The tragedy of it is, standing one's ground is often perceived by the person you're pushing back against as you going on the warpath. (And I mean that in lots of contexts, not just this one. Ask my daughter what she thinks I'm doing when I insist she put pants on before going outside. Many people just don't like being disagreed with, and find it highly objectionable.)
I think there's some selection bias here. Only evangelical atheists will push their ideology on you, so you only end up talking to evangelical atheists. You don't notice the quiet ones who keep to themselves.
That statistical knowledge doesn't make unpleasant conversations less unpleasant, I realize, and it doesn't stop the militant ones from being militant. But there's gobs of tactless and pushy people out there, in lots of arenas other than religion. Dodging them in all aspects is one of life's unfortunate burdens.
I've heard good things about Posgres from people who should know what they're talking about, but I haven't had anything important or demanding enough to go out of my way to explore it yet. Next time I've got something with any actual business use, I'll probably take a closer look at it. Database stuff isn't part of the day job, so it doesn't come up a lot.
I was just coming around to the idea I might explore MariaDB next time I needed to do something, where normally I've been turning to MySQL. Is SkySQL replacing that, now?
Also, do any of the large, inexpensive web hosts (hostgator, dreamhost, servint, etc.) provide either of these alternatives yet? Because frankly I'm not going to do a lot of personal configuration or pay a lot extra just for the novelty.
You could try making a summarisation service or a Bitcoin market or an in-store payment service that's so awesome it'll take the market by storm even against large established competitors. But then it has to be super awesome and perfect.
Yeah, just like FaceBook!
(I'm going for funny here, just in case there's any doubt.)
I've been referring to them as "salt, sugar, grease, caffeine" since college. Funny we're on the same wavelength. Make sure you get a little of all four, and your hangover will go away faster than if you're missing one of them. Of course, a little maturity to prevent the hangover in the first place is optimal, but I didn't always have that in college.
They've always been aggressive and aggravating, as far as I'm concerned. When a family member signed up with them I got a request. And another. And another. And they kept coming. I finally followed a link and told them to shut up and stop bothering me, but then another associate signed up and it started all over again. I can understand one invite, but they sent far more than was warranted, or could be considered reasonable or polite. I refuse to use them, not just because of the grudge, but also because I don't want them spamming friends or family based on my registration.
Ignoring scalability "until I have users" is a great way to keep costs down while making sure that you cannot ever be successful.
And paying for enough resources to support ten million users when you don't even have an app is a great way to bankrupt yourself uselessly.
I've seen both problems, more than once. I agree it's still important to plan for scalability, but today's virtual/cloud environments make the hardware part of the equation almost trivial.
The no remote admin access makes sense for a computer login, but for a web-based app like WordPress often run on a remote hosting account there's no such thing as "local" access. Or I suppose there is, but most users don't have access to the host server and wouldn't know how to use it even if they did.
Right - think less "banner ads flashing across the entire display while you're driving," and more "suddenly every building and car you pass is covered in 'artwork,' that turns out to be thinly veiled advertisements for Valtrex and Nikes." Kinda like Times' Square, but every-fucking-where.
A slight divergence from your point, but now I want Picasso vision, where the glasses turn everything cubist. That would probably be unusable, but it'd be neat. Other art styles would also be fun - pointilists, or make the night sky look like Starry Night. Or turn everything into a cartoon. I know that's several generations away, but I'd enjoy that.
I don't understand this. You seem to be saying programmers aren't coders because programmers program all the time and coders code when they're supposed to, but I still can't tell what you think the difference is between programming and coding. This is one of those "you've used the word to define the word" moments.
I can't speak for anyone else, but I think sin taxes are popular with two different crowds. 1) Some want to tax the sin to control behavior, while 2) others believe addicted consumers will continue paying, thus generating more revenue than would a tax on a non-addictive, non-staple. The overlap between these crowds makes sin taxes popular, so they get introduced quite a bit. I don't have enough data to say whether they work.
Beyond that I'm not sure if you were maybe misreading my quote, or I'm misreading your response. I was trying to say that I think you *can* change behavior by raising taxes, but for a lot of people there's a much more dramatic reaction just because there are taxes at all. If there was, say, a new "pizza tax" on pepperoni that wasn't on salami, I think that would very effectively coerce people into substituting salami on their pizza just to avoid a tax on principle, whereas if the pizza tax applied equally to both pepperoni and salami, doubling it on pepperoni probably wouldn't get the same reaction.
Half the water-cooler conversation I hear is about how to reduce taxes.
That's because people obsess over the part of personal economics that feels most painful to them, even though it's part of a much larger picture and isn't necessarily the most efficient thing to target. Taxes are also, on the whole, poorly understood (e.g., "I turned down the raise because I didn't want to go into a new tax bracket"). I think you could adjust tax rates pretty dramatically (up or down) and still have people standing around the water cooler complaining about them.
