...Sure you can always use gold or silver industrially, but it's not worth much otherwise as it's just some shiny metal.
In many parts of the world, and especially in India, gold is indeed widely used as an "ultimate" store of value. Go to Dubai and you'll see the immegrant workers buying "genuine guaranteed" ingots to take back home
Alvinrod is saying is that gold or silver doesn't have inherent worth because it doesn't meet any fundamental requirements for human survival (food, water, shelter, heat, clothes, etc.). You can't eat gold. You can't drink gold. Gold is not an appropriate material to make clothes or shelter. You can't warm yourself with gold. So, a person must be part of a functioning society that provides the minimum for human survival before it can ascribe any value to a rare shiny metal. Or another way to think of it... if you were stranded alone on an island with no hope of rescue and trying to survive, which would you prefer to have: a handful of gold or a handful of viable seeds for crops? Obviously the latter, because outside of society gold has no value.
"Unlimited" to Verizon means "unlimited as long as you use less than 300 kilobits per second continuously". Which just happens to be almost exactly the minimum bandwidth for a Skype video call...
Sure, I'll ponder that for a moment, then point out that you seem to think there are people that...Skype 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 12 months every year, never stopping to eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, etc. I suspect many/most customers lead more balanced lives then that.
Just to play devil's advocate... some tech-savy people could use their grand-fathered unlimited data plans to monitor home or business surveillance cameras 24/7 via Skype or a similar streaming program. I could also imagine a heavy torrents user tethering a computer to a phone with an unlimited data plan and easily exceeding Verizon's 100GB/month cut-off.
Interesting comment considering that the main reason Fury Road won so many Oscars is because Miller bucked Hollywood's 10+ year infatuation with green screens and CGI, and went back to classic old-school movie-making [like the original Mad Max films] with real effects, stunts, explosions, cars, costumes, choreography, and landscapes. Here's an article with more details and pre- and post edit comparison photos from the movie... http://www.dailydot.com/upstre...
As a counterpoint, the story of Mad Max was by no means great or compelling. Heck, the main character spends the first quarter of of the film grunting through a steel mask/gag. That didn't stop the movie from being nominated for ten Oscars and winning six, including best picture.
I loved Mad Max, but it's in the same blue and orange palette hollywood is obsessed with. Mad Max scenes were shot in full [Namibian desert] daylight, so it looked brighter, but undeniably blue and orange. Read here: http://priceonomics.com/why-ev...
How about this question. Have you or any of your family members suffered a reaction from a vaccine.
YES, and it required a visit to the ER and respiratory treatment. In this case, from the DTaP vaccine and involving my daughter.
***
That's a relatively rare reaction, but fully treatable and heck of lot better than getting diptheria, tetanus, or whooping cough.
....but that they were losing their efficacy and that they were become less effective against new strains.
And a good place to look as to why this is happening are the stupid people do not vaccinate or delay vaccinations against their doctor's recommendations.
Please note, that I did NOT say the vaccines didn't work...Nor am I anti-vaccine. But I am anti-stupid people, and anti-bad science on both sides.
Noted. However, please note that those who post a long-winded diatribes about the dangers of vaccines and then disclaim it with a "...but I'm not anti-vaccine" are talking out of two-sides of their mouth. Dangerously wrong opinions are not credible because one tries to position their view as being some sort of moderate middle ground. There are a great many topics that I'm all for a nuanced discussion of the gray-area, middle-ground, but in regards to vaccines and their effect on the greater public health, I don't believe a middle ground exists. You are either for science, modern medicine, and supporting public health, or you are not. If you choose the latter or persist in trying to have it both ways, then the germs win.
Do you realize that nearly every modern study on the safety of vaccinations is invalid?
Nearly every study conducted uses the VAERS data - this data is scientifically worthless.... blah blah blah blah
In lieu of every modern study of vaccinations, which are supposedly flawed, please answer these questions:
Do you or anyone in your extended family have or ever had smallpox? Do you or anyone in your extended family 50 years old or younger have or ever had polio? Do you or anyone in your extended family 50 years old or younger have or ever had diptheria? Do you or anyone in your extended family 50 years old or younger have or ever had rubella?
If the answer to these questions are all "NO" then vaccines work. No fancy science is needed to prove an anti-vaxxer wrong.
