The latter, restrictive operation of the clause was long the more important one from the point of view of the constitutional lawyer. Of the approximately 1400 cases which reached the Supreme Court under the clause prior to 1900, the overwhelming proportion stemmed from state legislation.578 The result was that, generally, the guiding lines in construction of the clause were initially laid down in the context of curbing state power rather than in that of its operation as a source of national power. The consequence of this historical progression was that the word ''commerce'' came to dominate the clause while the word ''regulate'' remained in the background.
As is recounted below, prior to reconsideration of the federal commerce power in the 1930s, the Court in effect followed a doctrine of ''dual federalism,'' under which Congress' power to regulate much activity depended on whether it had a ''direct'' rather than an ''indirect'' effect on interstate commerce.616 When the restrictive interpretation was swept away during and after the New Deal, the question of federalism limits respecting congressional regulation of private activities became moot. However, the States did in a number of instances engage in commercial activities that would be regulated by federal legislation if the enterprise were privately owned; the Court easily sustained application of federal law to these state proprietary activities.617 However, as Congress began to extend regulation to state governmental activities, the judicial response was inconsistent and wavering.618 While the Court may shift again to constrain federal power on federalism grounds, at the present time the rule is that Congress lacks authority under the commerce clause to regulate the States as States in some circumstances, when the federal statutory provisions reach only the States and do not bring the States under laws of general applicability.619
I'm sorry you feel my recent comments are trolls. I just looked back and all my initial comments on an article are on topic. If people replied and took it off topic, I may have replied and continued that thread.
Much of/. has headed in a political direction. If the original article says Congress or the like, don't you see a reason to condemn Congress' abuse of power?
So, yes, the federales can tell Microsoft where they can and can't sell their products.
I don't agree. I've studied the commerce clause and speeches of the time and believe that the clause is being read incorrectly. Even the mercantilist Whigs Clay and Hamilton believed in Federalism (States trump Central authorities). Commerce in 1780 did not mean business or economic passage but intercourse of human interaction. I strongly believe the clause was a limiting factor on Congress, not an unlimited power. Congress was to make sure that no State impeded trade, communications, travel or human progress. The Federalist Papers are key to this debate.
, it can be argued that the US has a strong strategic interest in seeing democracy flourish around the globe.
Considering that the US wasn't a democracy but a Republican Federalist Union of Independent States, I can't agree. Washington himself said trade with everyone, entangle alliances with no one.
ve a choice, and that choice is not to do business in those countries. There's nothing immoral in, effectively, blockading China's ability to buy software from American companies. That's anti-liberty and undeniably tyrannical. Let consumers make their own decisions.
What gives?
I was thinking the same! Odd.
I'm peeved about the elasticity given to our most prized documents -- we are at war with dozens of economies, we've demanded petrodollar use for decades and we're on the verge of collapse if we don't stop this imperialism. This past week we printed US$25 billion new dollars out of thin air, and no one says anything?
China isn't the bad guy -- consumers have decided this.
First, the last Constitutional war was declared in the 1930s or so -- WW2. Since then we've sent troops all over the world and currently quarter troops in over 100 countries.
Secondly I've resided in HK and China for business. In China I can open a business in under 4 hours, I can travel without ID and I can smoke, drink and rent prostitutes if any of those were my thing.
FYI, Iran's nuclear energy policy is a shill excuse for US intervention. Our politicos fear not nuke weapons, they fear Iran offering to sell oil for non-petrodollars. Iraq tried this twice and the US flattened them (using WMDs again as an excuse).
Do a Google for Iran bourse petrodollars for more info.
Nope, nothing here giving Congress any authority to regulate business in the U.S., let alone China.
FWIW, China isn't the worst government. I know of one that warmongers in 100 countries as we speak, forcing oil-buying countries to use this Empire's currency, all the while stomping on its own citizens' rights and freedoms while pretending to defend liberty.
It is the job of the citizens of China to restrain themselves ("government"), not businesses.
