I suspect that lots of companies are going to use the time to hone a Unix/OS X/Linux OS closed-source product development and marketing strategy.
There may be a certain amount of truth to this. I think a lot of companies are always trying to update their software with the latest spin from Microsoft. It's like Microsoft gives companies busy work that keeps them from making a lot of progress on their own systems--it just keeps them up to date with Microsoft. That works for Microsoft because it doesn't give companies time to move their application to *nix because they're too busy keeping up with Microsoft.
With a 3-4 years before the next major Microsoft technology shift, that might be enough time for many companies to get their current new features added to Windows and then have time to port to *nix.
Some else: They mean smart as in built-in anti-competitive DRM designed to squeeze others out of the marketplace and stopping me doing what I want to do with my e-mail?
You: Why don't you simply say that you don't understand what the DRM in Outlook 2003 is or how it works and haven't bothered to educate yourself about it?
While I don't use Outlook 2003 (and never will), from what I've read the person you replied to seemed to be correct. Would you care to elaborate on what you think is incorrect about his comments regarding Outlook 20003 DRM?
Ethanol is more fuel efficient? How do you figure?
Might want to check here. Check last paragraph page 2 "Some critics say that ethanol contains less energy per unit volume than unblended gasoline. This is true."
Sorry this is exactly what they are supposed to do. The trafic in that lane is supposed to proceed and pull over. New York may have it's own law in California that is the law however.
And if the law told you you had to jump off a bridge, would you do it?
I don't think the original poster is arguing with what is SUPPOSED to happen. But if I'm at an intersection and there is traffic backed up a half block behind me with its siren on and I have cars going through the intersection in both directions at 40mph do you think I'm just going to drive through there?
Maybe if you turn the getto music off on your over powered stereo you would have heard the ambulance/firetruck/police car siren and seen the lights and pulled to the right like you were supposed to before this became necessary.
I think he's talking about you being at a red light and then an ambulance pulls up a few cars behind you. As much as you'd like to move, someone else in cross-traffic might have their ghetto music going full blast and aren't going to be expecting you to pull into traffic.
If you make a rule of running a red light without hesitation whenever an ambulance comes up behind you I think you'll soon have high insurance rates and/or a lower life expectancy. Darwin Awards come to mind.
You obviously dont understand the capital markets.
Do you just like to troll or didn't you read my entire message?
Google could clearly put a couple hundress million to use on better product development.
Of course. The point is that analysts estimate they have an annual profit now of at least $150 million. That's more than enough for R&D without having to seek outside funding in the way of an IPO. If they only were making a million or two in profit each year, yeah, do an IPO to do the R&D you need to grow. But the company apparently already has sufficient profit to do whatever software R&D they need, so if you're the owner of Google why give up your equity and control if you don't need to?
The only reason why they would go public would to raise capital - they are selling equity for cash.
Obviously. But why are they selling equity for cash?
1. They want to expand or need to invest more in R&D than they have available right now. Assuming analysts are right with their $150 million annual profit estimate, I think they have sufficient funds to do the R&D and expansion they feel they need to do.
2. The owners just want out. They've built a successful company and just want to retire. Possible.
3. The owners want to pocket a few billion in cash. The amount of money they're talking about ($15-20 billion, maybe even $100 billion) is an obsecene amount of money and more than they could possibly need to grow. Heck, they could operate the company on the interest raised by that amount of money. Perhaps the owners just aren't satisfied with $150 million/year profit and want to pocket a few billion from the proceeds.
4. If they succeeded at a $100 billion IPO, maybe they just want to buy a third of MSFT.:)
Selling at the market price is way for Google to maximize its revenue and not necessarily benefit its underwriter with cheaper than market shares for distribution.
I don't deny that. As I said in my previous post, this makes sense for Google and the owners of Google. But as an investor I'm hestitant to play.
One of the requirements is that it be COST EFFECTIVE. Alcohol isn't. Alcohol is more expensive to produce than gasoline and has less heat content than oil which leads to decreased fuel efficiency and less range on a single tank of gas. So you'd be paying more to drive less.
You could also run your car on natural gas (I mean LPG...yes, I know that it is fossil fuel too).