- Halo, no not the first person shooter. They were on PCs for ages. But arguably the first first person shooter on a console to replicate the dynamic that was expected on PCs and to become so mainstream, that it essentially foot the bill for the Xbox marketing wise.
I would give GoldenEye 007 on the N64 a slight edge over Halo. I remember many kids/twenty-something who were not typically gamers, still had a N64 specifically for GoldenEye. IMO It was GoldenEye that opened the door for Halo's acceptance.
When GoldenEye was released I had already been playing PC shooters like Doom, Quake, and Duke Nukem for years so GoldenEye seemed like a huge step back to me, but there was no arguing against how popular it was.
It never really occurred to me, but the design is actually remarkably alike. Both arcades and phones make their games artificially time constrained or difficult to suck money out of your wallet.
I wish I had mod points to vote this up. I never considered the similarity before either... but absolutely, the arcade game design and mobile game design to encourage quarter-pumping and micro-transactions, respectively, for additional play time or unlocks are really similar.
The thing is, people are posting less and less even of pictures. My feed is all idiotic "shares"....I wish there was a way to block ALL shares, and ONLY see original content created by someone I know....
I agree that there should more feed filtering options. I also wish I could apply rules to my feed filter out posts containing certain words. In particular, I have few friends/family involved in home sales companies (e.g. Mary Kay, Stella&Dot, Shakeology, etc.). It's impossible to filter their marketing out of my feed except by unfriending or hiding that person from my feed entirely, which I'm not going to do because sometimes they do have posts I care about. Funny too that Facebook purposely hides official company Facebook pages unless they pay for a corporate account or sponsored posts, but they let these pyramid-scheme home marketing sales companies go free.
Power storage is everything. Every single option to store electric energy onboard an aircraft is orders of magniture less power-density efficient than gas.
Could power storage needs be reduced by regenerating some electricity during flight? Rudders, elevators, and ailerons steer a plane by creating airflow disturbances and drag, but if the drag forces could also spin a turbine to generate electricity in flight, then less [heavy] battery space would be needed. Like regenerative breaking in hybrid/electric cars.
Ad hominem. Attacking Snowden's point because of his own (supposed) failings of character. Snowden's actions are irrelevant to whether or not Cameron deserves criticism.
There are others who deserve criticism more than Cameron for something his dead father did. Snowden appears to have an axe to grind.
Snowden's point is devalued when from the protection of the Russian state he criticizes the UK Prime Minister for his dead father's activities, but says nothing about Putin's close personal connections to several living Russian oligarchs who clearly stole and laundered money from Russia.
Avis/Hertz has the solution for your twice a year problem and it will likely cost you less to rent than to rack up miles on your personal car for those long trips.
That 500 mile trip was only one example, there are others that pop up through the year, and some extended "local" driving that exceeds the LEAF's 70-80 mile range. Even if I was taking a fairly short 100 mile round trip, extending a ~1.5-2 hour drive to ~2-2.5 hours for a charging break is pain myself and many others probably don't want to deal with. My Avis budget would get ridiculous, which is why my wife's car is a Honda Accord. We swap cars when the other needs to go further in a day. In the past year this has never been a problem.
When I'm ready to retire the Leaf I'll look at the EVs with longer ranges and reevaluate.
...[buy] a Spark EV for $500 out the door and lease payments of $100/mo and potentially get $2500 back from the State of California. Net cost for 3 years of leasing about $1500.
You don't have to convince me on the economics. I already crunched the numbers and it's the main reason I bought a LEAF (used, ~$15K, barely over a year old, would have been ~$35k new). I think leasing cars is a waste of money, but your results may vary. I suspect I got my Leaf from previous lease, but they took the over 50% depreciation hit for me.
I have a deposit for a Model 3, it will meet 100% of my driving needs but I'll probably still rent from Avis for 800 mile weekend trips.
You're clearly a little biased then.... and if you're still renting that means it's not meeting 100% of your driving needs.
That said, I am supporter of EVs, and like you, I put my money where my mouth is and own one. EV technology today can work really well for many people and save them a lot of money. I just think some people get stars in their eyes about EV range and the promises charging networks.
Years down the road when you retire your Model 3 keep it in garage somewhere and I'll bet it will become a collector's item in a few decades... it's a part of car history.:-)
It's a car without the range to do a road trip. I realize they want to change that with rapid charging stations but it's not there yet.