Hit me up with an e-mail. I have an e-book about dating advice for poor bald fat geeks. I dated many hot girls, married one -- they all thought I was poor.
Most geeks I meet have negative net equity due to outrageous debt loads. Maybe it's just Chicago? It seems that every geek here thinks they can live like Sergei Brin.
I wonder if all the common people see are (leased) BMW's, (interest-only mortgaged) 5-bedroom homes and (almost maxed out) platinum cards when they see supergeeks?
v I spent years in the transit industry, which is one of the places where ADA has caused the biggest changes.
Because of ADA or because the transportation companies realized it woul make good market sense? The problem I have with ADA and the transit industry is the increased costs for everyone. You're talking about the many OVERPAYING for the few. I don't think it is fair to make everyone disabled financially -- and I'm the one paying for a few members of my own family (and employees) who are disabled. Regulations don't seem to help as far as I can tell -- I don't see a boom in the number of disabled people I see in daily life. You'd think with all these new "fixes" we'd see more of them.
. And if the demand for ramps caused by the ADA is really that great, you'd think more ramp contractors would have shown up to at least partially offset the increased demand.
Yeah, sure. Doctors are in high demand but we don't see more of them. Regulations come with a dark hand of evil: licensing. Good luck trying to overcome the barrier to industry that government creates. Want to make ramps? Get licensed. Want to get licensed? Get in line.
?" The whole idea behind disability-law reform is to allow people to move and live independently, not at the mercy (i.e. pity) of bouncers (or relatives, or anyone else). If disabled customers can't get into a business without begging for help, and the business refuses to upgrade accordingly, the business should be shut down.
Yet this bar was in business for 20 years and they did fine with their disabled customers. It was only once they had to "comply" that they got shut down -- losing all their customers.
How about forcing men's clothing stores to sell women's clothing, too? How about we get toupee stores to also carry items for those with hair? How about we force lingerie stores to carry sexy clothing for the grossly obese? Why not force Christian book stores to carry secular items?
Businesses start to focus on a particular group of people. My skateboad shops had to meet ADA compliance in the bathrooms -- $5000 a piece in added cost. Over 4 years I never had ONE person in a wheelchair come in. Oh, and I had to have 3 handicapped parking spaces out of the 7 I was allotted. Guess how many people used it? Just my handicapped brother-in-law, once in 4 years. He LIVED in the town my store was in and never visited.
These regulations are ridiculous. Pity? No, people help the disabled out of concern and out of profit-motives. If a bar doesn't want to help a wheelchair bound person come into their business, the wheelchair bound person is free to tell others online, and I bet anything the bar would come under a lot of criticism.
Shutting them down for refusing to pay $150,000 for an elevator is crazy. Or they could make their $1 beer into a $4 beer and hope that 50,000 people will be happy to pay for it.
Good post. Sorry to hear about your disabilities. I concur about getting a wheelchair -- my brother-in-law that passed away needed a wheelchair, but since they're normally paid for with public dollars, they're almost impossible to buy privately. They were thousands and thousands of dollars and impossible to get. So he waited for one for 2 years (public aid) and bought a used one (1970s model) for around $400.
I'm assuming that you're finding more ability to "get around" because of the Internet, not less, right? My father is now legally blind and the Internet has completely changed his life.
Here's the thing though -- no "broadcast" format is good for the new form of contextual user-desired advertising that AdSense is moving towards. AdSense isn't just about being contextually accurate with the website you're visiting, I believe that this year they'll also tie in the browsing user's habits to create truly two-way contextual ads. You can't do this when you're broadcasting to 5 million people.
Streaming on-demand music and voice has to happen. Podcasting is nice and all, but wireless "podcasting" would utterly destroy radio (satellite or public airwaves). It can be done, and done cheaply, if we deregulate much of the currently inefficiently used spectrum.
