Assuming the gun was legal, I would trust that anti-gun activist more. S/he knows the utility of a gun but still feels the negatives outweigh the personal benefits. On the other hand most anti-gun activists probably don't know anything about guns.
It's like when Warren Buffett, who has literally saved billions in tax loopholes, called for the government to end tax loopholes for the rich.
I was talking about a case where the items are trading on different markets (that's why I said _another market_). In your example this would be analogous to someone offering to buy something on craigslist while another person was offering to sell the thing on ebay. In these cases someone needs to coordinate the two markets by buying in one and selling in the other.
Well, if you only arbitrage ETFs against their related basket of stocks once a second, that means that the values could come apart and would only be restored once per second.
Thus if two people tried selling the same ETF in the same market in the same second (not a farfetched possibility) while the underlying stocks don't move in price, the second person could get a price that is too low (fundamentally speaking). However, an HFT could step in-between the two trades and make sure the EFT is correctly priced by putting in limit buy orders on the EFT and selling the stocks. The HFT could make a few pennies off the spread between the EFT and the constituent stocks, and the second EFT seller would get a better price.
This is an example of how fast trading and HFT companies add liquidity.
Right, when the stock market crashes, all the P/E ratios go down... This is pretty basic stuff—you want to buy low and sell high. So after a crash is a decent time to buy.
When the GP spoke of "todays [sic] stock markets" he was writing only a couple of days ago, not in 2001.
The markets "voluntarily" suspended it because 1) it wasn't that profitable compared to their other activities ("billions" is an over-estimate); 2) they were getting a lot of bad press over it; and 3) the SEC was going to ban it anywhere. Here's a direct link about NASDAQ banning flash trades. I doubt that made much difference to HFTs—I bet they're trading NASDAQ about as much as they did before that.
The problem with your argument is that items don't just get traded in one forum. For instance, if dollars are getting traded for yuan at one rate, and yuan are getting traded for euros at a different rate, that implies a unique correct exchange rate for dollars and euros. If these rates are varying quickly, only an HFT can keep the three rates (dollars:yuan, yuan:euros, dollars:euros) consistent on short time scales.
Microsoft is trading at 13:1 P/E ratio. Google is at 21. BP is at 4. The historical US average is 15. Clearly the P/E values alone don't support your argument.
Do you have any source for this information? From talking with traders, I'm under the impression that flash trading is a very niche market that most trading companies don't make much money from. Even the wikipedia article mentions that most flash trading programs have ended.
An item is liquid if it can be bought or sold relatively quickly without loss of value. Traders can add liquidity by making it easier to buy and sell securities.
For instance, suppose I'm trying to sell a share of an EFT (exchange traded fund, a basket of other stocks). Without HFTs, the EFT might go for something quite different than it's "true" value, measured in terms of its constituent stocks. With HFTs around, I can be pretty confident than one will allow me to sell my EFT share. And because the HFTs compete and try to out-arbitrage each other, I can sell my EFT share for within pennies of its true value.
But putting buyer and seller into contact does create liquidity and is the traditional (productive) role of the middleman.
For instance, suppose someone wants to sell item X for $29 in one market, and someone else wants to buy item X in another market for $30. The HFT can buy the item in the first market for $29, and sell it in the second for $30. The HFT makes a dollar and everyone is happy. Without someone trying to bridge the two markets, the buyer and seller wouldn't have been able to trade.
They're like insurance salesmen. They're simply trying for quantity and trying to live on margins, hoping that they don't get hit big by some massive info theft that they can't cover up or make disappear.
Uhh yeah, insurance is all a big scam that only morons buy into. No insurance company has ever paid out a claim and all that paperwork is just lies. Fortunately here at Slashdot we are too smart to be tricked into buying insurance. House fires and auto accidents are more lies by the megacorps/policitians.
The only reason the US isn't as strict is that the banks have used their powerful influence to make sure that nothing gets in the way of their ability to offer vast amounts of credit (home loans, car loans, personal loans, credit cards etc) to anyone and everyone.
Do you have any evidence of this? Because it also happens the other way around—the banks put up fake barriers to credit, and the government orders them to take them down due to fairness, anti-discrimination, etc.
I'm a bit suspicious when someone says that open source is "about" something or another, because open source isn't an essay or a single individual. You're right that a lot of people (including myself) work on open source out of their own generosity.
But from a non-programmers point of view, or society's point of view, an important question is whether there is enough open source software as there should be. For instance, before there was a welfare system could you say that feeding the hungry was about altruism and rich people showing off. That's true, but what if it turned out that that there simply weren't enough generous people to clothe and feed everyone?