While this is better than oil from an energy independence standpoint, it seems like a temporary solution since, as you said, it is still a non-renewable fossil fuel. Plus about 30% of LPG (in the U.S. anyway) comes from the oil and gas refinery process making the production of this "clean" alternative somewhat suspect.
So, yes, better than gas but I'm not sure it's worth an investment to get people to switch. I'd rather develop a renewal alternative and get people to switch 10 years from now when the alternative is ready than spend money on trying to push everyone to LPG today and then spend more money in 10 years when a truly renewable alternative is available.
But while high gas taxes probably won't convince most Americans to use public transportation (it's not even available in many places) it might convince them to try alternative fuels.
*What* alternative fules? What alternative fuel can I try that is even close to being as cheap as gas is?
And, what options do I have when my car runs on gas? Or are we thinking that charging $2.50/gallon instead of $1.50/gallon is going to make me run out and spend $30,000 on some new alternative fuel vehicle that I can't buy fuel for nationwide?
Nah, it'll just cause fewer people to travel which means fewer dollars being spent on everything vacation-related. It will increase the price of airline tickets as well as the price of everything that requires transporation (i.e. everything).
We have *chosen* to have an oil based economy -- this is a decision we've made
Yes, because we don't have any other efficient alternative right now. That won't always be the case--I suspect someday we'll be able to more efficiently utilize solar power and/or we'll see more nuclear reactors that can in turn be used to get hydrogen for fuel cells used in car. Until then I don't see any real alternative to oil--so trying to get us to stop using it when there isn't another option is pointless.
We could choose to start moving away from oil, decrease independence (economic too), but that'd be the rational, smart thing to do
No, at this point it is neither rational nor smart. As far as I know (and correct me if I'm wrong), there is still no alternative energy that is as cheap and reliable as oil.
It is neither smart nor rational to stop using oil, or punish those that do, until a more economically viable alternative presents itself. To force people to stop using oil when there's not a cost-effective alternative will reduce economic activty and increase the cost of all goods that have to be transported (just about everything). This will slow our economy down and further reduce the amount of money *available* for R&D to achieve a viable alternative energy source which will probably extend the amount of time we're stuck using oil.
There ARE viable alternatives in many sectors of the energy economy which WOULD be cheaper IF they had the benefit of the economy of scale oil enjoys.
Could you please tell me which alternatives would be cheaper than oil if they had an economy of scale?
At what point do you consider it acceptable for the government to try and tip that balance? Or do you expect a new technology to be so much cheaper at inception that the economy of scale advantage is irrelevant?
All things being equal, the new technology should be cheaper by at least the amount of tax government applies to the old technology to promote the new. In the case of alternative energy, if the alternative is as cheap as oil but is clean and/or reduces or eliminates our dependence on foreign energy I'd be in favor of pushing us towards that. But it should NOT cost more. Pushing the country to an economically les efficient fuel is not in our interest.
Again, if there are alternatives to oil that are currently as cheap and as reliable I'd very much like to know what they are.
I'll happily concede that point, as long as you will concede that "typical liberal solution" really means "willing to pay up-front cost to more quickly realize long-term gains".
No, that would be using tax dollars to invest in R&D to pay for the up-front cost of some alternative energy. Like I said, I don't mind my tax dollars going to something useful such as developing a working alternative energy.
The liberal solution is artificially inflating the cost of something they consider undesirable to achieve a goal they think is better even though, in this case, there isn't a viable alternative.
Again, please correct me if I'm wrong. But I know of no alternative energy right now that can compete with oil in terms of cost and reliability. The one exception is nuclear, of which I also approve. I would fully support massive deployment of nuclear power plants to provide cheap energy which could also be used to get the hydrogen for fuel cells which our cars would burn. But I doubt that's what you meant... or is it?
Did you know that if all the money that goes into subsidizing automobile transportation was cut, and all of that cost was added into gasoline, you'd be paying between $3.70 to $6.50 more per gallon?