How do you dictate if spectrum is efficiently used? If the advertising dollars go up with time, not down. The deals in radio advertising now are cheaper than anytime in my history of advertising (13 years).
These are my top 3 favorite articles (different authors, same website that keeps a good list of pro-liberty pieces). Read them and you'll see that the ADA is not helpful.
By the way, I have disabled friends and family who all agree it is harder to get a job and costlier to be disabled now than 10 years ago. What is your basis to repudiate what they've told me? Are you disabled? Do you live with a disabled person? Do you employ disabled people? I have a full time IT tech that is deaf who has worked for me for 3 years, and I pay him double what he received at his previous job. I also have a blind sales person who travels for me (he's legally blid 20/400 in his best eye) internationally. I do think I have something to say over what you do, my "theory" is based on facts in dealing with the disabled. Your "theory" seems to be based on class warfare.
Quite the tower of Babel there. I'd hate to be at an international conference.
Haha. Here's the thing though: in all my international travels (quite high in number) in the past 10 years, I have yet to meet anyone who doesn't understand English numbers. I've met old ladies in small stores in the backwoods of Poland who can understand THREE THREE ZERO DOLLARS.
When it comes to the States, I can't even think of one person I've met who doesn't speak English, except for the hispanic church that rents my church out on Saturday:)
Do you have ad-blindness, or in this case, ad-deafness?
If the radio spectrum was gone, deregulated to increase WiFi bandwidth, would you see yourself using on-demand streaming "radio" if it was available freely and you had the right tuner for it?
To me, "broad"-casting is a dead mechanism. There are two things holding it back -- the distribution cartels don't want to change (they've invested billions in the current hardware and political arena), and the force cartel (government) is too in bed with the distribution cartels to offer any change.
This is why I prefer a free market -- it is able to change on a whim as it meets the current needs of the consumers. The regulated market is so slow to react.
I'm fucking sick of people who bitch about things that are put in place to help our disabled neighbors
I sick of people like you who force people like me to do something against our will.
First, my brother-in-law is fully disabled, and we will be taking care of him when my mother-in-law passes on.
Second, my other brother-in-law had MS (and died recently) and he was wheelchair bound.
I deal with disabled people in my family, and I have some friends who are disabled as well. They agree with me that the ADA laws are made in order to control businesses and take care of cronies (who own many companies that handle ADA compliance).
My experience as a business owner:
A bar I used to go to was upstairs. They had no elevator. The 2 wheelchair bound customers was always helped up the stairs by the bouncers, and they never had a complaint. The bar had $1 beers. When they had a small kitchen fire, they had to close down because the repairs couldn't be performed without updating the club to ADA compliance -- requiring $150,000 in upgrades. The building to this day is unused for this reason.
My church received a $1 million donation of a building we needed to expand. The building was built in 1953, like an old fashioned church. It has great acoustics (I direct video and sound). We need to knock out a wall to handle the additional 100 people we're expecting to come. We can't. The previous church installed a $50,000 elevator, but the ADA compliance people say we need to put one in the front of the building (there isn't room). We can't expand.
A neighbor of mine recently became disabled. He called a company to build a ramp so he can get up to his home. Because of government mandates of ADA compliance, the price of building ramps is over 3 times higher than it should be given the amount of work that is being performed. Companies know they can charge more because they are mandated to do work.
The law doesn't help the disabled, it helps the enabled who happen to have on bigger disability: they're friends with those in office.
As an AdSense publisher, I've heard from "peers" that they prefer the payouts of Yahoo's contextual advertising program. I personally don't see AdSense being a big income unless you want to work for $1 per hour for 2 years, but its definitely a nice way to get an additional tip for content.
In the long run, though, Google's aggregation algorithms seem to be getting better every day. In the future, AdSense won't just offer contextual ads based on the site, but also based on the browsing user.
It's still everywhere, and everyone has access to it. Believe it or not, even having a broadband connection at home puts you in the minority, buddy.