So for a lot of people this would be a secondary vehicle, with a primary vehicle being gas or hybrid. Could be done Werth a married family. Certainly no range anxiety for commuting
I am a Leaf owner and I think you are mostly right. People are jumping on you a little prematurely.
Where you're right is, 1) even with a 200 mile range a road trip would still be much easier/preferable in a gas/hybrid car for most people*; 2) EVs work really well for 2 car households; 3) there is no range anxiety for commuting.
Where you're wrong is, that an EV would only be secondary vehicle. For most people the vast majority of their driving is local commuting to work and errands, which EVs are perfect for making it a great primary car, with a secondary a gas/hybrid car for longer trips. This assumes a two-car household, of course... for single-car households I would still recommend a gas/hybrid car for it's flexibility.
* - I know there will be a charging station network, but I think people are down-playing the charging time way too much. I do a 500 mile road trip a couple times a year to see my family and it takes between 7-8 hours in a gas car. If I had to do it an 200 mile range EV that would be 2 charging stops and pushing 9 hours or more and god-forbid if I have to wait in a charging line(s) on a busy traveling weekend/holiday. I love my Leaf and I think EVs are great, particularly for two-car households, but there are limitations.
I disagree, they have a unique product sure enough, but having a somewhat captive audience of commuters in their cars who happen to overlap with the set of people that will part with some of their income to donate to a public radio station because of a daily habit (of driving to work) isn't something to dismiss either.
Also programming fees paid by public radio stations make up about 40% of NPR's revenues and 10% from other distribution channels (e.g., cable, satellite, etc). If 1/2 their fees went away, NPR would be likely forced to rely on Corporate sponsorship (currently about 25%) and Grants (only about 15%). It probably won't be the same NPR given that funding would be dominated by corporate sponsorship.
The myth is that NPR is federally funded. Actually, federal funding of NPR comes through the public radio stations. Actually, federal grants are made to public radio stations, and public radio stations pay fees to NPR for their programming using this grant money (along with other local fund-raising sources).
I am aware of NPR's finances because I am a paying contributor to NPR. Maybe that makes me biased... maybe that makes me informed...maybe a little of both...
People will still be commuting and will still want to listen to quality news. Commuters are no more a "captive audience" by NPR than those tuning into Top 40 pop music or AM talk radio. NPR is competing on the free airwaves with their particular brand, and I don't see NPR listeners suddenly turning to the drivel that comes out mainstream media networks (music, news, talk, or otherwise). If in the next decade or so car radios are replaced with streaming devices that users select streams like we do already with AM/FM/XM-Sirius radio and they have NPR options on the dial, then the user experience is largely unchanged. Streaming format would allow NPR to centralize distribution and get funding directly from contributors instead of indirectly through dues/subscriptions from regional stations who divert significant funds to maintaining physical towers. It would definitely be a major change to the organization with it's bumps, but I believe it will be manageable as long as the demand and customer experience stays consistent.
That app is hardly the future of NPR, because NPR probably has no future after the demise of radio. While there have been occasionally cases of successfully monetizing podcasts, I think it highly unlikely that NPR would be able to offer the high-quality programming it is known for through solely podcast revenue.
So, when the radio is replaced with streaming (which it probably will), you think NPR is just going to shrivel up and die? You think the millions of people across the nation who listen to NPR on the radio will decide to stream Justin Beiber instead of a Terry Gross interview? Really?
NPR is in a tricky spot now with the radio stations, but they do have a unique product with a sustainable demand and will work it out.
I own a Nissan Leaf, so I figured I would chime in. You make very good points. Electric car technology today is not ready for everyone, but I think many people pre-maturely write off EVs. I would NOT recommend an electric car (today) to anyone who meets one or more of the following: - single car household - does not have a garage or home charging option - every driver in the household drives more 70 miles each day
However, there are many households that don't meet those criteria and that could benefit today from an electric car. My wife and I have pretty typical single-family home with a garage and we own two cars - a Honda Accord and a Leaf. I'll break down the main concerns with EVs and my experiences:
RANGE: My wife or I both have jobs we commute to and other errands to run. If one of us needs to drive more than 70 miles in a day that person takes the gas car that day. In a year of owning the Leaf there was only one day we both needed the range of a gas car and we traded a car with my wife's parents for the day. No big deal. CHARGING: I charge my Leaf overnight on a standard 120V outlet, so I did not install any special charging equipment. I have never needed to charge at a public station. The concern about public charging infrastructure is overblown because the vast majority of all EV charging is and will be done at home [or for some lucky people at work]; charging elsewhere is infrequent or for emergencies. COST: The Leaf is much cheaper to run and maintain than any gas car, and I bought the Leaf used (1.5 years old) for ~$15k with plenty left on the warranty, so it was/is quite affordable.* In fact, affordability to buy and maintain and EV was a much bigger selling point to me than anything related to it being green.
