the Olympic village will rarely be used after the games, and there's no long term subscriber base to fully amortize the costs of wiring the village, so they simply need to charge the right amount to re-coup the costs.
this is similar to people in the middle of the Saharan desert complaining about $10/min satellite phone service and comparing it to free VoIP
the study of math is the *natural* relationship of numbers, so it should be classified discovered.
we might *invent* theories to deduce the relationships if they're complex, but it's possible that we just haven't *discovered* the true path from A to B.
for example, we technically haven't fully *discovered* pi or e, since they're transcendental, but we have *invented* easier ways to approximate them in order to simplify our lives (~3.14 and ~2.72).
i agree that C++ needs to be updated for auto GC. Perhaps like a C# version of C++ without the vendor-tie-in.
C will *always* have its place in OS and systems-level programming. The high-level of abstraction in modern languages are preventing them from being an effective C replacement (which wants the lowest-level and no abstraction).
Now, why is Pascal and FoxPro growing so fast?? I didn't know there's such a huge demand for those 2?? Or have I been living in a cave through the Web 2.0 era?
ps : can someone explain the pros and cons of Ruby v. Python? I haven't programmed in either.
In our world that imperative languages are near ubiquity, functional languages actually teaches us how to code succinctly and cleanly.
The one SML class I took in Sophomore year was more helpful in defining my coding style than any of my other courses. I finally learnt how math and compsci are intrinsically related to each other when all your code is defined in y=f(x) format.
Granted, functional applications currently have too few APIs to allow true RAD (Java being the other extreme with too much API ^^). It's more a learning tool than a production one I guess.
isn't it usually when a format-war ends, the sales of the winning format goes up, both the players and the movies, and manufacturers have more incentive to pump out newer versions at lower prices?
i thought that's what happened when DVD-R and DVD+R finally converged into DVD+/-R.
hopefully this price increase is only temporary. When DVD players are routinely below $100, it's hard to imagine consumers other than die-hard HD fans will shell out $350-400 for something that similar. This is not VHS vs. DVD. This is more DVD vs. slightly-better-DVD.
i'm surprised the carriers haven't banned Skype. Actually it's probably not that hard to reject all Skype traffic over a 3G cellphone network. If i were a carrier that's a first thing I'd do.
And remember, Skype doesn't guarantee a connection (as opposed to cell phones, which allocate a fixed bandwidth for your call). Why would Apple want people to suffer choppy calls on their phones, then end up blaming Apple for it?
Cell phone networks have a finite quota of simultaneous calls per tower, and once that limit is reached, your call is rejected. The internet (like 3G data or WiFi), on the other hand, simply slows everyone down.
First, before people blast my post, I'd like to say I'm an avid supporter of free and open-source.
Now, looking at this iPhone SDK, the VoIP over Cellular is totally understandable, because if they allow that, then it'll totally undermine the revenue stream of the cell phone carriers. The iPhone, afterall, is first and foremost a phone.
Regarding Java, Apple might claim a legitimate concern that having a VM-based language will prevent programs from reaching guaranteed performance levels that native iPhone apps can achieve, thus "downgrading the user experience".
Regarding Firefox and Opera, I think the same argument can be used for game developers against XBox360 or PS3 or Wii consoles. As a hardware manufacturer, they have more rights to control what software goes onto their system (or what games).
And looking at the chaotic state of Linux and GUIs (too much customizations means no standard to identify with), maybe Apple would like a firmer grip at the user experience.
It's the interface of the iPhone that's so revolutionary. People keep talking about how the iPhone doesn't stack up because it lacks GPS and FM radio and Infrared and SD card slot and WiFi-N, but none of the other phones can remotely match the intuitive nature of the iPhone GUI. Heck, it doesn't even come with a manual.
but, yeah trying creating a PalmOS or Blackberry or WindowsMobile app and host it at www.no_one_knows_about_my_website_at_all.com and see what kind of sales you'll get, versus, say, a centralized distribution website, say, palmgear.com ???