The problem is really when software is widely distributed. The economics of open source software work fine when only one party benefits. But suppose for example that 1M people would each benefit $3 from some open source project. In theory that's $3M of benefit, easily enough to get a couple of developers full-time for a couple of years to get it done. But in reality that project would never get off the ground, or it would take one guy 15 years in his spare time (donating his own time) to pull it off.
It's just not clear how [open source] organizes a sustained and creative activity. Google is using this approach with Android. It's open source, but the money comes from someplace else. More broadly, how do people make a living and do something really creative? I think they have to organize it as a business. I'm all for sharing, but I recognize the truly great things may not come from that environment.
I can hear a lot of Slashdotters complaining that open source has succeeded and there's nothing wrong with today's system, but Bill Joy has a point. Sure some people have managed to make a living at open source, but how much quality open source is produced compared to how much should be produced by society? Unless you're the RIAA, it's hard to complain about what might have been.
The idea that the system is working fine is barely believable if you're an open source programmer, but I'm sure the failure is on a totally different level if you're working in alternative energy. Anyone with a computer can code in their spare time, but I'm sure it takes millions to even experiment with some of these green technologies.
you're more interested in the recognition than the achievement.
You're being uncharitable. All the OP asked was for an "to make interesting discoveries and potentially chart new territory"; he never mentioned wanting fame and fortune.
As you mentioned, some people love just love research for its own sake, and they may enjoy spending the rest of their life putzing around in their home even if they just "discover" something everyone in the field has known for years. But others want to make a positive contribution to society—they want to further humanity's knowledge, not just their own.
I think that's what the OP meant by "the potentially short-lived enjoyment factor". Hobbies can be interesting, but to many they become empty if you can't share them with the rest of the world.
I don't mean to be a skeptic, but I guess I fall into the camp that doesn't understand this. It seems that the control shaft is just used to undo the motion of the main input shaft. For instance, to go in reverse, the control shaft has to be going faster than the input shaft and would then be doing all the work. Furthermore it doesn't even solve the CVT part of it because the control shaft needs to be able to move through the same large range of speeds that the output does. If you had a control shaft that could do all this, why not just hook it up to the output?
Can someone explain to a non-engineer where I've gone wrong?
I don't understand why that letter is so controversial. From that wikipedia page it looks like it just classifies sexual abuse as one of the more serious offenses that a bishop isn't supposed to handle himself---instead he needs to kick the issue up to the next level (i.e. FBI not local police). Also there's nothing in there about secrecy. Shouldn't this prevent cover-ups, not cause them?
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Assuming the gun was legal, I would trust that anti-gun activist more. S/he knows the utility of a gun but still feels the negatives outweigh the personal benefits. On the other hand most anti-gun activists probably don't know anything about guns.
It's like when Warren Buffett, who has literally saved billions in tax loopholes, called for the government to end tax loopholes for the rich.
I was talking about a case where the items are trading on different markets (that's why I said _another market_). In your example this would be analogous to someone offering to buy something on craigslist while another person was offering to sell the thing on ebay. In these cases someone needs to coordinate the two markets by buying in one and selling in the other.
Well, if you only arbitrage ETFs against their related basket of stocks once a second, that means that the values could come apart and would only be restored once per second.
Thus if two people tried selling the same ETF in the same market in the same second (not a farfetched possibility) while the underlying stocks don't move in price, the second person could get a price that is too low (fundamentally speaking). However, an HFT could step in-between the two trades and make sure the EFT is correctly priced by putting in limit buy orders on the EFT and selling the stocks. The HFT could make a few pennies off the spread between the EFT and the constituent stocks, and the second EFT seller would get a better price.
This is an example of how fast trading and HFT companies add liquidity.
Right, when the stock market crashes, all the P/E ratios go down... This is pretty basic stuff—you want to buy low and sell high. So after a crash is a decent time to buy.
When the GP spoke of "todays [sic] stock markets" he was writing only a couple of days ago, not in 2001.
The markets "voluntarily" suspended it because 1) it wasn't that profitable compared to their other activities ("billions" is an over-estimate); 2) they were getting a lot of bad press over it; and 3) the SEC was going to ban it anywhere. Here's a direct link about NASDAQ banning flash trades. I doubt that made much difference to HFTs—I bet they're trading NASDAQ about as much as they did before that.
The problem with your argument is that items don't just get traded in one forum. For instance, if dollars are getting traded for yuan at one rate, and yuan are getting traded for euros at a different rate, that implies a unique correct exchange rate for dollars and euros. If these rates are varying quickly, only an HFT can keep the three rates (dollars:yuan, yuan:euros, dollars:euros) consistent on short time scales.
Microsoft is trading at 13:1 P/E ratio. Google is at 21. BP is at 4. The historical US average is 15. Clearly the P/E values alone don't support your argument.
