Except that the Xbox div loses tons of money. They might be smart to sell it off before the the publicity gets REALLY bad after the Xbox One presentation at E3. After then it'll be hard for MS to give the Xbox brand away.
I'm not sure which fantasy land you live in, but it must be nice.
Yes - there is a price people are willing to pay for things, and yes an increase in costs can be absorbed by a decrease in profits - to a point. Margins on A LOT of things right now are razor thin. You can't decrease the profit to negative. So prices go up, and people pay more. And companies find ways to fool you into doing it.
Why is ice cream sold in 1.5 quart containers now than 1/2 gallons? Because the price of ice cream has gone up considerably. Ice cream manufacturers know you won't pay $8 for a half gallon of ice cream. But if they change the shape so it looks about the same size but only holds 1.5 quarts they know they can still get away with charging $5.99. This same thing has happened with countless food products.
Or take fast food. Used to be, there were no combo meals. You bought everything a la carte. And any price change was immediately noticeable. So they introduce combos - you can SAVE $.20 by buying a meal instead of the component parts. In doing so you create a more confusing price structure. And it's way easier to inch up prices across the board. These days when I take my family to McDonald's we spend ~$30. Five years ago it was $18.
So retailers are jacking up prices. If not for the shale energy boom, things would be far more noticeably bad. Cheap energy has been a savior of this economy. But if you institute new pollution controls, you add yet one more cost to everything to negate those benefits we've been enjoying. And it's the poor who will suffer the most.
Sorry, do companies actually make money polluting, as in that is their business strategy?
Because otherwise, not polluting isn't going to increase the cost of living or cause cripling distress on the poor.
Reducing pollution is expensive. If it was free, companies would already do it. The only reason to pollute v/s not pollute is because the former helps profits.
So if it costs more money for, let's say... food manufacturers to produce their goods, the cost of those goods will necessarily have to increase. And the people who need food will suffer because they'll have to dedicate more of their scarce resources to that acquisition. This disproportionately impacts the poor and lower class. Their lives become significantly more difficult.
Now expand that effect across all industries - energy, transportation, manufacturing - and the costs will be pervasive and damaging. We're not talking about $1 more for a loaf of bread - we're talking about everything.
Of course you're a well-off IT guy just like the rest of us, so you won't feel it. Who cares if the kids in the bad neighborhoods go to bed hungry, right? Praise Gaia!
Sony made the right decision here. If a game publisher wants to cripple their games with always-on DRM they should have that right. And the publisher will be punished through customer outrage and lousy sales. But it's all on the publisher - their games, their risk. If the PS4 gives them the option, as rumored, any game publisher is free not to utilize it.
Microsoft, OTOH, is mandating this for all games. Publishers reportedly can't opt out. The only way games can voice an opposition in this case is to not buy the console at all. Given the current backlash, I expect that's exactly what will happen.
Comparing what we know so far about the PS4 v/s what is rumored/leaked about the NextBox, the NextBox looks disastrous. One wonders if Microsoft will pay attention to the backlash and revise their approach. One also wonders if they do if they'll still make a 2013 launch. Launching the NextBox with the current rumored "features" and being this tone-deaf to the community would be ill-advised. There's only so much gamers will put up with for the ability to play Gears and Halo.
I don't know that I've ever complained about Apple before in my life. Probably not since the monitor died on my Apple IIe.
If Apple wants to do green energy thing and their customers want to pay more to subsidize those efforts, then three cheers for all involved. If Dell wants to utilize more conventional power and as a result can offer cheaper prices, making their products available to a broader customer base including to the less affluent, bully for them as well. And if you think Apple would be doing this if they didn't think there'd be a sizable PR benefit, you're hopelessly naive.
Show me one method of shipping worldwide that uses 100% green energy. Just one. They are none.
Bicycle + kayak. Takes a while to get to Hawaii, but with a good sextant...
You've completely missed my point (and honestly, I don't know why you have such a bug up your butt about Dell...). My point is that there isn't a way to transport goods using renewables. I'm illustrating the absurdity of it. So any company that claims that 75% of their power needs are met by renewables is being criminally dishonest. Don't matter if they're Apple or Dell or HP or whoever else you want to say is worse than Apple.