I think if more people took a harder look at their household driving habits/needs many would be surprised to find how well an EVs could work and save them a lot of money.
* - I know I might have to replace a battery someday. Assuming it doesn't happen under warranty and based on current prices I think a battery replacement balances out well with the long-term fuel and maintenance savings, but there's good chance the costs to a replace a battery will come down too... a couple years is a long time in EV/battery technology.
But don't let that stop any of you from continuing your super-duper important arguments with randos about democracy, taxes, science funding, founding fathers' visions, discrimination, communism, etc.
Hydrogen will become very interesting once hydrogen storage containers come down in price due to economy of scale. Anyone with a water hookup and sunlight could run their own hydrogen refueling station.
Many things get interesting with economies of scale, but that's putting the cart before the horse. New technologies have to be viable for public/private investment from the outset.
My vote goes to the finding of active tectonics. This implies heat, which is coming from...where?
I think the most popular theory is gravity from Pluto's moon, Charon, pulls on the planet deferentially as it orbits creating internal friction and heat, in the same way the Earth's moon is theorized to drive the Earth's internal heat, mantle convection, and tectonics. Charon orbits Pluto very closely and is relatively large compared to Pluto. Some have even suggested calling Pluto and Charon a "binary planet." At any rate, they exert strong gravitational forces on each other, and based on the features observed it could be driving internal heat systems on both Pluto and Charon.
Slashdot Mirror
Netflix is the first media company with the business model of "Give the customers exactly what they want."
Personally, I think Valve follows this business model better and more successfully than Netflix.
...Sure you can always use gold or silver industrially, but it's not worth much otherwise as it's just some shiny metal.
In many parts of the world, and especially in India, gold is indeed widely used as an "ultimate" store of value.
Go to Dubai and you'll see the immegrant workers buying "genuine guaranteed" ingots to take back home
Alvinrod is saying is that gold or silver doesn't have inherent worth because it doesn't meet any fundamental requirements for human survival (food, water, shelter, heat, clothes, etc.). You can't eat gold. You can't drink gold. Gold is not an appropriate material to make clothes or shelter. You can't warm yourself with gold. So, a person must be part of a functioning society that provides the minimum for human survival before it can ascribe any value to a rare shiny metal. Or another way to think of it... if you were stranded alone on an island with no hope of rescue and trying to survive, which would you prefer to have: a handful of gold or a handful of viable seeds for crops? Obviously the latter, because outside of society gold has no value.
Sure, I'll ponder that for a moment, then point out that you seem to think there are people that...Skype 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 12 months every year, never stopping to eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, etc. I suspect many/most customers lead more balanced lives then that.
Just to play devil's advocate... some tech-savy people could use their grand-fathered unlimited data plans to monitor home or business surveillance cameras 24/7 via Skype or a similar streaming program. I could also imagine a heavy torrents user tethering a computer to a phone with an unlimited data plan and easily exceeding Verizon's 100GB/month cut-off.
Interesting comment considering that the main reason Fury Road won so many Oscars is because Miller bucked Hollywood's 10+ year infatuation with green screens and CGI, and went back to classic old-school movie-making [like the original Mad Max films] with real effects, stunts, explosions, cars, costumes, choreography, and landscapes. Here's an article with more details and pre- and post edit comparison photos from the movie... http://www.dailydot.com/upstre...
As a counterpoint, the story of Mad Max was by no means great or compelling. Heck, the main character spends the first quarter of of the film grunting through a steel mask/gag. That didn't stop the movie from being nominated for ten Oscars and winning six, including best picture.
I loved Mad Max, but it's in the same blue and orange palette hollywood is obsessed with. Mad Max scenes were shot in full [Namibian desert] daylight, so it looked brighter, but undeniably blue and orange. Read here: http://priceonomics.com/why-ev...
