Nowadays, it just means you are doing a bit better than average.
WTF? A bit better? When the average person household makes 55k a year and has negative net worth and saved 19k for retirement being worth more the 1 million+ is not a bit better then average. It puts you in the upper 1% of the poopulation.
I'm sorry, but Fannie and Freddie bought the least amount of the subprime and alt-a loans as a percentage of total assets of all the major players in the mortgage security business.
Yes, the GSEs(Govt Sponsered Enterprise) were making 'easy' money and it was only because they had government backing. This enticed non GSE to try and get into the game and it turned out it wasn't easy money after all.
The problem is without GSEs there would be no real market for fixed rate home mortgages. I think the majority of people would agree fixed rate mortgages are a real benefit to your average home buyer on many different levels. Fixed rate mortgages are a real drag on a Bank however. The reason for this is how Banks had traditionally acquired the money to lend for mortgages.
Say you want to loan out $1B to home buyers for 30 years you used to either have to have $1B on you or got someone else to loan you $1B. The majority of the time you get a $1B loan. Only You never really got a 30 year term. You got much more short term loans.
Here is the first flaw in non GSE mortgage lending. You can't borrow short and lend long, you will end up with nothing eventually as the return on your mortgages will be under the cost of your borrowing.
They had thought they had figured a way around this problem in the MBS, mortgage backed security. In this model you only need short term financing while you find a 3rd party to buy your securities. The MBS is a complicated device but everyone viewed it as a fixed income stream. An investor would give Firm $1B and then the Firm would give you, over the life of the MBS, $1B plus 'income' back.
Here is the 2nd flaw of non GSE companies. If you have $1B to spend, why would you spend it on a non-liquid long term non-GSE security when you could get the same return from a nice stable GSE security? So the non-GSE's had to make their MBS more attractive. They did this through financial trickery that was obfuscated on purpose I believe. If you make it very complicated its less likely your investors will ask tough questions as they don't understand it enough to ask tough questions. Not to disparage the investor's, but the people managing the investors money were much less savvy and much less skilled then the people at the securities firms.
I assume you know that it turns out the assumptions they used to make the models that they used to value and asses the risk of the MBS turned out to be flawed in a rather obvious and fatal manner.
Would we have had a bubble and the following contraction of the real estate market with out the MBS debacle? Yes, of course. There was to much demand for investment vehicles in the early part of this decade for no bubble to have occurred.
However, It should have stopped several years ago, probably around 2004-2005 time frame when all the 'prime' borrowers had bought homes and the pool of 'non-prime' borrowers who had loans was much smaller.
If you want to assign blame, then blame the middle class for wanting fixed rate mortgages or your over educated wall street types who mistake their privilege for merit. It is not some GSE's fault for trying facilitate the social policy of affordable non-discriminatory mortgage lending.
If you played at any of the levels where the pros inhabited you'd have been identified and banned quickly.
Most of the online pro's are using tracking software and doing analysis which would have picked up on you three. Though I hardly doubt they'd have needed it, the math involved in poker is only part of being a winning player.
2+2, where most of the collaboration is done, is the/. of the poker world. A lot of Statistical anomalies are discussed and investigated there.
Show of hands if anyone knows about the DERB thread?
I agree. Andrew Orlowski really seems like he didn't read the essay or he has some huge axe to grind.
Here is a copy of the letter I sent to the editor. I was very angry at their 'journalism'.
Hello,
In your essay "Anti-war slogan coined, repurposed and Googlewashed... in 42 days" posted 03/04/2003 on www.theregister.co.uk you seem to display a lack of reading comprehension or you have a large axe to grind against James F. Moore or google.
From his essay:
"There is an emerging second superpower, but it is not a nation. Instead, it is a new form of international player, constituted by the "will of the people" in a global social movement. The beautiful but deeply agitated face of this second superpower is the worldwide peace campaign, but the body of the movement is made up of millions of people concerned with a broad agenda that includes social development, environmentalism, health, and human rights."
He does not change the 'meme' of 'second superpower'. He still defines it as the 'global social movement' that took part in the world peace campaign.
He also does not say we must co-operate with the World Bank. He says, "Perhaps too often we attack institutions like the World Bank that might, under the right conditions, actually become partners with us in dealing with the first superpower." He is saying we should try and cooperate with global institutions like the World Bank if they can be partners with the 'second superpower' in their fight with the first.
He does not call upon netizens to form a new democracy. He says this movement uses the net and other modern forms of communication to organize.
I suppose being a "Bureau Chief" allows you to sidestep editorial controls, but maybe they should pay more attention to your essays now that you've shown your lack of reading comprehension.