I read that article you linked to. It's bogus and scarcely relevant to the discussion at hand regarding pushing people to alternative fuels before such technology is mature. Check out the comment:
It considered investment in transportation infrastructure, traffic-related police, fire and court costs, energy subsidies, tax breaks to businesses for "free" parking provided to employees, health costs and economic losses related to air pollution, effects of noise and sprawl on housing values, and economic impacts of importing foreign oil.
Transportation infrastructure? That's going to be the same whether my car is powered by oil or by hydrogen (more if you consider the cost of converting gas stations to hydrogen stations).
Traffic-related police? That's going to be the same whether my car is powered by oil or hydrogen.
Fire and court costs? I hardly see where that has anything to do with anything, but I don't see it going down if we use hydrogen instead of oil. These costs are facts of life in any major city.
Energy subsidies? Which? I'd be more intersted in hearing the specific costs of energy subsidies rather than some vague quote of $3.50 to $6.50 per gallon for which we are not given any real numbers in the article.
"Cost of Free parking?" Again, I don't see where this cost is any different with oil or hydrogen power.
Health/environmental because of air pollution? Hard to quantify with any accuracy. That said, I'm in favor of an alternative energy source as soon as it makes financial sense to do so.
Effects of noise and sprawl on housing values? Once again, nothing to do with oil-based energy. And, if anything, I bet sprawl helps housing values since many people don't like living downtown. And noise? I haven't run into any serious noise problems in the suburbs or countryside.
Economic impacts of importing oil? Again, I'm in favor of investing money in R&D of alternative energy and when it makes financial sense to use then we'll see the country start using it. But as long as the cost of alternative energy is more than the economic impact of importing oil, it's not going to happen--and shouldn't happen.
In short, your article seems to be arguing for the use of mass transit. That may make sense in some places, less in other places--but it's not what we're talking about right now.
You're getting to drive your automobile around for much cheaper than it should cost due to subsidies, and you're going to complain about adding taxes?
Give me the numbers. Don't tell me I'm driving my car around for cheaper than it should cost me. And don't tell me it should cost me $3.50 to $6.50/gallon. Show me all the "hidden" costs of driving that I'm not paying for. Especially considering I pay taxes on the gas I buy *AND* fund the government through my income taxes. So how exactly am I getting a free ride?
Heck, it could go over $8 a gallon if all the subsidies are removed.
Show me the numbers. The article you linked to doesn't really explain how they came up with their numbers. They mentioned some of the factors they supposedly included, but they didn't give numbers to back them up.
Please forgive me for not instantly believing vague claims made by an organization called the Conservation Law Foundation that doesn't provide numbers to back up its case.
And if you were Noah, you wouldn't have started building the ark until after the rain started.
No, I would have built it before. But I wouldn't have forced myself and family into it until it started raining.
In other words, let's work on alternative energy. But let's not drag the economy down by taxing oil until one of those alternative energies actually works efficiently enough to replace oil. Make sense?
Couldn't they just filter such packets before they send them to the user? That might be controversial, but less controversial than modifying the configuration of a customer's PC.
Denmark now gets 20% of its power from wind turbines, and it is becoming cheap ($0.03/kw/hr).
So do you power your cars with sails?
Yes, tax fossil fuels because they pollute, and dont last, and invest in green alternatives.
I agree, invest in alternative fuels. I'm 100% in favor of that. But don't tax fossil fuels until there is a viable alternative. That's like taxing cars to encourage people to purchase spaceships instead.
Their idea is to encourage conservation of oil and exploration of other energy sources. Surely you cannot object to that.
No, I don't object to that. I would support the government spending some of my tax dollars on R&D into alternative energy. And when an alternative energy source is found that is cheaper than oil the market will use it almost overnight.
I do NOT approve of the government artificially inflating the price of oil to push us towards an alternative energy that doesn't exist yet.
Now... if an alternative energy source is found and it's ready and it's cheaper than oil and for some reason it just isn't adopted then, yes, raise taxes on oil to push people to the alternative energy souce. But only do that when we have a viable alternative! Of course once we have a viable alternative it won't be necessary to raise taxes to convince people to use it. The market will adopt it immediately if it makes financial sense.
I smile at your characterization of The Economist as liberal.