Of course I am. I don't want to get into my usual anti-copyright debate today, but copyright gives the content cartels control of the media schemes use to publish content -- keeping streaming companies from being as competitive as the radio cartel.
If streamers had the ability to offer content as cheap as the radio can (in terms of paying off the content thugs), you'd better believe we'd have lobbyists trying to shut radio down and bring in more wireless bandwidth.
Actually, you make a very valid point (maybe without realizing it).
The radio ad-sales people are some of the best I've ever met -- in every market I've been in. Is Google buying up this aggressive sales company in order to accumulate the best sales minds and personalities to use to sell AdWords and other tools to advertisers?
If you can't hire them away, buy their bosses out.
I don't think it needs to be said at every floor it passes, only at the floor it stops at. Or is that what you meant?
The weird thing is, I know I've been in elevators with blind people (considering I make about 1000+ rides a year and I've maybe seen a handful in my life) and almost always I've had to let them know what floor it was. I don't think the current system works, but it probably placates the ADA cops.
I had to stop advertising on the radio last year -- it was declining returns. On my last (contractually required) run of ads, I paid over US$800 per customer earned. Considering I only profited about US$100 per year off of my average customer, radio was a dead form of advertising. This is on a 50,000 watt station in a major metropolitan area. My neighbors in business who kept their ads running this year only do so out of contractual obligation (5 year contracts offered almost 50% discounts). Almost everyone else still advertising on that station is the next batch of businesses ready to fail. The ad-sales people are that convincing.
Google is probably stupid to get into this business. I don't listen to the radio anymore, and I doubt many kids half my age do anymore either -- the iPod is that strong. The frequencies used for public broadcast radio seem wasted to me -- I'd rather see them deregulated and offered for another WiFi band. More WiFi means more access to streamed content as I need it. Hell, I stream MP3s to my PDA already via my Bluetooth-enabled EDGE-bandwidth cell phone (150kbps low latency all over Chicagoland).
So what does Google know that I don't? I'm sure a lot, but I can't see them being right in this situation. Maybe they're ahead of where radio will be in 10 years -- is it possible we'll see the large radio cartels end their regime, replaced with smaller stations all over the place? Could Google perform real time contextual advertising on 5000 watt stations, targeting listenes better?
Google's advertising engines don't work well on pages with too much variety it content. I see 50,000 watt stations having the same problem -- they're targeting too many different customers (and seemingly targeting them with the same generic content on 8 different stations).
How do Google's ads translate to those without sight? Radio only works as an audio mechanism, so Google's visible advertising campaign won't work here, either.
I can see Google's future in buying a company like Clear Channel -- they own most of the billboard advertising in Chicagoland, and they are also advertising in nightclub bathrooms and on the doors of toilets in office buildings. Google can find a way to digitize these ads. Is it possible that dMarc Broadcasting does more than radio (like Clear Channel)?
If it is just radio ads, I don't see it. Wasted bandwidth for a product that can't keep up with what the current customer base needs.
A voice system is complex? My neighbor had a Halloween pumpkin that said 50 different phrases in gorgeous clarity that he paid around $10 for at the drug store.
Sorry, but I don't buy it. In fact, I bet in 10 years the bing WILL be gone. Voice response makes more sense than trying to count bings.
Slashdot Mirror
Thousands of cases before FDR stacked the SCOTUS to keep his tyrannical New Deal intact:
c e.html
http://www.landmarkcases.org/landmarkframe_commer
The latter, restrictive operation of the clause was long the more important one from the point of view of the constitutional lawyer. Of the approximately 1400 cases which reached the Supreme Court under the clause prior to 1900, the overwhelming proportion stemmed from state legislation.578 The result was that, generally, the guiding lines in construction of the clause were initially laid down in the context of curbing state power rather than in that of its operation as a source of national power. The consequence of this historical progression was that the word ''commerce'' came to dominate the clause while the word ''regulate'' remained in the background.
