I wonder if the iphone can dial 911 before it's activated. i thought that was a requirement for all cellphones- that they can dial emergency numbers even without a sim inserted.
a-cost of *nix port with support for god-knows how many distros running on who know what kind of hardware b-profit (fixed, same as before) c-number of *nix-ONLY users who want an iphone for some reason
Multiply b and c. If that value is less than a, then you're not getting your linux itunes.
>>Apple had over a year to correct the supply/activation fiasco of the initial iPhone launch, and so far it's going worse, not better
After the success of the last iphone launch, the wii launch, and this launch, do you really expect it to _ever_ get better? This is the new method of creating a media frenzy. Well, wait, I guess beanie babies probably started it. Then furbies. Then tickle me elmos. ad naus.
I think that the reason the iPhone is such a big deal to people is that it is apple's first telephone product. If google released a phone (a whole, real phone), it would get almost as much press as the iPhone. Or I'll bet that if MS released one, they'd get a lot of press.
When Nokia releases a new phone, it doesn't get as much attention because it's just another model number for most people (although they _do_ get press, I've seen it on the tv). Another iteration or two and the iphone will get much less press; part of this will be due to other companies releasing essentially the same product in order to stay competetive (and that's already happening).
Eventually apple will release something even better, and the cycle will repeat. Trying to avoid apple products would be like trying to avoid toyotas when you're out driving.
Think of the next generation of students, who no longer will have to play with dangerous bunsen burners in the lab. Instead they'll fashion glassware and boil solutions in the safe, heatless flame of an alcohol lamp.
Will vetrolium clean the dr. pepper off of my keyboard?
I work in the paint/decal office here on an air base. Our primary focus is on aircraft markings, ground equipment, etc. but we support the entire base's paint, banner, and decal needs. We also do plaques and the like. I guess it's sort of a jack-of-all-trades kind of job. We use the Gerber Omega software for our vector design and typesetting, although I use gimp and a few other tools when Omega falls short (which it often does). Since it's not what I would classify as 'professional typesetting' I usually don't bother finding fonts from third parties unless it's a personal project. There is a core set that I use for military stuff and then I have a core set that I like to use. We also do a lot of personal jobs for people on base like boat registration numbers, and for almost all of that stuff I use serpentine, helvetica, or arial black.
So I guess that's it in a nutshell. Gotta go paint an airplane now.
>>Most of the natural gas in this country is used for heating homes directly and would not be freed up for powering cars.
A tremendous amount of it is simply burned off during processing. I live basically on the top of a large hill, and I can clearly see- in broad daylight- the giant flame at a refinery 30 miles away.
Surely we could use some of this gas for more useful purposes?
Stay away from anything Gerber. Some sets seem to be randomly-generated; many sets lack punctuation or numbers, requiring me to use two ' quotes and then converting them to vector in order to flip them. Or using numbers from a related font... pita, that.
People come in here with grand ideas about their designs, like that the letters should be 4" tall and the 30-character message needs to fit into a 20" space. And from now on, anyone who gives me a blank face when I ask what style of typeface/font they want gets Hobo or Marker, depending on my mood.
It's my fault for not reading the post you replied to; I assumed incorrectly.
>>Only 52? There are many more than that in a decent set
For the record, one of the graphics suites I use here at work came with over 5,000 typefaces. And all but 5 or 6 of them suck. I don't know if we paid extra for them, but 99% of our work uses "MILITARY BLOCK MED".
You're right, and I would have added that except that I wouldn't think many people are friends/family with reliable critics or proof-readers. My mother does professional proofreading for a local publisher, but I don't know if I'd present my work to her unless it was non-fiction. But that concerns our personal relationship.
I guess the main gist of my comment was that _most_ people, when given the chance to critique a friend/relative's work, will err far, far on the side of 'nice' rather than risking the person's feelings. It's not so much a matter of honesty as it is about emotional dissonance between liking a person and maybe not liking their manuscript or the ideas presented therein. Additionally, it is very often the case that one's family and friends are not anywhere near the intended audience for your manuscript. If you are lucky enough to have a good friend who IS the audience and who is qualified to critique, then you should of course listen to them.
But therein lies the key to this: You pick people based on their qualifications, not their relationship to you. Maybe I should have just written that in my original comment instead of rambling away. If you have a friend who is the audience and who is competent to critique, then it matters not that they are your friend.
Anyways, your technique seems to be working for you, so I won't say there aren't exceptions.
>>starting with those with the MOST impact... the people in the USA.