How about this question. Have you or any of your family members suffered a reaction from a vaccine.
YES, and it required a visit to the ER and respiratory treatment. In this case, from the DTaP vaccine and involving my daughter.
***
That's a relatively rare reaction, but fully treatable and heck of lot better than getting diptheria, tetanus, or whooping cough.
....but that they were losing their efficacy and that they were become less effective against new strains.
And a good place to look as to why this is happening are the stupid people do not vaccinate or delay vaccinations against their doctor's recommendations.
Please note, that I did NOT say the vaccines didn't work...Nor am I anti-vaccine. But I am anti-stupid people, and anti-bad science on both sides.
Noted. However, please note that those who post a long-winded diatribes about the dangers of vaccines and then disclaim it with a "...but I'm not anti-vaccine" are talking out of two-sides of their mouth. Dangerously wrong opinions are not credible because one tries to position their view as being some sort of moderate middle ground. There are a great many topics that I'm all for a nuanced discussion of the gray-area, middle-ground, but in regards to vaccines and their effect on the greater public health, I don't believe a middle ground exists. You are either for science, modern medicine, and supporting public health, or you are not. If you choose the latter or persist in trying to have it both ways, then the germs win.
Do you realize that nearly every modern study on the safety of vaccinations is invalid?
Nearly every study conducted uses the VAERS data - this data is scientifically worthless.... blah blah blah blah
In lieu of every modern study of vaccinations, which are supposedly flawed, please answer these questions:
Do you or anyone in your extended family have or ever had smallpox?
Do you or anyone in your extended family 50 years old or younger have or ever had polio?
Do you or anyone in your extended family 50 years old or younger have or ever had diptheria?
Do you or anyone in your extended family 50 years old or younger have or ever had rubella?
If the answer to these questions are all "NO" then vaccines work. No fancy science is needed to prove an anti-vaxxer wrong.
- Halo, no not the first person shooter. They were on PCs for ages. But arguably the first first person shooter on a console to replicate the dynamic that was expected on PCs and to become so mainstream, that it essentially foot the bill for the Xbox marketing wise.
I would give GoldenEye 007 on the N64 a slight edge over Halo. I remember many kids/twenty-something who were not typically gamers, still had a N64 specifically for GoldenEye. IMO It was GoldenEye that opened the door for Halo's acceptance.
When GoldenEye was released I had already been playing PC shooters like Doom, Quake, and Duke Nukem for years so GoldenEye seemed like a huge step back to me, but there was no arguing against how popular it was.
It never really occurred to me, but the design is actually remarkably alike. Both arcades and phones make their games artificially time constrained or difficult to suck money out of your wallet.
I wish I had mod points to vote this up. I never considered the similarity before either... but absolutely, the arcade game design and mobile game design to encourage quarter-pumping and micro-transactions, respectively, for additional play time or unlocks are really similar.
The thing is, people are posting less and less even of pictures. My feed is all idiotic "shares". ...I wish there was a way to block ALL shares, and ONLY see original content created by someone I know....
I agree that there should more feed filtering options. I also wish I could apply rules to my feed filter out posts containing certain words. In particular, I have few friends/family involved in home sales companies (e.g. Mary Kay, Stella&Dot, Shakeology, etc.). It's impossible to filter their marketing out of my feed except by unfriending or hiding that person from my feed entirely, which I'm not going to do because sometimes they do have posts I care about. Funny too that Facebook purposely hides official company Facebook pages unless they pay for a corporate account or sponsored posts, but they let these pyramid-scheme home marketing sales companies go free.
From one non-aerodynamicist to another, that sounds like a reasonably good point. :-)
Power storage is everything. Every single option to store electric energy onboard an aircraft is orders of magniture less power-density efficient than gas.
Could power storage needs be reduced by regenerating some electricity during flight? Rudders, elevators, and ailerons steer a plane by creating airflow disturbances and drag, but if the drag forces could also spin a turbine to generate electricity in flight, then less [heavy] battery space would be needed. Like regenerative breaking in hybrid/electric cars.
LOL... and my posts got modded down as "Troll." Mods here are a riot with anything involving Snowden.
Ad hominem.
Attacking Snowden's point because of his own (supposed) failings of character. Snowden's actions are irrelevant to whether or not Cameron deserves criticism.
