If you were counting on your creative works to support your family, you'd think differently. Would, not might.
Over 60% of my income comes from creative productions of mine. 100% of my written books and newsletters are not copywritten and never will be. I openly ask people to copy my work, I ask other publishers to bootleg it, and I openly ask my reader to give them to friends or quote it without giving me as a source.
Guess what? I get MORE money from the copying than I would if I didn't ask for the "piracy."
My brother is in a band. He just produced his second CD -- it was a US$10,000 production including duplications. I convinced him to let people copy, MP3 and even bootleg the music for their uses completely. He's already expecting double the number of people at his shows based on doing the same thing with his EP.
Copyright is a fallacy. There is no copyright protection without having a gang of thugs with gun s to back it up. Anyone who earns money from creative works knows fully well that copyright is only there to protect the publishing organizations who create nothing -- they just use copyright to retain control of the distribution media.
Take a hike if you've never written anything for a profit and believe copyright helps authors.
Loved the show, loved the movie. The lady and I still fall asleep to the TV show episodes on a regular basis (bedtime viewing).
If Whedon isn't interested in retrying the show in an iTunes/download model, it is because he doesn't have faith in his own creation and he doesn't have the balls to take a risky venture. This guy is Hollywood now, and there's no turning back.
Great news, geeks: we can do it ourselves. How? Fanvids. Right now they're not the greatest quality, but just wait for what the next generation can do. Screw copyright (I'm against it). Whedon calls it dead, so to me that is public domain. Take it, write better episodes. Find another Firefly ship with another crew and go deeper into the universe of Browncoats and the Alliance.
There's a virtually endless supply of land, for the time being.
My money is held in gold and silver (where it is safe), and in my businesses (where it earns me between 25% and 100% net profit annually). Stocks? So other people can pay themselves huge bonuses? Stocks? So brokers can screw me if I win and screw me if I don't? Stocks? Where I have to hope that regulations are followed or the company can be bankrupted? I think not.
I make more money doing less work as I push my value more by not pushing my value more. I also am an anarchocapitalist, so I hold different beliefs than the typical "I know economics and I learned it in college!!!" professional. My life revolves around time preference, not what I think people other than myself should be paid.
I know I could raise a kid and not lose a cent of what I'm worth -- but I value myself properly. Others run around thinking they're making real money while not really offering their customers (who would be their bosses if they're salaried) a return on the money spent on their labor. If I charge someone $1000 for something, they better see an immediately or short term gross return of $2000 on that labor. That is how you know you are worth what you command -- people see a return on the money spent.
This is also why I see such failures in the IT business in the US. So many people do work for $30 that can be performed internationally for $5. Is it bad for business? No, it is great for business -- it opens up doors for people to earn $60 for new work in the same time they used to charge $30. We just have people who don't want to continue building their personal value and their business value.
Good post, glad you're a success. Get a prodigy to mentor to, you'll see your knowledge passed on.
The house was owned cash, but I had other properties, too, as I did businesses in multiple cities.
Even if someone pays off their mortgage, in this country it seems we're in an endless race to upgrade. A very close friend of mine is single and now owns a 3000 square foot home and owes US$400,000 on it (US$700,000 house).
Not everyone can live in a trailer -- I understand that. Yet manufacturer homes are a great way to temporarily exit the housing market IF you believe there is a bubble. I am a firm believer that houses should depreciate over time, not appreciate. As long as houses continue to go up in price, it is a sign to me of inflation and manipulation of the marketplace, and I'll continue to live in a VERY nice trailer. When (and if?) the bubble bursts, I'll take my gold and my properties that I've held on to, sell them and hopefully buy a decent new home at a significant savings.
Here's a response that'll tickle the feminists. Babies make IT a bad business for women.
I own an IT company. We've hired women in the past. We've tried to get younger females with good brains to get into the computer science market and attend colleges and programs. Yet we've seen a very high quitting percentage over the past 10 years, and so have almost all of my competitors (who I'll get beers with).
The number one reason why women have left my industry has been child-rearing. If you're a guy, try leaving the business for a year or two, and see how competitive you are when you get back.
Many women I know today (younger ones, 18-25) seem to actually be thinking of babies, whereas when I was 18-25, most of my gal pals were thinking of becoming lawyers, doctors and, yes, even engineers. Maybe society is feeling a change back to the "old bad ways" of women raising kids and men working. I'm not saying this is the best or the worst way to live, but I don't have kids so it doesn't affect me, really.
Expect to see fewer women in the market place for a decade, either way -- in IT our in other industries.
I'm not a rich man -- rich is measured in dollars of equity and savings. I feel I'm a wealthy man -- wealth is measured in free time and long term ability to earn and spend. I may have less "on the books" than the guy I used to be, but I have way more security in my future as well as the time I can spend doing thing I like to do.
As for wind -- I spent almost US$5000 on security my trailer to the ground with a system that is more stable than most 60 year old houses. Also, my trailer has one of the highest R-ratings, so my heating bill is over 70% lower than my old house. Also, the view that trailers are unsafe more a myth than a reality, given that my insurance costs are also way lower than home living.
