Sure, like a poker game, the chips can end up being stacked in some guy's favor. The GP is saying that's less likely to happen under the free market than under communism, where it is an essential part of the game.
IMO the thing that is missing from this debate is size. Big government aint good for you. Neither are big corporations. They both have a great deal of say in what happens in certain countries, and both tend to serve their own purpose. People who work for them are often miserable, as are people who use their services.
This leads to an interesting dynamic when watching the US, because you have two groups who point fingers at each other, both legitimately, but essentially they are the same thing... they want to keep things the way they are, rather than trying new ways of doing things.
But then it's not the system that's a dream. It's the model of humanity. Why not just cut out the whole politics and redistribution, and just have a fantasy about a world where everyone is happy?
Well yeah. So what? The communists claim to be able to create a better society. It ain't better, and the excuse is that uhm... people are still people? How does that solve anyone of the purported weaknesses of the previous regime?
Yes, it hasn't been tried. Everyone who has ever tried it ended up subjugating a load of people, creating the same old power games that despots always create, and making everyone miserable. Can anyone name a communist country that they would like to live in?
No, I didn't mean to rule in, I mean as a normal citizen. I've met Cubans, Vietnamese, Poles, East Germans, etc. You know what? They all wanted to stop "trying" to bring on the revolution.
"This is a remarkable sight people get to see all too rarely," said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. "This view of our planet shows how Earth looks from the outside, illustrating a special perspective of our role and place in the universe. We see a humbling yet beautiful view of ourselves."
Are they about to sell this picture to a modern art museum?
That's brilliant, even the station itself is robotic. I was thinking you'd just yank it out and dump it in the station, plug in a new one. Now what is needed is critical mass, so that people don't need to stay within 300K of that place in Israel.
I wonder why they don't just have "Gas" stations with a load of charged batteries for the customers, who then drop off their old batts. Just like when you go and get propane for the BBQ.
This is exactly right. Unfortunately, it's not the cultural norm in the real business world. By "real", I mean companies who make real products and services.
Myself, I'm in the investment industry. Investors ask us as part of the due diligence process how much of our own net worth is invested in our products. You can't get around this. It is the only way to make sure people are acting in your interest. If they ask me how they know my interest is aligned with theirs, the answer is "four fifths of everything I own is in this product. I need the rest to eat." For the more wealthy guys in the business, I'd look for 99% or so.
A thing to note is that options and restricted stock are NOT the solution: 1) Options are asking for volatility. Ok, if you want your man to take more risk, do that. But be aware he's got a free dice roll. 2) Stock is an option. It can't go under zero, can it? But assuming your company is unlikely to go under, there's also the fact that by the time a dude is CXO, he's already pretty comfy. Kids mostly through school, got a house and a car. If the share price is more or less steady, I get a little payout. Or I can ramp up risk and see if I can finally buy a football club in 5 years.
No, you need the guy to actually suffer a loss if things go wrong. They need to put money on the table. (This is also a good gauge of how confident they really are.)
It's not at all clear that tax is the reason CEOs get paid a lot. What's the connection between lower tax and higher CEO pay, other than coincidence with the mood of the times (CEO as rockstar, every man as the architect of his own destiny)?
IMO the problem is big organisations. They tend to have enough resources that a huge sum like those you mentioned are just a drop in the ocean of revenue. It makes any amount of money seem justifiable.
And you're right about the superstar thing. There's probably a tendency for the boards of large organisations to look in a very small pool of people (we need a guy from our industry, a big firm, he need CXO experience... oh there's only 5 in total in play...). Which allows them to ask for more money.
A bit of creative destruction, rather than the endless domination of corporate dinosaurs would be good for everyone. Better, more interesting jobs. Interesting products. No need to climb a big pyramid.
that you've probably thought of is to get a big donor to pledge matching funds. My old college did this, with a dude pledging to match everything that was raised. Helps to have a suitable candidate for this kind of thing though, and my college is about 500 years old.
But good idea with the charge-when-target-reached site.
Anyway, seriously, the article conflates automation with algorithm. Sure, when we have computers, we can create more automated schemes. But we've been doing algorithms from long before we had computers.
