I worked for an airline that operated between 4,000 and 6,000 flights daily. After you account for the aircraft lease, flight and ground crew salaries (and per diem rates when applicable), fuel, ground operations, gate auctions, aircraft maintenance, and so on—all adding up to an appreciable sum—the average profit per flight, across the network, was about $200. Worst still, nearly every domestic flight (especially regional legs) lost money.
This is why most airliners no longer hand out free peanuts and pay their entry-level pilots between $18-30K yearly salaries.
Every player in the air transportation industry is running on razor-thin margins and the slightest perturbations cause substantial losses. How these companies have survived this long is beyond me, but it is no wonder all the major players have now filed for bankruptcy (including AMR, which was the longest-lasting hold out).
Add a dollar here, another dollar there, and before you know it you have eaten into all your profits. And before people get out their pitchforks and cry foul about how businesses are evil and greedy, realize first that they have to make profit to buy new aircraft as old equipment deteriorates, and build buffers against cancellations due to weather conditions, changes in demand, and so on.
Let me put it to you this way. Next time you find yourself in an airport, look out a window and find a jet sitting on the tarmac with its engines running. Now look at your watch. For every second that passes, that plane burnt about $20. Tick-tick-tick
As the public demands cheap airfares, the airlines have to keep costs low wherever and whenever possible.
Pilots do not "sit back and let the autopilot do the work" in any case on approach. And, on the contrary, they are required to maintain active control over the aircraft should conditions change unexpectedly.
Watch the following video to see an ILS Category II automated landing procedure from start to finish.
Buy enough supplies—canned food and bottled water—before Monday to keep me self-sufficient for months. All the while not realizing that any disaster so severe as to require their use leaves me screwed either way. Then I will go to Starbucks on Tuesday morning for my usual $5 coffee ritual. Remainder of the week is spent around the water cooler discussing the once-in-a-lifetime Perfect Storm that caused many rather severe nuisances. Forget about all the nonperishables I bought until the next holiday food drive pops up months or years later, and give it all away. Repeat the process next time it rains or snows.
She broke the law and her life is ruined. Her clients broke the law by purchasing her services. How come the worker bears the all the guilt in public while her clients get to hide behind anonyminity?
It is difficult to fathom how incredibly ignorant this person is. If I understand this correctly, he believes his company had to produce its own operating system in order to satisfy specific customers who are interested more in work than play.
Oh, the irony.
“Getting stuff done” happens with the software users interact with. The kernel and development environment do not matter to your end-users. Applications do.
This is the same old story of how everyone wants to reinvent the wheel. “Oh, yes! We should make our own language, and libraries, and stack!” Utter nonsense. He, like many other misguided leaders in our industry, created massive amounts of totally redundant work for his engineers, and—even worse—isolated them from communities that could act as force multipliers on their efforts.
This is an attempt to legitimize any incursion into privacy they want. No adversary so sophisticated as the drug cartels will engage in illegal activity out in the open, so to speak. It is entirely trivial to deploy tools for securing communications. The only logical conclusions to this initiative are: infringements upon the rights of innocents, and prohibitions on cryptography and anonymity.
Because severely catastrophic storms are rare, and because it costs. Yet people want cheap energy. If you are fine paying 10 times as much for power, then the electric company can retain 10 times the usual staff.
Also, it wouldn't be "Armies"
Not sure what you would call those long lines of people and equipment rolling in from five surrounding states, but we can use another word if you like.
You need to grow up and stop making excuses.
Uh, okay. How about I am not petulant about not having 100% uptime on a fairly cheap service that faces huge challenges brought on by forces of nature.
There is no reason not to have high expectation
Why?
and considering the response to these issues is getting worse over the last 25 years maybe something else is going on?
It is?
like exec. being more focuses on bonuses then long term quality.
Citation needed.
we are talking about weeks, not 48 hours.
My power was restored in less than 32 hours. Perhaps the lines around my home were not so damaged as others. Infrastructure sustaining heavier damage will likely take longer to repair.