Argh, I hit submit too soon. I also wanted to comment that I publish a 24 issue a year print newsletter called Mobile Home Millionaire that is ready by almost 1000 subscribers (and 1000 free gift given ones) around the country. If you find yourself making over US$50,000 a year and are perpetually broke, I can tell you how to become a millionaire and live a great life by ignoring what your friends are doing with their money, and returning to a life more suited to having fun.
There will come a time soon than many families will find themselves heavily burdened by debt directly due to housing and the pay-it-down-and-refinance game. I fear that many geeks here will have the same future if they're not careful.
Actually, I sold my 1600 square foot home (worth over US$250,000) and bought a US$40,000 trailer with over 1600 square feet. Why? US$210,000 that I now have in my pocket to spend on vacations, business trips, and new ways to make me money. Some of my neighbors are friends of mine who sold their US$500,000 for 2200 square foot trailers. Why? The same reason -- we took advantage of the housing bubble (caused by regulations, mind you).
If you think living in a trailer is trashy, I applaud you -- it is why I can continue to live in housing that costs me less than US$3000 per year (including property taxes) and pocket the US$2000 a month in mortgage to spend on other things I like.
In the next 3 years I'll move at least 60 people with similar lives as mine into my community -- and we'll all live high on the hog getting rid of the 38% overhead of living in a "house." In fact, I've been able to cut my work hours almost in HALF and have more money in my pocket at year's end.
Don't knock it just because you want to keep up with the Joneses. The Joneses are in debt and live beyond their means and will have to both work until they're 65 to pay off their excesses. Me? My family loves life and has smiles on our face when we go shopping with cash in our pocket. It seems like everyone else we see has a frown and wonders if that plastic card will say "denied" at the register.
In recent studies by many organization, public transportation costs more per mile than do cars. Public buses and subways pollute more, require more employees to maintain the bureaucracy and clog up the highways and roadways for the cars and cycles.
The insurance industry is more expensive BECAUSE of regulations and mandates. Before the HMO Act of 1974, everyone could afford private healthcare. After government required it and forced corporations to offer it, prices went up. Add in public healthcare such as medicare and medicaid and you see a bigger increase in prices. Don't believe that it is regulation that makes health care better or cheaper. In fact, we had great health care for decades until government stepped in.
Anti-trust is another issue I disagree with. I have never seen a monopoly except those enforced by government. We just have to agree to disagree, except your policies affect how I live. My policies don't force you to do anything you don't want to.
My Samsung t809 ($249 with 1 year contract extension) has Bluetooth file sharing and comes with a USB port that tethers as a mass storage device. The cable was "free."
This came out of competition over the past year to get rid of proprietary standards. Ring tones made a LOT of money for a lot of people, but some decided they'd rather hurt those profits and open up how phones handle ring tones. Now my family all has cell phones that use MP3 ringtones, all in the past year.
The other place competition has helped the cell industry is moving towards mini-USB ports for charging and for connectivity. Again, this happened without regulations or mandates, but out of a free market.
I've been in business since the age of 13 and there has never been a market I couldn't enter. Even today there are markets for ISPs -- I'm starting a wireless ISP in my trailer park in March (I have over 70 customers signed up and ready to prepay to set it all up). Don't think you know business if you haven't run a business.
All this theory is bunk -- I've been there and I can tell you that businesses don't combine often. I see more of everything in the unregulated markets, and I see less in the regulated ones. When a market is de-regulated by Congress, it really isn't true de-regulation, its basically reshuffling of preferential rules in order to keep the small guy out.
Even in medicine you see new companies entering the research arena. They are subcontractors to the BIG medicine companies, but in my area we had two new research companies appear in the past year -- and neither was started with more than a few million, which any group with good credit and a good idea can get with a reasonable business plan and some equity assets.
The socialists are running the camp here, as usual. They think that government is good except when it hurts their personal lives, then it isn't bad, it just needs new people controlling it. Typical authoritarian mumbo jumbo, unwilling to give freedom a chance even though freedom has time and again made their lives better.
Wal*mart increased my ma-and-pa store services sold almost 500%. They sold paintball markers and skateboards like we did, but when customers had problems, guess who Wal*mart sent them to? Us. We probably made US$100,000 one year on Wal*Mart referrals.
Blockbuster's rental of DVDs and CDs and videos caused a huge increase in the amount of DVD players and VCRs sold. This brought jobs to retail employees. Ma and pa video rental stores eventually bounced back in my area and now we are back to having 3 or 4 for every Blockbuster, especially in porn and import rentals.
How again did either of these two companies cause pain in the market? They made some things more efficient, and created new markets to support. Sounds good to me.
And this is why new companies show up every year that compete just fine with the big guys? Where was google on the map 10 years ago? Oh, they weren't.
If you have a high cost to enter a market, and you have people with good ideas, money is available from risk taking investors. My friend sells Love Sacs -- they're big "bean bag" chairs that sell for $300-$600 at malls. The kid who started this company is now a multi-multi-millionaire, and he started in his garage. Now he has millions to spend on other ideas (to make himself even richer) and he'll invest in technology or medicine or who knows what. Look at the billionaire who invented the Segway and tell me that transportation is a hard market to buy into. He did it, and there are numerous billionaires out there pushing for outer space and underwater, but can't do much without getting rid of government regulations.
Your attitude is based on the belief that big companies are bad. They are only bad if they're given the ability to use force, and only government can grant that ability.
