganda machine and corruption.
$25,000 'trees'? Are you kidding me? Seems utterly ridiculous.
On 3 June 2017, the CRS-11 capsule largely assembled from previously flown components from the CRS-4 mission in September 2014 was launched again for the first time, with the hull, structural elements, thrusters, harnesses, propellant tanks, plumbing and many of the avionics reused while the heat shield, batteries and components exposed to sea water upon splashdown for recovery were replaced.
Now, you could be correct that they outright lied about that but I fail to see why they would. Furthermore, that's the dragon capsule not the booster itself.
Yes, exact/recurring refurb costs are still being figured for the boosters but what gives you belief that those costs are going to be similar to building the thing from scratch? Even if it's 50% less, that reduces their capital costs per launch by half leaving fuel (negligible) and support costs (significant, but not exceptional).
Thinking that they can't turn a profit is nonsense though. Sat launching is most certainly profitable. I say that simply because 1) companies are launching satellites and 2) other companies are paying for those launches and then making a profit off having them up there. If the cost to launch exceeded what companies could afford to pay, there wouldn't be launches. Instead the bottleneck isn't paying customers, it's how fast the very limited number of launching companies can blast shit into the sky.
Yes, there's money going into R&D for the next generation (and evolution) of launch platforms. That's what you do when you want to ensure your company has a future. (oh, and your species too if you want to include that viewpoint)
False basis.
1) Just because someone (actually several someones) did something fundamentally similar before you means they forever have claim to every derivative work. Furthermore, NASA is a government funded entity. It's R&D (among other things) is for the good of the country and its citizens which include Elon and the SpaceX investors. NASA did, and does, amazing things. SpaceX also does amazing things including some very impressive R&D. Would the situation be different without NASA? Sure. But that's basically asking "so if the USA never had a space exploration program..." then SpaceX very well might be a russian company. (oh wait, who's been doing a lot of our launches?)
2) This is simple misdirection. NASA absolutely funds relevant development efforts but that's not even the case here. NASA bought (committed to) launches from SpaceX. That's not support, that's purchasing services that NASA currently requires and has no means to execute themselves. Was it immensely helpful to SpaceX? Absolutely. Did it save the company? In a manner of speaking but SpaceX still had to be a viable supplier. It was not a gimmie/bail-out at all.
NASA gets a lot of credit for building the US Space program, though a large portion of their work was outsourced so even claiming it all as 'theirs' is a fundamentally flawed argument. They just paid for a bunch of genius engineers to build things that were at (or beyond) the material science of the time. SpaceX has a much easier time of it now with the history of design that the US and USSR went through years back...but that's not to say modern science couldn't recreate much of that work for far, far less effort today.
In this and the other citation provided, the crash happened because the pilots fought the autopilot (and made plenty of other mistakes). Had they NOT tried to compensate for a situation they didn't fully understand, they might have had a rough time until the auto-systems got them on a level flightpath but they'd be alive.
The difficulty here isn't skill loss due to automated systems, it's pilots and autopilots not being able to interpret what the other is doing. If the pilots in this example had simply let the plane go it would have (presumably) just not landed. The would have had to explain the aborted landing but ... no dead people DESPITE incorrectly setting and auto-system.
In the other, it's almost exactly the same. A child playing in the cockpit during flight (idiot pilot/father there) did what's necessary to disengage some of the auto-flight systems. The resulting situation was greatly exacerbated by the pilot not knowing what was happening and him fighting with the auto-systems caused the crash.
You can't have two masters in a system. Despite these autopilots NOT being designed to overcome gross stupidity, they WOULD have handled both accidental caused situations if they had been allowed to (based on the reports and conclusions therein). Similarly, had the pilots been prepared (and able) to completely remove all flight automation they probably could have recovered the planes as well.
Plus autopilots don't get bad ideas of inviting children to cockpits or flipping the wrong switch in a moment of tired/stupid/drink/bored/sick/unconscious.
Clearly that system is poorly designed and implemented. Funny how everything in aviation needs to be tested to the 3rd degree yet some obviously broken things still pass muster.
I don't think (or hope!) that anyone here is suggesting taking a brain dead 'automation/decision tree computer' and letting it fly a plane without a pilot.
But a properly designed system? That's different. Heck, you could probably use some of the machine learning from IBM Watson and let it watch a few million hours of pilots flying and it could extrapolate almost any conceivable flight situation with the best response. Use that response set to program your new flight computer :)
IANAP (pilot) but I've done a small bit of flying in the cockpit of small planes. As I understand it, flying is technically complex, but generally quite rigid and structured (i.e. straight-forward with a given body of knowledge). Driving, as best as I can interpolate, has FAR more variables and many of those are much less predictable. I'm curious on your take regarding the comparison.