Even open source developers host their apps at SourceForge (among others) to gain visibility. You need something major enough like KDE or Staroffice before people will actually visit those websites.
"but I strongly suspect that apple will limit ichat type clients though. Those would kill the golden goose that is SMS."
There's one drastic difference - IM is synchronous, requiring both participants to be actively dialogging to have a meaningful conversation. SMS, on the other hand, is asynchronous (just like email), and allows the recipient to read and respond only when it's convenient for him/her.
Also, Apple can semi-protect SMS by disallowing logging and history-saving of IM conversations, thus forcing all non-real-time discussions back to SMS.
this is more than fair. the developer only has to focus on his core competency - i.e. creating a great app, and leave Apple doing all the annoying work of hosting, selling, and advertising the apps for you. for developers of applets and small-utilities, this is the best way to get exposure.
also, by allowing direct over-the-air installs, it allows the iPhone to completely bypass the computer, which is great for impulse-buys. say i want to play tetris. i can just tap-tap and buy it in 1-min and start playing right-away in the middle of my morning commute.
Unix/Linux/BSD people wondered for years why the mainstream wouldn't adopt their OS, or open source for that matter. How would you expect a normal person to compile their own programs via command line input of a software they have to download at distribution sites? Heck, I have a masters in CS from a Top 10 compsci university in the US, and sometimes I wonder if i have all the library files I need to make the gcc work flawlessly. End-users dont have time for that. KDE and Gnome has been around much longer than MacOS X, and yet Mac's interface beats either of them hands them. Apple proved to us that given the right interface, people WILL embrace Unix. People are not anti-open source, but they're very much anti-command-line.
Another good example is mobile devices. Palm and Microsoft had YEARS of experience on how to refine their mobile experience. They have barely made incremental UI changes since their first release. Apple managed to put Unix in a handheld and make it so easy to use that it doesn't even come with a manual.
While I respect Torvalds to a great degree, he shouldn't engage in his form/functionality debate. He's the expert at making the OS internals flawless. Let other experts figure out how to turn his masterpiece into a usable design. Please don't try to mix filesystems designers with graphic designers.
And on a final unrelated note, to counter Torvald's argument that HFS is crap, we've been reading for nearly a year that Apple is ready to adapt ZFS. Once MacOS defaults to ZFS, it'll trounce any existing form of ext3. He really should be comparing the merits of ext3 against ZFS, the future, not the past. Otherwise we might as well discuss the Minix one too =)
the article only mentioned digital music companies filings in general, and didn't mention Apple anywhere in the article. The author's intrinsic bias against Apple is rampant. The author worded the article to make it sound like Apple was the one PUSHING for the 4% when in fact, it's probably the concensus of the trade lobby that is asking for 4%. I'm appalled that this author is allowed to spin his dislike against Apple using the most uncorrelated information. hey, if u can't afford to buy an iPod and be cool, grow up and get a job. Bashing Apple is not the solution.
unless every computer is running OpenBSD level of security, i wont trust business-confidential and mission-critical systems lying around a huge global WAN with no firewall to offer some level of protection.
Besides, data requirements will go up, so when our WAN gets to gigabit level speeds, our LAN might approach terabit.
10 years ago we were satisfied with basic web pages and a couple javascripts. currently we're satisfied with AJAX and that low-quality feed from YouTube. 10 years from now we might need high-def 3D virtual reality rendered locally. who knows?
LAN and WAN will both go up in speeds, but the one thing i wont bet on is LAN's demise just yet.
PS1 was met with intense competition from Sega Saturn and Nintendo 64. It was good effort to let others know that Sony can be a serious player in the console market even though it's only Sony's first attempt. But it was the PS2 that solidified Sony's reputation as, not only a market player, but a market leader, of the console industry. XBox and Gamecube had their followers, but PS2 played well into mass-market. But whatever fame and reputation and good-will that Sony has built-up has been squabbled by the over-powered over-priced under-selling monster that PS3 is.