I didn't characterize the Economist as liberal. I characterized the idea as a typical liberal solution. And it is.
but if the idea is to push people onto other energy sources, which currently cost more than oil, that has to reduce our standard of living, doesn't it
Yes. And don't let anyone try to convince you otherwise.
1) You can't have a "painless" tax if the goal is to push people into other energy sources. If you want to change behavior with taxes, the tax has to be punitive. If it's not punitive it will not change behavior. Liberals often try to suggest that creating new taxes will make things better, but usually they just cost me more money.
2) You should not push the public into using any alternative energy source until it is economically viable. Right now there are no economically viable alternatives to oil. I would support the government spending money to fund serious R&D to *make* alternatives economically viable at which point the market will use them without any pushing necessary. But to push us into some alternative energy that is not as efficient as oil before that alternative can stand against oil on its own economic merits is bad economic policy, period.
I read the article. It all was good and fine but I was wondering at what point they were going to suggest a tax. Answer: 2nd from last paragraph. Their solution is increasing taxes. Great. If raising gas taxes is the solution, why don't I see Europeans driving around in fuel cell cars even though they already pay too much in gas taxes?
Rather than make alternative energy cheaper (by investing in alternative energy R&D) so that the market just goes to alternative energy all by itself, increase the cost of gas so much that it has the same cost as alternative energy. Bogus, but typical, liberal approach to just about any problem. Manipulate the market with taxes.
As long as you believe that the market-movers actually know what Google's worth.
Of course they don't.:)
But I'm not very optimistic at Google increasing profit on a constant basis. Yes, they're doing well and I think they can continue to do well. But if they are seeing profits of $150m/year, then anything over about $5 billion market cap is just out of line. There's not a whole lot of growth available to them short of changing their service so much that it becomes less attractive to Internet users. And if it's not about growth then I need to see dividends that make my investment worthwhile. If they have over about $5 billion market cap then I'd be better off investing in a savings account.
Anyway, if they do a traditional IPO I'll probably buy some stocks the first day and try to ride it for awhile. I don't think it's a long-term good investment, but the IPO ride should be predictable. But if they go with an auction I'll probably pass because the initial price will have the "IPO ride" already factored into it. Google will get the profit instead of me. That's fine for Google and it's their right, but it doesn't help me.
As they said, an auction would net Google more money. That means the investor would pay more which lessens the urge to actually participate. Of course, it at least gives you the option to participate in the IPO whereas normally only good friends of important people get to participate.
It seems, though, that an auction will mean that everyone will pay the maximum amount for the shares rather than a tempting IPO amount. So instead of some people getting in at a $10 IPO value (for example) and riding it to $100, everyone will have to pay $100 each and there will be no IPO ride.
What this means to me that there is no pressing reason why I should participate in the IPO. Presumably the auction will set a price very close to what it will be trading at when shares become available through traditional channels, so why bother? Just wait a few days and see how the stock moves. IPOs in the past have been tempting for investors because there is an expectation it will rise quickly, so everyone wants in. If the IPO is at the "already risen" stock price then there's no rush to get in at the very beginning since a few days later will be essentially the same price on the open market.
This only makes sense for Google, and only the owners. As someone else has said, they already have good profit and I doubt they need more to grow the company. If the company doesn't have any plans on why it needs/wants $15 billion (other than to make a few owners rich) I'd be skeptical of giving it to them.
The Administration (White House) *HAS* expressed support for the bill. The expected road block is in the House, not the White House. Sorry, can't blame this one on Bush.
That said, I'm not sure that enacting legislation that will not solve the problem but may lead to unintended consequences is really a good idea.
Sure, at first the approval system would suffer from DOS like problems. But once 99.999% of spam never reaches the end user, there is less incentive to send it.
But that's true of any anti-spam solution, including passive Bayesian filters that don't require "approval" or anything. If 99% of all users were using Bayesian filters then most spam would never reach the end user and there'd be less of an incentive to send it.
The problem is getting 99% of all users to use *anything*. Even getting 99% of all mail admins to use anything is a challenge.
I'm suspicious of the 7% number they cited. That doesn't jive with what even the spammers have mentioned as their success rate.