I'm not arguing that tax rates don't affect behavior at all, but I think those are small adjustments compared to the behavior generated by the simple existence of taxes, regardless of rates.
I'm also surprised comparisons between NYC and TX aren't overwhelmed by the cost of living analysis, which ought to completely trump the tax differences, but that's based on general impressions and not backed up with any facts. Is the tax burden really a more significant factor than, say, the cost of real estate?
FICA represents payments into Social Security, which, assuming that the greedy politicians don't steal all of that money for yourself, you'll get back someday.
Which may be a big assumption. I'm not in a panic about it, and I do think I'll see some return, but I'm expecting it to be a net loss. All of my retirement plans (probably 20 - 25 years out) are formulated without any consideration for Social Security. If or what I get from it is such a huge unknown right now I'd rather assume I won't get any and then have it be a bonus rather than count on it and be disappointed.
I'm one of those people who think you should be able to choose whether or not you want to participate in that system, but the social justice crowd who wants big brother to hold on to their money for them all disagree with me.
I'm with you there, actually. The historic rate of return from that system is pretty lousy, and I like choices. I'm also realistic enough to recognize there are a lot of people who, if not pushed into it, wouldn't manage to save anything and I'll still end up paying for it down the line either way.
Everybody wants everybody else to pay more taxes - just not them. It's the nature of the system. Everybody wants everything else to be cut, just not their stuff.
Also want to add the parent's post said "your relationship with the government" (not sure if he meant Fed or all of them) and not specifically, "your federal income tax balance." FICA is definitely part of my relationship with the government.
I'll be honest and say I don't pay too close attention to how much is "income tax" versus "FICA tax". They're both operating at a federal level, so I thought they were lumped in together. This is the first time someone has clearly suggested FICA doesn't count as part of the "federal" income tax in these calculations.
But if so, I think the argument gets slimmer and slimmer if the complaint is that a single guy making $35k who was paying city, county, state, sales, medicare, self-employment, and social security taxes, but not federal income tax, is a lousy, no-good, tax-evading, leech who was getting a "big gain" by breaking even in that one arena.
Slashdot Mirror
The tragedy of it is, standing one's ground is often perceived by the person you're pushing back against as you going on the warpath. (And I mean that in lots of contexts, not just this one. Ask my daughter what she thinks I'm doing when I insist she put pants on before going outside. Many people just don't like being disagreed with, and find it highly objectionable.)
I think there's some selection bias here. Only evangelical atheists will push their ideology on you, so you only end up talking to evangelical atheists. You don't notice the quiet ones who keep to themselves.
That statistical knowledge doesn't make unpleasant conversations less unpleasant, I realize, and it doesn't stop the militant ones from being militant. But there's gobs of tactless and pushy people out there, in lots of arenas other than religion. Dodging them in all aspects is one of life's unfortunate burdens.
Cheese, Gromit?
Great, now I'm going to be guilty by association, only one letter away from whatever this place is.
I've heard good things about Posgres from people who should know what they're talking about, but I haven't had anything important or demanding enough to go out of my way to explore it yet. Next time I've got something with any actual business use, I'll probably take a closer look at it. Database stuff isn't part of the day job, so it doesn't come up a lot.
I was just coming around to the idea I might explore MariaDB next time I needed to do something, where normally I've been turning to MySQL. Is SkySQL replacing that, now?
Also, do any of the large, inexpensive web hosts (hostgator, dreamhost, servint, etc.) provide either of these alternatives yet? Because frankly I'm not going to do a lot of personal configuration or pay a lot extra just for the novelty.
You could try making a summarisation service or a Bitcoin market or an in-store payment service that's so awesome it'll take the market by storm even against large established competitors. But then it has to be super awesome and perfect.
Yeah, just like FaceBook!
(I'm going for funny here, just in case there's any doubt.)
I've been referring to them as "salt, sugar, grease, caffeine" since college. Funny we're on the same wavelength. Make sure you get a little of all four, and your hangover will go away faster than if you're missing one of them. Of course, a little maturity to prevent the hangover in the first place is optimal, but I didn't always have that in college.
In Soviet Russia, overlords welcome you!?
They've always been aggressive and aggravating, as far as I'm concerned. When a family member signed up with them I got a request. And another. And another. And they kept coming. I finally followed a link and told them to shut up and stop bothering me, but then another associate signed up and it started all over again. I can understand one invite, but they sent far more than was warranted, or could be considered reasonable or polite. I refuse to use them, not just because of the grudge, but also because I don't want them spamming friends or family based on my registration.
nothing ever survives the userbase intact.
And thus was the eleventh commandment written!
Ignoring scalability "until I have users" is a great way to keep costs down while making sure that you cannot ever be successful.
And paying for enough resources to support ten million users when you don't even have an app is a great way to bankrupt yourself uselessly.
I've seen both problems, more than once. I agree it's still important to plan for scalability, but today's virtual/cloud environments make the hardware part of the equation almost trivial.