Well, I was commenting on how ridiculous it is for Apple to claim 75% of their power needs are met with renewable sources, not holding them to a different standard then Dell or any other corporation.
I do, however, take issue with your suggestion that these costs are outside Apple's control. Apple chooses the companies who transport their products to their retail stores. I presume they choose to pay for gas-guzzling tractor trailers. They could opt instead to use plug-in electric vehicles. And they could choose only to deal with transportation companies who power up their vehicles at charge stations that get their electricity from renewables. It would certainly be outrageously more expensive and far less efficient, but it is fully within their control. So in fact I was criticizing something over which Apple is 100% responsible.
PS: I wonder how renewable the energy burned to drive the truck that deliver products to their retail stores is.
Re:It's not all about power....differentiators are
on
Sony Announces the PS4
·
· Score: 1
Well duh. And what's that cost? $15? Compared to $150 for the DS4 and PSEye2? My point, since you missed it, is that the cost of the peripherals must be factored into the price tag when doing an apples-to-apples comparison. So comparing a theoretical $500 PS3 retail box to a $500 PC rig (keyboard/mouse included) doesn't make sense.
Re:It's not all about power....differentiators are
on
Sony Announces the PS4
·
· Score: 1
Does your $550 rig come with a Dualshock 4 and PSEye 2 (assuming you want to compare apples to apples). If the PS4 does come out for $500, that price will include everything in the box, not just the CPU and RAM.
"The article suggests that the first real-life model of the starship Enterprise might cost somewhere in the range of $1 trillion, an immense amount now, but pocket change in a world where asteroid mining is taking place and the solar system is being economically developed and settled."
$1 trillions is "an immense amount now"? Tell that to Obama. We could own 5 Enterprises already with the new debt he's created. What's another trillion more if it means we can fly to other solar systems?
It was the first that came to mind, and the idea that a kid with a spork would have scared him off is idiotic.
My point, and it's valid and verifiable, is that legally armed citizens do intervene and prevent mass-shooters from continuing their rampages.
Actually, there's too much money at stake for good science to rule the day. I expect the green energy billionaires to pressure the IPCC to alter their predictions before this report is officially released.
I thought the factual (as opposed to most likely) story was:
1) Al Qaeda planned attacks for 9-11.
2) The videos had absolutely nothing to do with them.
3) The Obama administration used the video as an excuse to cover up their security/intelligence failures.
I thought the whole "YouTube video sparked violent protests" thing had been thoroughly debunked. Nobody had seen the video in question. The "protests" were actually coordinated terrorist attacks to coincide with 9-11.
Forgive me if I'm wrong there.
Romney/Ryan: Their faiths say that abortion is wrong and they want to change the rules so even if you aren't a member of their respective religions, you have to live by those rules.
I did it with nested loops in ColdFusion. There are 33 "w" lengths and 48 "e" lengths. 11 "n" and 19 "s". Had to limit the outer loop because my server would time out, but with a bit of grinding I was able to generate a list of all the tiles.
<!--- Check if no status code or status code 404 --->
<cfif NOT IsDefined("cfhttp.responseheader.status_code")
OR cfhttp.responseheader.status_code EQ "404">
<cfset result=false>
<cfelse>
<cfoutput><a href="#testUrl#">#testUrl#</a></cfoutput><br/>
</cfif>
</cfloop>
</cfloop>
You really have to admire Marvel for how well they've handled their movie franchises the past decade, especially the Avengers arc. It's hard not to be in awe of what transpired to bring The Avengers to fruition. They made smart choices which eventually paid off handsomely.
DC, outside the Nolan films, has botched everything. Warner Bros. just doesn't trust creative people to handle the material.
If you think that's all the Uncharted series is, then you haven't played it. It has its rails, but they're needed for what is an unmatched gaming experience.
Slashdot Mirror
Except that the Xbox div loses tons of money. They might be smart to sell it off before the the publicity gets REALLY bad after the Xbox One presentation at E3. After then it'll be hard for MS to give the Xbox brand away.
I'm not sure which fantasy land you live in, but it must be nice.
Yes - there is a price people are willing to pay for things, and yes an increase in costs can be absorbed by a decrease in profits - to a point. Margins on A LOT of things right now are razor thin. You can't decrease the profit to negative. So prices go up, and people pay more. And companies find ways to fool you into doing it.