Seriously. Look at a map for any densely populated urban area, and consider the scale and complexity any utility provider must face. The problem is enormous and the adverse conditions affecting the utility are highly varied. Also consider that it makes no sense for these utility providers to retain standing armies of workers and equipment to react to rare events.
People need to grow up, and understand that sometimes they will be left without the conveniences of modern life. It is incumbent upon each of us to be prepared for these difficult times when we might have to go a full 48 hours without being able to watch The Bachelorette.
Global Warming/Climate Change may or may not be happening.
That statement is absurd. I cannot believe there are still people pandering this and similar opinions. Read Why the Global Warming Skeptics Are Wrong by William Nordhaus. Climate change is happening, and human activities are likely causing it.
[Not at] the rate that would justify dismantling civilization over...
Nobody is suggesting that. This is nonsensical hyperbole on its face. However, the scientific community is suggesting that we: use less energy, find renewable energy sources, and make less babies. The first two are profitable investments we ought to make regardless whether the climate is changing.
The YouTube video previously linked is of a lecture given by Albert Barlett. If you find it not so easy to navigate, or that it obscures the credibility of the content, go straight to the source for the definitive copy, and the summary. This lecture truly is among the most important videos any of us will see. It makes plain the simple reality of exponential growth against finite resources in terms that are entirely relevant to our daily lives.
Slashdot Mirror
How does this not use a loop?
This and similar events may help teach people that nothing they put on services like Facebook or Google is private.
I worked for an airline that operated between 4,000 and 6,000 flights daily. After you account for the aircraft lease, flight and ground crew salaries (and per diem rates when applicable), fuel, ground operations, gate auctions, aircraft maintenance, and so on—all adding up to an appreciable sum—the average profit per flight, across the network, was about $200. Worst still, nearly every domestic flight (especially regional legs) lost money.
This is why most airliners no longer hand out free peanuts and pay their entry-level pilots between $18-30K yearly salaries.
Every player in the air transportation industry is running on razor-thin margins and the slightest perturbations cause substantial losses. How these companies have survived this long is beyond me, but it is no wonder all the major players have now filed for bankruptcy (including AMR, which was the longest-lasting hold out).
Add a dollar here, another dollar there, and before you know it you have eaten into all your profits. And before people get out their pitchforks and cry foul about how businesses are evil and greedy, realize first that they have to make profit to buy new aircraft as old equipment deteriorates, and build buffers against cancellations due to weather conditions, changes in demand, and so on.
Let me put it to you this way. Next time you find yourself in an airport, look out a window and find a jet sitting on the tarmac with its engines running. Now look at your watch. For every second that passes, that plane burnt about $20. Tick-tick-tick
As the public demands cheap airfares, the airlines have to keep costs low wherever and whenever possible.
Disclaimer: I am a pilot.
Pilots do not "sit back and let the autopilot do the work" in any case on approach. And, on the contrary, they are required to maintain active control over the aircraft should conditions change unexpectedly.
Watch the following video to see an ILS Category II automated landing procedure from start to finish.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=MdK1Q8gdgmo
Buy enough supplies—canned food and bottled water—before Monday to keep me self-sufficient for months. All the while not realizing that any disaster so severe as to require their use leaves me screwed either way. Then I will go to Starbucks on Tuesday morning for my usual $5 coffee ritual. Remainder of the week is spent around the water cooler discussing the once-in-a-lifetime Perfect Storm that caused many rather severe nuisances. Forget about all the nonperishables I bought until the next holiday food drive pops up months or years later, and give it all away. Repeat the process next time it rains or snows.
She broke the law and her life is ruined. Her clients broke the law by purchasing her services. How come the worker bears the all the guilt in public while her clients get to hide behind anonyminity?
NVIDIA stops developing the Linux driver.
Think back, 15 years ago, to what you were doing the first day you read Slashdot.
We don't need another highway!