As is recounted below, prior to reconsideration of the federal commerce power in the 1930s, the Court in effect followed a doctrine of ''dual federalism,'' under which Congress' power to regulate much activity depended on whether it had a ''direct'' rather than an ''indirect'' effect on interstate commerce.616 When the restrictive interpretation was swept away during and after the New Deal, the question of federalism limits respecting congressional regulation of private activities became moot. However, the States did in a number of instances engage in commercial activities that would be regulated by federal legislation if the enterprise were privately owned; the Court easily sustained application of federal law to these state proprietary activities.617 However, as Congress began to extend regulation to state governmental activities, the judicial response was inconsistent and wavering.618 While the Court may shift again to constrain federal power on federalism grounds, at the present time the rule is that Congress lacks authority under the commerce clause to regulate the States as States in some circumstances, when the federal statutory provisions reach only the States and do not bring the States under laws of general applicability.619
I believe Justice Marshal through it all to hell.
I'm sorry you feel my recent comments are trolls. I just looked back and all my initial comments on an article are on topic. If people replied and took it off topic, I may have replied and continued that thread.
/. has headed in a political direction. If the original article says Congress or the like, don't you see a reason to condemn Congress' abuse of power?
Much of
http://www.lewrockwell.com/vance/vance8.html
I was wrong, it isn't 100 countries it's ~130-something.
Out of nearly 200.
So, yes, the federales can tell Microsoft where they can and can't sell their products.
I don't agree. I've studied the commerce clause and speeches of the time and believe that the clause is being read incorrectly. Even the mercantilist Whigs Clay and Hamilton believed in Federalism (States trump Central authorities). Commerce in 1780 did not mean business or economic passage but intercourse of human interaction. I strongly believe the clause was a limiting factor on Congress, not an unlimited power. Congress was to make sure that no State impeded trade, communications, travel or human progress. The Federalist Papers are key to this debate.
, it can be argued that the US has a strong strategic interest in seeing democracy flourish around the globe.
Considering that the US wasn't a democracy but a Republican Federalist Union of Independent States, I can't agree. Washington himself said trade with everyone, entangle alliances with no one.
ve a choice, and that choice is not to do business in those countries. There's nothing immoral in, effectively, blockading China's ability to buy software from American companies.
That's anti-liberty and undeniably tyrannical. Let consumers make their own decisions.
What gives?
I was thinking the same! Odd.
I'm peeved about the elasticity given to our most prized documents -- we are at war with dozens of economies, we've demanded petrodollar use for decades and we're on the verge of collapse if we don't stop this imperialism. This past week we printed US$25 billion new dollars out of thin air, and no one says anything?
China isn't the bad guy -- consumers have decided this.
First, the last Constitutional war was declared in the 1930s or so -- WW2. Since then we've sent troops all over the world and currently quarter troops in over 100 countries.
Secondly I've resided in HK and China for business. In China I can open a business in under 4 hours, I can travel without ID and I can smoke, drink and rent prostitutes if any of those were my thing.
It's called the interstate commerce clause. Or did you sleep through high school government class?
Ahh the fine teachers unions and their education!
The interstate commerce clause was written to prevent individual states from taxing, tariffing or embargoing trade with other states.
Read your history, you'll see this to be true.
FYI, Iran's nuclear energy policy is a shill excuse for US intervention. Our politicos fear not nuke weapons, they fear Iran offering to sell oil for non-petrodollars. Iraq tried this twice and the US flattened them (using WMDs again as an excuse).
Do a Google for Iran bourse petrodollars for more info.
China... China... China...
Nope, nothing here giving Congress any authority to regulate business in the U.S., let alone China.
FWIW, China isn't the worst government. I know of one that warmongers in 100 countries as we speak, forcing oil-buying countries to use this Empire's currency, all the while stomping on its own citizens' rights and freedoms while pretending to defend liberty.
It is the job of the citizens of China to restrain themselves ("government"), not businesses.
(what girl wants a poor guy)
Every girl.
