I'd like to know which country has an electric grid that makes the US grid look primitive.
I don't think it's so much that the US grid is primitive compared to other countries. Rather it is primitive compared with the available technology and projected needs. The monitoring and control equipment on much of the grid remains rather primitive, the wire infrastructure is fragile (major outages every time a serious storm blows through), many areas still depend on sending a person out to read the meter for billing, there is a too much interdependence without adequate safeguards, local generation (solar, wind, etc) remains problematic in many places, generation sources are relatively dirty, usage controls are primitive, etc. Most of our infrastructure was built decades ago and (IMO) too little was allocated for ongoing upgrades nor were the increases in demand adequately planned for.
The grid works but it's not nearly as robust, efficient or clean as it could be. That's the problem.
You, sir or madam, owe me a new monitor and beverage. Although the sad thing is that I believe you...
Sir. And yes in the finance world most serious ad-hoc number crunching is done on spreadsheets. It's actually a pretty good tool for the job believe it or not.
The HP-12C is superior to Excel when it comes to performing quick financial calculations.
Only in select circumstances. And certainly not for doing anything that involves more than a single calculation or a long list of parameters. I certainly can enter data much faster on a 10key than on any handheld calculator. A handheld calculator is only useful if you are in a circumstance where having a full blown computer is impractical.
The RPN allows you to enter in formulas without worrying about matching parenthesis and formatting the cells, while it contains all the essential formulas you need with none of the bloat.
??? You need two parenthesis for any formula in excel. And their are wizards if you really need a crutch. Furthermore there are LOTS of "essential formulas" that the HP-12C does not have that I use every day.
You can't hack numbers together as fast and efficient with any other calculator or computer program out there, which is why the HP-12C is still popular after all these years.
Nonsense. I WORK with the guys that use HP-12Cs all the time. They use it because they are comfortable with it - NOT because it is the best option.
Look at any business school class these days any you will not find very many HP-12Cs or TI BA-IIPlus calculators anywhere. Most serious number crunching is done on a spreadsheet so the only use for one is if you are in a meeting or need to do a very quick calculation when a computer isn't readily available. (happens now and then) The HP-12C is a fine piece of equipment but if you have a spreadsheet available it's kind of like using a slide rule. Sure it works but it probably isn't the best tool available most of the time.
I'm actually a certified accountant. I have one of the TI BA-IIPlus calculators and the only time I have used it in the last 8 years was to take a certification exam. (they only allow those two calculators in the test) Otherwise it sits in a drawer and gathers dust. Frankly I can't imagine I'm going to use it in the next 8 years either. For reasons I cannot fully grasp a lot of accountants still insist on using paper tape calculators to add up long strings of numbers even though they have a spreadsheet available on their computer. I can't begin to count the number of times I've seen accountants repeatedly type in long strings of numbers because of typos. Strange people who aren't willing to change with the times. I'm waiting for one to ask for the "4:30 autogyro to Siam one of these days.
It was way way way better than Microsoft Word and always was.
Debatable on the DOS versions. Word for DOS wasn't anything great. Gotta disagree with you on the Windows versions. They were at least comparable and the consensus seemed to be that Word was regarded as the better product by most.
Some of it's features even modern word processors don't have.
A double edged sword if there ever was one... That's not necessarily a bad thing. I remember with little fondness the little cards you had to attach to the function keys so that you could remember the gazillion totally non-intuitive functions that were available. Virtually every keyboard in every office at one time had one of those little things attached to it. Ugh.
WordPerfect deserved to win and Microsoft Word did not get it's dominant position through innovation or a superior product.
"Deserved to win"? They failed to recognize that Windows was the future and came out with an late, buggy and arguably inferior product well after the migration to Word was under way. You can argue that Microsoft used some underhanded tactics but Wordperfect had the dominant position and they unquestionably screwed it up. Word was nothing amazing but some of the main reasons Wordperfect "died" was from self inflicted wounds. They had a dominant market position and failed to recognize where the market was going.
Actually, I don't understand why the fuel tax is a fixed value anyway. If it were a % of the purchase price like ordinary sales taxes, then revenue should stay fairly level as prices rise and usage drops.
Doesn't really work like that in the short run. Gasoline prices are pretty volatile in the short run so taxing based on a percentage basis would send tax revenues bouncing around like a caffeinated puppy. It would be REALLY hard to predict the tax revenues. Done on a per gallon basis the revenues are MUCH more predictable because the number of miles people drive is fairly stable in the short run. You can figure out within a reasonable error rate how many miles will be driven next year and the average fuel economy is a known number so we have a pretty good idea how many gallons of gasoline will be consumed to within a few percent. That makes for a stable tax revenue stream which is what you want.
Absolutely the correct answer and it will not happen anytime soon. Short of cutting social security benefits (old people rarely forget to vote), I can't think of a faster way for a politician to get voted out of office than to directly raise the price of gasoline. Seriously, it's political suicide with gas at $4.00/gal and an economy in the dumps even if the republican led house would be willing to consider a tax hike - which they definitely will not.