The no remote admin access makes sense for a computer login, but for a web-based app like WordPress often run on a remote hosting account there's no such thing as "local" access. Or I suppose there is, but most users don't have access to the host server and wouldn't know how to use it even if they did.
That's why I changed mine from username 'admin' with a blank password to password 'admin' with a blank username. They'll never guess that one!
Once at the office I touched my laptop and the static shock was strong enough it made the computer reboot. That one was a little scary.
Right - think less "banner ads flashing across the entire display while you're driving," and more "suddenly every building and car you pass is covered in 'artwork,' that turns out to be thinly veiled advertisements for Valtrex and Nikes." Kinda like Times' Square, but every-fucking-where.
A slight divergence from your point, but now I want Picasso vision, where the glasses turn everything cubist. That would probably be unusable, but it'd be neat. Other art styles would also be fun - pointilists, or make the night sky look like Starry Night. Or turn everything into a cartoon. I know that's several generations away, but I'd enjoy that.
I don't understand this. You seem to be saying programmers aren't coders because programmers program all the time and coders code when they're supposed to, but I still can't tell what you think the difference is between programming and coding. This is one of those "you've used the word to define the word" moments.
Hah! You're the second person to say as much to me this week. I keep waiting for the Twilight Zone music to start ...
I can't speak for anyone else, but I think sin taxes are popular with two different crowds. 1) Some want to tax the sin to control behavior, while 2) others believe addicted consumers will continue paying, thus generating more revenue than would a tax on a non-addictive, non-staple. The overlap between these crowds makes sin taxes popular, so they get introduced quite a bit. I don't have enough data to say whether they work.
Beyond that I'm not sure if you were maybe misreading my quote, or I'm misreading your response. I was trying to say that I think you *can* change behavior by raising taxes, but for a lot of people there's a much more dramatic reaction just because there are taxes at all. If there was, say, a new "pizza tax" on pepperoni that wasn't on salami, I think that would very effectively coerce people into substituting salami on their pizza just to avoid a tax on principle, whereas if the pizza tax applied equally to both pepperoni and salami, doubling it on pepperoni probably wouldn't get the same reaction.
I would gladly pay the tax in exchange for free snacks. My employer doesn't provide them currently.
Half the water-cooler conversation I hear is about how to reduce taxes.
That's because people obsess over the part of personal economics that feels most painful to them, even though it's part of a much larger picture and isn't necessarily the most efficient thing to target. Taxes are also, on the whole, poorly understood (e.g., "I turned down the raise because I didn't want to go into a new tax bracket"). I think you could adjust tax rates pretty dramatically (up or down) and still have people standing around the water cooler complaining about them.
I'm not arguing that tax rates don't affect behavior at all, but I think those are small adjustments compared to the behavior generated by the simple existence of taxes, regardless of rates.
I'm also surprised comparisons between NYC and TX aren't overwhelmed by the cost of living analysis, which ought to
completely trump the tax differences, but that's based on general impressions and not backed up with any facts. Is the tax burden really a more significant factor than, say, the cost of real estate?
FICA represents payments into Social Security, which, assuming that the greedy politicians don't steal all of that money for yourself, you'll get back someday.
Which may be a big assumption. I'm not in a panic about it, and I do think I'll see some return, but I'm expecting it to be a net loss. All of my retirement plans (probably 20 - 25 years out) are formulated without any consideration for Social Security. If or what I get from it is such a huge unknown right now I'd rather assume I won't get any and then have it be a bonus rather than count on it and be disappointed.
I'm one of those people who think you should be able to choose whether or not you want to participate in that system, but the social justice crowd who wants big brother to hold on to their money for them all disagree with me.
I'm with you there, actually. The historic rate of return from that system is pretty lousy, and I like choices. I'm also realistic enough to recognize there are a lot of people who, if not pushed into it, wouldn't manage to save anything and I'll still end up paying for it down the line either way.
Everybody wants everybody else to pay more taxes - just not them. It's the nature of the system. Everybody wants everything else to be cut, just not their stuff.
No arguments about that.
Also want to add the parent's post said "your relationship with the government" (not sure if he meant Fed or all of them) and not specifically, "your federal income tax balance." FICA is definitely part of my relationship with the government.
I'll be honest and say I don't pay too close attention to how much is "income tax" versus "FICA tax". They're both operating at a federal level, so I thought they were lumped in together. This is the first time someone has clearly suggested FICA doesn't count as part of the "federal" income tax in these calculations.
But if so, I think the argument gets slimmer and slimmer if the complaint is that a single guy making $35k who was paying city, county, state, sales, medicare, self-employment, and social security taxes, but not federal income tax, is a lousy, no-good, tax-evading, leech who was getting a "big gain" by breaking even in that one arena.
Peacefully in his sleep, not terrified and screaming like his passengers.
Wait, I'm confusing my astronaut jokes and my grandfather jokes again.