Hit me up with an e-mail. I have an e-book about dating advice for poor bald fat geeks. I dated many hot girls, married one -- they all thought I was poor.
When did wealth mean "big credit lines?"
Most geeks I meet have negative net equity due to outrageous debt loads. Maybe it's just Chicago? It seems that every geek here thinks they can live like Sergei Brin.
I wonder if all the common people see are (leased) BMW's, (interest-only mortgaged) 5-bedroom homes and (almost maxed out) platinum cards when they see supergeeks?
Talk about keeping up with the Joneses.
The FP'er is a karma whoring subscriber who gets a preview of upcoming articles so he can pre-write his comments.
He's a nutcase, I hear.
v I spent years in the transit industry, which is one of the places where ADA has caused the biggest changes.
Because of ADA or because the transportation companies realized it woul make good market sense? The problem I have with ADA and the transit industry is the increased costs for everyone. You're talking about the many OVERPAYING for the few. I don't think it is fair to make everyone disabled financially -- and I'm the one paying for a few members of my own family (and employees) who are disabled. Regulations don't seem to help as far as I can tell -- I don't see a boom in the number of disabled people I see in daily life. You'd think with all these new "fixes" we'd see more of them.
. And if the demand for ramps caused by the ADA is really that great, you'd think more ramp contractors would have shown up to at least partially offset the increased demand.
Yeah, sure. Doctors are in high demand but we don't see more of them. Regulations come with a dark hand of evil: licensing. Good luck trying to overcome the barrier to industry that government creates. Want to make ramps? Get licensed. Want to get licensed? Get in line.
?" The whole idea behind disability-law reform is to allow people to move and live independently, not at the mercy (i.e. pity) of bouncers (or relatives, or anyone else). If disabled customers can't get into a business without begging for help, and the business refuses to upgrade accordingly, the business should be shut down.
Yet this bar was in business for 20 years and they did fine with their disabled customers. It was only once they had to "comply" that they got shut down -- losing all their customers.
How about forcing men's clothing stores to sell women's clothing, too? How about we get toupee stores to also carry items for those with hair? How about we force lingerie stores to carry sexy clothing for the grossly obese? Why not force Christian book stores to carry secular items?
Businesses start to focus on a particular group of people. My skateboad shops had to meet ADA compliance in the bathrooms -- $5000 a piece in added cost. Over 4 years I never had ONE person in a wheelchair come in. Oh, and I had to have 3 handicapped parking spaces out of the 7 I was allotted. Guess how many people used it? Just my handicapped brother-in-law, once in 4 years. He LIVED in the town my store was in and never visited.
These regulations are ridiculous. Pity? No, people help the disabled out of concern and out of profit-motives. If a bar doesn't want to help a wheelchair bound person come into their business, the wheelchair bound person is free to tell others online, and I bet anything the bar would come under a lot of criticism.
Shutting them down for refusing to pay $150,000 for an elevator is crazy. Or they could make their $1 beer into a $4 beer and hope that 50,000 people will be happy to pay for it.
Good post. Sorry to hear about your disabilities. I concur about getting a wheelchair -- my brother-in-law that passed away needed a wheelchair, but since they're normally paid for with public dollars, they're almost impossible to buy privately. They were thousands and thousands of dollars and impossible to get. So he waited for one for 2 years (public aid) and bought a used one (1970s model) for around $400.
I'm assuming that you're finding more ability to "get around" because of the Internet, not less, right? My father is now legally blind and the Internet has completely changed his life.
Here's the thing though -- no "broadcast" format is good for the new form of contextual user-desired advertising that AdSense is moving towards. AdSense isn't just about being contextually accurate with the website you're visiting, I believe that this year they'll also tie in the browsing user's habits to create truly two-way contextual ads. You can't do this when you're broadcasting to 5 million people.