Phew... For a second there I thought you might have been about to say something correct or honest and sacrifice your karma. You might have said something about farmers in the amazon destroying the rain forests, or china's dirty coal, or oil companies and mining cartels (non-U.S.) raping the environment and the local people, or so help me you might have said something about poor farming practices in africa and the middle east leading to desertification! Goodness no, we better not say that!
It is apparently necessary, being a member of a rich country, to deprecate oneself and one's country. This is so that poor people in other countries don't feel so bad about their situation when they see how bad we feel about being fat and rich. I know I feel just awful about having enough wealth to own a computer to type on.
The U.S. has lead the world in agricultural, municipal, and scientific advances that make our current (6 billion strong) existence possible. The lifestyles of our 1800's ancestors, if scaled up to current populations, would destroy the planet in weeks. Read about easter island or crete.
>>No, what a poor writer who wants to get better needs is either a good critique group or some friends who will act as beta-readers
I strongly, strongly disagree with using friends or family or anyone you know, frankly, to judge any of your written works. It causes negative emotions from contempt to feelings of betrayal.
People either give you glowing reviews and pick something basically at random to recommend that you change, like a character's outfit in a scene something equally foolish; or people are utterly ignorant of literature and pick apart your work by disagreeing with characters' personalities or actions.
I know I probably sound terribly cynical about this, but it's true. You will never get published if your work has only been reviewed by your mother, your gf, one coworker, and your best friend. None of those people will sacrifice their relationship with you to be honest (or might not be capable of a competent review) and you will never progress from the "I"m writing a book based on my (17-year-old) life because it's SOOOOOO interesting to other people" stage.
No, what writers need are good professors who can dish out honest and useful critiques. Than after school is done, you'll know if you are successful if your reviews, while they remain critical, start coming from people outside of academia, outside of your family, and from within the actual industry. You know, they people who have been in the business of publishing books for the past couple hundred years.
Again sorry about the rant, but I just absolutely refuse to read anything that friends/family have written. It may be good or bad- that part doesn't matter- but it is in my nature to pick things apart and I've noticed that that bugs the crap out of people. And if I was going to give a fluff review, I might as well not even read the thing. Constructive criticism come from knowledgeable people who are unafraid of your feelings.
>>Mechanical criticism of literature can only result in mechanical literature, not good writing.
Oh I forgot to add this earlier. If a writer has a very poor style mechanically, or spelling too awful for machine recognition, then I can assure you that they are a bad writer, period.
If a person rights, like, without any regard, for the differentses between speaken and righten works, and cant get a sentents to make sents let alone a paragraph, or can't stay in one person from sentents to sentents with no parallel structure? and I'm nnot saying that their havent been remarkable non-conformal works in the past? but those works were makde by peple who knew HOW to write well traditionly but chose to right different for artistic affect? because just writing poorely and hoping for a coherent plot is a pointless shot int he dark?
No computer will be able to definitively sort books by 'quality' as that is very subjective even within groups of people with otherwise similar interests.
But-
You know, it's OK to read middling-to-bad books every now and then. How are you supposed to know that Infinite Jest is a fantastically well-written book if that's all you've read? Or maybe all you've read are Stephen King novels. What good is it for a S.K.-only reader to say that S.K. is a good author if all they've read are are S.K., Michael Crichton, John Grisham, and other mass-market paperbacks?
A user review saying, "all I read is S.K. and this is his best book yet" is useless to me. A review that says, "All I usually read is S.K. and I found Infinite Jest to be impenetrable, purposefully obscure, obfuscated, dull, and self-indulgent," would be more useful.
Maybe you use the ITMS to buy music/shows. The iTunes review system is useless- you will find countless reviews like, "5 stars: I haven't finished downloading the album yet but I already know I'm going to love it!"
The itunes rating system is kind of broken (or stupid people use it...) when the only people writing reviews for an album are people who would buy it even if it was a recording of the band sleeping. When every album is 4 1/2 stars, the star system is useless.
But that's my personal rant.
I've had amazon and friends recommend books that turned out to be bad- almost painfully bad- but I don't regret reading them. Among that same group of books were works of art that changed my life. And, like you said, there are only tiny differences among good and bad books.
I guess maybe we have two different mindsets- you believe in maximizing pleasure by seeking the known-good books/art/food/etc while I am willing to forgo maximum pleasure sometimes in order to better define what exactly gives me pleasure. It's like thinking that Big Macs are teh best without trying or even thinking about trying a steak or a salad.