My votes for all-time consoles will be SNES and PS2. But then, I was born late, so I might have been missing out on all the Commodore and Atari craziness too =)
you mean those anti-gay anti-choice anti-diplomacy global-warming-denying bible-thumping fox-watching coulter-praising bush-voting trailer-park-living beer-chugging rednecks from the south and the plains ?..... i'm pretty sure Californians, who own Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and 2 of the world's best cities, won't miss you guys a bit.
oh wait a minute...and who's Larry Craig? Your neighbor's Senator. They must be so proud to have him represent their "states rights" from the stall.
"A state is (theoretically) a voluntary member of the union"
A state is no longer a voluntary member because unilateral secession from the Union is no longer an option (was it banned after the Civil War? I forgot). Heck, if that's an option, after the 2004 presidential election, California would've seceded and became the world's 7th largest economy on its own.
"Face it, Senate "overrepresentation" is a defensive measure."
It's more an offensive measure when they vote for restricting a women's choice and marriage equality in *my* state. If you Wyomians like to oppress your own people, be my guest. But when YOUR opinion affects my outcome in a negative manner, that's an offensive measure. When these small-state Senators vote for a Constitutional Amendment against marriage equality, which directly affects every state, then yes, Wyoming has imposed its will on others. If you want us to respect your state's "sovereignty" and your "states rights", you guys can begin by respecting ours.
Of course you small-state people will keep insisting the federalist papers are correct because it's in YOUR own best interests. Any exercise to balance fairness will take power from your little state, so you'll try to use a 200-year old logic to explain why it's fair.
By your wolf/sheep analogy, there's already a clear bias that you believe big states are out to destroy you. California wouldn't even bother taking Wyoming with it if CA ever wants to secede....too much baggage. So yes, your sheep is safe in the ruralness and wilderness of middle-of-nowhere-america. We coastal wolves only go for the big prey like China and India.
Wow...Wyoming has 500,000 people with 96% white and 78% Christian. Talk about diversity. I guess a sheep is also all-white.
exactly...."The people of Wyoming have just as much right to be Wyomingites as the people of California to be Californians". 65x power is not exactly "just as much right". I have no problem to let people chose their lifestyle preferences (urban vs. rural, ocean vs. mountain, coast vs. plains, etc), but I have a problem when those in another state use their 65x power to impose their lifestyle on me.
look at congressional results in 2004... Republicans ended up controlling 55% of the Senate seats and their population representation is probably around 40-45%... isn't that the tyranny of the minority to the maximum effect ?
it's sad that the country that tries the hardest to advocate "democracy" worldwide isn't even a democratic model. And the most powerful legislative branch is not even designed to give fairness to the people. That's as anti-democratic as one can get.
The merit of those federalist papers can be debated by historians. Today's political scientists should debate modern voting methodology and fairness representation. Being a "strict constructionist" is just a nice way to say "failing to keep up the world because we still envision the country from the pre-civil-war days." Europe was founded way before the US, and the modern European Parliament is a good example of keeping up with the times by using collaborative power to ensure their survival.
I dont understand why people read those ancient articles written by dead people from parties that no longer exist and treat them as some sort of infallible truth. Those federalist papers have every right to be refuted.
Times change, the world change, now it's time to modernize.
Perhaps you can study legislative models of other western nations before declaring our current system is the best because your civics class teacher taught you so.
"Now, explain to me why we should punish those people who choose a less metropolitan lifestyle by stripping away at their electoral clout?"
i'm advocating equal electoral clout for people who live in every state. One person, one vote. Be it the primaries or the general election or Congress. If the voting population is 100mil, I want everyone's electoral power to be 1/100millionth. No more, no less.
Small states already have over-representation in the Senate, so it's merely "re-balancing" the power. Let's take Wyoming as an example. In Wyoming it's 260,000 people per Senate. For CA, it's nearly 17million people per Senator. Therefore, Wyomians have around 65x that of Senate representation compare to a Californian. I wouldn't call this fairness.