There are others who deserve criticism more than Cameron for something his dead father did. Snowden appears to have an axe to grind.
And how does that devalue his point....
Snowden's point is devalued when from the protection of the Russian state he criticizes the UK Prime Minister for his dead father's activities, but says nothing about Putin's close personal connections to several living Russian oligarchs who clearly stole and laundered money from Russia.
Avis/Hertz has the solution for your twice a year problem and it will likely cost you less to rent than to rack up miles on your personal car for those long trips.
That 500 mile trip was only one example, there are others that pop up through the year, and some extended "local" driving that exceeds the LEAF's 70-80 mile range. Even if I was taking a fairly short 100 mile round trip, extending a ~1.5-2 hour drive to ~2-2.5 hours for a charging break is pain myself and many others probably don't want to deal with. My Avis budget would get ridiculous, which is why my wife's car is a Honda Accord. We swap cars when the other needs to go further in a day. In the past year this has never been a problem.
When I'm ready to retire the Leaf I'll look at the EVs with longer ranges and reevaluate.
...[buy] a Spark EV for $500 out the door and lease payments of $100/mo and potentially get $2500 back from the State of California. Net cost for 3 years of leasing about $1500.
You don't have to convince me on the economics. I already crunched the numbers and it's the main reason I bought a LEAF (used, ~$15K, barely over a year old, would have been ~$35k new). I think leasing cars is a waste of money, but your results may vary. I suspect I got my Leaf from previous lease, but they took the over 50% depreciation hit for me.
I have a deposit for a Model 3, it will meet 100% of my driving needs but I'll probably still rent from Avis for 800 mile weekend trips.
You're clearly a little biased then.... and if you're still renting that means it's not meeting 100% of your driving needs.
That said, I am supporter of EVs, and like you, I put my money where my mouth is and own one. EV technology today can work really well for many people and save them a lot of money. I just think some people get stars in their eyes about EV range and the promises charging networks.
Years down the road when you retire your Model 3 keep it in garage somewhere and I'll bet it will become a collector's item in a few decades... it's a part of car history. :-)
It's a car without the range to do a road trip. I realize they want to change that with rapid charging stations but it's not there yet.
So for a lot of people this would be a secondary vehicle, with a primary vehicle being gas or hybrid. Could be done Werth a married family. Certainly no range anxiety for commuting
I am a Leaf owner and I think you are mostly right. People are jumping on you a little prematurely.
Where you're right is, 1) even with a 200 mile range a road trip would still be much easier/preferable in a gas/hybrid car for most people*; 2) EVs work really well for 2 car households; 3) there is no range anxiety for commuting.
Where you're wrong is, that an EV would only be secondary vehicle. For most people the vast majority of their driving is local commuting to work and errands, which EVs are perfect for making it a great primary car, with a secondary a gas/hybrid car for longer trips. This assumes a two-car household, of course... for single-car households I would still recommend a gas/hybrid car for it's flexibility.
* - I know there will be a charging station network, but I think people are down-playing the charging time way too much. I do a 500 mile road trip a couple times a year to see my family and it takes between 7-8 hours in a gas car. If I had to do it an 200 mile range EV that would be 2 charging stops and pushing 9 hours or more and god-forbid if I have to wait in a charging line(s) on a busy traveling weekend/holiday. I love my Leaf and I think EVs are great, particularly for two-car households, but there are limitations.
I disagree, they have a unique product sure enough, but having a somewhat captive audience of commuters in their cars who happen to overlap with the set of people that will part with some of their income to donate to a public radio station because of a daily habit (of driving to work) isn't something to dismiss either.
Also programming fees paid by public radio stations make up about 40% of NPR's revenues and 10% from other distribution channels (e.g., cable, satellite, etc). If 1/2 their fees went away, NPR would be likely forced to rely on Corporate sponsorship (currently about 25%) and Grants (only about 15%). It probably won't be the same NPR given that funding would be dominated by corporate sponsorship.
The myth is that NPR is federally funded. Actually, federal funding of NPR comes through the public radio stations. Actually, federal grants are made to public radio stations, and public radio stations pay fees to NPR for their programming using this grant money (along with other local fund-raising sources).
I am aware of NPR's finances because I am a paying contributor to NPR. Maybe that makes me biased... maybe that makes me informed...maybe a little of both...