I used to use greek gods and goddesses, just like many people, but that got boring. Now I use bacteria and virus names (campylobacter, salmonella, clostridium, etc.).
There are hundreds or thousands to choose from, even if you narrow it down to only stds or GI infections.
>>some settings like early classical music and chant where, usually, they didn't sing like that
That's interesting, thanks. If you don't mind me asking, when exactly did vibrato come into vogue? I know, for example, that the ancient greeks understood the concepts of octaves and how the length of a string affected tone, etc. I kind of assumed that pretty much anything the voice could do was already done circa 300 bc.
I agree. And let's not forget the rock renditions/guitar solos of the anthem. Ugh, what a mess. Hendrix, Van Halen, I love you guys, but seriously I hate your little versions of the anthem. And you know what? Maybe part of it is that I just don't really care for the anthem's tune to begin with. Maybe the anthem isn't the best freakin' choice for solo riffing. You know?
See how your audience likes your 5-minute guitar solo version of the T-Mobile jingle. Lame, right? So stop it.
Imagine the looks you would get if you turned timeless church hymns into a 10-minute-long self-indulgent vibrato goat bleating extravaganza.
That's what it amounts to, I think. "Looka me I make wobbly voice with mah face!!1! I do tricks fer you!!"
That's interesting. I was sort of under the impression that 'real' vibrato isn't caused by br-ea-th-in-g in a weird way but the interactions of harmonics in the singer's voice. I'm thinking of something like tuvan throat singing.
I've built audio contraptions that played a straight, unvarying tone in or out of phase with itself or a nearby frequency (each on its own speaker) that provided a passable imitation of vibrato.
Or are we talking about different things?
The only time my voice got vibrato is when the handles of a pair of rivet squeezers snapped shut on my right testicle.
>>Perhaps Heinlein's idea in Starship Troopers where one can vote after serving in the military is the proper choice. It'd be a "poverty check", intelligence test, and understanding our country all wrapped in one.
Then you'd need to change the military quite a bit. Many people in the military live below the poverty line. An E-2's wages are great if you're single, but try being the sole provider with a family of 4.
As for the intelligence/civics part... I am in the military. I work with a guy who said, in so many words: "You know how spain isn't very big, right? And you know how mexico is pretty big? And spain discovered mexico, like, what, 300 years ago, right? So how did mexico fill up with people so quickly?"
Look on and despair. This is above-average for military intelligence levels. In fact, I'd say that he's extra-above-average because he is showing some budding critical-thinking skills. Oh, I should mention that the person in question is 40 and is almost done with his master's degree.
>>So selling things to your parents would be par for course.
I've done both things before with family and friends. I think I can boil down the etiquette into:
-Something you paid for recently, and basically new, and you no longer need for some reason. This get paid for, because if it wasn't going to the friend/parent, it'd be going right back to the store for a refund.
-Something you were given, something that is well-used, something you know the person will actually use/need. This stuff is free or at the most quid pro quo.
I bought a bike a few years back not realizing that I didn't enjoying riding bikes anymore. I mentioned this to my mom, and she offered to take it off my hands because she was in the market. She saved $50 on a $300 bike and I avoided the chance that the store might not take the return.
I had a pair of nice solomon roller blades that were well-used but decent. I gave these to an aunt in return for dinner or something.
I don't think the indignation by some posters above is warranted. Maybe cousins, siblings, friends, etc are economic peers, but parents and children are not peers. My parents are putting in a $20,000 kitchen right now and I got all the old cabinets for free. The reverse doesn't really work, imo. I don't have anything like that to offer them. When I do buy something, I buy it because I need it. If, like my bicycle, I do decide to sell it to someone in my family, it will be discounted. Would you expect a child to buy their parents two $200 monitors or a $300 bike for xmas? It sounds weird that way.
Slashdot Mirror
ok, i gotcha now.
I wonder if the iphone can dial 911 before it's activated. i thought that was a requirement for all cellphones- that they can dial emergency numbers even without a sim inserted.
-b
>>What if I don't run Windows nor Mac?
Do the math in your head quick to determine:
a-cost of *nix port with support for god-knows how many distros running on who know what kind of hardware
b-profit (fixed, same as before)
c-number of *nix-ONLY users who want an iphone for some reason
Multiply b and c. If that value is less than a, then you're not getting your linux itunes.