While I think this "draft proposal" (daft would be a better word) is stupid in many ways, it might be an effort to do an end run around the fact that US voters almost invariably detest any hike in the price of gasoline. Phrased right it would be possible to have the same or simiar effect as a gasoline tax without having an actual gasoline tax. Doesn't make it a good idea but that might be the intent. I shudder at the cost of all the bureaucracy something like this would create however.
I would definitely support a gradually phased in gasoline tax hike. All at once would be too much of an economic shock but if you give people a few years to adjust (buying more efficient cars, etc) it would definitely have some long term desirable benefits. If the price of gas is high enough, CAFE standards become unnecessary because people will naturally seek an economically efficient solution.
Okay now just put that in a Minitower case with PCIe slots, sata connectors, and lots of Dimm slots. Sell it for under $1000 dollars.
Why would Apple do that? If you are looking for a cheap PC, go buy a cheap PC. The only difference between what you describe and a generic Windows box is the operating system. Apple would be retarded to do that. The fastest way for Apple to become unprofitable is to get into selling products that are no different than any other computer maker. Hell, if you want that sort of a machine go build yourself a hackintosh. Nothing stopping you.
You see -- All of the software I need to run is open source, thus it runs on any architecture.
Good for you. Seriously. Good for you. I'm not being the slightest bit sarcastic either. I wish that were the case for more people.
Unfortunately that also tells us some things about what YOUR needs are not. Clearly you aren't a heavy duty CAD user, you aren't an accountant, odds are you aren't a graphics professional (Photoshop), you don't use MRP or ERP either and I could go on. I also very much doubt that all of the hardware you use is open source only. (While possible to do in theory, open source only hardware is very restricting.) Open source is great but there are some types of applications for which the closed source versions remain clearly superior and probably will for the foreseeable future. There is no open source 3D solid modeling software comparable to CATIA or ProE. Hell there isn't a 2D open source CAD package that even matches AutoCAD. There is no open source accounting software comparable even to QuickBooks much less some of the enterprise level accounting software. I use GIMP all the time but there is no open source replacement for Photoshop if you are a graphics professional. There are tons of additional examples. Open source simply isn't the best choice available right now for some software needs. I hope that changes but I'm not holding my breath.
If your needs are fully satisfied by open source software, that is really terrific, but it doesn't describe a huge percentage of the rest of us. I literally could not do my job using only open source software. I use as much as I can but it simply does not exist for some of my needs. (predominantly manufacturing and accounting)
That depends very much on what you mean by "good phones". While I haven't used their very latest offerings, my experiences with Blackberries is that they work fine but the interface is very annoying to me. I'm geeky enough to not be bothered by a complicated device but I just can't warm up the interface. The Blackberry devices have their charms but they have some serious annoyances too. I'm pretty agnostic about my choice of phone but I haven't seen a Blackberry yet that I'd spend my own money to buy. Personal preference of course.
The Android/iPhone is a handheld internet portal that happens to make phone calls, not always very reliably.
No argument but I would describe the Blackberries as email devices that happen to make calls - not always very reliably.
For example, in bright sunlight it's difficult to even see the keypad to dial a number on.
Really? I've never had a problem with any iPhone or Android phone I've used in sunlight. You can dial the screen brightness up you know. I does get washed out for some uses (taking pictures) but it's never been so bad I couldn't dial.
They need to break free of their corporate mentality and market this thing to the general public, not just their loyal BB users.
I don't think it's in their corporate DNA. I'd be pleased to be wrong but I think their development cycles are too slow, they don't have the design chops of Apple, and their business model is based on selling to businesses and keeping them through dependence on their backend software. Their phones are fine but nothing amazing. I don't know anyone who owns a blackberry who didn't get it in some manner via their job. I just think they're not equipped to deal with the recent changes in the smartphone market. Their focus on enterprises will keep them in the game for now but if Google or Apple can provide equivalent back end administration (and right now they don't) then RIM's future prospects become much dimmer.
They had a HUGE place in business servers years ago, and then they just sat down on their laurels, and never stood back up.
Their Netware product was arguably better that Microsoft's offerings but the problem was that Microsoft's competing product was good enough for most customers and it was cheaper and bundled. Businesses don't make money by buying network management software. Novell built their Netware business around features that was missing in Microsoft's offerings. When Microsoft provided it, Novell's business model no longer made sense. The only reason they hung around as long as they did is because ripping that sort of software out and replacing it is an expensive pain in the ass. But you can't live on legacy customers forever.
For the same reasons I would never buy (to hold) stock in an anti-virus vendor, inkjet cartridge refill company, or any other company whose business is based on some mis-feature of another company's product. They can be put out of business very easily.
Apple's computer sells have been outpacing the market for years since it went to "commodity" PC hardware.
Apple is fifth in market share (around 10%) behind 4 other companies in terms of units sold. Their market share has doubled in the last five years but it's relatively easy to grow from 5% compared with HP's nearly 30% or Dell's 20+%. They've grown but they've only taken a fraction of the market share and almost all at the high end of the consumer market. Apple does not seriously compete in corporate PC sales nor do they compete at the lowest end of the consumer market.
