And Hitler was a vegetarian! Congratulations for non-sequitur of the week. In case it's escaped your attention, you are not obliged to use the services of any bank. Rather different from your relationship to an Assad as a Syrian citizen, for example.
Um, no, they don't. Different banks have different rules for how much cash can be withdrawn, notice periods, etc etc.
But I tell you what, if you don't like the rules, stop fucking whining, keep your cash at home, and if you're really bothered, go set up your own bank with a different set of rules, and see how you do.
Wow, I had no idea there were two people so laughably ignorant they'd never realised that: (A) they entered into an agreement when depositing money at a bank, and the agreement covers access, and if the terms were unacceptable, other banks are available, and you can also just put the money under a mattress or in a safe; and (B) that runs on banks are a bad thing, and banks take measures to limit them.
Do you really, honestly, think BMW deliberately made the i3 ugly so they could sell fewer of them? What possible motivation could they have to do that? Compliance car doesn't make sense as a motivation given this car is made primarily for European markets where that term has no meaning.
You seem to think that I've argued VW have gone as fast as they could have done. I agree with you, they could (and should) have started earlier. But you previously seemed to be arguing that they still hadn't really started, when they clearly have. They've just not managed to crank out a production car yet. It's coming, though. It's pretty clearly coming. And they pretty clearly have spent billions already, with many more billions to come.
You may think an i3 is ugly. I may think an i3 is ugly. But they're pretty successful cars -- a slow burn but it's now selling in reasonable numbers in Europe. And the Leaf sold well despite its looks. I won't argue that Teslas are all much more beautiful though. (I happen to think my Renault Zoe is quite attractive, but not everyone agrees)
You missed my point about range anxiety and the difference between the US and European markets. Range anxiety is less acute in European markets, because consumers are more comfortable with the concept of an urban runabout. This is demonstrated by the fact that small cars with limited range sell in reasonable volumes in Europe but not in the US. Gen 1 Zoes, for example.
I know you're an automotive engineer, which is why your statement about "marketing bullshit" comes across as just weirdly naive. Surely you understand that building a new platform takes multiple years? There's the design of the platform itself, figuring out the site strategy, the component supplies, etc etc. And it's an especially big challenge as they've been working through cost reductions to try to reduce the impact of battery costs, by reducing component numbers and scaling them across multiple models, by de-contenting, etc etc. And this is the first platform they've ever built with a skateboard battery pack, which is obviously quite a significant departure from all their existing cars and will have taken time to get right. They only did their pivot to high-volume EV in 2015, and only started designing the MEB in 2016. So it's pretty fast for a legacy automaker. It's not as fast as I would like, and of course, it could fall flat on its arse, but I don't think it's accurate to describe it as marketing bullshit, although there's plenty of that in the materials VW release about the platform.
I mean: do you believe they haven't spent billions? And that they aren't intending to launch a series of EVs using the MEB platform? If so, what could possibly be their rationale for doing something as stupid as pretending that they have spent the money and are launching EVs? How can that possibly help their cause?
[Let me be clear about my own purchase intentions, by the way, in case you want to read something into my biases from that: as mentioned above, I have a Renault Zoe, which I like. My next car is quite possibly going to be a Model 3. But I'll be interested / excited to see what other options I have when the Zoe PCP ends in Dec 2021. I could imagine it possibly being a VW, but I'll wait and see what they actually get to market by then.]
This reads like someone who doesn't understand just how different the European and US car markets are. The European market sells gazillions of hatchbacks, and while US consumers may find them ugly, European consumers love them. They're wildly popular. Ranges of under 200 miles work particularly well in Europe, where hatchbacks are often used almost exclusively as city runabouts, driven for well under 20 miles a day.
You also come across as naive about car platforms. VW has been investing billions in MEB. It's routinely discussed in the professional press. It's obviously a real thing and it's obviously happening, and it's obviously not a lie, and it takes a long time because platforms always do, never mind platforms for new tech like EV. Of course we all want the EVs to be out next week and have ranges of 400+ miles and amazing performance specs and cost under 10k, but in the meantime, they'll come out more slowly, have worse range and performance, and still be a step ahead of current tech, and continue to get better. There's plenty of pie for both VW and Tesla.
Look, I'm on my second Zoe since 2015, and I love it. It's a fantastic car. It demonstrates affordability in a way that the Model 3 doesn't. But this isn't a zero sum game: Tesla has obviously been hugely influential for the German car makers in particular. Yes, eGolf, but it's MEB that matters, and that was clearly more prodded along by Tesla than Renault. What Nissan/Renault did was change things in Europe, especially in creating some pull for public infrastructure and policy. I doubt we'd have the Kia et al without Nissan/Renault. And hopefully Zoe 2 will be a further significant shift along. What I'm saying is there's plenty of credit to go round, and I'm glad that both established carmakers like Renault and newbies like Tesla have dented this particular universe.