Do you have any source for this information? From talking with traders, I'm under the impression that flash trading is a very niche market that most trading companies don't make much money from. Even the wikipedia article mentions that most flash trading programs have ended.
An item is liquid if it can be bought or sold relatively quickly without loss of value. Traders can add liquidity by making it easier to buy and sell securities.
For instance, suppose I'm trying to sell a share of an EFT (exchange traded fund, a basket of other stocks). Without HFTs, the EFT might go for something quite different than it's "true" value, measured in terms of its constituent stocks. With HFTs around, I can be pretty confident than one will allow me to sell my EFT share. And because the HFTs compete and try to out-arbitrage each other, I can sell my EFT share for within pennies of its true value.
But putting buyer and seller into contact does create liquidity and is the traditional (productive) role of the middleman.
For instance, suppose someone wants to sell item X for $29 in one market, and someone else wants to buy item X in another market for $30. The HFT can buy the item in the first market for $29, and sell it in the second for $30. The HFT makes a dollar and everyone is happy. Without someone trying to bridge the two markets, the buyer and seller wouldn't have been able to trade.
Wow, the only post that seems to know anything about the topic and it gets modded +5! It's a Slashdot miracle!
No, it is ironic, and a decent example of it. See situational irony.
That's certainly a matter of opinion. I really liked the film and most of my friends did also.
Uhh yeah, insurance is all a big scam that only morons buy into. No insurance company has ever paid out a claim and all that paperwork is just lies. Fortunately here at Slashdot we are too smart to be tricked into buying insurance. House fires and auto accidents are more lies by the megacorps/policitians.
Because it's cool to be cynical and against the "system".
Do you have any evidence of this? Because it also happens the other way around—the banks put up fake barriers to credit, and the government orders them to take them down due to fairness, anti-discrimination, etc.
I'm a bit suspicious when someone says that open source is "about" something or another, because open source isn't an essay or a single individual. You're right that a lot of people (including myself) work on open source out of their own generosity.
But from a non-programmers point of view, or society's point of view, an important question is whether there is enough open source software as there should be. For instance, before there was a welfare system could you say that feeding the hungry was about altruism and rich people showing off. That's true, but what if it turned out that that there simply weren't enough generous people to clothe and feed everyone?
The problem is really when software is widely distributed. The economics of open source software work fine when only one party benefits. But suppose for example that 1M people would each benefit $3 from some open source project. In theory that's $3M of benefit, easily enough to get a couple of developers full-time for a couple of years to get it done. But in reality that project would never get off the ground, or it would take one guy 15 years in his spare time (donating his own time) to pull it off.
I can hear a lot of Slashdotters complaining that open source has succeeded and there's nothing wrong with today's system, but Bill Joy has a point. Sure some people have managed to make a living at open source, but how much quality open source is produced compared to how much should be produced by society? Unless you're the RIAA, it's hard to complain about what might have been.
The idea that the system is working fine is barely believable if you're an open source programmer, but I'm sure the failure is on a totally different level if you're working in alternative energy. Anyone with a computer can code in their spare time, but I'm sure it takes millions to even experiment with some of these green technologies.
Wow, it looks like you're right. In Texas it's easier to buy a handgun or rifle than a pyrex flask.
I guess as far as hobbies go, ranchers, factory workers, and the other "real Texans" enjoy shooting more than science. Big surprise there.
You're being uncharitable. All the OP asked was for an "to make interesting discoveries and potentially chart new territory"; he never mentioned wanting fame and fortune.
As you mentioned, some people love just love research for its own sake, and they may enjoy spending the rest of their life putzing around in their home even if they just "discover" something everyone in the field has known for years. But others want to make a positive contribution to society—they want to further humanity's knowledge, not just their own.
I think that's what the OP meant by "the potentially short-lived enjoyment factor". Hobbies can be interesting, but to many they become empty if you can't share them with the rest of the world.
I don't mean to be a skeptic, but I guess I fall into the camp that doesn't understand this. It seems that the control shaft is just used to undo the motion of the main input shaft. For instance, to go in reverse, the control shaft has to be going faster than the input shaft and would then be doing all the work. Furthermore it doesn't even solve the CVT part of it because the control shaft needs to be able to move through the same large range of speeds that the output does. If you had a control shaft that could do all this, why not just hook it up to the output?
Can someone explain to a non-engineer where I've gone wrong?
How often did that laptop crash running OS X 10.6.2?
I don't understand why that letter is so controversial. From that wikipedia page it looks like it just classifies sexual abuse as one of the more serious offenses that a bishop isn't supposed to handle himself---instead he needs to kick the issue up to the next level (i.e. FBI not local police). Also there's nothing in there about secrecy. Shouldn't this prevent cover-ups, not cause them?
In case you still want to play text games, the genre is called interactive fiction and many authors are still interested in it.