Also, the per-person electoral vote power of WY is nearly 4x that of California (0.589 per 100,000 people vs. 0.152 per 100,000 people)... what makes a person in Wyoming worth 4x that of a Californian?
And don't say the founding fathers intended it that way, so it must be the best way to go. Remember the founding fathers also owned slaves. I wouldn't blindly follow their "wisdom" just yet.
Then onto the topic of energy...France supplies like 80+% of their energy through civilian nuclear plants. If they can do it, so can we.
Oh yea, and sorry to disappoint you, I only eat beef from Kobe and I don't live in Cali.
what is the whining all about? The House may be slightly favoring large states due to fractional rounding. Look at the Senate. A state with like 2 million people has 2 senators. A state with like 35 million people ALSO has 2 senators. The gap is actually an entire order of magnitude.
So it's entirely possible for senators that represent like 70% of the population, but with only 50% of the voting power.
A fairer way will be proportional allocation by party based on vote share (say if green party has 7% of votes, they get 7% of whichever seats in question) as opposed to the current winner-takes-all-system on a seat-by-seat basis, which only favors a duopoly.
Big states are big to begin with because people WANT to live there. Don't punish people for the choice of a metropolitan lifestyle by stripping away at their electoral clout.
We have a better case if exit polls and actual results pose a huge discrepancy, but this is not the case in NH. The exit polls already suggested a very tight race, resulting in the networks inability to "make the call" until more than 80% of the precincts have reported.
However, if we're talking about Ohio 2004 in which exit polls and actual results don't match at all, then there might be something fishy.
As much as I despise Diebold, I think we shouldn't jump onto the conclusion of fraud just yet if the exit polls are within the margin of error of the actuals.
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the Olympic village will rarely be used after the games, and there's no long term subscriber base to fully amortize the costs of wiring the village, so they simply need to charge the right amount to re-coup the costs.
this is similar to people in the middle of the Saharan desert complaining about $10/min satellite phone service and comparing it to free VoIP
the study of math is the *natural* relationship of numbers, so it should be classified discovered.
we might *invent* theories to deduce the relationships if they're complex, but it's possible that we just haven't *discovered* the true path from A to B.
for example, we technically haven't fully *discovered* pi or e, since they're transcendental, but we have *invented* easier ways to approximate them in order to simplify our lives (~3.14 and ~2.72).
i agree that C++ needs to be updated for auto GC. Perhaps like a C# version of C++ without the vendor-tie-in.
C will *always* have its place in OS and systems-level programming. The high-level of abstraction in modern languages are preventing them from being an effective C replacement (which wants the lowest-level and no abstraction).
Now, why is Pascal and FoxPro growing so fast?? I didn't know there's such a huge demand for those 2?? Or have I been living in a cave through the Web 2.0 era?
ps : can someone explain the pros and cons of Ruby v. Python? I haven't programmed in either.
In our world that imperative languages are near ubiquity, functional languages actually teaches us how to code succinctly and cleanly.
The one SML class I took in Sophomore year was more helpful in defining my coding style than any of my other courses. I finally learnt how math and compsci are intrinsically related to each other when all your code is defined in y=f(x) format.
Granted, functional applications currently have too few APIs to allow true RAD (Java being the other extreme with too much API ^^). It's more a learning tool than a production one I guess.
I usually just keep tracking of time based on seconds since Jan 1, 1970 =)
so which day will Unix consider a pi day?
isn't it usually when a format-war ends, the sales of the winning format goes up, both the players and the movies, and manufacturers have more incentive to pump out newer versions at lower prices?
i thought that's what happened when DVD-R and DVD+R finally converged into DVD+/-R.
hopefully this price increase is only temporary. When DVD players are routinely below $100, it's hard to imagine consumers other than die-hard HD fans will shell out $350-400 for something that similar. This is not VHS vs. DVD. This is more DVD vs. slightly-better-DVD.
i'm surprised the carriers haven't banned Skype. Actually it's probably not that hard to reject all Skype traffic over a 3G cellphone network. If i were a carrier that's a first thing I'd do.
