Wow, that article had some crappy analysis. The two standouts for me: - the rubbish analysis of whether cameraphones are taking over from dedicated cameras. 97% of photos may be uploaded to flickr from dedicated cameras, but more flickr members are using cameraphones. It's just that they're uploading smaller numbers of photos each. If I'm selling cameras, I am interested the latter stat, not the former - the blithe assertion that facebook photos would also largely be from dedicated cameras, just like flickr. stoopid.
Well, nobody except the company in question, which has said it has checked out the legality of what it is doing very thoroughly with the Information Commissioner. Apart from that minor point, you're absolutely spot on.
You have confused the number of people who get an honour with the number who are made knights. In the NY list just published, 983 people got an honour of some sort; only 27 were made knights bachelor (the most common type of knight). Jony Ive was one of only two people made a KBE.
In addition, being made even an OBE is a pretty uncommon thing -- there are a couple of thousand awards each year, yes, but there are at least 40m people in the UK who are potentially capable of receiving an award, so the rate of award is something like 0.005%.
who has ever complained that they find an ipad hard to hold, for god's sake? who has ever said that the Air is too sharp?? and who really believes that the decision about how many buttons is made *only* on aesthetic grounds, when it has been made clear ad nauseam that it is a decision about *usability* -- keep things simple to minimise cognitive load -- and *durability* -- the fewer moving parts, the longer the MTBF.
why don't you enlighten us with your list of the top ten computers and devices that are better designed than Apple products. Be sure to explain how they make better tradeoff decisions, while you're at it. But a warning: if you put a ThinkPad on the list, I will personally come round to your house and shove my shitty shitty work laptop where the sun don't shine, as I am sick to fucking death of its broken mechanical latch that means it routinely opens itself in my bag and discharges the battery, the crappy plastic that has cracked and flexes alarmingly if I pick it up with one hand, the tiny trackpad, the enormous but shortlived battery that sticks out at the back and means it doesn't fit in a laptop sleeve or my cycle bag, the ridiculous peanut light that doesn't illuminate the screen enough to be useful, the idiotic screen brightness increments (0, then 4, then 7, I mean WTF? with completely random jumps in brightness that bear no relation to these numbers), the pathetic tinny speakers that can barely be heard, etc et fucking cetera.
erm, because: a) they sell millions of paper on the back of their actions b) they have publicly ruined the lives of hundreds or possibly thousands of people c) there has been blanket impunity until very recently d) the hacking has been on a vast scale
At this stage, I think it's fair to say that the UK has a *nominal* concept of Fit and Proper. Given that it didn't stop Richard Desmond getting his hands on his print and television assets, and given that it hasn't seen the removal of James Murdoch or indeed anyone at all, it appears to be worth three-fifths of fuck-all in practice.
Who are you, Askylist? Paul "the twat" McMullan? You seem ever-so-eager to read this as entirely political, despite the large numbers of apolitical figures, public and private alike, whose privacy has been invaded and whose lives have been damaged by tabloids acting with the most atrocious viciousness.
Incidentally, there's a ton of material out there on the risk = frequency * severity equation, all of which happens to show that this is an absolutely standard way of defining risk.
In your example, you simply define the term "risk" to be the expected damage from a single incident.
I am *telling you* that this is not how medics, epidemiologists and risk analysts define risk. It does not make them less precise. They still care about expected damage. They call this severity. They also care about the likelihood of incurring that expected damage. They call this frequency.
You have not introduced any third variable beyond frequency or severity. It seems you just object to calling the results of the multiplication of these two things together "risk".
Your question at the end proves the value of the calculation: the way you phrase it seems to imply you think there's a single right answer that is inherently deducible from the circumstances, but in fact there is no way for me to know whether I'd prefer to be in a car with the "problem" you describe or a one-engined plane with the other problem you describe without knowing the likelihood of the following risk (the crash) and the severity of the outcome -- that requires knowing things like how effective the mitigation engineering is in both the car and the plane (car: will I retain steering/braking? how effective are the airbags? plane: how effective is it at gliding? is there a reserve oil supply? etc) and also environmental issues such as speed at time of failure etc.