My guess is that the 7% refers to people who have *ever* bought anything advertised via spam. It's not that 7% of spam results in a sale, but after receiving ten thousand spams perhaps 7% of the people bought something from one of them. If that's the case then you're still looking an awful response rate.
Also, we can be optimistic that 99% of those 7% only bought something from spam once and learned their lesson and will never do it again.
Surprisingly the only e-mails I still get are for Viagra or penis enlargement, all the others have stopped. So yeah I still have to use my filters, but they're doing a lot less work.
Strange. That's pretty much opposite what virtually everyone else in the world reports when replying or clicking on unsubscribe links.
Personally, my spam just keeps getting worse. I had 2171 spams in April of this year. I got 5073 last month and I'm on track to receive about 7100 this month. That's a 3x increase in 6 months.
The good news is that thanks to my Bayesian filter the amount of spam that I actually *SEE* has gone from 2171 spams (obviously) down to about 14 per month--and those 14 usually come in bursts and are duplicates (i.e., come in in the morning and find that 4 copies of the same spam got through). So I probably see a single spam about once every week or so. That's tolerable.
Slashdot Mirror
There may be a certain amount of truth to this. I think a lot of companies are always trying to update their software with the latest spin from Microsoft. It's like Microsoft gives companies busy work that keeps them from making a lot of progress on their own systems--it just keeps them up to date with Microsoft. That works for Microsoft because it doesn't give companies time to move their application to *nix because they're too busy keeping up with Microsoft.
With a 3-4 years before the next major Microsoft technology shift, that might be enough time for many companies to get their current new features added to Windows and then have time to port to *nix.
Microsoft may be dropping the ball on this one. :)
Yes, but that doesn't mean you're wrong. :)
You: Why don't you simply say that you don't understand what the DRM in Outlook 2003 is or how it works and haven't bothered to educate yourself about it?
While I don't use Outlook 2003 (and never will), from what I've read the person you replied to seemed to be correct. Would you care to elaborate on what you think is incorrect about his comments regarding Outlook 20003 DRM?
Ethanol is more fuel efficient? How do you figure?
Might want to check here. Check last paragraph page 2 "Some critics say that ethanol contains less energy per unit volume than unblended gasoline. This is true."
Thank you, drive through.
And if the law told you you had to jump off a bridge, would you do it?
I don't think the original poster is arguing with what is SUPPOSED to happen. But if I'm at an intersection and there is traffic backed up a half block behind me with its siren on and I have cars going through the intersection in both directions at 40mph do you think I'm just going to drive through there?
Maybe if you turn the getto music off on your over powered stereo you would have heard the ambulance/firetruck/police car siren and seen the lights and pulled to the right like you were supposed to before this became necessary.
I think he's talking about you being at a red light and then an ambulance pulls up a few cars behind you. As much as you'd like to move, someone else in cross-traffic might have their ghetto music going full blast and aren't going to be expecting you to pull into traffic.
If you make a rule of running a red light without hesitation whenever an ambulance comes up behind you I think you'll soon have high insurance rates and/or a lower life expectancy. Darwin Awards come to mind.
Do you just like to troll or didn't you read my entire message?
Google could clearly put a couple hundress million to use on better product development.
Of course. The point is that analysts estimate they have an annual profit now of at least $150 million. That's more than enough for R&D without having to seek outside funding in the way of an IPO. If they only were making a million or two in profit each year, yeah, do an IPO to do the R&D you need to grow. But the company apparently already has sufficient profit to do whatever software R&D they need, so if you're the owner of Google why give up your equity and control if you don't need to?
The only reason why they would go public would to raise capital - they are selling equity for cash.
Obviously. But why are they selling equity for cash?
1. They want to expand or need to invest more in R&D than they have available right now. Assuming analysts are right with their $150 million annual profit estimate, I think they have sufficient funds to do the R&D and expansion they feel they need to do.
2. The owners just want out. They've built a successful company and just want to retire. Possible.
3. The owners want to pocket a few billion in cash. The amount of money they're talking about ($15-20 billion, maybe even $100 billion) is an obsecene amount of money and more than they could possibly need to grow. Heck, they could operate the company on the interest raised by that amount of money. Perhaps the owners just aren't satisfied with $150 million/year profit and want to pocket a few billion from the proceeds.