SEC guidelines have made it easier to pay corporate managers profits rather than pass them on as dividends. You can blame SEC regulations for this one (I know, I used to consult to some of the biggest broker dealers in the world).
In a free market, competitive companies that realize cost savings pass on these savings as increased profits. When the trend of increased profits stays stable, competition always causes companies to try to low ball their competitors -- decreasing prices to consumers.
Competition allows a guy with a better idea to bring it to the market, upsetting the big players. I see it all the time in the businesses I am in (skateboard retail, paintball retail, engineering IT consultant, contract outsourcing) -- some kid with a good idea and low overhead comes into the market to undersell the big boys. Sometimes the kid profits and succeeds, sometimes the kid runs out of cash and fails. Whatever the case, the prices drop to compete -- and if the kid goes out of business, a few months later someone else replaces him with the same idea or a better one.
Competition does not create megacorporations -- Congressional regulations and SEC mandates create megacorporations.
It was de-regulation that caused every hamburger chain to combine into one.
It was de-regulation that caused every big box consumer store to combine into one.
It was de-regulation that caused every candy bar company to combine into one.
It was de-regulation that caused every shoe company to combine into one.
Oh, wait a minute. You're talking about regulating so that we're protected from all these competitors trying to drive each other out of business? I guess Congress knows better than consumers what is best for the country.
You're referencing the rest of your comment, right?
In the PC world, there is no regulations on the cost, quality or performance of PCs. We have hundreds of companies selling products -- big boys like Dell and HP, small guys like Ram's PC Shop. Guess what? Prices have fallen even against inflation.
In the automotive world, we have heavy regulations -- steel tariffs, union requirements and other government mandates. Car prices have risen, faster than inflation.
In the soda world, we have almost no regulations (except for some USDA/FDA ones). Soda prices have fallen against inflation, and generic versions taste as good as the real ones in some occasions. I can buy a 2 liter of diet cola for US$0.49 versus US$0.99 a few years ago.
In the medicine world, we have excessive regulations, and prices have climbed beyond inflation.
In the clothing world, we have few regulations (some tariffs on cotton and other materials). I can buy a nice, quality hoodie for US$10 at H&M. A few years back they were over US$50 at the mall.
Tell me again how regulations help and anarchy hurts?
My cell phone bill is under $100 per month. I get over 5000 minutes (2500 anytime anyone), unlimited SMS and unlimited EDGE wireless networking (150kbps). I used almost 1 gig last month in bandwidth on my cell phone and PDA and laptop, over T-Mobile's network. $20 for unlimited wireless Internet, $10 for unlimited SMS and $70 for nearly unlimited minutes (although I do go over from time to time).
My cell phone provider is competitive BECAUSE of competition. Your provider is trying tooth and nail to hold onto the regulations that let them gouge your downloads.
Oh, and my Samsung t809 cell phone uses MP3s for ring tones. I don't pay $1-$2 for ringtones, why do you?
Real deregulation has nothing to do with Congress making laws, changing laws or getting rid of a few old regulations that actually don't affect communications. True deregulation means getting rid of ALL laws that affect communication, including ones that were set up over a hundred years ago that we still have to follow.
In my opinion, the interstate commerce "clause" in the Constitution was not intended to control communications, set up an FCC, or regulate costs or services. It was intended to prevent taxation and tariffs (exactly the problem we have today!) I'll grudgingly accept the argument for the regulation up to maybe 1995, but after that, we saw an unregulated quantity of computers magically connect without major subsidies (I'll grant you that ARPA was originally tax paid, but how big did it get during the government years?). The fact that so many people got online without excessive regulations aimed at driving the Internet leads me to believe that the best form of our beloved Internet IS anarchy (not chaos).
Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press...
My speech is free to go where I sent it. For Congress to say that 2 or 5 or 10 big companies know better than thousands of little ones is typical nannyism. Who knows best? The People. We choose ISps that meet our needs. The system works. Some ISPs go under. Some combine into one ISP. Some fall apart into seperate smaller ISPs. This is how the free market works. We're going to see more free WiFi ISPs (my small town has 3!). We're going to see faster cell phone bandwidth (my EDGE network gets 150kbps downloads). We're going to see less reliance on the phone companies and the cable companies. This isn't happening because of regulation.
As to the two-tiered Internet, I'm all in support of the system if it isn't regulated. Without regulations, the ISPs must compete with one another. This means that the two-tier system could actually be of benefit to the end users. I have customers with offices all over the country who have to maintain expensive T1 lines. With a two-tier system that gives customers on the same network preferential treatment, I think we'll see lowered costs for corporate WANs, meaning lower prices for consumers of those corporations' products. Every dollar saved is some money passed on to the consumer.
Yet these two tiered systems can, overnight, become a mess if Congress decides to set rules and restrictions and requirements. Instead of promoting more bandwidth between same-network customers, regulations will push less bandwidth for different-network customers. If the little guy is pushed out (as regulations tend to do), the big guys won't have any reason to stay competitive. It isn't AOL versus MSN versus Comcast versus SBC that lowers prices and raises bandwidth. It is the thousands of smaller ISPs that are like mosquitos, constantly biting the big elephants and causing them to make changes to their service. For years I used Speakeasy and converted dozens of my customers. I still prefer Speakeasy, but they've been cut off in my market -- by SBC and Comcast that lobbied my local government and state government. REGULATION killed off Speakeasy in my area -- deregulation gave me years of amazing performance and price.