Streaming on-demand music and voice has to happen. Podcasting is nice and all, but wireless "podcasting" would utterly destroy radio (satellite or public airwaves). It can be done, and done cheaply, if we deregulate much of the currently inefficiently used spectrum.
How do you dictate if spectrum is efficiently used? If the advertising dollars go up with time, not down. The deals in radio advertising now are cheaper than anytime in my history of advertising (13 years).
That's simply false and doesn't even merit a response.
Let's see how I can pwn this comment with a response of some articles covering how the disabled are hurt by the ADA laws and complaince regulations:
If You Weren't Disabled Before the ADA, You Are Now by Greg Perry
ADA Success? At What?
What is disabled?
These are my top 3 favorite articles (different authors, same website that keeps a good list of pro-liberty pieces). Read them and you'll see that the ADA is not helpful.
By the way, I have disabled friends and family who all agree it is harder to get a job and costlier to be disabled now than 10 years ago. What is your basis to repudiate what they've told me? Are you disabled? Do you live with a disabled person? Do you employ disabled people? I have a full time IT tech that is deaf who has worked for me for 3 years, and I pay him double what he received at his previous job. I also have a blind sales person who travels for me (he's legally blid 20/400 in his best eye) internationally. I do think I have something to say over what you do, my "theory" is based on facts in dealing with the disabled. Your "theory" seems to be based on class warfare.
Quite the tower of Babel there. I'd hate to be at an international conference.
:)
Haha. Here's the thing though: in all my international travels (quite high in number) in the past 10 years, I have yet to meet anyone who doesn't understand English numbers. I've met old ladies in small stores in the backwoods of Poland who can understand THREE THREE ZERO DOLLARS.
When it comes to the States, I can't even think of one person I've met who doesn't speak English, except for the hispanic church that rents my church out on Saturday
Interesting.
Do you have ad-blindness, or in this case, ad-deafness?
If the radio spectrum was gone, deregulated to increase WiFi bandwidth, would you see yourself using on-demand streaming "radio" if it was available freely and you had the right tuner for it?
To me, "broad"-casting is a dead mechanism. There are two things holding it back -- the distribution cartels don't want to change (they've invested billions in the current hardware and political arena), and the force cartel (government) is too in bed with the distribution cartels to offer any change.
This is why I prefer a free market -- it is able to change on a whim as it meets the current needs of the consumers. The regulated market is so slow to react.
I'm fucking sick of people who bitch about things that are put in place to help our disabled neighbors
I sick of people like you who force people like me to do something against our will.
First, my brother-in-law is fully disabled, and we will be taking care of him when my mother-in-law passes on.
Second, my other brother-in-law had MS (and died recently) and he was wheelchair bound.
I deal with disabled people in my family, and I have some friends who are disabled as well. They agree with me that the ADA laws are made in order to control businesses and take care of cronies (who own many companies that handle ADA compliance).
My experience as a business owner:
A bar I used to go to was upstairs. They had no elevator. The 2 wheelchair bound customers was always helped up the stairs by the bouncers, and they never had a complaint. The bar had $1 beers. When they had a small kitchen fire, they had to close down because the repairs couldn't be performed without updating the club to ADA compliance -- requiring $150,000 in upgrades. The building to this day is unused for this reason.
My church received a $1 million donation of a building we needed to expand. The building was built in 1953, like an old fashioned church. It has great acoustics (I direct video and sound). We need to knock out a wall to handle the additional 100 people we're expecting to come. We can't. The previous church installed a $50,000 elevator, but the ADA compliance people say we need to put one in the front of the building (there isn't room). We can't expand.
A neighbor of mine recently became disabled. He called a company to build a ramp so he can get up to his home. Because of government mandates of ADA compliance, the price of building ramps is over 3 times higher than it should be given the amount of work that is being performed. Companies know they can charge more because they are mandated to do work.
The law doesn't help the disabled, it helps the enabled who happen to have on bigger disability: they're friends with those in office.