I won't be returning to your site, even though I used to be a regular visitor, until I've heard you've improved your editorial process or you've been to remedial reading course.
And due to the fact we live in a supper hot market it was pointless. By the time the homes made it to the online sites all of the 'good' homes were already under contract.
At least in the Maryland market we couldn't find a way to access the MLS listings as they were entered in the the database.
We ended up going with a broker and found a great house and put a contract down on it the day of the first showing. As did 3 other people, but we got the contract anyways.
So if you live in a market or want to buy a home nobody else likes that takes weeks to sell you can use the internet. Otherwise you need a broker to get you in a house the first day on market.
This would be a great thing, but the Gov't routinely sells or even gives away free the discoveries of scientists that it employees directly to bussiness. Usually if they hold the patent, which the gov't allows to be in their name but the gov't retains the rights to, they get a paid if it sells, but if the Gov't gives it away free, they get nothing even if the Company the Gov't gave the patent to turns around and makes money off the patent.
The gov't routinely does not release gov't funded activity into the Public Domain. Its not doing this just for linux. Just like any of the other companies whine when they lose the patent bid, he's just angry that the NSA isn't improving Windows security for free.
I read the article as there will be no backlog fills, i.e. you will only get your regular shipment, Intel will not be shipping you the PIII's they didn't ship you in January.
Its possiable in the US, right now, to collect money from all of the parents who owe child support and alimoni, but we don't. Owe the IRS 5 bucks and you will have your checking account frozen untill the IRS is paid.
Its not going to change. I guess I'm just a pessimistic American. Will moving to Sweden restore my faith in Gov't? If so, lemme know.:>
The thing is, transparency does not have to be bad. Transparency makes people accountable for their actions. It means that people will once again have to take responsibility for what they do. In my opinion, adults not taking responsibity for the effects of their own actions (be it through the American legal system or European welfair states) is one of the biggest problems with todays society.
To bad transparency really only works on those of us *in* the system. The people who commit the most crimes don't have credit cards, don't have checking accounts, or a perm address. So how am I going to be protected in this new world of transparency?
Will the cops pull all the video footage from store cameres when my car gets stolen to find where it goes? Nope.
If there is an arrest warrant out for me will my location be tracked via my Credit Card purchases? Yep. You don't have to do anything bad to have a warrant out either. Forgetting to pay a speeding ticket or having the Police forget you paid a speeding ticket will get you arrested.
Transparency only helps keep the sheeple in line, to bad we are the sheeple.
I said they were radical opinions, making people prove they are responsible before they are allowed to possiably ruin the life of another person and innocent bystanders if their child self destructs. You want to see what irresponsable parenting leads too, look at our prison population. Nothing but broken homes and parental abuse. If you belive in Responsiblity why aren't the Parents who created them held responsible?
Hmm, this is a very off topic discussion. I will say this though, Addicts are Addicts all of their lives even after they no longer using the substance of choice, its not something they 'catch' because they take a drink or smoke a joint. Its an inability to function in life with out being in an altered state.
I don't blame society, I blame parents who else could possiably be to blame for the actions of a person who was in their care since their birth?
If we start doing gene therapy for alcoholism (a horrible example, Katz) we are truly the laziest, most worthless society to ever have existed. Hey look, i've created a huge problem for myself, anybody got a Quick Fix(tm). Quick Fixes lead to nuclear weapons.
I think you don't understand Addiction. Its a disorder, maybe genetic maybe not, whose seeds are sown in childhood. Do you really think a 12 year old is at fault when they start drinking? How about a 10 year old?
Addicts aren't taught how to cope with the highs and lows of life from their parents so they turn to substances or behaviors that can push the stress of life down to a manageable level.
I'm even more radical then Singer, I think we should take away everyones reproductive rights untill they prove they can be good parents. I'm not talking feeding and clothing your children. I'm talking being there for your children so they lead happy productive lives and can cope with life even if its not happy and productive with out self destructing.
So please don't automatically assume that "anyone" who wants to attend college can. It's actually depressed me so much, watching him struggle to come up with a way to go, that I agreed to front him $20k for living expenses to ease the load a bit (over four years of course). I find it extremely sad that there are still highly talented young geeks out there who are stuck because of financial situations out of their control.
I'm going to say something evil... Community College. If he can live at home and doesn't mind working during college or taking 5+ years its very easy.
My point was all the symptoms of Asperger Syndrome and Autism are also symptoms of children and adult children of physical, sexual or emotional abuse. "miserable childhood" was me trying to be a delicate.