Don't believe the hype -- anarchy in communications has led us to a smaller world and a brighter future. Regulations have led us to 90 years of excise taxes on our phone bills that won't go away, even if the reason for the taxes is antiquated or ancient. Yes, we're still paying taxes on our phone bill that were set up in 1898 and for World War I costs. And you continue to support those leeches by voting for them?
I'm probably going to get the Belkin CF card with a PC Card adapter. I generally hate Belkin but we have a reseller account somewhere so I can get a deal on it:)
All my newer laptops have BT built in, but I tend to customize and sell them too quickly. The older lease-outs I've picked up work fine, even if they're outdated. What I'd really like (but can't justify) would be a BT/WiFi/GPRS/EDGE PC Card for complete wireless connectivity. Maybe through in CDPD for old times sake.
Since this is a dupe, I'd like to know if anyone has any experience with decent Bluetooth PC Cards. Windows 2000 and Windows XP support is all I really need. Low power usage is definitely a plus.
I'm using various USB dongles, but they constantly get broken off or lost. A permanent addition to my cheap laptops would be great.
My gmail on my mobile devices shows differently on every device. Pocket IE displays the basic gmail, Netfront shows a closer version to the AJAX desktop version. WAP doesn't work at all. Gmail probably has the best support short of hotmail (Microsoft loves to make sites compatible with Pocket IE) for mobiles, but all of them are far short of usable like the desktop.
I'm really lost in finding a solution. No mobile web browser can compete with the desktop ones, based mostly on memory and processor limitations. Standards are becoming too hard to catch up with for the mobile end. I'm thinking the only solution is for these web designers to actually test a mobile version on various devices.
Slashdot looks great on my PDA (I'm on it now). Gmail is getting closer. Even with these two looking decent, they aren't good enough. Why are companies spending money adding new features when the web sites still don't render perfectly? Get the code and interface stable across the mobile platforms and THEN add features.
Good points, but in manufacturing many companies don't consider investments and returns -- they look at input costs based solely on labor and material and output costs based on market demand and production efficiencies.
It is very difficult to convince a manufacturer that there can be a return on the investment of IS labor or hardware. We've worked a number of years solely on manufacturing and assembly clients and they're the absolute worst in believing that technology can make them more profitable.
I've toured manufacturing competitors in Asia and Mexico and I was utterly blown away by how efficient their IS groups were compared to the shops here in the U.S. I hold similar beliefs to yours (read your blog), so I think you'd agree that our labor organizations may hold a big hand against the unorganized IS workers.
I own an IT/IS company that's sole purpose is to try to make a customer rely on themselves, not us. It is the best business model available in IT as we receive more referrals than we "lose" customers who become self-sufficient.
The key, for us, in selling a customer on hiring a full time team rather than contracting out the work (to us and others) is showing them a return on investment. There is no other way for a company to acquire any assets or employees without a residual increase in profitability.
How can you tell your bosses that they need an IS group? Show them how they'll save money or make more money, or how their competitors are doing something better. Business owners hate three things: bleeding losses, missed profit opportunities, and competition that does something better.
I can't imagine how hard your job will be, though, in the near future. U.S. manufacturing is attempted to cut back on costs, not increase them. Being in the business for 16 years, I know how hiring the right team IS a money saver, but many of our customers take years to convince. We've seen 6 digit yearly contracts that would have cost less than US$60,000 a year with a good individual and minor contract jobs.
Work up a nice (not colorful, but factual) brochure to sell your bosses on a team. Find who your competitors' IS managers are and talk to them -- you'd be surprised how many employees of competiting companies are beer buddies on the weekends. Pick up a decent manufacturing periodical that talks about these issues, and maybe even get membership to manufacturing webzines that offer the advice.
In engineering, general contracting, graphic design and other service industries, an IS group is a must-have. Manufacturing used to be technology-superior until the work became too inefficient to perform in the U.S. Since the costs are so high here, the management teams don't want to hear about expanded employees except in production. Place yourself in that role: producing an efficient "engine" to run the company. Use manufacturing terms. Point at studies and point at success stories.
I read EVERYTHING on my PDA phone. 99% of my browsing, posting and e-mail is performed there. Sites that don't support me don't get viewed, and as time goes on, there will be more like me.
I've spent thousands annually subscribing to websites that support my PDA. Slashdot was actually one of the first. Google does it as well. I can't wait to see what happens as mobile browsers become more available.
I just picked up the Samsung t809 phone and can browse the web via Mini Opera (or my PDA synced via Bluetooth). Getting 150kbps downloads through T-Mobile's EDGE, so most websites are instantaneous even on the road (yeah, it's safe, sure it is).
There are webmasters that have e-mailed me back saying they'd never support a tiny screen. I don't see how you can ignore the amount of phones that read more than just WAP -- many are HTML compliant with just a little software addition. Give it time and I bet we'll see popular sites getting more than 5% of their users from tiny screens.
Slashdot Mirror
If you were counting on your creative works to support your family, you'd think differently. Would, not might.