Demonstrably incorrect. There are tablets out there for equal or less money from (potentially) serious competitors like Research In Motion and Motorola. Somewhat misleading though since tablets are essentially a new market so there has been little time for competitors to bring competing products to market, regardless of price.
Apple can compete on price because it has $60 billion in the bank to buy up components raising the price for everyone else.
Having a lot of money in the bank does not mean they can (or should) compete on price. Competing on price means low margins and high volumes with undifferentiated products - exactly the opposite of what Apple sells. Apple does not try to maximize volume and their margins are among the highest in the industry. Their costs are quite high - developing all that software and their fancy designs is not cheap and you can see the cost in their financial statements. They tried to compete on cost in the 1990s and it nearly bankrupted them.
BTW your logic is not right. They have $60 billion in the bank because they DIDN"T buy inventory with it - that money is retained profit. Yes they could buy more inventory but they would be less profitable and drive up the price on themselves as well. No point in purchasing inventory you can't sell.
At one point Apple was buying 75% of the worlds capacity of flash memory. Apple still buys 25% of the world's supply.
Flash memory is not generally purchased in large quantities on a spot market. You can't just run to Toshiba and say I'd like 3 million flash memory chips delivered tomorrow. They have to purchase in advance and only then do the manufacturers produce the products. Buying market moving percentages of anything does not always result in lower prices if other people want that commodity too. If you buy 75% of the world's supply of anything, by definition you paid more than others were willing meaning you moved the price up, not down. There are numerous suppliers of flash memory and they adjust supply as demand shifts. Apple is a big player in this market but hardly the only one.
Apple can make money off of low priced iOS devices by selling its own software
The vast majority of the profit Apple makes is from selling hardware. Yes they make some money on the side from software and music sales and the rest it's a fraction of their overall revenue. Any profit Apple makes from software sales is simply gravy. Itunes exists to keep people buying iPods and iPads and iPhones. It is widely known that Apple does not make huge amounts of money from music sales. They do pretty well with App Store sales but those still are a fraction of their hardware sales. Don't take my word for it, look at Apple's financial statements.
Google makes their money selling advertising. Anything else they do is simply to keep the ad engine rolling.
What can an Android OEM make money from besides the phone?
Doesn't matter if they are willing to take a lower profit. There are plenty of companies who compete with Apple who are willing to take lower profits. Apple has big fat margins so there is a lot of room to compete on price. Furthermore since Google is bankrolling the software development for them (Apple has to eat those software development costs themselves) the Android OEMs have a theoretically lower price floor than Apple. Conceivably they could sell the Android device for less than Apple's cost and still be profitable.
The risk to Apple from Android is that smartphones (and other devices) get commoditized thereby sucking significant profits out of their devices. Apple is a company build on selling differentiated hardware at higher prices - they cannot compete on low prices and when they tried in the past it nearly put them out of business. Android is a defensive play for Google since much internet use (and thus ad dollars) is moving to mobile devices and away from PCs. Android and iOs don't bring in money directly for either company - both exist to keep their main revenue streams viable (mostly hardware for Apple and mostly advertising for Google) and both are essentially given away. The big difference is that Google can (theoretically) make just as much money from a low priced smartphone as a high priced one whereas Apple cannot. Apple will likely have to move downmarket at some point to protect their high end sales in much the same way they did with their iPods. I doubt they can forever compete only at the high end of the market.
The bigger risk to Apple is simply that they drop the ball majorly with some future iPhone release. It's not a diverse revenue stream and if they can't keep the iPhone ahead of the pack and in demand, they could be in serious trouble very quickly. It's something of a high wire act - high risk and high reward.
Religion explicitly requires an absence of doubt. The moment you doubt the existence of a god for which there is not a shred of evidence, you no longer believe in that god. Religion cannot co-exist comfortably with doubt. You cannot simultaneously believe in something for which there is no evidence and also require evidence to be certain. You can't have it both ways.
There are scientists who believe in gods but they are making a partition in their brain. They are demanding evidence for everything except the existence of their god(s). In other words they are intentionally ignoring the reasoning they use in their professional lives.
A good example is the origin of life, which many say has been explained through science despite the fact that it has not been reproduced in a lab (or anywhere else) and is therefore not "demonstrable, repeatable and self-correcting".
Many might say that but no (reputable) scientists do. I've never met a scientist who claims to know how life originated. I have met some who have some intriguing theories on the subject but the weight of the evidence does not yet point to any single theory and they will be the first to acknowledge that.
I am willing to bet that you don't know much about quantum physics, but have faith that the theory has some true groundings.
I do know a fair bit about quantum physics (I have a minor in applied physics) but that is not the important bit. The important part is that I know how to go about finding out if a scientific theory is plausible or not. Furthermore I know EXACTLY what would cause me to cease trusting that a particular scientific theory was credible.