My point that AS and Autism like symptoms 'geeks' tend exhibit are more likely from childhood issues then biological issues.
Even if the 'geek' population has say 4x the distrubution of the rest of the population that leaves a large number of 'geeks' with no biological reason for their symptoms.
You're also describing a Social Phobia or a Post Traumatic Stress disorder.
My observations have been that most 'geeks' over intellectualize to make up for a painfull childhood. Supressing their emotions, since acknowledging them would be very painfull and we don't have a support system to deal with the pain, and focusing on their intellectual interests.
Social interaction can be very scary and painfull if you didn't learn how to connect to another human being or how to handle an unpleasent human being because your upbringing was lacking.
Most people won't admit to it, again since admiting to it would mean acknowledging their past. I know its an easy cop out, but its true.
The previous comment about the simplist answer, its not a rare brain disorder, but simple side effects of a poor childhood that are self reinforcing. You are affriad in social situations and thus get hurt, so you are even more affraid the next time around.
Slashdot Mirror
Nowadays, it just means you are doing a bit better than average.
WTF? A bit better? When the average person household makes 55k a year and has negative net worth and saved 19k for retirement being worth more the 1 million+ is not a bit better then average. It puts you in the upper 1% of the poopulation.
Asshole.
You are missing the 3rd and most important aspect of a functioning free market, symmetrical information.
Even rational and educated people can't make the right decisions with out all the relevant information.
I'm sorry, but Fannie and Freddie bought the least amount of the subprime and alt-a loans as a percentage of total assets of all the major players in the mortgage security business.
Yes, the GSEs(Govt Sponsered Enterprise) were making 'easy' money and it was only because they had government backing. This enticed non GSE to try and get into the game and it turned out it wasn't easy money after all.
The problem is without GSEs there would be no real market for fixed rate home mortgages. I think the majority of people would agree fixed rate mortgages are a real benefit to your average home buyer on many different levels. Fixed rate mortgages are a real drag on a Bank however. The reason for this is how Banks had traditionally acquired the money to lend for mortgages.
Say you want to loan out $1B to home buyers for 30 years you used to either have to have $1B on you or got someone else to loan you $1B. The majority of the time you get a $1B loan. Only You never really got a 30 year term. You got much more short term loans.
Here is the first flaw in non GSE mortgage lending. You can't borrow short and lend long, you will end up with nothing eventually as the return on your mortgages will be under the cost of your borrowing.
They had thought they had figured a way around this problem in the MBS, mortgage backed security. In this model you only need short term financing while you find a 3rd party to buy your securities. The MBS is a complicated device but everyone viewed it as a fixed income stream. An investor would give Firm $1B and then the Firm would give you, over the life of the MBS, $1B plus 'income' back.
Here is the 2nd flaw of non GSE companies. If you have $1B to spend, why would you spend it on a non-liquid long term non-GSE security when you could get the same return from a nice stable GSE security? So the non-GSE's had to make their MBS more attractive. They did this through financial trickery that was obfuscated on purpose I believe. If you make it very complicated its less likely your investors will ask tough questions as they don't understand it enough to ask tough questions. Not to disparage the investor's, but the people managing the investors money were much less savvy and much less skilled then the people at the securities firms.
I assume you know that it turns out the assumptions they used to make the models that they used to value and asses the risk of the MBS turned out to be flawed in a rather obvious and fatal manner.
Would we have had a bubble and the following contraction of the real estate market with out the MBS debacle? Yes, of course. There was to much demand for investment vehicles in the early part of this decade for no bubble to have occurred.
However, It should have stopped several years ago, probably around 2004-2005 time frame when all the 'prime' borrowers had bought homes and the pool of 'non-prime' borrowers who had loans was much smaller.
If you want to assign blame, then blame the middle class for wanting fixed rate mortgages or your over educated wall street types who mistake their privilege for merit. It is not some GSE's fault for trying facilitate the social policy of affordable non-discriminatory mortgage lending.
If you played at any of the levels where the pros inhabited you'd have been identified and banned quickly.
Most of the online pro's are using tracking software and doing analysis which would have picked up on you three. Though I hardly doubt they'd have needed it, the math involved in poker is only part of being a winning player.
2+2, where most of the collaboration is done, is the /. of the poker world. A lot of Statistical anomalies are discussed and investigated there.
Show of hands if anyone knows about the DERB thread?
Hi,
B is not static. It is a function of n in its simplest form. Each software company has to find the ratio of n to B in the RW.
If B was static, they could factor support into the price of windows and provide free support.
If B was static they could charge for suppport and make profits.