As an AdSense publisher, I've heard from "peers" that they prefer the payouts of Yahoo's contextual advertising program. I personally don't see AdSense being a big income unless you want to work for $1 per hour for 2 years, but its definitely a nice way to get an additional tip for content.
In the long run, though, Google's aggregation algorithms seem to be getting better every day. In the future, AdSense won't just offer contextual ads based on the site, but also based on the browsing user.
It's still everywhere, and everyone has access to it. Believe it or not, even having a broadband connection at home puts you in the minority, buddy.
Of course I am. I don't want to get into my usual anti-copyright debate today, but copyright gives the content cartels control of the media schemes use to publish content -- keeping streaming companies from being as competitive as the radio cartel.
If streamers had the ability to offer content as cheap as the radio can (in terms of paying off the content thugs), you'd better believe we'd have lobbyists trying to shut radio down and bring in more wireless bandwidth.
Actually, you make a very valid point (maybe without realizing it).
The radio ad-sales people are some of the best I've ever met -- in every market I've been in. Is Google buying up this aggressive sales company in order to accumulate the best sales minds and personalities to use to sell AdWords and other tools to advertisers?
If you can't hire them away, buy their bosses out.
I don't think it needs to be said at every floor it passes, only at the floor it stops at. Or is that what you meant?
The weird thing is, I know I've been in elevators with blind people (considering I make about 1000+ rides a year and I've maybe seen a handful in my life) and almost always I've had to let them know what floor it was. I don't think the current system works, but it probably placates the ADA cops.
I had to stop advertising on the radio last year -- it was declining returns. On my last (contractually required) run of ads, I paid over US$800 per customer earned. Considering I only profited about US$100 per year off of my average customer, radio was a dead form of advertising. This is on a 50,000 watt station in a major metropolitan area. My neighbors in business who kept their ads running this year only do so out of contractual obligation (5 year contracts offered almost 50% discounts). Almost everyone else still advertising on that station is the next batch of businesses ready to fail. The ad-sales people are that convincing.
Google is probably stupid to get into this business. I don't listen to the radio anymore, and I doubt many kids half my age do anymore either -- the iPod is that strong. The frequencies used for public broadcast radio seem wasted to me -- I'd rather see them deregulated and offered for another WiFi band. More WiFi means more access to streamed content as I need it. Hell, I stream MP3s to my PDA already via my Bluetooth-enabled EDGE-bandwidth cell phone (150kbps low latency all over Chicagoland).
So what does Google know that I don't? I'm sure a lot, but I can't see them being right in this situation. Maybe they're ahead of where radio will be in 10 years -- is it possible we'll see the large radio cartels end their regime, replaced with smaller stations all over the place? Could Google perform real time contextual advertising on 5000 watt stations, targeting listenes better?
Google's advertising engines don't work well on pages with too much variety it content. I see 50,000 watt stations having the same problem -- they're targeting too many different customers (and seemingly targeting them with the same generic content on 8 different stations).
How do Google's ads translate to those without sight? Radio only works as an audio mechanism, so Google's visible advertising campaign won't work here, either.
I can see Google's future in buying a company like Clear Channel -- they own most of the billboard advertising in Chicagoland, and they are also advertising in nightclub bathrooms and on the doors of toilets in office buildings. Google can find a way to digitize these ads. Is it possible that dMarc Broadcasting does more than radio (like Clear Channel)?
If it is just radio ads, I don't see it. Wasted bandwidth for a product that can't keep up with what the current customer base needs.
I've been pushing AQ2 everywhere and the numbers worldwide have jumped about 300% in 6 months.
:)
Come check it out: http://www.aq2world.com/?p=faq
Expect to download about 2 Gigs of maps and data though
A voice system is complex? My neighbor had a Halloween pumpkin that said 50 different phrases in gorgeous clarity that he paid around $10 for at the drug store.
Sorry, but I don't buy it. In fact, I bet in 10 years the bing WILL be gone. Voice response makes more sense than trying to count bings.