The military has been using remote piloted and autonomous drones for a while now.
Also consider that most large, modern plans include
Autopilot
Autoland
Autobrake
I don't know of any auto-takeoff but as I understand it that's a simple process (full thrust, maintain heading, when speed > preset, rotate and ascend) with the typical emergency-abort criteria.
Mainly what pilots seem to do is make announcements, talk to towers, and request a flight path change if there's turbulence. None of this is especially complex to automate. Oh, and if you DO automate the planes then you open up the option of automating some (though not all) of the tower operations...which are known to be the most stressful, demanding, and difficult jobs in aviation.
Now...i'm still stupefied as to why the MTA (NYC Subway etc) and other cities trains still run things completely manually.
Actually, I think a large portion is #3: because piracy (arrrr!) is actually easier and works better.
To wit: you have multiple streaming platforms with some intersection of content and lots of 'exclusives'. It's a pain to go through 4 or 5 different services to find one movie you want to watch (not to mention paying for them or signing up for yet another if that's all that has your content). Compare that to using torrents where the only exclusivity is private trackers, but virtually any reasonably popular content is readily available.
And...then you have it to do with as you wish. Time-shift. Device-shift. Cut clips for amusement or making gifs. Loading up a huge playlist because you're going to be stuck on a plane for 18 hours and the in-flight music service is horrible.
The cost driver is more relevant when you're talking about recent releases that want $5-10 to download/stream, not content that's part of a $10/month service.
The thrill? That's only a very small number of people - the ones who 'produce' the bulk of the pirated content mainly.
The terms you're looking for are 'good-faith' and 'bad-faith'.
Even if it's a shitty lawsuit, if she *in good faith* believed or had evidence to support her claims, it's a meritorious lawsuit and she is protected from retaliation. Firing her after complaining about harassment, discrimination, etc. is an extremely clear example of retaliation. How good or bad her case is doesn't matter and neither does winning or losing.
However if she acted in bad faith - she had legitimate reason to believe her lawsuit was NOT based on actual facts or was intentionally fabricating false information - then those protections go out the window. If, she claimed some employee harassed her and it was clearly documented that they never crossed paths and she made the whole thing up, then her protections potentially go out the window.
You need a VERY clear path to establish bad-faith. That's why so many obviously BS lawsuits get to continue and no one gets in trouble. As long as you can show an even vaguely reasonable chance that you believed the BS when you started it all, you are generally protected.
Actually, this is why many legitimate victims never bother to speak out. They already went through a bunch of shit and don't want any more.
However, those seeking a thrill (or money/attention) and realizing they have nothing to lose have greater motivation to make a huge ordeal.
It's the second group that completely screws over the first by making people take them less seriously.
Maybe for you grocery delivery is pointless.
For those living in cities and/or without cars, lugging 10+ bags of groceries isn't especially convenient. Or those who can't carry them at all. Or those who work odd hours. Or those who have no interest in wandering a grocery store but can click through a website during lunch/work/commute/etc.
There's PLENTY of reasons for grocery delivery beyond just pure laziness...oh, and that's still a valid reason too.
Anecdotal evidence on both sides...but I've had prime for years and order at least a couple things a month.
It's very rare that something shows up late.
The only exception is the stupid USPS Smartpost thing they used for a while. A package would be 'delivered' per tracking but what they really meant was delivered to the local post office. It almost always was at my door a day later, 2 at most. But that's 1-2 days over their guaranteed 2-day delivery. Luckily they don't seem to be using that anymore (or at least for me).
So with the one exception which doesn't happen anymore. I get my amazon stuff in 2 days, sometimes 1, occasionally ~2 hours.
What still confuses me is how some things are prime via some sellers and not via others. It's the same product, in the same (intermixed inventory) bins.
Any of them who elect to carry a package for Wal-Mart will have no insurance at least between the time when they leave work, and the time when they deliver the last package they're carrying.
I double checked for a /sarcasm tag but nope.
Of course w-mart will get an umbrella policy that covers it's drivers while they're on the clock delivering packages. It's stupid to think they wouldn't for many reasons. Just like they will be covered by the various insurances covering on-the-job injuries etc. These people are actively working while making a delivery (even if it's conveniently routed so it's on their way home) so all the normal work protections apply. When you but an insurance policy for (if this takes off) 10s to 100's of thousands of part time drivers/delivery people you get some pretty nice rates.
TBH the hourly rate will be more than it probably costs for the delivery in some cases, but this isn't about w-mart saving on shipping. It's about them one-upping prime-now which has much more limited availability than w-mart would if they leverage this in most of their stores.
It will be interesting to see how they handle the hourly pay though. They can't pay less than minimum wage and they also have to reimburse for mileage. I wonder if instead they try to go around that and offer a fixed fee or something.