4. If they succeeded at a $100 billion IPO, maybe they just want to buy a third of MSFT. :)
Selling at the market price is way for Google to maximize its revenue and not necessarily benefit its underwriter with cheaper than market shares for distribution.
I don't deny that. As I said in my previous post, this makes sense for Google and the owners of Google. But as an investor I'm hestitant to play.
Though the unit is priced out of reach for some with an MSRP of $2800, it is an impressive system for those who want the latest and the best.
Try "priced out of reach for MOST..."
One of the requirements is that it be COST EFFECTIVE. Alcohol isn't. Alcohol is more expensive to produce than gasoline and has less heat content than oil which leads to decreased fuel efficiency and less range on a single tank of gas. So you'd be paying more to drive less.
You could also run your car on natural gas (I mean LPG...yes, I know that it is fossil fuel too).
While this is better than oil from an energy independence standpoint, it seems like a temporary solution since, as you said, it is still a non-renewable fossil fuel. Plus about 30% of LPG (in the U.S. anyway) comes from the oil and gas refinery process making the production of this "clean" alternative somewhat suspect.
So, yes, better than gas but I'm not sure it's worth an investment to get people to switch. I'd rather develop a renewal alternative and get people to switch 10 years from now when the alternative is ready than spend money on trying to push everyone to LPG today and then spend more money in 10 years when a truly renewable alternative is available.
*What* alternative fules? What alternative fuel can I try that is even close to being as cheap as gas is?
And, what options do I have when my car runs on gas? Or are we thinking that charging $2.50/gallon instead of $1.50/gallon is going to make me run out and spend $30,000 on some new alternative fuel vehicle that I can't buy fuel for nationwide?
Nah, it'll just cause fewer people to travel which means fewer dollars being spent on everything vacation-related. It will increase the price of airline tickets as well as the price of everything that requires transporation (i.e. everything).
Yes, because we don't have any other efficient alternative right now. That won't always be the case--I suspect someday we'll be able to more efficiently utilize solar power and/or we'll see more nuclear reactors that can in turn be used to get hydrogen for fuel cells used in car. Until then I don't see any real alternative to oil--so trying to get us to stop using it when there isn't another option is pointless.
We could choose to start moving away from oil, decrease independence (economic too), but that'd be the rational, smart thing to do
No, at this point it is neither rational nor smart. As far as I know (and correct me if I'm wrong), there is still no alternative energy that is as cheap and reliable as oil.
It is neither smart nor rational to stop using oil, or punish those that do, until a more economically viable alternative presents itself. To force people to stop using oil when there's not a cost-effective alternative will reduce economic activty and increase the cost of all goods that have to be transported (just about everything). This will slow our economy down and further reduce the amount of money *available* for R&D to achieve a viable alternative energy source which will probably extend the amount of time we're stuck using oil.
Could you please tell me which alternatives would be cheaper than oil if they had an economy of scale?
At what point do you consider it acceptable for the government to try and tip that balance? Or do you expect a new technology to be so much cheaper at inception that the economy of scale advantage is irrelevant?
All things being equal, the new technology should be cheaper by at least the amount of tax government applies to the old technology to promote the new. In the case of alternative energy, if the alternative is as cheap as oil but is clean and/or reduces or eliminates our dependence on foreign energy I'd be in favor of pushing us towards that. But it should NOT cost more. Pushing the country to an economically les efficient fuel is not in our interest.
Again, if there are alternatives to oil that are currently as cheap and as reliable I'd very much like to know what they are.
I'll happily concede that point, as long as you will concede that "typical liberal solution" really means "willing to pay up-front cost to more quickly realize long-term gains".
No, that would be using tax dollars to invest in R&D to pay for the up-front cost of some alternative energy. Like I said, I don't mind my tax dollars going to something useful such as developing a working alternative energy.
The liberal solution is artificially inflating the cost of something they consider undesirable to achieve a goal they think is better even though, in this case, there isn't a viable alternative.