Over 60% of my income comes from creative productions of mine. 100% of my written books and newsletters are not copywritten and never will be. I openly ask people to copy my work, I ask other publishers to bootleg it, and I openly ask my reader to give them to friends or quote it without giving me as a source.
Guess what? I get MORE money from the copying than I would if I didn't ask for the "piracy."
My brother is in a band. He just produced his second CD -- it was a US$10,000 production including duplications. I convinced him to let people copy, MP3 and even bootleg the music for their uses completely. He's already expecting double the number of people at his shows based on doing the same thing with his EP.
Copyright is a fallacy. There is no copyright protection without having a gang of thugs with gun s to back it up. Anyone who earns money from creative works knows fully well that copyright is only there to protect the publishing organizations who create nothing -- they just use copyright to retain control of the distribution media.
Take a hike if you've never written anything for a profit and believe copyright helps authors.
Loved the show, loved the movie. The lady and I still fall asleep to the TV show episodes on a regular basis (bedtime viewing).
If Whedon isn't interested in retrying the show in an iTunes/download model, it is because he doesn't have faith in his own creation and he doesn't have the balls to take a risky venture. This guy is Hollywood now, and there's no turning back.
Great news, geeks: we can do it ourselves. How? Fanvids. Right now they're not the greatest quality, but just wait for what the next generation can do. Screw copyright (I'm against it). Whedon calls it dead, so to me that is public domain. Take it, write better episodes. Find another Firefly ship with another crew and go deeper into the universe of Browncoats and the Alliance.
I'll pay for a few episodes. Go get 'em, kids.
There's a virtually endless supply of land, for the time being.
My money is held in gold and silver (where it is safe), and in my businesses (where it earns me between 25% and 100% net profit annually). Stocks? So other people can pay themselves huge bonuses? Stocks? So brokers can screw me if I win and screw me if I don't? Stocks? Where I have to hope that regulations are followed or the company can be bankrupted? I think not.
I'll be very happy in my trailers.
You are a rarity.
I make more money doing less work as I push my value more by not pushing my value more. I also am an anarchocapitalist, so I hold different beliefs than the typical "I know economics and I learned it in college!!!" professional. My life revolves around time preference, not what I think people other than myself should be paid.
I know I could raise a kid and not lose a cent of what I'm worth -- but I value myself properly. Others run around thinking they're making real money while not really offering their customers (who would be their bosses if they're salaried) a return on the money spent on their labor. If I charge someone $1000 for something, they better see an immediately or short term gross return of $2000 on that labor. That is how you know you are worth what you command -- people see a return on the money spent.
This is also why I see such failures in the IT business in the US. So many people do work for $30 that can be performed internationally for $5. Is it bad for business? No, it is great for business -- it opens up doors for people to earn $60 for new work in the same time they used to charge $30. We just have people who don't want to continue building their personal value and their business value.
Good post, glad you're a success. Get a prodigy to mentor to, you'll see your knowledge passed on.
The house was owned cash, but I had other properties, too, as I did businesses in multiple cities.
Even if someone pays off their mortgage, in this country it seems we're in an endless race to upgrade. A very close friend of mine is single and now owns a 3000 square foot home and owes US$400,000 on it (US$700,000 house).
Not everyone can live in a trailer -- I understand that. Yet manufacturer homes are a great way to temporarily exit the housing market IF you believe there is a bubble. I am a firm believer that houses should depreciate over time, not appreciate. As long as houses continue to go up in price, it is a sign to me of inflation and manipulation of the marketplace, and I'll continue to live in a VERY nice trailer. When (and if?) the bubble bursts, I'll take my gold and my properties that I've held on to, sell them and hopefully buy a decent new home at a significant savings.
Here's a response that'll tickle the feminists. Babies make IT a bad business for women.
I own an IT company. We've hired women in the past. We've tried to get younger females with good brains to get into the computer science market and attend colleges and programs. Yet we've seen a very high quitting percentage over the past 10 years, and so have almost all of my competitors (who I'll get beers with).
The number one reason why women have left my industry has been child-rearing. If you're a guy, try leaving the business for a year or two, and see how competitive you are when you get back.
Many women I know today (younger ones, 18-25) seem to actually be thinking of babies, whereas when I was 18-25, most of my gal pals were thinking of becoming lawyers, doctors and, yes, even engineers. Maybe society is feeling a change back to the "old bad ways" of women raising kids and men working. I'm not saying this is the best or the worst way to live, but I don't have kids so it doesn't affect me, really.
Expect to see fewer women in the market place for a decade, either way -- in IT our in other industries.
I'm not a rich man -- rich is measured in dollars of equity and savings. I feel I'm a wealthy man -- wealth is measured in free time and long term ability to earn and spend. I may have less "on the books" than the guy I used to be, but I have way more security in my future as well as the time I can spend doing thing I like to do.
As for wind -- I spent almost US$5000 on security my trailer to the ground with a system that is more stable than most 60 year old houses. Also, my trailer has one of the highest R-ratings, so my heating bill is over 70% lower than my old house. Also, the view that trailers are unsafe more a myth than a reality, given that my insurance costs are also way lower than home living.
You trust your beliefs, and I'll trust mine.