And remember, Skype doesn't guarantee a connection (as opposed to cell phones, which allocate a fixed bandwidth for your call). Why would Apple want people to suffer choppy calls on their phones, then end up blaming Apple for it?
Cell phone networks have a finite quota of simultaneous calls per tower, and once that limit is reached, your call is rejected. The internet (like 3G data or WiFi), on the other hand, simply slows everyone down.
First, before people blast my post, I'd like to say I'm an avid supporter of free and open-source.
Now, looking at this iPhone SDK, the VoIP over Cellular is totally understandable, because if they allow that, then it'll totally undermine the revenue stream of the cell phone carriers. The iPhone, afterall, is first and foremost a phone.
Regarding Java, Apple might claim a legitimate concern that having a VM-based language will prevent programs from reaching guaranteed performance levels that native iPhone apps can achieve, thus "downgrading the user experience".
Regarding Firefox and Opera, I think the same argument can be used for game developers against XBox360 or PS3 or Wii consoles. As a hardware manufacturer, they have more rights to control what software goes onto their system (or what games).
And looking at the chaotic state of Linux and GUIs (too much customizations means no standard to identify with), maybe Apple would like a firmer grip at the user experience.
It's the interface of the iPhone that's so revolutionary. People keep talking about how the iPhone doesn't stack up because it lacks GPS and FM radio and Infrared and SD card slot and WiFi-N, but none of the other phones can remotely match the intuitive nature of the iPhone GUI. Heck, it doesn't even come with a manual.
"This would make a good bar bet - which is flatter, the universe, or Kansas?"
I'd say neither....it's the women in Kansas.
the "accuracy" referred in the headline is the +/1 120 million years margin of error.
so yes, they've calculated it to 4 figures of precision, and within +/- 0.874%. I'd say that's impressive work.
but, yeah trying creating a PalmOS or Blackberry or WindowsMobile app and host it at www.no_one_knows_about_my_website_at_all.com and see what kind of sales you'll get, versus, say, a centralized distribution website, say, palmgear.com ???
Even open source developers host their apps at SourceForge (among others) to gain visibility. You need something major enough like KDE or Staroffice before people will actually visit those websites.
"but I strongly suspect that apple will limit ichat type clients though. Those would kill the golden goose that is SMS."
There's one drastic difference - IM is synchronous, requiring both participants to be actively dialogging to have a meaningful conversation. SMS, on the other hand, is asynchronous (just like email), and allows the recipient to read and respond only when it's convenient for him/her.
Also, Apple can semi-protect SMS by disallowing logging and history-saving of IM conversations, thus forcing all non-real-time discussions back to SMS.
this is more than fair. the developer only has to focus on his core competency - i.e. creating a great app, and leave Apple doing all the annoying work of hosting, selling, and advertising the apps for you. for developers of applets and small-utilities, this is the best way to get exposure.
also, by allowing direct over-the-air installs, it allows the iPhone to completely bypass the computer, which is great for impulse-buys. say i want to play tetris. i can just tap-tap and buy it in 1-min and start playing right-away in the middle of my morning commute.
i thought that's a S-Video port, not a PS/2 ?
Unix/Linux/BSD people wondered for years why the mainstream wouldn't adopt their OS, or open source for that matter. How would you expect a normal person to compile their own programs via command line input of a software they have to download at distribution sites? Heck, I have a masters in CS from a Top 10 compsci university in the US, and sometimes I wonder if i have all the library files I need to make the gcc work flawlessly. End-users dont have time for that. KDE and Gnome has been around much longer than MacOS X, and yet Mac's interface beats either of them hands them. Apple proved to us that given the right interface, people WILL embrace Unix. People are not anti-open source, but they're very much anti-command-line.
Another good example is mobile devices. Palm and Microsoft had YEARS of experience on how to refine their mobile experience. They have barely made incremental UI changes since their first release. Apple managed to put Unix in a handheld and make it so easy to use that it doesn't even come with a manual.