There is evidence that their claims are true (e.g., someone named Jesus did exist in the past, and there is significant evidence that he was executed by the Romans). You may dismiss this or believe that the evidence is not enough to believe in, but those who do believe it are a far cry from the strawman "blind faith" you describe.
You are setting up a straw man yourself. Their claim is not simply that Jesus existed but that he was the "son of god" come to earth and that he "died for our sins". Their claim is that he was a deity, for which there is NO credible evidence of any kind anywhere. Pure faith and nothing more. If they stopped simply at the notion that a man named Jesus lived 2000 years ago and he was executed then that is fine as far as it goes. But you know damn well the argument does not stop there.
You could study for a decade or two in order to attain the same knowledge and verify it for yourself... but until you do that, your only option is to place your trust (and faith) in those who have already done that.
Trust is not the same thing as faith. Trust is based in experience and evidence whereas faith is not. I trust scientists (as a whole) because it is possible to verify their results even if I choose not to. In fact no one should consider what they say as meaningful until someone can replicate their results. It's a critical part of the process. And you don't have to understand all the details to understand that it works. I'm sitting in front of a computer that could not possibly work if quantum mechanics was incorrect. (for the record I have studied enough quantum mechanics to feel comfortable saying that) I don't have to travel to China myself to have credible evidence that it exists. Conversely I do not have faith that the Loomaland exists just because I read about it in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Mostly because I haven't studied it and the math required to do much with it, and I have no equipment with which to test.
But you could study it if you were so inclined and that makes all the difference.
And don't sell yourself short on the equipment front. You could reproduce some informative experiments with very little equipment. A laser pointer and some polarized lenses can reveal amazing things about the properties of light. Some of the most useful experiments are elegant ones that don't require much hardware.
I trust science. While I don't remotely understand every bit of science, I understand the process and the results. If I doubt something, I know exactly how to go about either justifying that doubt or confirming experimental results. I trust that the scientific process works because the evidence is literally staring me in the face as I type this. I also know how the people who conduct science go about their work and I know that I could check their work any time I desire. I don't have faith in science, I trust science.
Faith is simply blindly believing received wisdom. You can't test it, you can't challenge it, you can't even argue it. Faith simply is belief and evidence never plays into it. I trust scientists because I can check their work even if I choose not to. I don't have blind faith in any of them because I know they can be (and often are) proven wrong.
Oh, and yes, it's true that they stop being miracles if you bother learning how they work and understand it, and all the miracle performers (scientists and engineers) TELL you that.
I have a degree in engineering and I have studied rather a lot of physics. I understand rather well the concepts of how an airplane flies, how a supertanker floats, and how a transistor works. If you fail to be astonished at those things, I'm not really sure you understand them. I'm MORE impressed the more I understand them, not less. A 747 flying overhead is a damn miracle no matter how jaded you might be.
But from what I understand, the Democrats aren't offering up anything for cuts, and are just trying to continue overspending at their current levels. If the media's wrong,
$40 billion in cuts spread over several years when the single year deficit is close to $1 TRILLION doesn't qualify as offering anything either. That is a rounding error in a 3 Trillion dollar budget. Let's be frank, NEITHER party has offered a proposal that is meaningful in any way. The cuts being proposed by the Republican party members are insubstantial amounts designed to score political points, not to actually correct our fiscal situation. Any proposal which doesn't have some combination of tax increases and/or spending cuts totaling in the HUNDREDS of Billions of dollars (minimum) is not a serious proposal. The notion that either party is being responsible in this situation is ridiculous.
In short you are correct that the Democrats haven't proposed anything but realistically neither have the Republicans.
So will the government shut-down or not? From some online dictionary, shut-down refers to: "ceasing operations or cause to cease operating."
Sigh... Love to hear people being uselessly pedantic regarding the definition of "shutdown" which is well understood in this context by all parties involved. This has happened before and it will happen again and the word isn't going to change. Get over it.
For solar power to work and be economically viable, it needs to be in orbit.
And your evidence for this is what exactly?
No solar cell, no matter how efficient is going to be viable under an atmosphere
Really? You do realize that almost all life on this planet derives its energy from photosynthesis which is simply an organic solar cell. Your argument seems to have a fatal flaw unless you get a lot more specific.
We should have a new space race to build a space elevator
So we should ignore development of solar cells which we know work (even if they aren't the most economic choice at present) in favor of the extremely unlikely chance we could develop a space elevator. An enormously complex device we aren't even sure is possible and which requires materials that are hugely stronger than anything we know how to build. Why not just go for broke and build a dyson sphere while you are at it? I like science fiction as much as anyone here but a space elevator is only slightly more likely to happen than FTL space travel.
once its complete we can have all the orbital arrays we want for cheap.
Cute how you think building this fictional space elevator will be cheap.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd like to know which country has an electric grid that makes the US grid look primitive.