Argh, I hit submit too soon. I also wanted to comment that I publish a 24 issue a year print newsletter called Mobile Home Millionaire that is ready by almost 1000 subscribers (and 1000 free gift given ones) around the country. If you find yourself making over US$50,000 a year and are perpetually broke, I can tell you how to become a millionaire and live a great life by ignoring what your friends are doing with their money, and returning to a life more suited to having fun.
There will come a time soon than many families will find themselves heavily burdened by debt directly due to housing and the pay-it-down-and-refinance game. I fear that many geeks here will have the same future if they're not careful.
Actually, I sold my 1600 square foot home (worth over US$250,000) and bought a US$40,000 trailer with over 1600 square feet. Why? US$210,000 that I now have in my pocket to spend on vacations, business trips, and new ways to make me money. Some of my neighbors are friends of mine who sold their US$500,000 for 2200 square foot trailers. Why? The same reason -- we took advantage of the housing bubble (caused by regulations, mind you).
If you think living in a trailer is trashy, I applaud you -- it is why I can continue to live in housing that costs me less than US$3000 per year (including property taxes) and pocket the US$2000 a month in mortgage to spend on other things I like.
In the next 3 years I'll move at least 60 people with similar lives as mine into my community -- and we'll all live high on the hog getting rid of the 38% overhead of living in a "house." In fact, I've been able to cut my work hours almost in HALF and have more money in my pocket at year's end.
Don't knock it just because you want to keep up with the Joneses. The Joneses are in debt and live beyond their means and will have to both work until they're 65 to pay off their excesses. Me? My family loves life and has smiles on our face when we go shopping with cash in our pocket. It seems like everyone else we see has a frown and wonders if that plastic card will say "denied" at the register.
In recent studies by many organization, public transportation costs more per mile than do cars. Public buses and subways pollute more, require more employees to maintain the bureaucracy and clog up the highways and roadways for the cars and cycles.
The insurance industry is more expensive BECAUSE of regulations and mandates. Before the HMO Act of 1974, everyone could afford private healthcare. After government required it and forced corporations to offer it, prices went up. Add in public healthcare such as medicare and medicaid and you see a bigger increase in prices. Don't believe that it is regulation that makes health care better or cheaper. In fact, we had great health care for decades until government stepped in.
Anti-trust is another issue I disagree with. I have never seen a monopoly except those enforced by government. We just have to agree to disagree, except your policies affect how I live. My policies don't force you to do anything you don't want to.
My Samsung t809 ($249 with 1 year contract extension) has Bluetooth file sharing and comes with a USB port that tethers as a mass storage device. The cable was "free."
This came out of competition over the past year to get rid of proprietary standards. Ring tones made a LOT of money for a lot of people, but some decided they'd rather hurt those profits and open up how phones handle ring tones. Now my family all has cell phones that use MP3 ringtones, all in the past year.
The other place competition has helped the cell industry is moving towards mini-USB ports for charging and for connectivity. Again, this happened without regulations or mandates, but out of a free market.
This is such a crock.
I've been in business since the age of 13 and there has never been a market I couldn't enter. Even today there are markets for ISPs -- I'm starting a wireless ISP in my trailer park in March (I have over 70 customers signed up and ready to prepay to set it all up). Don't think you know business if you haven't run a business.
All this theory is bunk -- I've been there and I can tell you that businesses don't combine often. I see more of everything in the unregulated markets, and I see less in the regulated ones. When a market is de-regulated by Congress, it really isn't true de-regulation, its basically reshuffling of preferential rules in order to keep the small guy out.
Even in medicine you see new companies entering the research arena. They are subcontractors to the BIG medicine companies, but in my area we had two new research companies appear in the past year -- and neither was started with more than a few million, which any group with good credit and a good idea can get with a reasonable business plan and some equity assets.
The socialists are running the camp here, as usual. They think that government is good except when it hurts their personal lives, then it isn't bad, it just needs new people controlling it. Typical authoritarian mumbo jumbo, unwilling to give freedom a chance even though freedom has time and again made their lives better.
Wal*mart increased my ma-and-pa store services sold almost 500%. They sold paintball markers and skateboards like we did, but when customers had problems, guess who Wal*mart sent them to? Us. We probably made US$100,000 one year on Wal*Mart referrals.
Blockbuster's rental of DVDs and CDs and videos caused a huge increase in the amount of DVD players and VCRs sold. This brought jobs to retail employees. Ma and pa video rental stores eventually bounced back in my area and now we are back to having 3 or 4 for every Blockbuster, especially in porn and import rentals.
How again did either of these two companies cause pain in the market? They made some things more efficient, and created new markets to support. Sounds good to me.
And this is why new companies show up every year that compete just fine with the big guys? Where was google on the map 10 years ago? Oh, they weren't.
If you have a high cost to enter a market, and you have people with good ideas, money is available from risk taking investors. My friend sells Love Sacs -- they're big "bean bag" chairs that sell for $300-$600 at malls. The kid who started this company is now a multi-multi-millionaire, and he started in his garage. Now he has millions to spend on other ideas (to make himself even richer) and he'll invest in technology or medicine or who knows what. Look at the billionaire who invented the Segway and tell me that transportation is a hard market to buy into. He did it, and there are numerous billionaires out there pushing for outer space and underwater, but can't do much without getting rid of government regulations.
Your attitude is based on the belief that big companies are bad. They are only bad if they're given the ability to use force, and only government can grant that ability.