While I respect Torvalds to a great degree, he shouldn't engage in his form/functionality debate. He's the expert at making the OS internals flawless. Let other experts figure out how to turn his masterpiece into a usable design. Please don't try to mix filesystems designers with graphic designers.
And on a final unrelated note, to counter Torvald's argument that HFS is crap, we've been reading for nearly a year that Apple is ready to adapt ZFS. Once MacOS defaults to ZFS, it'll trounce any existing form of ext3. He really should be comparing the merits of ext3 against ZFS, the future, not the past. Otherwise we might as well discuss the Minix one too =)
the article only mentioned digital music companies filings in general, and didn't mention Apple anywhere in the article. The author's intrinsic bias against Apple is rampant. The author worded the article to make it sound like Apple was the one PUSHING for the 4% when in fact, it's probably the concensus of the trade lobby that is asking for 4%. I'm appalled that this author is allowed to spin his dislike against Apple using the most uncorrelated information. hey, if u can't afford to buy an iPod and be cool, grow up and get a job. Bashing Apple is not the solution.
unless every computer is running OpenBSD level of security, i wont trust business-confidential and mission-critical systems lying around a huge global WAN with no firewall to offer some level of protection.
Besides, data requirements will go up, so when our WAN gets to gigabit level speeds, our LAN might approach terabit.
10 years ago we were satisfied with basic web pages and a couple javascripts. currently we're satisfied with AJAX and that low-quality feed from YouTube. 10 years from now we might need high-def 3D virtual reality rendered locally. who knows?
LAN and WAN will both go up in speeds, but the one thing i wont bet on is LAN's demise just yet.
PS1 was met with intense competition from Sega Saturn and Nintendo 64. It was good effort to let others know that Sony can be a serious player in the console market even though it's only Sony's first attempt. But it was the PS2 that solidified Sony's reputation as, not only a market player, but a market leader, of the console industry. XBox and Gamecube had their followers, but PS2 played well into mass-market. But whatever fame and reputation and good-will that Sony has built-up has been squabbled by the over-powered over-priced under-selling monster that PS3 is.
My votes for all-time consoles will be SNES and PS2. But then, I was born late, so I might have been missing out on all the Commodore and Atari craziness too =)
you must be calculating a $2B loan to overflow it =) i wonder what the monthly payment will look like on that 30-year fixed subprime mortgage
"There are many that would be happy to see it go"
you mean those anti-gay anti-choice anti-diplomacy global-warming-denying bible-thumping fox-watching coulter-praising bush-voting trailer-park-living beer-chugging rednecks from the south and the plains ?..... i'm pretty sure Californians, who own Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and 2 of the world's best cities, won't miss you guys a bit.
oh wait a minute...and who's Larry Craig? Your neighbor's Senator. They must be so proud to have him represent their "states rights" from the stall.
"A state is (theoretically) a voluntary member of the union"
A state is no longer a voluntary member because unilateral secession from the Union is no longer an option (was it banned after the Civil War? I forgot). Heck, if that's an option, after the 2004 presidential election, California would've seceded and became the world's 7th largest economy on its own.
"Face it, Senate "overrepresentation" is a defensive measure."
It's more an offensive measure when they vote for restricting a women's choice and marriage equality in *my* state. If you Wyomians like to oppress your own people, be my guest. But when YOUR opinion affects my outcome in a negative manner, that's an offensive measure. When these small-state Senators vote for a Constitutional Amendment against marriage equality, which directly affects every state, then yes, Wyoming has imposed its will on others. If you want us to respect your state's "sovereignty" and your "states rights", you guys can begin by respecting ours.
Of course you small-state people will keep insisting the federalist papers are correct because it's in YOUR own best interests. Any exercise to balance fairness will take power from your little state, so you'll try to use a 200-year old logic to explain why it's fair.
