Are there any specific products that Sun sells that IBM doesn't have equivalents of?
Java?
I realize that this isn't a product, per se, but it seems to me that IBM has focused their company on the services and consulting side and many of those projects are Java-based. They'll be able to go to their clients and affirm that the next multi-billion dollar enterprise project will be built on "their" language that they are fully behind.
P.S. Can we please not start a Java teh sux thread! I'm mostly just curious what the value of being the "owner of Java" is to a company...
I agree that sometimes it's required, especially where performance is the main factor and the compiler isn't able to optimize well enough on its own.
I don't disagree, but there better be a documented change order in the system that explains EXACTLY which bottleneck is being addressed. IMHO, if you're still in the "let's get this working" pre-beta phase of the software development there had better not be any clever code being written.
As someone who once tried to write clever code (when I was younger and smarter) I wish I could track down my younger self and beat him with my walking stick. There's a part of me that wants to find a new job simply so I can escape my old code...
I'm trying it out now. One of the first things I noticed (as a FireBug user on FireFox) is the Inspect Element option appears in the contextual menu and it looks like a major subset of FireBug functionality is available by default. I'm suddenly very happy...
Sounds like a combination of tolls and fuel tax is the best solution. Heavy, inefficient vehicles (e.g. SUVs and trucks) that are driven many miles get taxed the most. Light, efficient vehicles (e.g. motorcycles and hybrids) that are driven few miles get taxed the least. Most of use, depending on our circumstances, will be in the middle.
Even better, each state gets to pick the proper combination that meets their needs. If your state is most concerned about pollution then you jack up the percentage of taxes that are gathered from fossile fuel taxes. If your state is most concerned about wear and tear on the roads, then you increase the tolls.
How about a single "infrastructure" monopoly -- call it Ma Pole, or something -- that leases the telephone poles, culverts, and underground pipes to whatever provider asks? You could have a free market in suppliers but maintain the natural monopoly of infrastructure.
FYI, right now I have a $25 / month WiMAX provider in Baltimore (up to $35 in 4 months). I purchased the stand-alone modem since and it's been pretty reliable. In general the ping times are a little slower than my Cavalier DSL but the throughput is consistently faster.
Actually, according to Keynsian economics a recession / depression is exactly when you are supposed to run a deficit.
The unforgivable sin of the Bush administration (or at least, one of the first) was taking the country from surplus to deficit when the economy was relatively strong. Remember, the first round of tax cuts for the rich?
The problem is that under the current rules unions now have the upper hand in bargaining...
That seems counter-intuitive. We're just finishing up 8 years of a rabid anti-union administration where the government only intervened in labor issues on the side of the corporations. Are you sure unions have the upper hand?
Not a bad idea. I'd also like to see a 10 year term limit on any C-level executive in a company that receives any form of local, state, or federal tax breaks or subsidies or any government contracts.
A salary cap equal to the salary of a Congressman should also be implemented.
These limits should also apply to managers and players of sports teams granted exceptions to federal monopoly laws -- MLB, NBA, etc..
Except a fair percentage of those arrested are not doing anything wrong. Remember in the U.S.A. guilt is established by a jury of your peers not by a rent-a-cop with a junior high education.
Unfortunately, it's subscription only, but this month's Make magazine has an article by a MIT student caught up in TSA's grasp:
I was actually trying to establish a morally complex, either-or set questions as an example of how complex this issue is. I probably wasn't very effective.
Anyway, I'm no conservative -- check my old posts; pretty much a knee-jerk liberal here -- and, personally, I think some form of socialized medicine is the correct solution.
But how should we get there? I think I'm a relatively smart guy; a computer programmer who is fairly skilled at untangling complex real-world situations into state charts and logical entities and relationships. But, I'm not nearly smart enough to tackle this question! I say, "good luck" to whichever poor bastard has to tackle this problem starting on January 20th.
It's possible that there are no "direct answers for simple questions"; probably because the useful questions are not simple*.
I'm going to play devil's advocate and say that I have some sympathy for the modern American politician. They appear to be stuck in a bind since any complex answer to a complex question will be chopped up into sound bites and used to attack him or her. This is especially a problem in this "Age of Outrage" where the easiest way to start a news article is to interview some screaming nincompoop who is incensed that the politicians haven't waved a magic wand to provide them with eternal happiness.
- - - - - -
Here's a complex question: should a 70 year old retired male with a history of drinking problems but is currently a non-drinker get a liver transplant covered by Medicare?
Here's another one: a different, retired 70 year old male is wealthy enough to afford a liver transplant on his own, should he be in line for the next available donor organ before or after a 40 year old working male without health insurance?
* Douglas Adams taught me this. "What is the meaning of life?" is a simple but useless question.