SEC guidelines have made it easier to pay corporate managers profits rather than pass them on as dividends. You can blame SEC regulations for this one (I know, I used to consult to some of the biggest broker dealers in the world).
In a free market, competitive companies that realize cost savings pass on these savings as increased profits. When the trend of increased profits stays stable, competition always causes companies to try to low ball their competitors -- decreasing prices to consumers.
Competition allows a guy with a better idea to bring it to the market, upsetting the big players. I see it all the time in the businesses I am in (skateboard retail, paintball retail, engineering IT consultant, contract outsourcing) -- some kid with a good idea and low overhead comes into the market to undersell the big boys. Sometimes the kid profits and succeeds, sometimes the kid runs out of cash and fails. Whatever the case, the prices drop to compete -- and if the kid goes out of business, a few months later someone else replaces him with the same idea or a better one.
Competition does not create megacorporations -- Congressional regulations and SEC mandates create megacorporations.
I'm sorry, you're right.
It was de-regulation that caused every hamburger chain to combine into one.
It was de-regulation that caused every big box consumer store to combine into one.
It was de-regulation that caused every candy bar company to combine into one.
It was de-regulation that caused every shoe company to combine into one.
Oh, wait a minute. You're talking about regulating so that we're protected from all these competitors trying to drive each other out of business? I guess Congress knows better than consumers what is best for the country.
This is a complete load of bollocks.
You're referencing the rest of your comment, right?
In the PC world, there is no regulations on the cost, quality or performance of PCs. We have hundreds of companies selling products -- big boys like Dell and HP, small guys like Ram's PC Shop. Guess what? Prices have fallen even against inflation.
In the automotive world, we have heavy regulations -- steel tariffs, union requirements and other government mandates. Car prices have risen, faster than inflation.
In the soda world, we have almost no regulations (except for some USDA/FDA ones). Soda prices have fallen against inflation, and generic versions taste as good as the real ones in some occasions. I can buy a 2 liter of diet cola for US$0.49 versus US$0.99 a few years ago.
In the medicine world, we have excessive regulations, and prices have climbed beyond inflation.
In the clothing world, we have few regulations (some tariffs on cotton and other materials). I can buy a nice, quality hoodie for US$10 at H&M. A few years back they were over US$50 at the mall.
Tell me again how regulations help and anarchy hurts?
My cell phone bill is under $100 per month. I get over 5000 minutes (2500 anytime anyone), unlimited SMS and unlimited EDGE wireless networking (150kbps). I used almost 1 gig last month in bandwidth on my cell phone and PDA and laptop, over T-Mobile's network. $20 for unlimited wireless Internet, $10 for unlimited SMS and $70 for nearly unlimited minutes (although I do go over from time to time).
My cell phone provider is competitive BECAUSE of competition. Your provider is trying tooth and nail to hold onto the regulations that let them gouge your downloads.
Oh, and my Samsung t809 cell phone uses MP3s for ring tones. I don't pay $1-$2 for ringtones, why do you?
De. Regulate.
... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press ...
Real deregulation has nothing to do with Congress making laws, changing laws or getting rid of a few old regulations that actually don't affect communications. True deregulation means getting rid of ALL laws that affect communication, including ones that were set up over a hundred years ago that we still have to follow.
In my opinion, the interstate commerce "clause" in the Constitution was not intended to control communications, set up an FCC, or regulate costs or services. It was intended to prevent taxation and tariffs (exactly the problem we have today!) I'll grudgingly accept the argument for the regulation up to maybe 1995, but after that, we saw an unregulated quantity of computers magically connect without major subsidies (I'll grant you that ARPA was originally tax paid, but how big did it get during the government years?). The fact that so many people got online without excessive regulations aimed at driving the Internet leads me to believe that the best form of our beloved Internet IS anarchy (not chaos).
Congress shall make no law
My speech is free to go where I sent it. For Congress to say that 2 or 5 or 10 big companies know better than thousands of little ones is typical nannyism. Who knows best? The People. We choose ISps that meet our needs. The system works. Some ISPs go under. Some combine into one ISP. Some fall apart into seperate smaller ISPs. This is how the free market works. We're going to see more free WiFi ISPs (my small town has 3!). We're going to see faster cell phone bandwidth (my EDGE network gets 150kbps downloads). We're going to see less reliance on the phone companies and the cable companies. This isn't happening because of regulation.
As to the two-tiered Internet, I'm all in support of the system if it isn't regulated. Without regulations, the ISPs must compete with one another. This means that the two-tier system could actually be of benefit to the end users. I have customers with offices all over the country who have to maintain expensive T1 lines. With a two-tier system that gives customers on the same network preferential treatment, I think we'll see lowered costs for corporate WANs, meaning lower prices for consumers of those corporations' products. Every dollar saved is some money passed on to the consumer.
Yet these two tiered systems can, overnight, become a mess if Congress decides to set rules and restrictions and requirements. Instead of promoting more bandwidth between same-network customers, regulations will push less bandwidth for different-network customers. If the little guy is pushed out (as regulations tend to do), the big guys won't have any reason to stay competitive. It isn't AOL versus MSN versus Comcast versus SBC that lowers prices and raises bandwidth. It is the thousands of smaller ISPs that are like mosquitos, constantly biting the big elephants and causing them to make changes to their service. For years I used Speakeasy and converted dozens of my customers. I still prefer Speakeasy, but they've been cut off in my market -- by SBC and Comcast that lobbied my local government and state government. REGULATION killed off Speakeasy in my area -- deregulation gave me years of amazing performance and price.