"mRNA cap structure" is a *buzzword*? Riiiiight. You don't know what mRNA cap structure means, and you don't know what buzzword means. Well done!
I'm glad you are pleased with your own wit. Hopefully it provides you with a little comfort as you carefully avoid contemplating your stupidity. I mean, it would be nice for you to have something to cling to besides blaming women for your failings. It might spare them some of your bile, although let's be honest, that's unlikely isn't it?
And that was your come-back, was it? What a zinger. You should consider a career in comedy. I mean, STEM isn't working out for you due to all the mean feminists, and you know people will laugh when you stand at stage. Alright, it'll be at you, not with you. But still, beggars can't be choosers.
Oh, you're absolutely right. You've clearly spent years in biology labs. I mean, just the other day, I heard my friend trying to talk about how mRNA cap structure protects transcripts from degradation and recruits factors which mediate processing events, and some feminist kept on interrupting with feminist nonsense about enzymes being recruited to phosphorylated RNA pol II at the early stages of transcription. I mean, who comes up with these nutty feminist ideas, eh?
Yes, this was sarcasm. Just in case you're dumb enough not to be sure.
I believe they were taking it seriously, but not in any good way: they wanted a fig-leaf, and are sufficiently tone-deaf despite having lots of clever people that it didn't occur to them that the head of a conservative political think-tank was a really shitty choice of fig-leaf.
So you're not going to admit you argued government regulation was bad by approvingly citing an example of government regulation?
I mean this is hardly fancy logic. This is the same as someone arguing "trains are always shittier than cars. Here's an example of a train that's better than car". It's just idiocy.
Instead of talking about new strawmen as a distraction, it would be better if you simply acknowledged that you cited an example of a government using deadly force as a regulatory sanction as evidence of how free markets can operate successfully without regulation. If you can't be honest with me, at least be honest with yourself.
Hammurabi? Are you fucking kidding me?! Hammurabi created a *law*! with a *sanction*! That is regulation, you muppet! As the ruler of the country -- you know, the government -- he wrote a law that said builders whose buildings collapse and kill someone should themselves be killed. You should be *outraged* at Hammurabi interfering in the free market in that way, not parading it as though it's an example of the free market in action.
Jesus fucking Christ, you people try to be so clever and then you say such stupid stupid things.
You really do know fuck all about history, don't you?
The causes of the Famine included: the unchecked power of landlords over their tenants; the consequential splitting of tenant landholdings into ever small parcels, such that ultimately only potatoes could be farmed (Irish farmers at this time were subsistence famers, they could not afford to buy their main source of calories, because they were impoverished, not because of the price of grain); and the dominance of the potato as a staple crop (and especially the Irish Lumper), significantly driven by the use of better pasture land to grow beef for the English market (those unchecked landlords again).
Notoriously, the Famine's impact was made dramatically worse by the Whig government's laissez-faire conviction that the market would provide the food required. You really do have to be all kinds of stupid to review the history of the Famine and conclude that the main problem was government action, as opposed to inaction.
Naturally, you go on to prove this to be the case, by tendentiously explaining the concept of regulatory capture, and then assuming that because regulation is necessarily imperfect (what with being a human endeavour and all), it is never a good idea, a particularly risible argument when you consider how it might apply to capitalism, free markets, etc.
Yeah, but no. We had free markets in the UK in the 1800s and we got potato famines, adulteration of food beverages and medicines, grotesque industrial injuries, kids being sent up chimneys, etc etc.
I'd focus on masturbating to the idea of free markets, because they're a fantasy that seem to turn you on. In real life, you can carry on living in a country that uses regulations to ensure your buildings don't fall over, your kids' toys aren't stuffed silly with cheap nasty chemicals that'll kill them, a gallon in a gas station is actually a gallon, and endlessly on. I suppose you can try to set up your own free state where none of this is true, but the odds of it being a success that doesn't look like Somalia seem pretty low to me. Happy to be proved wrong though!
The answer to "the regulator is toothless" is not "remove the regulator". It's "give the regulator teeth". Similarly, the answer to "the regulator has been captured by providers" is "don't allow this to happen". See also: FAA & Boeing.
The market solution to insufficient competition is, in theory, more competition. When there's not enough competition, we have a market failure, and regulators should step in, in this case with Net Neutrality.
The article wasn't suggesting the problem was the existence of pre-installed software per se. It was about that pre-installed software behaving perniciously. The Weather app on iOS does not do that.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh you're one of *those*. Okeydokey. Now we know where we stand. Knee deep in bigoted bullshit conspiracies.
Why choose between ignorance and malice when you can have both in one fine AC?
And Hitler was a vegetarian!
Congratulations for non-sequitur of the week.