I read about a game you could buy at the gadget shop that measures how stressed out you are. The purpose, of course, is to be less stressed out than your opponent. The catch: loser gets an electric shock!
Why doesn't the religion just say "use your common sense"? "Have a look at your environment, people's experience with the flora and fauna, and make your own judgement on whether to eat it." That would solve everything, for all of time.
Moved from there now, but IIRC Pret do this. They have loads of shops, but I don't know if it's an official policy. Possibly a number of the Pret lookalikes (eg Eat). Not sure about the supermarket chains. But if you ask a homeless guy, they can probably tell you.
Typically when it comes to capitalism, we are told that America is the example. Not sure why. Well, actually, there's other countries to look at that are doing a better job of it.
Communism, which country is the example? (One worth living in...)
That's right. So people who do something important with their time, like working, are less incentivised to vote than people who are retired. Result: retired people get a bigger say in what happens, because the working voters are throwing out their votes. Not really an ideal situation.
Blizzard needs to prevent WoW from becoming The X-Files here; they need to notice that the interest level (and the natural story arc) are winding down and create a proper ending before the whole thing becomes a bloated mess destined to a messy, horribly unsatisfying conclusion.
Dude, my wife and I just finished watching the boxed set of the 9 seasons of the X-Files. We'd both seen the early episodes when we were younger, and thought we'd get the set to find out how the story ends...
Finished watching the last episode, she turns to me: -OMFG. I've been poked in the perineum --How so? -A little up or down, and at least there would have been a sensation.
And yes, since programming is a hands-on experience, it's better to have a practitioner teaching. I remember numerous occasions on the Engineering course where I just thought "hmm, WTF does this have to do with building stuff".
Hey, I'm quite interested in high performance. Does your course have a website/notes/syllabus/anything? I'm one of those guys who learned by doing on the job, after uni. Got an MEng though.
Slashdot Mirror
Sure, like a poker game, the chips can end up being stacked in some guy's favor. The GP is saying that's less likely to happen under the free market than under communism, where it is an essential part of the game.
IMO the thing that is missing from this debate is size. Big government aint good for you. Neither are big corporations. They both have a great deal of say in what happens in certain countries, and both tend to serve their own purpose. People who work for them are often miserable, as are people who use their services.
This leads to an interesting dynamic when watching the US, because you have two groups who point fingers at each other, both legitimately, but essentially they are the same thing... they want to keep things the way they are, rather than trying new ways of doing things.
But then it's not the system that's a dream. It's the model of humanity. Why not just cut out the whole politics and redistribution, and just have a fantasy about a world where everyone is happy?
Well yeah. So what? The communists claim to be able to create a better society. It ain't better, and the excuse is that uhm... people are still people? How does that solve anyone of the purported weaknesses of the previous regime?
Yes, it hasn't been tried. Everyone who has ever tried it ended up subjugating a load of people, creating the same old power games that despots always create, and making everyone miserable. Can anyone name a communist country that they would like to live in?
No, I didn't mean to rule in, I mean as a normal citizen. I've met Cubans, Vietnamese, Poles, East Germans, etc. You know what? They all wanted to stop "trying" to bring on the revolution.
You can barely see anything in the picture!
From TFA:
"This is a remarkable sight people get to see all too rarely," said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. "This view of our planet shows how Earth looks from the outside, illustrating a special perspective of our role and place in the universe. We see a humbling yet beautiful view of ourselves."
Are they about to sell this picture to a modern art museum?
Aren't ordinary batteries for devices made by various manufacturers, both on the device and the battery side?
That's brilliant, even the station itself is robotic. I was thinking you'd just yank it out and dump it in the station, plug in a new one. Now what is needed is critical mass, so that people don't need to stay within 300K of that place in Israel.
I wonder why they don't just have "Gas" stations with a load of charged batteries for the customers, who then drop off their old batts. Just like when you go and get propane for the BBQ.
This is exactly right. Unfortunately, it's not the cultural norm in the real business world. By "real", I mean companies who make real products and services.
Myself, I'm in the investment industry. Investors ask us as part of the due diligence process how much of our own net worth is invested in our products. You can't get around this. It is the only way to make sure people are acting in your interest. If they ask me how they know my interest is aligned with theirs, the answer is "four fifths of everything I own is in this product. I need the rest to eat." For the more wealthy guys in the business, I'd look for 99% or so.