Again, please correct me if I'm wrong. But I know of no alternative energy right now that can compete with oil in terms of cost and reliability. The one exception is nuclear, of which I also approve. I would fully support massive deployment of nuclear power plants to provide cheap energy which could also be used to get the hydrogen for fuel cells which our cars would burn. But I doubt that's what you meant... or is it?
I read that article you linked to. It's bogus and scarcely relevant to the discussion at hand regarding pushing people to alternative fuels before such technology is mature. Check out the comment:
Transportation infrastructure? That's going to be the same whether my car is powered by oil or by hydrogen (more if you consider the cost of converting gas stations to hydrogen stations).
Traffic-related police? That's going to be the same whether my car is powered by oil or hydrogen.
Fire and court costs? I hardly see where that has anything to do with anything, but I don't see it going down if we use hydrogen instead of oil. These costs are facts of life in any major city.
Energy subsidies? Which? I'd be more intersted in hearing the specific costs of energy subsidies rather than some vague quote of $3.50 to $6.50 per gallon for which we are not given any real numbers in the article.
"Cost of Free parking?" Again, I don't see where this cost is any different with oil or hydrogen power.
Health/environmental because of air pollution? Hard to quantify with any accuracy. That said, I'm in favor of an alternative energy source as soon as it makes financial sense to do so.
Effects of noise and sprawl on housing values? Once again, nothing to do with oil-based energy. And, if anything, I bet sprawl helps housing values since many people don't like living downtown. And noise? I haven't run into any serious noise problems in the suburbs or countryside.
Economic impacts of importing oil? Again, I'm in favor of investing money in R&D of alternative energy and when it makes financial sense to use then we'll see the country start using it. But as long as the cost of alternative energy is more than the economic impact of importing oil, it's not going to happen--and shouldn't happen.
In short, your article seems to be arguing for the use of mass transit. That may make sense in some places, less in other places--but it's not what we're talking about right now.
You're getting to drive your automobile around for much cheaper than it should cost due to subsidies, and you're going to complain about adding taxes?
Give me the numbers. Don't tell me I'm driving my car around for cheaper than it should cost me. And don't tell me it should cost me $3.50 to $6.50/gallon. Show me all the "hidden" costs of driving that I'm not paying for. Especially considering I pay taxes on the gas I buy *AND* fund the government through my income taxes. So how exactly am I getting a free ride?
Heck, it could go over $8 a gallon if all the subsidies are removed.
Show me the numbers. The article you linked to doesn't really explain how they came up with their numbers. They mentioned some of the factors they supposedly included, but they didn't give numbers to back them up. Please forgive me for not instantly believing vague claims made by an organization called the Conservation Law Foundation that doesn't provide numbers to back up its case.
No, I would have built it before. But I wouldn't have forced myself and family into it until it started raining.
In other words, let's work on alternative energy. But let's not drag the economy down by taxing oil until one of those alternative energies actually works efficiently enough to replace oil. Make sense?
Couldn't they just filter such packets before they send them to the user? That might be controversial, but less controversial than modifying the configuration of a customer's PC.
I'm paying more so I can pay less? Uh..... Ok, whatever. :)
So do you power your cars with sails?
Yes, tax fossil fuels because they pollute, and dont last, and invest in green alternatives.
I agree, invest in alternative fuels. I'm 100% in favor of that. But don't tax fossil fuels until there is a viable alternative. That's like taxing cars to encourage people to purchase spaceships instead.
Not only claim, but did.
Their idea is to encourage conservation of oil and exploration of other energy sources. Surely you cannot object to that.
No, I don't object to that. I would support the government spending some of my tax dollars on R&D into alternative energy. And when an alternative energy source is found that is cheaper than oil the market will use it almost overnight.
I do NOT approve of the government artificially inflating the price of oil to push us towards an alternative energy that doesn't exist yet.
Now... if an alternative energy source is found and it's ready and it's cheaper than oil and for some reason it just isn't adopted then, yes, raise taxes on oil to push people to the alternative energy souce. But only do that when we have a viable alternative! Of course once we have a viable alternative it won't be necessary to raise taxes to convince people to use it. The market will adopt it immediately if it makes financial sense.
I smile at your characterization of The Economist as liberal.