In case it's escaped your attention, you are not obliged to use the services of any bank. Rather different from your relationship to an Assad as a Syrian citizen, for example.
Um, no, they don't. Different banks have different rules for how much cash can be withdrawn, notice periods, etc etc.
But I tell you what, if you don't like the rules, stop fucking whining, keep your cash at home, and if you're really bothered, go set up your own bank with a different set of rules, and see how you do.
Wow, I had no idea there were two people so laughably ignorant they'd never realised that: (A) they entered into an agreement when depositing money at a bank, and the agreement covers access, and if the terms were unacceptable, other banks are available, and you can also just put the money under a mattress or in a safe; and (B) that runs on banks are a bad thing, and banks take measures to limit them.
Do you really, honestly, think BMW deliberately made the i3 ugly so they could sell fewer of them? What possible motivation could they have to do that? Compliance car doesn't make sense as a motivation given this car is made primarily for European markets where that term has no meaning.
You seem to think that I've argued VW have gone as fast as they could have done. I agree with you, they could (and should) have started earlier. But you previously seemed to be arguing that they still hadn't really started, when they clearly have. They've just not managed to crank out a production car yet. It's coming, though. It's pretty clearly coming. And they pretty clearly have spent billions already, with many more billions to come.
You may think an i3 is ugly. I may think an i3 is ugly. But they're pretty successful cars -- a slow burn but it's now selling in reasonable numbers in Europe. And the Leaf sold well despite its looks. I won't argue that Teslas are all much more beautiful though. (I happen to think my Renault Zoe is quite attractive, but not everyone agrees)
You missed my point about range anxiety and the difference between the US and European markets. Range anxiety is less acute in European markets, because consumers are more comfortable with the concept of an urban runabout. This is demonstrated by the fact that small cars with limited range sell in reasonable volumes in Europe but not in the US. Gen 1 Zoes, for example.
I know you're an automotive engineer, which is why your statement about "marketing bullshit" comes across as just weirdly naive. Surely you understand that building a new platform takes multiple years? There's the design of the platform itself, figuring out the site strategy, the component supplies, etc etc. And it's an especially big challenge as they've been working through cost reductions to try to reduce the impact of battery costs, by reducing component numbers and scaling them across multiple models, by de-contenting, etc etc. And this is the first platform they've ever built with a skateboard battery pack, which is obviously quite a significant departure from all their existing cars and will have taken time to get right. They only did their pivot to high-volume EV in 2015, and only started designing the MEB in 2016. So it's pretty fast for a legacy automaker. It's not as fast as I would like, and of course, it could fall flat on its arse, but I don't think it's accurate to describe it as marketing bullshit, although there's plenty of that in the materials VW release about the platform.
I mean: do you believe they haven't spent billions? And that they aren't intending to launch a series of EVs using the MEB platform? If so, what could possibly be their rationale for doing something as stupid as pretending that they have spent the money and are launching EVs? How can that possibly help their cause?
[Let me be clear about my own purchase intentions, by the way, in case you want to read something into my biases from that: as mentioned above, I have a Renault Zoe, which I like. My next car is quite possibly going to be a Model 3. But I'll be interested / excited to see what other options I have when the Zoe PCP ends in Dec 2021. I could imagine it possibly being a VW, but I'll wait and see what they actually get to market by then.]
Pot, meet kettle
This reads like someone who doesn't understand just how different the European and US car markets are. The European market sells gazillions of hatchbacks, and while US consumers may find them ugly, European consumers love them. They're wildly popular. Ranges of under 200 miles work particularly well in Europe, where hatchbacks are often used almost exclusively as city runabouts, driven for well under 20 miles a day.
You also come across as naive about car platforms. VW has been investing billions in MEB. It's routinely discussed in the professional press. It's obviously a real thing and it's obviously happening, and it's obviously not a lie, and it takes a long time because platforms always do, never mind platforms for new tech like EV. Of course we all want the EVs to be out next week and have ranges of 400+ miles and amazing performance specs and cost under 10k, but in the meantime, they'll come out more slowly, have worse range and performance, and still be a step ahead of current tech, and continue to get better. There's plenty of pie for both VW and Tesla.
Look, I'm on my second Zoe since 2015, and I love it. It's a fantastic car. It demonstrates affordability in a way that the Model 3 doesn't. But this isn't a zero sum game: Tesla has obviously been hugely influential for the German car makers in particular. Yes, eGolf, but it's MEB that matters, and that was clearly more prodded along by Tesla than Renault. What Nissan/Renault did was change things in Europe, especially in creating some pull for public infrastructure and policy. I doubt we'd have the Kia et al without Nissan/Renault. And hopefully Zoe 2 will be a further significant shift along. What I'm saying is there's plenty of credit to go round, and I'm glad that both established carmakers like Renault and newbies like Tesla have dented this particular universe.