I'm struggling to understand what you mean. It's particularly weird because you're criticising my usage of the term risk but doing so using practically unintelligible phrases like "the risk you mean or the parent of me".
You are utterly and completely wrong if you think that the use of the term risk I have described is specific to financial risk. It is routinely used to quantify risks to human health by epidemiologists and other scientists.
In this field, matey, an OO programmer is the layman, not a risk analyst. Risk does indeed equal frequency times severity. The rest of your post is just twaddle, and a reference to an "original" -- lay -- definition of risk.
What is significant about the change from pre-industrial revolution economies to now that explains why 30/40% is needed now but wasn't needed back then? How much, exactly, does the UK economy in 2011 resemble the UK economy in the 20s and 30s, either?
There is obviously the accident risk, even if it pales in comparison to the lives lost coal mining.
Risk = frequency * impact
Nuclear accidents are very rare compared to coal accidents. The impact thus far has been relatively low, but the potential impact is very very high. A bad coal disaster might kill a few hundred people. A bad nuclear disaster might kill a lot more....
But this is simply because the externalities are not fully factored into the build or operate costs for the power plants. Fossil fuel plants don't pay anywhere near the costs of mitigating their environmental impact. So they look artificially cheap.
I think the most interesting chart is the one showing historical debt since 1692. It shows that the UK's debt was: - continuously above 40% from about 1715 through to about 1880! - continuously above 60% from about 1720 through to about 1870! - continuously above 60% from about 1720 through to about 1860! - continuously above 80% from about 1745 through to about 1855! More than 100 years, during most of which debt was above 120%!
So I don't think it's self-evidently true that high levels of debt are automatically unsustainable.
I agree that building up reserves is what ought to have happened in the NICE era. Instead, what happened was that tax cuts were put in place for the wealthiest, resulting in an enormous buildup of assets for the very wealthiest, and a huge real estate asset bubble for everyone else.
Some economists debate if the number should be 30 or 40%. Others look at historical debt levels and aren't that fussed (cf deficit levels, which every economist is fussed about). See here, for example: http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_debt
Re my other comment: just by tweaking what I wrote slightly, it becomes not an over-simplification but accurate: "A national economy in which everyone, including the government, pays down debt and stops spending is an economy that is shrinking." becomes "A national economy in which everyone, including the government, pays down debt and cuts spending significantly is an economy that is shrinking."
Austerity programmes shrink GDP unless very carefully handled. There are dozens of examples of this, including of it leading to more significant structural deficits as two things happen in tandem: - GDP falls faster than debt levels - Debt servicing costs increase as lenders worry about the fall in GDP
Look, the top X% don't control Y% of *all possible wealth*. They control Y% of *all current wealth*. The fact that the game isn't zero-sum in the long term doesn't make the Gini co-efficient magically disappear.
I don't agree fully with your analysis of the problem, but I'm more struck by how bizarre some of your solutions are: 2) I have no idea why this would automagically mean *less* rather than more spending. It might increase local responsiveness, but it also loses economies of scale and ensures inequities across the nation. 3) War on drugs, fine. "Things like" -- kinda want to see what those things are 4) Sure. But how does this help the economy? 8) Flat taxes are dumb and regressive and mean that poor people have to choose between clothing and dentistry and feeding.
Well, quite a lot of economists believe the recession would have been an awful lot worse had the government not spent at the rates it did. Additionally, Keynes was a fan of thoughtful spending that would be particularly effective in stimulating the economy, not just spending shit left right and centre.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow, that article had some crappy analysis. The two standouts for me:
- the rubbish analysis of whether cameraphones are taking over from dedicated cameras. 97% of photos may be uploaded to flickr from dedicated cameras, but more flickr members are using cameraphones. It's just that they're uploading smaller numbers of photos each. If I'm selling cameras, I am interested the latter stat, not the former
- the blithe assertion that facebook photos would also largely be from dedicated cameras, just like flickr. stoopid.
Well, nobody except the company in question, which has said it has checked out the legality of what it is doing very thoroughly with the Information Commissioner. Apart from that minor point, you're absolutely spot on.
You have confused the number of people who get an honour with the number who are made knights. In the NY list just published, 983 people got an honour of some sort; only 27 were made knights bachelor (the most common type of knight). Jony Ive was one of only two people made a KBE.