I didn't characterize the Economist as liberal. I characterized the idea as a typical liberal solution. And it is.
Yes. And don't let anyone try to convince you otherwise.
1) You can't have a "painless" tax if the goal is to push people into other energy sources. If you want to change behavior with taxes, the tax has to be punitive. If it's not punitive it will not change behavior. Liberals often try to suggest that creating new taxes will make things better, but usually they just cost me more money.
2) You should not push the public into using any alternative energy source until it is economically viable. Right now there are no economically viable alternatives to oil. I would support the government spending money to fund serious R&D to *make* alternatives economically viable at which point the market will use them without any pushing necessary. But to push us into some alternative energy that is not as efficient as oil before that alternative can stand against oil on its own economic merits is bad economic policy, period.
Rather than make alternative energy cheaper (by investing in alternative energy R&D) so that the market just goes to alternative energy all by itself, increase the cost of gas so much that it has the same cost as alternative energy. Bogus, but typical, liberal approach to just about any problem. Manipulate the market with taxes.
We should tax being a Democrat. :)
Of course they don't. :)
But I'm not very optimistic at Google increasing profit on a constant basis. Yes, they're doing well and I think they can continue to do well. But if they are seeing profits of $150m/year, then anything over about $5 billion market cap is just out of line. There's not a whole lot of growth available to them short of changing their service so much that it becomes less attractive to Internet users. And if it's not about growth then I need to see dividends that make my investment worthwhile. If they have over about $5 billion market cap then I'd be better off investing in a savings account.
Anyway, if they do a traditional IPO I'll probably buy some stocks the first day and try to ride it for awhile. I don't think it's a long-term good investment, but the IPO ride should be predictable. But if they go with an auction I'll probably pass because the initial price will have the "IPO ride" already factored into it. Google will get the profit instead of me. That's fine for Google and it's their right, but it doesn't help me.
It seems, though, that an auction will mean that everyone will pay the maximum amount for the shares rather than a tempting IPO amount. So instead of some people getting in at a $10 IPO value (for example) and riding it to $100, everyone will have to pay $100 each and there will be no IPO ride.
What this means to me that there is no pressing reason why I should participate in the IPO. Presumably the auction will set a price very close to what it will be trading at when shares become available through traditional channels, so why bother? Just wait a few days and see how the stock moves. IPOs in the past have been tempting for investors because there is an expectation it will rise quickly, so everyone wants in. If the IPO is at the "already risen" stock price then there's no rush to get in at the very beginning since a few days later will be essentially the same price on the open market.
This only makes sense for Google, and only the owners. As someone else has said, they already have good profit and I doubt they need more to grow the company. If the company doesn't have any plans on why it needs/wants $15 billion (other than to make a few owners rich) I'd be skeptical of giving it to them.
That said, I'm not sure that enacting legislation that will not solve the problem but may lead to unintended consequences is really a good idea.
But that's true of any anti-spam solution, including passive Bayesian filters that don't require "approval" or anything. If 99% of all users were using Bayesian filters then most spam would never reach the end user and there'd be less of an incentive to send it.
The problem is getting 99% of all users to use *anything*. Even getting 99% of all mail admins to use anything is a challenge.
My guess is that the 7% refers to people who have *ever* bought anything advertised via spam. It's not that 7% of spam results in a sale, but after receiving ten thousand spams perhaps 7% of the people bought something from one of them. If that's the case then you're still looking an awful response rate.
Also, we can be optimistic that 99% of those 7% only bought something from spam once and learned their lesson and will never do it again.
Strange. That's pretty much opposite what virtually everyone else in the world reports when replying or clicking on unsubscribe links.
Personally, my spam just keeps getting worse. I had 2171 spams in April of this year. I got 5073 last month and I'm on track to receive about 7100 this month. That's a 3x increase in 6 months.
The good news is that thanks to my Bayesian filter the amount of spam that I actually *SEE* has gone from 2171 spams (obviously) down to about 14 per month--and those 14 usually come in bursts and are duplicates (i.e., come in in the morning and find that 4 copies of the same spam got through). So I probably see a single spam about once every week or so. That's tolerable.