I don't think it's so much that the US grid is primitive compared to other countries. Rather it is primitive compared with the available technology and projected needs. The monitoring and control equipment on much of the grid remains rather primitive, the wire infrastructure is fragile (major outages every time a serious storm blows through), many areas still depend on sending a person out to read the meter for billing, there is a too much interdependence without adequate safeguards, local generation (solar, wind, etc) remains problematic in many places, generation sources are relatively dirty, usage controls are primitive, etc. Most of our infrastructure was built decades ago and (IMO) too little was allocated for ongoing upgrades nor were the increases in demand adequately planned for.
The grid works but it's not nearly as robust, efficient or clean as it could be. That's the problem.
You, sir or madam, owe me a new monitor and beverage. Although the sad thing is that I believe you...
Sir. And yes in the finance world most serious ad-hoc number crunching is done on spreadsheets. It's actually a pretty good tool for the job believe it or not.
The HP-12C is superior to Excel when it comes to performing quick financial calculations.
Only in select circumstances. And certainly not for doing anything that involves more than a single calculation or a long list of parameters. I certainly can enter data much faster on a 10key than on any handheld calculator. A handheld calculator is only useful if you are in a circumstance where having a full blown computer is impractical.
The RPN allows you to enter in formulas without worrying about matching parenthesis and formatting the cells, while it contains all the essential formulas you need with none of the bloat.
??? You need two parenthesis for any formula in excel. And their are wizards if you really need a crutch. Furthermore there are LOTS of "essential formulas" that the HP-12C does not have that I use every day.
You can't hack numbers together as fast and efficient with any other calculator or computer program out there, which is why the HP-12C is still popular after all these years.
Nonsense. I WORK with the guys that use HP-12Cs all the time. They use it because they are comfortable with it - NOT because it is the best option.
Remember, they're working for you, on your dime.
HAHAHAHAHAHAAA! Funniest thing I've heard all day. Will anyone who thinks our government is working for us speak up?
[crickets]
Thought so...
Look at any business school class these days any you will not find very many HP-12Cs or TI BA-IIPlus calculators anywhere. Most serious number crunching is done on a spreadsheet so the only use for one is if you are in a meeting or need to do a very quick calculation when a computer isn't readily available. (happens now and then) The HP-12C is a fine piece of equipment but if you have a spreadsheet available it's kind of like using a slide rule. Sure it works but it probably isn't the best tool available most of the time.
I'm actually a certified accountant. I have one of the TI BA-IIPlus calculators and the only time I have used it in the last 8 years was to take a certification exam. (they only allow those two calculators in the test) Otherwise it sits in a drawer and gathers dust. Frankly I can't imagine I'm going to use it in the next 8 years either. For reasons I cannot fully grasp a lot of accountants still insist on using paper tape calculators to add up long strings of numbers even though they have a spreadsheet available on their computer. I can't begin to count the number of times I've seen accountants repeatedly type in long strings of numbers because of typos. Strange people who aren't willing to change with the times. I'm waiting for one to ask for the "4:30 autogyro to Siam one of these days.
It was way way way better than Microsoft Word and always was.
Debatable on the DOS versions. Word for DOS wasn't anything great. Gotta disagree with you on the Windows versions. They were at least comparable and the consensus seemed to be that Word was regarded as the better product by most.
Some of it's features even modern word processors don't have.
A double edged sword if there ever was one... That's not necessarily a bad thing. I remember with little fondness the little cards you had to attach to the function keys so that you could remember the gazillion totally non-intuitive functions that were available. Virtually every keyboard in every office at one time had one of those little things attached to it. Ugh.
WordPerfect deserved to win and Microsoft Word did not get it's dominant position through innovation or a superior product.
"Deserved to win"? They failed to recognize that Windows was the future and came out with an late, buggy and arguably inferior product well after the migration to Word was under way. You can argue that Microsoft used some underhanded tactics but Wordperfect had the dominant position and they unquestionably screwed it up. Word was nothing amazing but some of the main reasons Wordperfect "died" was from self inflicted wounds. They had a dominant market position and failed to recognize where the market was going.
Actually, I don't understand why the fuel tax is a fixed value anyway. If it were a % of the purchase price like ordinary sales taxes, then revenue should stay fairly level as prices rise and usage drops.
Doesn't really work like that in the short run. Gasoline prices are pretty volatile in the short run so taxing based on a percentage basis would send tax revenues bouncing around like a caffeinated puppy. It would be REALLY hard to predict the tax revenues. Done on a per gallon basis the revenues are MUCH more predictable because the number of miles people drive is fairly stable in the short run. You can figure out within a reasonable error rate how many miles will be driven next year and the average fuel economy is a known number so we have a pretty good idea how many gallons of gasoline will be consumed to within a few percent. That makes for a stable tax revenue stream which is what you want.
just increase the tax on gas instead
Absolutely the correct answer and it will not happen anytime soon. Short of cutting social security benefits (old people rarely forget to vote), I can't think of a faster way for a politician to get voted out of office than to directly raise the price of gasoline. Seriously, it's political suicide with gas at $4.00/gal and an economy in the dumps even if the republican led house would be willing to consider a tax hike - which they definitely will not.