A thing to note is that options and restricted stock are NOT the solution:
1) Options are asking for volatility. Ok, if you want your man to take more risk, do that. But be aware he's got a free dice roll.
2) Stock is an option. It can't go under zero, can it? But assuming your company is unlikely to go under, there's also the fact that by the time a dude is CXO, he's already pretty comfy. Kids mostly through school, got a house and a car. If the share price is more or less steady, I get a little payout. Or I can ramp up risk and see if I can finally buy a football club in 5 years.
No, you need the guy to actually suffer a loss if things go wrong. They need to put money on the table. (This is also a good gauge of how confident they really are.)
It's not at all clear that tax is the reason CEOs get paid a lot. What's the connection between lower tax and higher CEO pay, other than coincidence with the mood of the times (CEO as rockstar, every man as the architect of his own destiny)?
IMO the problem is big organisations. They tend to have enough resources that a huge sum like those you mentioned are just a drop in the ocean of revenue. It makes any amount of money seem justifiable.
And you're right about the superstar thing. There's probably a tendency for the boards of large organisations to look in a very small pool of people (we need a guy from our industry, a big firm, he need CXO experience... oh there's only 5 in total in play...). Which allows them to ask for more money.
A bit of creative destruction, rather than the endless domination of corporate dinosaurs would be good for everyone. Better, more interesting jobs. Interesting products. No need to climb a big pyramid.
that you've probably thought of is to get a big donor to pledge matching funds. My old college did this, with a dude pledging to match everything that was raised. Helps to have a suitable candidate for this kind of thing though, and my college is about 500 years old.
But good idea with the charge-when-target-reached site.
See what I did there?
Anyway, seriously, the article conflates automation with algorithm. Sure, when we have computers, we can create more automated schemes. But we've been doing algorithms from long before we had computers.
Nobody walks over a cliff if they can see it approaching, duh!
We'll just keep walking backwards...
I read about a game you could buy at the gadget shop that measures how stressed out you are. The purpose, of course, is to be less stressed out than your opponent. The catch: loser gets an electric shock!
Failed government, sure. Unfortunately not a failed meme. It's a bit like a weed in that way.
Why doesn't the religion just say "use your common sense"? "Have a look at your environment, people's experience with the flora and fauna, and make your own judgement on whether to eat it." That would solve everything, for all of time.
Moved from there now, but IIRC Pret do this. They have loads of shops, but I don't know if it's an official policy. Possibly a number of the Pret lookalikes (eg Eat). Not sure about the supermarket chains. But if you ask a homeless guy, they can probably tell you.
Yeah, after hours. Makes good sense, too. Why throw out food just because you aren't gonna sell it?
Typically when it comes to capitalism, we are told that America is the example. Not sure why. Well, actually, there's other countries to look at that are doing a better job of it.
Communism, which country is the example? (One worth living in...)
You do know that various fast food chains actually hand out food for free in the evenings, don't you?
That's right. So people who do something important with their time, like working, are less incentivised to vote than people who are retired. Result: retired people get a bigger say in what happens, because the working voters are throwing out their votes. Not really an ideal situation.
I'm all for a vote-at-home, online system.
Blizzard needs to prevent WoW from becoming The X-Files here; they need to notice that the interest level (and the natural story arc) are winding down and create a proper ending before the whole thing becomes a bloated mess destined to a messy, horribly unsatisfying conclusion.
Dude, my wife and I just finished watching the boxed set of the 9 seasons of the X-Files. We'd both seen the early episodes when we were younger, and thought we'd get the set to find out how the story ends...
Finished watching the last episode, she turns to me:
-OMFG. I've been poked in the perineum
--How so?
-A little up or down, and at least there would have been a sensation.
Wow, what a great resource! Thanks so much.
And yes, since programming is a hands-on experience, it's better to have a practitioner teaching. I remember numerous occasions on the Engineering course where I just thought "hmm, WTF does this have to do with building stuff".
Hey, I'm quite interested in high performance. Does your course have a website/notes/syllabus/anything? I'm one of those guys who learned by doing on the job, after uni. Got an MEng though.