We already have a way home.
All we want are roads without:
The thunder holes.
[B]ring a population of replacement humans who don't have a hilariously dodgy risk-discounting algorithm as a matter of empirical fact...
The proposed method will produce your desired population.
It is difficult to fathom how incredibly ignorant this person is. If I understand this correctly, he believes his company had to produce its own operating system in order to satisfy specific customers who are interested more in work than play.
Oh, the irony.
“Getting stuff done” happens with the software users interact with. The kernel and development environment do not matter to your end-users. Applications do.
This is the same old story of how everyone wants to reinvent the wheel. “Oh, yes! We should make our own language, and libraries, and stack!” Utter nonsense. He, like many other misguided leaders in our industry, created massive amounts of totally redundant work for his engineers, and—even worse—isolated them from communities that could act as force multipliers on their efforts.
Great job, Heins.
This is an attempt to legitimize any incursion into privacy they want. No adversary so sophisticated as the drug cartels will engage in illegal activity out in the open, so to speak. It is entirely trivial to deploy tools for securing communications. The only logical conclusions to this initiative are: infringements upon the rights of innocents, and prohibitions on cryptography and anonymity.
You beat me to it.
Why doesn't it?
Because severely catastrophic storms are rare, and because it costs. Yet people want cheap energy. If you are fine paying 10 times as much for power, then the electric company can retain 10 times the usual staff.
Also, it wouldn't be "Armies"
Not sure what you would call those long lines of people and equipment rolling in from five surrounding states, but we can use another word if you like.
You need to grow up and stop making excuses.
Uh, okay. How about I am not petulant about not having 100% uptime on a fairly cheap service that faces huge challenges brought on by forces of nature.
There is no reason not to have high expectation
Why?
and considering the response to these issues is getting worse over the last 25 years maybe something else is going on?
It is?
like exec. being more focuses on bonuses then long term quality.
Citation needed.
we are talking about weeks, not 48 hours.
My power was restored in less than 32 hours. Perhaps the lines around my home were not so damaged as others. Infrastructure sustaining heavier damage will likely take longer to repair.
Oh, never mind. Forget all this reason and sense.
Fuck the man!
Seriously. Look at a map for any densely populated urban area, and consider the scale and complexity any utility provider must face. The problem is enormous and the adverse conditions affecting the utility are highly varied. Also consider that it makes no sense for these utility providers to retain standing armies of workers and equipment to react to rare events.
People need to grow up, and understand that sometimes they will be left without the conveniences of modern life. It is incumbent upon each of us to be prepared for these difficult times when we might have to go a full 48 hours without being able to watch The Bachelorette.
In all the same ways that zippers, machines, contraceptives, music, and drugs ruined all the previous generations.
Software piracy has not caused the industry to collapse.
Thanks for the laughs. Keep it up!
They would be foolish to fire him if he was performing his duties well.
Global Warming/Climate Change may or may not be happening.
That statement is absurd. I cannot believe there are still people pandering this and similar opinions. Read Why the Global Warming Skeptics Are Wrong by William Nordhaus. Climate change is happening, and human activities are likely causing it.
[Not at] the rate that would justify dismantling civilization over...
Nobody is suggesting that. This is nonsensical hyperbole on its face. However, the scientific community is suggesting that we: use less energy, find renewable energy sources, and make less babies. The first two are profitable investments we ought to make regardless whether the climate is changing.
The YouTube video previously linked is of a lecture given by Albert Barlett. If you find it not so easy to navigate, or that it obscures the credibility of the content, go straight to the source for the definitive copy, and the summary. This lecture truly is among the most important videos any of us will see. It makes plain the simple reality of exponential growth against finite resources in terms that are entirely relevant to our daily lives.
Suppose these people had devoted their time to producing something useful.
Obelisk? Really? Not a 1:4:9 rectangular solid?
But we also know that nobody here or their managers are going to accept it and follow through, so why bother having the discussion?
Please define “harm” for us.