Okay, it's obvious we're never going to see eye-to-eye on this, but let's get back to my basic point:
Why is it -- given that there are so many places to cut welfare in the budget -- do self-described libertarians choose to focus on the programs that benefit the sick, poor, and politically unconnected and ignore the programs that benefit the powerful, wealthy, and politically connected?
A libertarian group going after Exxon or a "bridge to nowhere" or a boondoggle military project would be a courageous thing! And, once successful and having proven that they actually live by their ideals, such a group might have a moral high ground to work to modify social programs into a libertarian model.
However, as far as I can tell, libertarians only seem willing to attack the weak, old, and hungry. And, as a political philosophy, it make all libertarians look like cowardly bullies.
Very simply: Social Security and Medicare are self funded. They are pay as you go schemes (and people can argue endlessly about their long-term viability), but there is a set-aside on every paycheck that goes to those programs.
For the other things -- military boondoggles and no-bid contracts; tax credits for politically connected industries; under-market rates for mineral rights, grazing rights, spectrum right, and water rights -- the lost funds come out of the general pie of money to benefit some politically connected company at the expense of the general good. THAT is what I call welfare and if libertarians spent more time attacking that kind of waste rather than picking on poor people I think I might take them seriously. However, taking on Exxon takes courage; courage that most libertarians lack.
What you're describing doesn't make sense. I don't think you know what you're talking about.
If Mom and Pop own the total shares of a corporation they should be paying themselves a salary out of that corporation. That salary is subtracted before profits so they are only being taxed once. The profits can be removed from the company as dividends -- as opposed to being reinvested in the company -- and you'd be taxed on that, but don't forget those dividends are coming out after expenses.
If, on the other hand, you are referring to a company structure with pass-through profits (like a sole proprietorship) then all profits are taxed as personal income. Once again, you've only been taxed once.
Now a good tax lawyer could explain the details better. I've owned an S-Corp, a sole proprietorship, and been in a partnership and I let my accountant figure out the details. But, in all that time I never was taxed twice.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, it's genius. You only allow submissions from browsers who DON'T answer the CAPTCHA correctly.
Are there any specific products that Sun sells that IBM doesn't have equivalents of?
Java?
I realize that this isn't a product, per se, but it seems to me that IBM has focused their company on the services and consulting side and many of those projects are Java-based. They'll be able to go to their clients and affirm that the next multi-billion dollar enterprise project will be built on "their" language that they are fully behind.
P.S. Can we please not start a Java teh sux thread! I'm mostly just curious what the value of being the "owner of Java" is to a company...
I agree that sometimes it's required, especially where performance is the main factor and the compiler isn't able to optimize well enough on its own.
I don't disagree, but there better be a documented change order in the system that explains EXACTLY which bottleneck is being addressed. IMHO, if you're still in the "let's get this working" pre-beta phase of the software development there had better not be any clever code being written.
As someone who once tried to write clever code (when I was younger and smarter) I wish I could track down my younger self and beat him with my walking stick. There's a part of me that wants to find a new job simply so I can escape my old code...
I wish I had karma points. Excellent post.
I'm trying it out now. One of the first things I noticed (as a FireBug user on FireFox) is the Inspect Element option appears in the contextual menu and it looks like a major subset of FireBug functionality is available by default. I'm suddenly very happy...
Sounds like a combination of tolls and fuel tax is the best solution. Heavy, inefficient vehicles (e.g. SUVs and trucks) that are driven many miles get taxed the most. Light, efficient vehicles (e.g. motorcycles and hybrids) that are driven few miles get taxed the least. Most of use, depending on our circumstances, will be in the middle.
Even better, each state gets to pick the proper combination that meets their needs. If your state is most concerned about pollution then you jack up the percentage of taxes that are gathered from fossile fuel taxes. If your state is most concerned about wear and tear on the roads, then you increase the tolls.
Multiply weight by miles driven each year and you've got a good solution.
So? What do you want, a free lunch? The maintenance of roads cost money.
How about a single "infrastructure" monopoly -- call it Ma Pole, or something -- that leases the telephone poles, culverts, and underground pipes to whatever provider asks? You could have a free market in suppliers but maintain the natural monopoly of infrastructure.
FYI, right now I have a $25 / month WiMAX provider in Baltimore (up to $35 in 4 months). I purchased the stand-alone modem since and it's been pretty reliable. In general the ping times are a little slower than my Cavalier DSL but the throughput is consistently faster.
Actually, according to Keynsian economics a recession / depression is exactly when you are supposed to run a deficit.
The unforgivable sin of the Bush administration (or at least, one of the first) was taking the country from surplus to deficit when the economy was relatively strong. Remember, the first round of tax cuts for the rich?
You seem quite worked up with all the shouting and profanity and all. Are you okay?
What do you have against profit?
The problem is that under the current rules unions now have the upper hand in bargaining...