Why is ice cream sold in 1.5 quart containers now than 1/2 gallons? Because the price of ice cream has gone up considerably. Ice cream manufacturers know you won't pay $8 for a half gallon of ice cream. But if they change the shape so it looks about the same size but only holds 1.5 quarts they know they can still get away with charging $5.99. This same thing has happened with countless food products.
Or take fast food. Used to be, there were no combo meals. You bought everything a la carte. And any price change was immediately noticeable. So they introduce combos - you can SAVE $.20 by buying a meal instead of the component parts. In doing so you create a more confusing price structure. And it's way easier to inch up prices across the board. These days when I take my family to McDonald's we spend ~$30. Five years ago it was $18.
So retailers are jacking up prices. If not for the shale energy boom, things would be far more noticeably bad. Cheap energy has been a savior of this economy. But if you institute new pollution controls, you add yet one more cost to everything to negate those benefits we've been enjoying. And it's the poor who will suffer the most.
Sorry, do companies actually make money polluting, as in that is their business strategy?
Because otherwise, not polluting isn't going to increase the cost of living or cause cripling distress on the poor.
Reducing pollution is expensive. If it was free, companies would already do it. The only reason to pollute v/s not pollute is because the former helps profits.
So if it costs more money for, let's say... food manufacturers to produce their goods, the cost of those goods will necessarily have to increase. And the people who need food will suffer because they'll have to dedicate more of their scarce resources to that acquisition. This disproportionately impacts the poor and lower class. Their lives become significantly more difficult.
Now expand that effect across all industries - energy, transportation, manufacturing - and the costs will be pervasive and damaging. We're not talking about $1 more for a loaf of bread - we're talking about everything.
Of course you're a well-off IT guy just like the rest of us, so you won't feel it. Who cares if the kids in the bad neighborhoods go to bed hungry, right? Praise Gaia!
Dramatically increased cost of living causing crippling economic distress on the poor.
Sony made the right decision here. If a game publisher wants to cripple their games with always-on DRM they should have that right. And the publisher will be punished through customer outrage and lousy sales. But it's all on the publisher - their games, their risk. If the PS4 gives them the option, as rumored, any game publisher is free not to utilize it.
Microsoft, OTOH, is mandating this for all games. Publishers reportedly can't opt out. The only way games can voice an opposition in this case is to not buy the console at all. Given the current backlash, I expect that's exactly what will happen.
Comparing what we know so far about the PS4 v/s what is rumored/leaked about the NextBox, the NextBox looks disastrous. One wonders if Microsoft will pay attention to the backlash and revise their approach. One also wonders if they do if they'll still make a 2013 launch. Launching the NextBox with the current rumored "features" and being this tone-deaf to the community would be ill-advised. There's only so much gamers will put up with for the ability to play Gears and Halo.
I don't know that I've ever complained about Apple before in my life. Probably not since the monitor died on my Apple IIe.
If Apple wants to do green energy thing and their customers want to pay more to subsidize those efforts, then three cheers for all involved. If Dell wants to utilize more conventional power and as a result can offer cheaper prices, making their products available to a broader customer base including to the less affluent, bully for them as well. And if you think Apple would be doing this if they didn't think there'd be a sizable PR benefit, you're hopelessly naive.
Show me one method of shipping worldwide that uses 100% green energy. Just one. They are none.
Bicycle + kayak. Takes a while to get to Hawaii, but with a good sextant...
You've completely missed my point (and honestly, I don't know why you have such a bug up your butt about Dell...). My point is that there isn't a way to transport goods using renewables. I'm illustrating the absurdity of it. So any company that claims that 75% of their power needs are met by renewables is being criminally dishonest. Don't matter if they're Apple or Dell or HP or whoever else you want to say is worse than Apple.
Well, I was commenting on how ridiculous it is for Apple to claim 75% of their power needs are met with renewable sources, not holding them to a different standard then Dell or any other corporation.
I do, however, take issue with your suggestion that these costs are outside Apple's control. Apple chooses the companies who transport their products to their retail stores. I presume they choose to pay for gas-guzzling tractor trailers. They could opt instead to use plug-in electric vehicles. And they could choose only to deal with transportation companies who power up their vehicles at charge stations that get their electricity from renewables. It would certainly be outrageously more expensive and far less efficient, but it is fully within their control. So in fact I was criticizing something over which Apple is 100% responsible.