While I think this "draft proposal" (daft would be a better word) is stupid in many ways, it might be an effort to do an end run around the fact that US voters almost invariably detest any hike in the price of gasoline. Phrased right it would be possible to have the same or simiar effect as a gasoline tax without having an actual gasoline tax. Doesn't make it a good idea but that might be the intent. I shudder at the cost of all the bureaucracy something like this would create however.
I would definitely support a gradually phased in gasoline tax hike. All at once would be too much of an economic shock but if you give people a few years to adjust (buying more efficient cars, etc) it would definitely have some long term desirable benefits. If the price of gas is high enough, CAFE standards become unnecessary because people will naturally seek an economically efficient solution.
Why use something which can be defeated with a $5 wrench [xkcd.com]?
Your $5 wrench isn't much use if the person who has the password is already dead.
Okay now just put that in a Minitower case with PCIe slots, sata connectors, and lots of Dimm slots. Sell it for under $1000 dollars.
Why would Apple do that? If you are looking for a cheap PC, go buy a cheap PC. The only difference between what you describe and a generic Windows box is the operating system. Apple would be retarded to do that. The fastest way for Apple to become unprofitable is to get into selling products that are no different than any other computer maker. Hell, if you want that sort of a machine go build yourself a hackintosh. Nothing stopping you.
You see -- All of the software I need to run is open source, thus it runs on any architecture.
Good for you. Seriously. Good for you. I'm not being the slightest bit sarcastic either. I wish that were the case for more people.
Unfortunately that also tells us some things about what YOUR needs are not. Clearly you aren't a heavy duty CAD user, you aren't an accountant, odds are you aren't a graphics professional (Photoshop), you don't use MRP or ERP either and I could go on. I also very much doubt that all of the hardware you use is open source only. (While possible to do in theory, open source only hardware is very restricting.) Open source is great but there are some types of applications for which the closed source versions remain clearly superior and probably will for the foreseeable future. There is no open source 3D solid modeling software comparable to CATIA or ProE. Hell there isn't a 2D open source CAD package that even matches AutoCAD. There is no open source accounting software comparable even to QuickBooks much less some of the enterprise level accounting software. I use GIMP all the time but there is no open source replacement for Photoshop if you are a graphics professional. There are tons of additional examples. Open source simply isn't the best choice available right now for some software needs. I hope that changes but I'm not holding my breath.
If your needs are fully satisfied by open source software, that is really terrific, but it doesn't describe a huge percentage of the rest of us. I literally could not do my job using only open source software. I use as much as I can but it simply does not exist for some of my needs. (predominantly manufacturing and accounting)
Rim makes good phones.
That depends very much on what you mean by "good phones". While I haven't used their very latest offerings, my experiences with Blackberries is that they work fine but the interface is very annoying to me. I'm geeky enough to not be bothered by a complicated device but I just can't warm up the interface. The Blackberry devices have their charms but they have some serious annoyances too. I'm pretty agnostic about my choice of phone but I haven't seen a Blackberry yet that I'd spend my own money to buy. Personal preference of course.
The Android/iPhone is a handheld internet portal that happens to make phone calls, not always very reliably.
No argument but I would describe the Blackberries as email devices that happen to make calls - not always very reliably.
For example, in bright sunlight it's difficult to even see the keypad to dial a number on.
Really? I've never had a problem with any iPhone or Android phone I've used in sunlight. You can dial the screen brightness up you know. I does get washed out for some uses (taking pictures) but it's never been so bad I couldn't dial.
They need to break free of their corporate mentality and market this thing to the general public, not just their loyal BB users.
I don't think it's in their corporate DNA. I'd be pleased to be wrong but I think their development cycles are too slow, they don't have the design chops of Apple, and their business model is based on selling to businesses and keeping them through dependence on their backend software. Their phones are fine but nothing amazing. I don't know anyone who owns a blackberry who didn't get it in some manner via their job. I just think they're not equipped to deal with the recent changes in the smartphone market. Their focus on enterprises will keep them in the game for now but if Google or Apple can provide equivalent back end administration (and right now they don't) then RIM's future prospects become much dimmer.
They had a HUGE place in business servers years ago, and then they just sat down on their laurels, and never stood back up.
Their Netware product was arguably better that Microsoft's offerings but the problem was that Microsoft's competing product was good enough for most customers and it was cheaper and bundled. Businesses don't make money by buying network management software. Novell built their Netware business around features that was missing in Microsoft's offerings. When Microsoft provided it, Novell's business model no longer made sense. The only reason they hung around as long as they did is because ripping that sort of software out and replacing it is an expensive pain in the ass. But you can't live on legacy customers forever.
For the same reasons I would never buy (to hold) stock in an anti-virus vendor, inkjet cartridge refill company, or any other company whose business is based on some mis-feature of another company's product. They can be put out of business very easily.
Apple's computer sells have been outpacing the market for years since it went to "commodity" PC hardware.