"mRNA cap structure" is a *buzzword*? Riiiiight. You don't know what mRNA cap structure means, and you don't know what buzzword means. Well done!
I'm glad you are pleased with your own wit. Hopefully it provides you with a little comfort as you carefully avoid contemplating your stupidity. I mean, it would be nice for you to have something to cling to besides blaming women for your failings. It might spare them some of your bile, although let's be honest, that's unlikely isn't it?
And that was your come-back, was it? What a zinger. You should consider a career in comedy. I mean, STEM isn't working out for you due to all the mean feminists, and you know people will laugh when you stand at stage. Alright, it'll be at you, not with you. But still, beggars can't be choosers.
You are clearly very very stupid. It wasn't the "conservative" bit that was the issue. It was the "political think-tank" bit.
The trouble with America, these days, is that people like you keep on being so very fucking dumb. Be cleverer.
Oh, you're absolutely right. You've clearly spent years in biology labs. I mean, just the other day, I heard my friend trying to talk about how mRNA cap structure protects transcripts from degradation and recruits factors which mediate processing events, and some feminist kept on interrupting with feminist nonsense about enzymes being recruited to phosphorylated RNA pol II at the early stages of transcription. I mean, who comes up with these nutty feminist ideas, eh?
Yes, this was sarcasm. Just in case you're dumb enough not to be sure.
I believe they were taking it seriously, but not in any good way: they wanted a fig-leaf, and are sufficiently tone-deaf despite having lots of clever people that it didn't occur to them that the head of a conservative political think-tank was a really shitty choice of fig-leaf.
So you're not going to admit you argued government regulation was bad by approvingly citing an example of government regulation?
I mean this is hardly fancy logic. This is the same as someone arguing "trains are always shittier than cars. Here's an example of a train that's better than car". It's just idiocy.
Instead of talking about new strawmen as a distraction, it would be better if you simply acknowledged that you cited an example of a government using deadly force as a regulatory sanction as evidence of how free markets can operate successfully without regulation. If you can't be honest with me, at least be honest with yourself.
Hammurabi? Are you fucking kidding me?! Hammurabi created a *law*! with a *sanction*! That is regulation, you muppet! As the ruler of the country -- you know, the government -- he wrote a law that said builders whose buildings collapse and kill someone should themselves be killed. You should be *outraged* at Hammurabi interfering in the free market in that way, not parading it as though it's an example of the free market in action.
Jesus fucking Christ, you people try to be so clever and then you say such stupid stupid things.
You really do know fuck all about history, don't you?
The causes of the Famine included: the unchecked power of landlords over their tenants; the consequential splitting of tenant landholdings into ever small parcels, such that ultimately only potatoes could be farmed (Irish farmers at this time were subsistence famers, they could not afford to buy their main source of calories, because they were impoverished, not because of the price of grain); and the dominance of the potato as a staple crop (and especially the Irish Lumper), significantly driven by the use of better pasture land to grow beef for the English market (those unchecked landlords again).
Notoriously, the Famine's impact was made dramatically worse by the Whig government's laissez-faire conviction that the market would provide the food required. You really do have to be all kinds of stupid to review the history of the Famine and conclude that the main problem was government action, as opposed to inaction.
Naturally, you go on to prove this to be the case, by tendentiously explaining the concept of regulatory capture, and then assuming that because regulation is necessarily imperfect (what with being a human endeavour and all), it is never a good idea, a particularly risible argument when you consider how it might apply to capitalism, free markets, etc.
Reasonable advice, but a non sequitur
Yeah, but no. We had free markets in the UK in the 1800s and we got potato famines, adulteration of food beverages and medicines, grotesque industrial injuries, kids being sent up chimneys, etc etc.
I'd focus on masturbating to the idea of free markets, because they're a fantasy that seem to turn you on. In real life, you can carry on living in a country that uses regulations to ensure your buildings don't fall over, your kids' toys aren't stuffed silly with cheap nasty chemicals that'll kill them, a gallon in a gas station is actually a gallon, and endlessly on. I suppose you can try to set up your own free state where none of this is true, but the odds of it being a success that doesn't look like Somalia seem pretty low to me. Happy to be proved wrong though!
The answer to "the regulator is toothless" is not "remove the regulator". It's "give the regulator teeth". Similarly, the answer to "the regulator has been captured by providers" is "don't allow this to happen". See also: FAA & Boeing.
Incandescent bulbs aren't "defaulting to Nature" any more than LEDs are.
The market solution to insufficient competition is, in theory, more competition. When there's not enough competition, we have a market failure, and regulators should step in, in this case with Net Neutrality.
The article wasn't suggesting the problem was the existence of pre-installed software per se. It was about that pre-installed software behaving perniciously. The Weather app on iOS does not do that.