-b
>>Apple had over a year to correct the supply/activation fiasco of the initial iPhone launch, and so far it's going worse, not better
After the success of the last iphone launch, the wii launch, and this launch, do you really expect it to _ever_ get better? This is the new method of creating a media frenzy. Well, wait, I guess beanie babies probably started it. Then furbies. Then tickle me elmos. ad naus.
-b
I think that the reason the iPhone is such a big deal to people is that it is apple's first telephone product. If google released a phone (a whole, real phone), it would get almost as much press as the iPhone. Or I'll bet that if MS released one, they'd get a lot of press.
When Nokia releases a new phone, it doesn't get as much attention because it's just another model number for most people (although they _do_ get press, I've seen it on the tv). Another iteration or two and the iphone will get much less press; part of this will be due to other companies releasing essentially the same product in order to stay competetive (and that's already happening).
Eventually apple will release something even better, and the cycle will repeat. Trying to avoid apple products would be like trying to avoid toyotas when you're out driving.
-b
Think of the next generation of students, who no longer will have to play with dangerous bunsen burners in the lab. Instead they'll fashion glassware and boil solutions in the safe, heatless flame of an alcohol lamp.
Will vetrolium clean the dr. pepper off of my keyboard?
-b
I work in the paint/decal office here on an air base. Our primary focus is on aircraft markings, ground equipment, etc. but we support the entire base's paint, banner, and decal needs. We also do plaques and the like. I guess it's sort of a jack-of-all-trades kind of job. We use the Gerber Omega software for our vector design and typesetting, although I use gimp and a few other tools when Omega falls short (which it often does). Since it's not what I would classify as 'professional typesetting' I usually don't bother finding fonts from third parties unless it's a personal project. There is a core set that I use for military stuff and then I have a core set that I like to use. We also do a lot of personal jobs for people on base like boat registration numbers, and for almost all of that stuff I use serpentine, helvetica, or arial black.
So I guess that's it in a nutshell. Gotta go paint an airplane now.
-b
>>Most of the natural gas in this country is used for heating homes directly and would not be freed up for powering cars.
A tremendous amount of it is simply burned off during processing. I live basically on the top of a large hill, and I can clearly see- in broad daylight- the giant flame at a refinery 30 miles away.
Surely we could use some of this gas for more useful purposes?
-b
Stay away from anything Gerber. Some sets seem to be randomly-generated; many sets lack punctuation or numbers, requiring me to use two ' quotes and then converting them to vector in order to flip them. Or using numbers from a related font... pita, that.
People come in here with grand ideas about their designs, like that the letters should be 4" tall and the 30-character message needs to fit into a 20" space. And from now on, anyone who gives me a blank face when I ask what style of typeface/font they want gets Hobo or Marker, depending on my mood.
It's my fault for not reading the post you replied to; I assumed incorrectly.
-b
>>Only 52? There are many more than that in a decent set
For the record, one of the graphics suites I use here at work came with over 5,000 typefaces. And all but 5 or 6 of them suck. I don't know if we paid extra for them, but 99% of our work uses "MILITARY BLOCK MED".
-b
Gentlemen, redouble your efforts!
*looks down at clipboard*
"Gentlemen, we'll need 3 more people to read TFA."
-b
>> in an aerial photo of a field 1.5 miles [about 2.5 km] across, you could detect an object about the size of a small notebook computer
That's either a really tall tripod or image stabilization has come a lot farther than I thought.
-b
>>I trust them to be honest and objective
You're right, and I would have added that except that I wouldn't think many people are friends/family with reliable critics or proof-readers. My mother does professional proofreading for a local publisher, but I don't know if I'd present my work to her unless it was non-fiction. But that concerns our personal relationship.
I guess the main gist of my comment was that _most_ people, when given the chance to critique a friend/relative's work, will err far, far on the side of 'nice' rather than risking the person's feelings. It's not so much a matter of honesty as it is about emotional dissonance between liking a person and maybe not liking their manuscript or the ideas presented therein. Additionally, it is very often the case that one's family and friends are not anywhere near the intended audience for your manuscript. If you are lucky enough to have a good friend who IS the audience and who is qualified to critique, then you should of course listen to them.
But therein lies the key to this: You pick people based on their qualifications, not their relationship to you. Maybe I should have just written that in my original comment instead of rambling away. If you have a friend who is the audience and who is competent to critique, then it matters not that they are your friend.
Anyways, your technique seems to be working for you, so I won't say there aren't exceptions.
-b
-b
>>The total amount of energy on the coastline was the same, of course, but distributed somewhat differently.
Minus, of course, the energy extracts by the generators ;-)
sorry, I had to.