In addition, being made even an OBE is a pretty uncommon thing -- there are a couple of thousand awards each year, yes, but there are at least 40m people in the UK who are potentially capable of receiving an award, so the rate of award is something like 0.005%.
what kind of fuckwit mods this drivel insightful?
who has ever complained that they find an ipad hard to hold, for god's sake?
who has ever said that the Air is too sharp??
and who really believes that the decision about how many buttons is made *only* on aesthetic grounds, when it has been made clear ad nauseam that it is a decision about *usability* -- keep things simple to minimise cognitive load -- and *durability* -- the fewer moving parts, the longer the MTBF.
why don't you enlighten us with your list of the top ten computers and devices that are better designed than Apple products. Be sure to explain how they make better tradeoff decisions, while you're at it. But a warning: if you put a ThinkPad on the list, I will personally come round to your house and shove my shitty shitty work laptop where the sun don't shine, as I am sick to fucking death of its broken mechanical latch that means it routinely opens itself in my bag and discharges the battery, the crappy plastic that has cracked and flexes alarmingly if I pick it up with one hand, the tiny trackpad, the enormous but shortlived battery that sticks out at the back and means it doesn't fit in a laptop sleeve or my cycle bag, the ridiculous peanut light that doesn't illuminate the screen enough to be useful, the idiotic screen brightness increments (0, then 4, then 7, I mean WTF? with completely random jumps in brightness that bear no relation to these numbers), the pathetic tinny speakers that can barely be heard, etc et fucking cetera.
What's with the "interesting names for someone from the mideast"?
Joseph is Anglicised version of the Hebrew name Yosef
Mary is the Anglicisation of the Greek Maria which derives from the Hebrew name Miriam
You are just failing to understand what a design patent is all about. Since you mention Ford, why not take a look at some info about Ford and design patents:
http://www.patentspostgrant.com/lang/en/2010/06/paparazzi-photo-kills-ford-design-in-patent-reexamination
http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2007/09/car-part-design.html
Then you might want to read a proper detailed analysis of the Apple vs Samsung case:
http://www.mhmlaw.com/files/Carani%20-%20Apple%20v%20%20Samsung%20-%20BNA%20-%2010-11.pdf
He really is an unutterable cunt in that video. I feel like I need to wash my eyeballs.
What, all night, every night? That's a lot of pay runs and a lot of maintenance!
Perhaps you ought to read Collapse by Jared Diamond. It has a famous passage about people chopping down trees.
Wow. Just wow. How can you present the discovery of the public interest defence as something new?? I despair, I really do.
erm, because:
a) they sell millions of paper on the back of their actions
b) they have publicly ruined the lives of hundreds or possibly thousands of people
c) there has been blanket impunity until very recently
d) the hacking has been on a vast scale
At this stage, I think it's fair to say that the UK has a *nominal* concept of Fit and Proper. Given that it didn't stop Richard Desmond getting his hands on his print and television assets, and given that it hasn't seen the removal of James Murdoch or indeed anyone at all, it appears to be worth three-fifths of fuck-all in practice.
Who are you, Askylist? Paul "the twat" McMullan? You seem ever-so-eager to read this as entirely political, despite the large numbers of apolitical figures, public and private alike, whose privacy has been invaded and whose lives have been damaged by tabloids acting with the most atrocious viciousness.
Incidentally, there's a ton of material out there on the risk = frequency * severity equation, all of which happens to show that this is an absolutely standard way of defining risk.
You could start here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_Matrix
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk#ISO31000:2009_Risk_Management_Standard
or just google risk frequency severity
Honestly, this is just semantic twattery
In your example, you simply define the term "risk" to be the expected damage from a single incident.
I am *telling you* that this is not how medics, epidemiologists and risk analysts define risk. It does not make them less precise. They still care about expected damage. They call this severity. They also care about the likelihood of incurring that expected damage. They call this frequency.
You have not introduced any third variable beyond frequency or severity. It seems you just object to calling the results of the multiplication of these two things together "risk".