Apple is fifth in market share (around 10%) behind 4 other companies in terms of units sold. Their market share has doubled in the last five years but it's relatively easy to grow from 5% compared with HP's nearly 30% or Dell's 20+%. They've grown but they've only taken a fraction of the market share and almost all at the high end of the consumer market. Apple does not seriously compete in corporate PC sales nor do they compete at the lowest end of the consumer market.
Demonstrably incorrect. There are tablets out there for equal or less money from (potentially) serious competitors like Research In Motion and Motorola. Somewhat misleading though since tablets are essentially a new market so there has been little time for competitors to bring competing products to market, regardless of price.
Apple can compete on price because it has $60 billion in the bank to buy up components raising the price for everyone else.
Having a lot of money in the bank does not mean they can (or should) compete on price. Competing on price means low margins and high volumes with undifferentiated products - exactly the opposite of what Apple sells. Apple does not try to maximize volume and their margins are among the highest in the industry. Their costs are quite high - developing all that software and their fancy designs is not cheap and you can see the cost in their financial statements. They tried to compete on cost in the 1990s and it nearly bankrupted them.
BTW your logic is not right. They have $60 billion in the bank because they DIDN"T buy inventory with it - that money is retained profit. Yes they could buy more inventory but they would be less profitable and drive up the price on themselves as well. No point in purchasing inventory you can't sell.
At one point Apple was buying 75% of the worlds capacity of flash memory. Apple still buys 25% of the world's supply.
Flash memory is not generally purchased in large quantities on a spot market. You can't just run to Toshiba and say I'd like 3 million flash memory chips delivered tomorrow. They have to purchase in advance and only then do the manufacturers produce the products. Buying market moving percentages of anything does not always result in lower prices if other people want that commodity too. If you buy 75% of the world's supply of anything, by definition you paid more than others were willing meaning you moved the price up, not down. There are numerous suppliers of flash memory and they adjust supply as demand shifts. Apple is a big player in this market but hardly the only one.
Apple can make money off of low priced iOS devices by selling its own software
The vast majority of the profit Apple makes is from selling hardware. Yes they make some money on the side from software and music sales and the rest it's a fraction of their overall revenue. Any profit Apple makes from software sales is simply gravy. Itunes exists to keep people buying iPods and iPads and iPhones. It is widely known that Apple does not make huge amounts of money from music sales. They do pretty well with App Store sales but those still are a fraction of their hardware sales. Don't take my word for it, look at Apple's financial statements.
Google makes their money selling advertising. Anything else they do is simply to keep the ad engine rolling.
What can an Android OEM make money from besides the phone?
Doesn't matter if they are willing to take a lower profit. There are plenty of companies who compete with Apple who are willing to take lower profits. Apple has big fat margins so there is a lot of room to compete on price. Furthermore since Google is bankrolling the software development for them (Apple has to eat those software development costs themselves) the Android OEMs have a theoretically lower price floor than Apple. Conceivably they could sell the Android device for less than Apple's cost and still be profitable.
They're making all the profit.
The risk to Apple from Android is that smartphones (and other devices) get commoditized thereby sucking significant profits out of their devices. Apple is a company build on selling differentiated hardware at higher prices - they cannot compete on low prices and when they tried in the past it nearly put them out of business. Android is a defensive play for Google since much internet use (and thus ad dollars) is moving to mobile devices and away from PCs. Android and iOs don't bring in money directly for either company - both exist to keep their main revenue streams viable (mostly hardware for Apple and mostly advertising for Google) and both are essentially given away. The big difference is that Google can (theoretically) make just as much money from a low priced smartphone as a high priced one whereas Apple cannot. Apple will likely have to move downmarket at some point to protect their high end sales in much the same way they did with their iPods. I doubt they can forever compete only at the high end of the market.
The bigger risk to Apple is simply that they drop the ball majorly with some future iPhone release. It's not a diverse revenue stream and if they can't keep the iPhone ahead of the pack and in demand, they could be in serious trouble very quickly. It's something of a high wire act - high risk and high reward.
But it also requires doubt.
To be worthwhile, I assert religion does too.
Religion explicitly requires an absence of doubt. The moment you doubt the existence of a god for which there is not a shred of evidence, you no longer believe in that god. Religion cannot co-exist comfortably with doubt. You cannot simultaneously believe in something for which there is no evidence and also require evidence to be certain. You can't have it both ways.
There are scientists who believe in gods but they are making a partition in their brain. They are demanding evidence for everything except the existence of their god(s). In other words they are intentionally ignoring the reasoning they use in their professional lives.
A good example is the origin of life, which many say has been explained through science despite the fact that it has not been reproduced in a lab (or anywhere else) and is therefore not "demonstrable, repeatable and self-correcting".
Many might say that but no (reputable) scientists do. I've never met a scientist who claims to know how life originated. I have met some who have some intriguing theories on the subject but the weight of the evidence does not yet point to any single theory and they will be the first to acknowledge that.
I am willing to bet that you don't know much about quantum physics, but have faith that the theory has some true groundings.