-b
>>starting with those with the MOST impact... the people in the USA.
Phew... For a second there I thought you might have been about to say something correct or honest and sacrifice your karma. You might have said something about farmers in the amazon destroying the rain forests, or china's dirty coal, or oil companies and mining cartels (non-U.S.) raping the environment and the local people, or so help me you might have said something about poor farming practices in africa and the middle east leading to desertification! Goodness no, we better not say that!
It is apparently necessary, being a member of a rich country, to deprecate oneself and one's country. This is so that poor people in other countries don't feel so bad about their situation when they see how bad we feel about being fat and rich. I know I feel just awful about having enough wealth to own a computer to type on.
The U.S. has lead the world in agricultural, municipal, and scientific advances that make our current (6 billion strong) existence possible. The lifestyles of our 1800's ancestors, if scaled up to current populations, would destroy the planet in weeks. Read about easter island or crete.
-b
>>No, what a poor writer who wants to get better needs is either a good critique group or some friends who will act as beta-readers
I strongly, strongly disagree with using friends or family or anyone you know, frankly, to judge any of your written works. It causes negative emotions from contempt to feelings of betrayal.
People either give you glowing reviews and pick something basically at random to recommend that you change, like a character's outfit in a scene something equally foolish; or people are utterly ignorant of literature and pick apart your work by disagreeing with characters' personalities or actions.
I know I probably sound terribly cynical about this, but it's true. You will never get published if your work has only been reviewed by your mother, your gf, one coworker, and your best friend. None of those people will sacrifice their relationship with you to be honest (or might not be capable of a competent review) and you will never progress from the "I"m writing a book based on my (17-year-old) life because it's SOOOOOO interesting to other people" stage.
No, what writers need are good professors who can dish out honest and useful critiques. Than after school is done, you'll know if you are successful if your reviews, while they remain critical, start coming from people outside of academia, outside of your family, and from within the actual industry. You know, they people who have been in the business of publishing books for the past couple hundred years.
Again sorry about the rant, but I just absolutely refuse to read anything that friends/family have written. It may be good or bad- that part doesn't matter- but it is in my nature to pick things apart and I've noticed that that bugs the crap out of people. And if I was going to give a fluff review, I might as well not even read the thing. Constructive criticism come from knowledgeable people who are unafraid of your feelings.
>>Mechanical criticism of literature can only result in mechanical literature, not good writing.
Oh I forgot to add this earlier. If a writer has a very poor style mechanically, or spelling too awful for machine recognition, then I can assure you that they are a bad writer, period.
If a person rights, like, without any regard, for the differentses between speaken and righten works, and cant get a sentents to make sents let alone a paragraph, or can't stay in one person from sentents to sentents with no parallel structure? and I'm nnot saying that their havent been remarkable non-conformal works in the past? but those works were makde by peple who knew HOW to write well traditionly but chose to right different for artistic affect? because just writing poorely and hoping for a coherent plot is a pointless shot int he dark?
-b
No computer will be able to definitively sort books by 'quality' as that is very subjective even within groups of people with otherwise similar interests.
But-
You know, it's OK to read middling-to-bad books every now and then. How are you supposed to know that Infinite Jest is a fantastically well-written book if that's all you've read? Or maybe all you've read are Stephen King novels. What good is it for a S.K.-only reader to say that S.K. is a good author if all they've read are are S.K., Michael Crichton, John Grisham, and other mass-market paperbacks?
A user review saying, "all I read is S.K. and this is his best book yet" is useless to me. A review that says, "All I usually read is S.K. and I found Infinite Jest to be impenetrable, purposefully obscure, obfuscated, dull, and self-indulgent," would be more useful.
Maybe you use the ITMS to buy music/shows. The iTunes review system is useless- you will find countless reviews like, "5 stars: I haven't finished downloading the album yet but I already know I'm going to love it!"
The itunes rating system is kind of broken (or stupid people use it...) when the only people writing reviews for an album are people who would buy it even if it was a recording of the band sleeping. When every album is 4 1/2 stars, the star system is useless.
But that's my personal rant.
I've had amazon and friends recommend books that turned out to be bad- almost painfully bad- but I don't regret reading them. Among that same group of books were works of art that changed my life. And, like you said, there are only tiny differences among good and bad books.
I guess maybe we have two different mindsets- you believe in maximizing pleasure by seeking the known-good books/art/food/etc while I am willing to forgo maximum pleasure sometimes in order to better define what exactly gives me pleasure. It's like thinking that Big Macs are teh best without trying or even thinking about trying a steak or a salad.