Your question at the end proves the value of the calculation: the way you phrase it seems to imply you think there's a single right answer that is inherently deducible from the circumstances, but in fact there is no way for me to know whether I'd prefer to be in a car with the "problem" you describe or a one-engined plane with the other problem you describe without knowing the likelihood of the following risk (the crash) and the severity of the outcome -- that requires knowing things like how effective the mitigation engineering is in both the car and the plane (car: will I retain steering/braking? how effective are the airbags? plane: how effective is it at gliding? is there a reserve oil supply? etc) and also environmental issues such as speed at time of failure etc.
I'm struggling to understand what you mean. It's particularly weird because you're criticising my usage of the term risk but doing so using practically unintelligible phrases like "the risk you mean or the parent of me".
You are utterly and completely wrong if you think that the use of the term risk I have described is specific to financial risk. It is routinely used to quantify risks to human health by epidemiologists and other scientists.
In this field, matey, an OO programmer is the layman, not a risk analyst. Risk does indeed equal frequency times severity. The rest of your post is just twaddle, and a reference to an "original" -- lay -- definition of risk.
What is significant about the change from pre-industrial revolution economies to now that explains why 30/40% is needed now but wasn't needed back then? How much, exactly, does the UK economy in 2011 resemble the UK economy in the 20s and 30s, either?
There is obviously the accident risk, even if it pales in comparison to the lives lost coal mining.
Risk = frequency * impact
Nuclear accidents are very rare compared to coal accidents. The impact thus far has been relatively low, but the potential impact is very very high. A bad coal disaster might kill a few hundred people. A bad nuclear disaster might kill a lot more....
Actually, the article being linked to shows that the original claim that the Hummer comes out ahead is utter horseshit
But this is simply because the externalities are not fully factored into the build or operate costs for the power plants. Fossil fuel plants don't pay anywhere near the costs of mitigating their environmental impact. So they look artificially cheap.
I think the most interesting chart is the one showing historical debt since 1692. It shows that the UK's debt was:
- continuously above 40% from about 1715 through to about 1880!
- continuously above 60% from about 1720 through to about 1870!
- continuously above 60% from about 1720 through to about 1860!
- continuously above 80% from about 1745 through to about 1855! More than 100 years, during most of which debt was above 120%!
So I don't think it's self-evidently true that high levels of debt are automatically unsustainable.
I agree that building up reserves is what ought to have happened in the NICE era. Instead, what happened was that tax cuts were put in place for the wealthiest, resulting in an enormous buildup of assets for the very wealthiest, and a huge real estate asset bubble for everyone else.
Re bankruptcy -- national economies have a history of bouncing back quite quickly from disorderly defaults. There's a good scholarly paper here:
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/fsr/fs_paper01.pdf
Some economists debate if the number should be 30 or 40%. Others look at historical debt levels and aren't that fussed (cf deficit levels, which every economist is fussed about). See here, for example: http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/uk_national_debt
Re my other comment: just by tweaking what I wrote slightly, it becomes not an over-simplification but accurate:
"A national economy in which everyone, including the government, pays down debt and stops spending is an economy that is shrinking." becomes
"A national economy in which everyone, including the government, pays down debt and cuts spending significantly is an economy that is shrinking."
Austerity programmes shrink GDP unless very carefully handled. There are dozens of examples of this, including of it leading to more significant structural deficits as two things happen in tandem:
- GDP falls faster than debt levels
- Debt servicing costs increase as lenders worry about the fall in GDP
Look, the top X% don't control Y% of *all possible wealth*. They control Y% of *all current wealth*. The fact that the game isn't zero-sum in the long term doesn't make the Gini co-efficient magically disappear.
I don't agree fully with your analysis of the problem, but I'm more struck by how bizarre some of your solutions are:
2) I have no idea why this would automagically mean *less* rather than more spending. It might increase local responsiveness, but it also loses economies of scale and ensures inequities across the nation.
3) War on drugs, fine. "Things like" -- kinda want to see what those things are
4) Sure. But how does this help the economy?
8) Flat taxes are dumb and regressive and mean that poor people have to choose between clothing and dentistry and feeding.
Well, quite a lot of economists believe the recession would have been an awful lot worse had the government not spent at the rates it did. Additionally, Keynes was a fan of thoughtful spending that would be particularly effective in stimulating the economy, not just spending shit left right and centre.