I do know a fair bit about quantum physics (I have a minor in applied physics) but that is not the important bit. The important part is that I know how to go about finding out if a scientific theory is plausible or not. Furthermore I know EXACTLY what would cause me to cease trusting that a particular scientific theory was credible.
There is evidence that their claims are true (e.g., someone named Jesus did exist in the past, and there is significant evidence that he was executed by the Romans). You may dismiss this or believe that the evidence is not enough to believe in, but those who do believe it are a far cry from the strawman "blind faith" you describe.
You are setting up a straw man yourself. Their claim is not simply that Jesus existed but that he was the "son of god" come to earth and that he "died for our sins". Their claim is that he was a deity, for which there is NO credible evidence of any kind anywhere. Pure faith and nothing more. If they stopped simply at the notion that a man named Jesus lived 2000 years ago and he was executed then that is fine as far as it goes. But you know damn well the argument does not stop there.
You could study for a decade or two in order to attain the same knowledge and verify it for yourself... but until you do that, your only option is to place your trust (and faith) in those who have already done that.
Trust is not the same thing as faith. Trust is based in experience and evidence whereas faith is not. I trust scientists (as a whole) because it is possible to verify their results even if I choose not to. In fact no one should consider what they say as meaningful until someone can replicate their results. It's a critical part of the process. And you don't have to understand all the details to understand that it works. I'm sitting in front of a computer that could not possibly work if quantum mechanics was incorrect. (for the record I have studied enough quantum mechanics to feel comfortable saying that) I don't have to travel to China myself to have credible evidence that it exists. Conversely I do not have faith that the Loomaland exists just because I read about it in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Mostly because I haven't studied it and the math required to do much with it, and I have no equipment with which to test.
But you could study it if you were so inclined and that makes all the difference.
And don't sell yourself short on the equipment front. You could reproduce some informative experiments with very little equipment. A laser pointer and some polarized lenses can reveal amazing things about the properties of light. Some of the most useful experiments are elegant ones that don't require much hardware.
I trust science. While I don't remotely understand every bit of science, I understand the process and the results. If I doubt something, I know exactly how to go about either justifying that doubt or confirming experimental results. I trust that the scientific process works because the evidence is literally staring me in the face as I type this. I also know how the people who conduct science go about their work and I know that I could check their work any time I desire. I don't have faith in science, I trust science.
Faith is simply blindly believing received wisdom. You can't test it, you can't challenge it, you can't even argue it. Faith simply is belief and evidence never plays into it. I trust scientists because I can check their work even if I choose not to. I don't have blind faith in any of them because I know they can be (and often are) proven wrong.
Oh, and yes, it's true that they stop being miracles if you bother learning how they work and understand it, and all the miracle performers (scientists and engineers) TELL you that.
I have a degree in engineering and I have studied rather a lot of physics. I understand rather well the concepts of how an airplane flies, how a supertanker floats, and how a transistor works. If you fail to be astonished at those things, I'm not really sure you understand them. I'm MORE impressed the more I understand them, not less. A 747 flying overhead is a damn miracle no matter how jaded you might be.
Obligatory XKCD
But from what I understand, the Democrats aren't offering up anything for cuts, and are just trying to continue overspending at their current levels. If the media's wrong,
$40 billion in cuts spread over several years when the single year deficit is close to $1 TRILLION doesn't qualify as offering anything either. That is a rounding error in a 3 Trillion dollar budget. Let's be frank, NEITHER party has offered a proposal that is meaningful in any way. The cuts being proposed by the Republican party members are insubstantial amounts designed to score political points, not to actually correct our fiscal situation. Any proposal which doesn't have some combination of tax increases and/or spending cuts totaling in the HUNDREDS of Billions of dollars (minimum) is not a serious proposal. The notion that either party is being responsible in this situation is ridiculous.
In short you are correct that the Democrats haven't proposed anything but realistically neither have the Republicans.
So will the government shut-down or not? From some online dictionary, shut-down refers to: "ceasing operations or cause to cease operating."
Sigh... Love to hear people being uselessly pedantic regarding the definition of "shutdown" which is well understood in this context by all parties involved. This has happened before and it will happen again and the word isn't going to change. Get over it.
For solar power to work and be economically viable, it needs to be in orbit.
And your evidence for this is what exactly?
No solar cell, no matter how efficient is going to be viable under an atmosphere
Really? You do realize that almost all life on this planet derives its energy from photosynthesis which is simply an organic solar cell. Your argument seems to have a fatal flaw unless you get a lot more specific.
We should have a new space race to build a space elevator
So we should ignore development of solar cells which we know work (even if they aren't the most economic choice at present) in favor of the extremely unlikely chance we could develop a space elevator. An enormously complex device we aren't even sure is possible and which requires materials that are hugely stronger than anything we know how to build. Why not just go for broke and build a dyson sphere while you are at it? I like science fiction as much as anyone here but a space elevator is only slightly more likely to happen than FTL space travel.
once its complete we can have all the orbital arrays we want for cheap.
Cute how you think building this fictional space elevator will be cheap.