No coffee yet, sorry.
-b
I used to use greek gods and goddesses, just like many people, but that got boring. Now I use bacteria and virus names (campylobacter, salmonella, clostridium, etc.).
There are hundreds or thousands to choose from, even if you narrow it down to only stds or GI infections.
Good luck!
-b
>>some settings like early classical music and chant where, usually, they didn't sing like that
That's interesting, thanks. If you don't mind me asking, when exactly did vibrato come into vogue? I know, for example, that the ancient greeks understood the concepts of octaves and how the length of a string affected tone, etc. I kind of assumed that pretty much anything the voice could do was already done circa 300 bc.
Just curious, thanks for illuminating things.
-b
I agree. And let's not forget the rock renditions/guitar solos of the anthem. Ugh, what a mess. Hendrix, Van Halen, I love you guys, but seriously I hate your little versions of the anthem. And you know what? Maybe part of it is that I just don't really care for the anthem's tune to begin with. Maybe the anthem isn't the best freakin' choice for solo riffing. You know?
See how your audience likes your 5-minute guitar solo version of the T-Mobile jingle. Lame, right? So stop it.
Imagine the looks you would get if you turned timeless church hymns into a 10-minute-long self-indulgent vibrato goat bleating extravaganza.
That's what it amounts to, I think. "Looka me I make wobbly voice with mah face!!1! I do tricks fer you!!"
OK I'm done.
-b
That's interesting. I was sort of under the impression that 'real' vibrato isn't caused by br-ea-th-in-g in a weird way but the interactions of harmonics in the singer's voice. I'm thinking of something like tuvan throat singing.
I've built audio contraptions that played a straight, unvarying tone in or out of phase with itself or a nearby frequency (each on its own speaker) that provided a passable imitation of vibrato.
Or are we talking about different things?
The only time my voice got vibrato is when the handles of a pair of rivet squeezers snapped shut on my right testicle.
-b
>>how pleasant someone's singing voice is, is a completely subjective thing
As someone who owns Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, and Neutral Milk Hotel albums, I can only agree.
Oh, and MC Chris.
-b
>>Perhaps Heinlein's idea in Starship Troopers where one can vote after serving in the military is the proper choice. It'd be a "poverty check", intelligence test, and understanding our country all wrapped in one.
Then you'd need to change the military quite a bit. Many people in the military live below the poverty line. An E-2's wages are great if you're single, but try being the sole provider with a family of 4.
As for the intelligence/civics part... I am in the military. I work with a guy who said, in so many words: "You know how spain isn't very big, right? And you know how mexico is pretty big? And spain discovered mexico, like, what, 300 years ago, right? So how did mexico fill up with people so quickly?"
Look on and despair. This is above-average for military intelligence levels. In fact, I'd say that he's extra-above-average because he is showing some budding critical-thinking skills. Oh, I should mention that the person in question is 40 and is almost done with his master's degree.
-b
>>So selling things to your parents would be par for course.
I've done both things before with family and friends. I think I can boil down the etiquette into:
-Something you paid for recently, and basically new, and you no longer need for some reason. This get paid for, because if it wasn't going to the friend/parent, it'd be going right back to the store for a refund.
-Something you were given, something that is well-used, something you know the person will actually use/need. This stuff is free or at the most quid pro quo.
I bought a bike a few years back not realizing that I didn't enjoying riding bikes anymore. I mentioned this to my mom, and she offered to take it off my hands because she was in the market. She saved $50 on a $300 bike and I avoided the chance that the store might not take the return.
I had a pair of nice solomon roller blades that were well-used but decent. I gave these to an aunt in return for dinner or something.
I don't think the indignation by some posters above is warranted. Maybe cousins, siblings, friends, etc are economic peers, but parents and children are not peers. My parents are putting in a $20,000 kitchen right now and I got all the old cabinets for free. The reverse doesn't really work, imo. I don't have anything like that to offer them. When I do buy something, I buy it because I need it. If, like my bicycle, I do decide to sell it to someone in my family, it will be discounted. Would you expect a child to buy their parents two $200 monitors or a $300 bike for xmas? It sounds weird that way.
-b
>>Indeed, im not sure about all these -iums, which are no doubt toxic to us anyways...
Helium? Magnesium? Sodium, potassium, calcium?
I think I get what you were trying to say, but thought I'd chime in with some of the more useful and abundant -iums.
-b