That seems counter-intuitive. We're just finishing up 8 years of a rabid anti-union administration where the government only intervened in labor issues on the side of the corporations. Are you sure unions have the upper hand?
Not a bad idea. I'd also like to see a 10 year term limit on any C-level executive in a company that receives any form of local, state, or federal tax breaks or subsidies or any government contracts.
A salary cap equal to the salary of a Congressman should also be implemented.
These limits should also apply to managers and players of sports teams granted exceptions to federal monopoly laws -- MLB, NBA, etc..
Take it to the law school and see if you can be a class project?
Except a fair percentage of those arrested are not doing anything wrong. Remember in the U.S.A. guilt is established by a jury of your peers not by a rent-a-cop with a junior high education.
Unfortunately, it's subscription only, but this month's Make magazine has an article by a MIT student caught up in TSA's grasp:
http://makezine.com/16/simpson/
I was actually trying to establish a morally complex, either-or set questions as an example of how complex this issue is. I probably wasn't very effective.
Anyway, I'm no conservative -- check my old posts; pretty much a knee-jerk liberal here -- and, personally, I think some form of socialized medicine is the correct solution.
But how should we get there? I think I'm a relatively smart guy; a computer programmer who is fairly skilled at untangling complex real-world situations into state charts and logical entities and relationships. But, I'm not nearly smart enough to tackle this question! I say, "good luck" to whichever poor bastard has to tackle this problem starting on January 20th.
It's possible that there are no "direct answers for simple questions"; probably because the useful questions are not simple*.
I'm going to play devil's advocate and say that I have some sympathy for the modern American politician. They appear to be stuck in a bind since any complex answer to a complex question will be chopped up into sound bites and used to attack him or her. This is especially a problem in this "Age of Outrage" where the easiest way to start a news article is to interview some screaming nincompoop who is incensed that the politicians haven't waved a magic wand to provide them with eternal happiness.
- - - - - -
Here's a complex question: should a 70 year old retired male with a history of drinking problems but is currently a non-drinker get a liver transplant covered by Medicare?
Here's another one: a different, retired 70 year old male is wealthy enough to afford a liver transplant on his own, should he be in line for the next available donor organ before or after a 40 year old working male without health insurance?
* Douglas Adams taught me this. "What is the meaning of life?" is a simple but useless question.
Here's a timely post from of my favorite economics blogs. It actually refers to Adam Smith and "big-L" Liberalism.
How the World Works
Okay, it's obvious we're never going to see eye-to-eye on this, but let's get back to my basic point:
Why is it -- given that there are so many places to cut welfare in the budget -- do self-described libertarians choose to focus on the programs that benefit the sick, poor, and politically unconnected and ignore the programs that benefit the powerful, wealthy, and politically connected?
A libertarian group going after Exxon or a "bridge to nowhere" or a boondoggle military project would be a courageous thing! And, once successful and having proven that they actually live by their ideals, such a group might have a moral high ground to work to modify social programs into a libertarian model.
However, as far as I can tell, libertarians only seem willing to attack the weak, old, and hungry. And, as a political philosophy, it make all libertarians look like cowardly bullies.
Very simply: Social Security and Medicare are self funded. They are pay as you go schemes (and people can argue endlessly about their long-term viability), but there is a set-aside on every paycheck that goes to those programs.
For the other things -- military boondoggles and no-bid contracts; tax credits for politically connected industries; under-market rates for mineral rights, grazing rights, spectrum right, and water rights -- the lost funds come out of the general pie of money to benefit some politically connected company at the expense of the general good. THAT is what I call welfare and if libertarians spent more time attacking that kind of waste rather than picking on poor people I think I might take them seriously. However, taking on Exxon takes courage; courage that most libertarians lack.
Instead of modding me down, could someone please inform me if I'm wrong?
I did some Google searches on "who owns mineral rights to my property" and got a whole series of interesting anecdotal accounts.
I think you meant "Objectivism is just Libertarianism..."?
I personally would put Objectivism pretty far from Liberalism on a chart. Jerry Pournelle seems to agree with me: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Pournelle_chart_color.gif
What you're describing doesn't make sense. I don't think you know what you're talking about.
If Mom and Pop own the total shares of a corporation they should be paying themselves a salary out of that corporation. That salary is subtracted before profits so they are only being taxed once. The profits can be removed from the company as dividends -- as opposed to being reinvested in the company -- and you'd be taxed on that, but don't forget those dividends are coming out after expenses.
If, on the other hand, you are referring to a company structure with pass-through profits (like a sole proprietorship) then all profits are taxed as personal income. Once again, you've only been taxed once.
Now a good tax lawyer could explain the details better. I've owned an S-Corp, a sole proprietorship, and been in a partnership and I let my accountant figure out the details. But, in all that time I never was taxed twice.