People will still be commuting and will still want to listen to quality news. Commuters are no more a "captive audience" by NPR than those tuning into Top 40 pop music or AM talk radio. NPR is competing on the free airwaves with their particular brand, and I don't see NPR listeners suddenly turning to the drivel that comes out mainstream media networks (music, news, talk, or otherwise). If in the next decade or so car radios are replaced with streaming devices that users select streams like we do already with AM/FM/XM-Sirius radio and they have NPR options on the dial, then the user experience is largely unchanged. Streaming format would allow NPR to centralize distribution and get funding directly from contributors instead of indirectly through dues/subscriptions from regional stations who divert significant funds to maintaining physical towers. It would definitely be a major change to the organization with it's bumps, but I believe it will be manageable as long as the demand and customer experience stays consistent.
That app is hardly the future of NPR, because NPR probably has no future after the demise of radio. While there have been occasionally cases of successfully monetizing podcasts, I think it highly unlikely that NPR would be able to offer the high-quality programming it is known for through solely podcast revenue.
So, when the radio is replaced with streaming (which it probably will), you think NPR is just going to shrivel up and die? You think the millions of people across the nation who listen to NPR on the radio will decide to stream Justin Beiber instead of a Terry Gross interview? Really?
NPR is in a tricky spot now with the radio stations, but they do have a unique product with a sustainable demand and will work it out.
I own a Nissan Leaf, so I figured I would chime in. You make very good points. Electric car technology today is not ready for everyone, but I think many people pre-maturely write off EVs. I would NOT recommend an electric car (today) to anyone who meets one or more of the following:
- single car household
- does not have a garage or home charging option
- every driver in the household drives more 70 miles each day
However, there are many households that don't meet those criteria and that could benefit today from an electric car. My wife and I have pretty typical single-family home with a garage and we own two cars - a Honda Accord and a Leaf. I'll break down the main concerns with EVs and my experiences:
RANGE: My wife or I both have jobs we commute to and other errands to run. If one of us needs to drive more than 70 miles in a day that person takes the gas car that day. In a year of owning the Leaf there was only one day we both needed the range of a gas car and we traded a car with my wife's parents for the day. No big deal.
CHARGING: I charge my Leaf overnight on a standard 120V outlet, so I did not install any special charging equipment. I have never needed to charge at a public station. The concern about public charging infrastructure is overblown because the vast majority of all EV charging is and will be done at home [or for some lucky people at work]; charging elsewhere is infrequent or for emergencies.
COST: The Leaf is much cheaper to run and maintain than any gas car, and I bought the Leaf used (1.5 years old) for ~$15k with plenty left on the warranty, so it was/is quite affordable.* In fact, affordability to buy and maintain and EV was a much bigger selling point to me than anything related to it being green.
I think if more people took a harder look at their household driving habits/needs many would be surprised to find how well an EVs could work and save them a lot of money.
* - I know I might have to replace a battery someday. Assuming it doesn't happen under warranty and based on current prices I think a battery replacement balances out well with the long-term fuel and maintenance savings, but there's good chance the costs to a replace a battery will come down too... a couple years is a long time in EV/battery technology.
The "study" is a hoax... http://gawker.com/the-federal-...
But don't let that stop any of you from continuing your super-duper important arguments with randos about democracy, taxes, science funding, founding fathers' visions, discrimination, communism, etc.
While I certainly hope that this is a hoax, I am quite skeptical.
It is a hoax... http://gawker.com/the-federal-...
Hydrogen will become very interesting once hydrogen storage containers come down in price due to economy of scale. Anyone with a water hookup and sunlight could run their own hydrogen refueling station.
Many things get interesting with economies of scale, but that's putting the cart before the horse. New technologies have to be viable for public/private investment from the outset.
My vote goes to the finding of active tectonics. This implies heat, which is coming from...where?
I think the most popular theory is gravity from Pluto's moon, Charon, pulls on the planet deferentially as it orbits creating internal friction and heat, in the same way the Earth's moon is theorized to drive the Earth's internal heat, mantle convection, and tectonics. Charon orbits Pluto very closely and is relatively large compared to Pluto. Some have even suggested calling Pluto and Charon a "binary planet." At any rate, they exert strong gravitational forces on each other, and based on the features observed it could be driving internal heat systems on both Pluto and Charon.