That's why Apple products are so expensive!
PS: I wonder how renewable the energy burned to drive the truck that deliver products to their retail stores is.
Well duh. And what's that cost? $15? Compared to $150 for the DS4 and PSEye2? My point, since you missed it, is that the cost of the peripherals must be factored into the price tag when doing an apples-to-apples comparison. So comparing a theoretical $500 PS3 retail box to a $500 PC rig (keyboard/mouse included) doesn't make sense.
Does your $550 rig come with a Dualshock 4 and PSEye 2 (assuming you want to compare apples to apples). If the PS4 does come out for $500, that price will include everything in the box, not just the CPU and RAM.
"The article suggests that the first real-life model of the starship Enterprise might cost somewhere in the range of $1 trillion, an immense amount now, but pocket change in a world where asteroid mining is taking place and the solar system is being economically developed and settled."
$1 trillions is "an immense amount now"? Tell that to Obama. We could own 5 Enterprises already with the new debt he's created. What's another trillion more if it means we can fly to other solar systems?
It was the first that came to mind, and the idea that a kid with a spork would have scared him off is idiotic. My point, and it's valid and verifiable, is that legally armed citizens do intervene and prevent mass-shooters from continuing their rampages.
None would also be a very wrong guesstimate. This happened just last month: http://www.examiner.com/article/media-blackout-oregon-mall-shooter-was-stopped-by-an-armed-citizen Apologies for the very political news source... it was the first match on Google.
Actually, there's too much money at stake for good science to rule the day. I expect the green energy billionaires to pressure the IPCC to alter their predictions before this report is officially released.
... it'll join the Surface and Windows Phone? Perhaps they should stick to video game consoles...
I thought the factual (as opposed to most likely) story was:
1) Al Qaeda planned attacks for 9-11.
2) The videos had absolutely nothing to do with them.
3) The Obama administration used the video as an excuse to cover up their security/intelligence failures.
State Department: Libya Consulate Attack Not Preceded By Protest
There may have been other unrelated protests elsewhere, some maybe even about the stupid video, but that's not what these articles are referencing.
I thought the whole "YouTube video sparked violent protests" thing had been thoroughly debunked. Nobody had seen the video in question. The "protests" were actually coordinated terrorist attacks to coincide with 9-11. Forgive me if I'm wrong there.
I'm sorry, but I don't believe a word ut of Romney's mouth.
I guess there's no point in debating you with facts and evidence then, is there?
Romney/Ryan: Their faiths say that abortion is wrong and they want to change the rules so even if you aren't a member of their respective religions, you have to live by those rules.
Untrue: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/10/us-usa-campaign-romney-abortion-idUSBRE89901X20121010
Re: OK, UBS: Now please repeat the research with coffee.
I'd rather see it for bacon.
I did it with nested loops in ColdFusion. There are 33 "w" lengths and 48 "e" lengths. 11 "n" and 19 "s". Had to limit the outer loop because my server would time out, but with a bit of grinding I was able to generate a list of all the tiles.
/>
/>
<cfloop from="19" to="20" index="y">
<cfloop from="1" to="33" index="x">
<cfset testUrl="http://imgs.xkcd.com/clickdrag/#y#s#x#w.png">
<cfhttp method="head" url="#testUrl#"
resolveurl="no" throwonerror="no"
<!--- Check if no status code or status code 404 --->
<cfif NOT IsDefined("cfhttp.responseheader.status_code")
OR cfhttp.responseheader.status_code EQ "404">
<cfset result=false>
<cfelse>
<cfoutput><a href="#testUrl#">#testUrl#</a></cfoutput><br
</cfif>
</cfloop>
</cfloop>
You really have to admire Marvel for how well they've handled their movie franchises the past decade, especially the Avengers arc. It's hard not to be in awe of what transpired to bring The Avengers to fruition. They made smart choices which eventually paid off handsomely. DC, outside the Nolan films, has botched everything. Warner Bros. just doesn't trust creative people to handle the material.
If you think that's all the Uncharted series is, then you haven't played it. It has its rails, but they're needed for what is an unmatched gaming experience.