By your wolf/sheep analogy, there's already a clear bias that you believe big states are out to destroy you. California wouldn't even bother taking Wyoming with it if CA ever wants to secede....too much baggage. So yes, your sheep is safe in the ruralness and wilderness of middle-of-nowhere-america. We coastal wolves only go for the big prey like China and India.
Wow...Wyoming has 500,000 people with 96% white and 78% Christian. Talk about diversity. I guess a sheep is also all-white.
exactly...."The people of Wyoming have just as much right to be Wyomingites as the people of California to be Californians". 65x power is not exactly "just as much right". I have no problem to let people chose their lifestyle preferences (urban vs. rural, ocean vs. mountain, coast vs. plains, etc), but I have a problem when those in another state use their 65x power to impose their lifestyle on me.
... Republicans ended up controlling 55% of the Senate seats and their population representation is probably around 40-45%... isn't that the tyranny of the minority to the maximum effect ?
look at congressional results in 2004
it's sad that the country that tries the hardest to advocate "democracy" worldwide isn't even a democratic model. And the most powerful legislative branch is not even designed to give fairness to the people. That's as anti-democratic as one can get.
The merit of those federalist papers can be debated by historians. Today's political scientists should debate modern voting methodology and fairness representation. Being a "strict constructionist" is just a nice way to say "failing to keep up the world because we still envision the country from the pre-civil-war days." Europe was founded way before the US, and the modern European Parliament is a good example of keeping up with the times by using collaborative power to ensure their survival.
I dont understand why people read those ancient articles written by dead people from parties that no longer exist and treat them as some sort of infallible truth. Those federalist papers have every right to be refuted.
Times change, the world change, now it's time to modernize.
Perhaps you can study legislative models of other western nations before declaring our current system is the best because your civics class teacher taught you so.
"Now, explain to me why we should punish those people who choose a less metropolitan lifestyle by stripping away at their electoral clout?"
i'm advocating equal electoral clout for people who live in every state. One person, one vote. Be it the primaries or the general election or Congress. If the voting population is 100mil, I want everyone's electoral power to be 1/100millionth. No more, no less.
Small states already have over-representation in the Senate, so it's merely "re-balancing" the power. Let's take Wyoming as an example. In Wyoming it's 260,000 people per Senate. For CA, it's nearly 17million people per Senator. Therefore, Wyomians have around 65x that of Senate representation compare to a Californian. I wouldn't call this fairness.
Also, the per-person electoral vote power of WY is nearly 4x that of California (0.589 per 100,000 people vs. 0.152 per 100,000 people)... what makes a person in Wyoming worth 4x that of a Californian?
And don't say the founding fathers intended it that way, so it must be the best way to go. Remember the founding fathers also owned slaves. I wouldn't blindly follow their "wisdom" just yet.
Then onto the topic of energy...France supplies like 80+% of their energy through civilian nuclear plants. If they can do it, so can we.
Oh yea, and sorry to disappoint you, I only eat beef from Kobe and I don't live in Cali.
what is the whining all about? The House may be slightly favoring large states due to fractional rounding. Look at the Senate. A state with like 2 million people has 2 senators. A state with like 35 million people ALSO has 2 senators. The gap is actually an entire order of magnitude.
So it's entirely possible for senators that represent like 70% of the population, but with only 50% of the voting power.
A fairer way will be proportional allocation by party based on vote share (say if green party has 7% of votes, they get 7% of whichever seats in question) as opposed to the current winner-takes-all-system on a seat-by-seat basis, which only favors a duopoly.
Big states are big to begin with because people WANT to live there. Don't punish people for the choice of a metropolitan lifestyle by stripping away at their electoral clout.
We have a better case if exit polls and actual results pose a huge discrepancy, but this is not the case in NH. The exit polls already suggested a very tight race, resulting in the networks inability to "make the call" until more than 80% of the precincts have reported.
However, if we're talking about Ohio 2004 in which exit polls and actual results don't match at all, then there might be something fishy.
As much as I despise Diebold, I think we shouldn't jump onto the conclusion of fraud just yet if the exit polls are within the margin of error of the actuals.