Don't believe the hype -- anarchy in communications has led us to a smaller world and a brighter future. Regulations have led us to 90 years of excise taxes on our phone bills that won't go away, even if the reason for the taxes is antiquated or ancient. Yes, we're still paying taxes on our phone bill that were set up in 1898 and for World War I costs. And you continue to support those leeches by voting for them?
Didn't realize that, regarding power. Interesting!
:)
I'm probably going to get the Belkin CF card with a PC Card adapter. I generally hate Belkin but we have a reseller account somewhere so I can get a deal on it
All my newer laptops have BT built in, but I tend to customize and sell them too quickly. The older lease-outs I've picked up work fine, even if they're outdated. What I'd really like (but can't justify) would be a BT/WiFi/GPRS/EDGE PC Card for complete wireless connectivity. Maybe through in CDPD for old times sake.
Since this is a dupe, I'd like to know if anyone has any experience with decent Bluetooth PC Cards. Windows 2000 and Windows XP support is all I really need. Low power usage is definitely a plus.
I'm using various USB dongles, but they constantly get broken off or lost. A permanent addition to my cheap laptops would be great.
My gmail on my mobile devices shows differently on every device. Pocket IE displays the basic gmail, Netfront shows a closer version to the AJAX desktop version. WAP doesn't work at all. Gmail probably has the best support short of hotmail (Microsoft loves to make sites compatible with Pocket IE) for mobiles, but all of them are far short of usable like the desktop.
I'm really lost in finding a solution. No mobile web browser can compete with the desktop ones, based mostly on memory and processor limitations. Standards are becoming too hard to catch up with for the mobile end. I'm thinking the only solution is for these web designers to actually test a mobile version on various devices.
Slashdot looks great on my PDA (I'm on it now). Gmail is getting closer. Even with these two looking decent, they aren't good enough. Why are companies spending money adding new features when the web sites still don't render perfectly? Get the code and interface stable across the mobile platforms and THEN add features.
Good points, but in manufacturing many companies don't consider investments and returns -- they look at input costs based solely on labor and material and output costs based on market demand and production efficiencies.
It is very difficult to convince a manufacturer that there can be a return on the investment of IS labor or hardware. We've worked a number of years solely on manufacturing and assembly clients and they're the absolute worst in believing that technology can make them more profitable.
I've toured manufacturing competitors in Asia and Mexico and I was utterly blown away by how efficient their IS groups were compared to the shops here in the U.S. I hold similar beliefs to yours (read your blog), so I think you'd agree that our labor organizations may hold a big hand against the unorganized IS workers.
I own an IT/IS company that's sole purpose is to try to make a customer rely on themselves, not us. It is the best business model available in IT as we receive more referrals than we "lose" customers who become self-sufficient.
The key, for us, in selling a customer on hiring a full time team rather than contracting out the work (to us and others) is showing them a return on investment. There is no other way for a company to acquire any assets or employees without a residual increase in profitability.
How can you tell your bosses that they need an IS group? Show them how they'll save money or make more money, or how their competitors are doing something better. Business owners hate three things: bleeding losses, missed profit opportunities, and competition that does something better.
I can't imagine how hard your job will be, though, in the near future. U.S. manufacturing is attempted to cut back on costs, not increase them. Being in the business for 16 years, I know how hiring the right team IS a money saver, but many of our customers take years to convince. We've seen 6 digit yearly contracts that would have cost less than US$60,000 a year with a good individual and minor contract jobs.
Work up a nice (not colorful, but factual) brochure to sell your bosses on a team. Find who your competitors' IS managers are and talk to them -- you'd be surprised how many employees of competiting companies are beer buddies on the weekends. Pick up a decent manufacturing periodical that talks about these issues, and maybe even get membership to manufacturing webzines that offer the advice.
In engineering, general contracting, graphic design and other service industries, an IS group is a must-have. Manufacturing used to be technology-superior until the work became too inefficient to perform in the U.S. Since the costs are so high here, the management teams don't want to hear about expanded employees except in production. Place yourself in that role: producing an efficient "engine" to run the company. Use manufacturing terms. Point at studies and point at success stories.
Good luck.
I read EVERYTHING on my PDA phone. 99% of my browsing, posting and e-mail is performed there. Sites that don't support me don't get viewed, and as time goes on, there will be more like me.
I've spent thousands annually subscribing to websites that support my PDA. Slashdot was actually one of the first. Google does it as well. I can't wait to see what happens as mobile browsers become more available.
I just picked up the Samsung t809 phone and can browse the web via Mini Opera (or my PDA synced via Bluetooth). Getting 150kbps downloads through T-Mobile's EDGE, so most websites are instantaneous even on the road (yeah, it's safe, sure it is).
There are webmasters that have e-mailed me back saying they'd never support a tiny screen. I don't see how you can ignore the amount of phones that read more than just WAP -- many are HTML compliant with just a little software addition. Give it time and I bet we'll see popular sites getting more than 5% of their users from tiny screens.