As it is, they have to charge for support and they probably don't even recoup the costs.
Later,
MarkV.
Hi,
And in places where gas prices are regulated its gone up too, because demand has increased and resources are dwindling which leads to incrased prices.
You can't effectively import it from outside of North America easily so cheap gas from other nations who have an excess doesn't help us at all.
There is an empending energy crisis in the US, your increases in energy costs are the warning and not completely releated to deregulation.
Later,
MarkV.
I agree. Andrew Orlowski really seems like he didn't read the essay or he has some huge axe to grind.
Here is a copy of the letter I sent to the editor. I was very angry at their 'journalism'.
Hello,
In your essay "Anti-war slogan coined, repurposed and Googlewashed... in 42 days" posted 03/04/2003 on www.theregister.co.uk you seem to display a lack of reading comprehension or you have a large axe to grind against James F. Moore or google.
From his essay:
"There is an emerging second superpower, but it is not a nation. Instead, it is a new form of international player, constituted by the "will of the people" in a global social movement. The beautiful but deeply agitated face of this second superpower is the worldwide peace campaign, but the body of the movement is made up of millions of people concerned with a broad agenda that includes social development, environmentalism, health, and human rights."
He does not change the 'meme' of 'second superpower'. He still defines it as the 'global social movement' that took part in the world peace campaign.
He also does not say we must co-operate with the World Bank. He says, "Perhaps too often we attack institutions like the World Bank that might, under the right conditions, actually become partners with us in dealing with the first superpower." He is saying we should try and cooperate with global institutions like the World Bank if they can be partners with the 'second superpower' in their fight with the first.
He does not call upon netizens to form a new democracy. He says this movement uses the net and other modern forms of communication to organize.
I suppose being a "Bureau Chief" allows you to sidestep editorial controls, but maybe they should pay more attention to your essays now that you've shown your lack of reading comprehension.
I won't be returning to your site, even though I used to be a regular visitor, until I've heard you've improved your editorial process or you've been to remedial reading course.
MarkV.
And due to the fact we live in a supper hot market it was pointless. By the time the homes made it to the online sites all of the 'good' homes were already under contract.
At least in the Maryland market we couldn't find a way to access the MLS listings as they were entered in the the database.
We ended up going with a broker and found a great house and put a contract down on it the day of the first showing. As did 3 other people, but we got the contract anyways.
So if you live in a market or want to buy a home nobody else likes that takes weeks to sell you can use the internet. Otherwise you need a broker to get you in a house the first day on market.
Later,
MarkV.
Hi,
This would be a great thing, but the Gov't routinely sells or even gives away free the discoveries of scientists that it employees directly to bussiness. Usually if they hold the patent, which the gov't allows to be in their name but the gov't retains the rights to, they get a paid if it sells, but if the Gov't gives it away free, they get nothing even if the Company the Gov't gave the patent to turns around and makes money off the patent.
The gov't routinely does not release gov't funded activity into the Public Domain. Its not doing this just for linux. Just like any of the other companies whine when they lose the patent bid, he's just angry that the NSA isn't improving Windows security for free.
MarkV.It depends on how you read it.
I read the article as there will be no backlog fills, i.e. you will only get your regular shipment, Intel will not be shipping you the PIII's they didn't ship you in January.
Later,
MarkV.
Its possiable in the US, right now, to collect money from all of the parents who owe child support and alimoni, but we don't. Owe the IRS 5 bucks and you will have your checking account frozen untill the IRS is paid.
Its not going to change. I guess I'm just a pessimistic American. Will moving to Sweden restore my faith in Gov't? If so, lemme know.
Later,
MarkV.
The thing is, transparency does not have to be bad. Transparency makes people accountable for their actions. It means that people will once again have to take responsibility for what they do. In my opinion, adults not taking responsibity for the effects of their own actions (be it through the American legal system or European welfair states) is one of the biggest problems with todays society.
To bad transparency really only works on those of us *in* the system. The people who commit the most crimes don't have credit cards, don't have checking accounts, or a perm address. So how am I going to be protected in this new world of transparency?
Will the cops pull all the video footage from store cameres when my car gets stolen to find where it goes? Nope.
If there is an arrest warrant out for me will my location be tracked via my Credit Card purchases? Yep. You don't have to do anything bad to have a warrant out either. Forgetting to pay a speeding ticket or having the Police forget you paid a speeding ticket will get you arrested.
Transparency only helps keep the sheeple in line, to bad we are the sheeple.
Later,
MarkV.
I said they were radical opinions, making people prove they are responsible before they are allowed to possiably ruin the life of another person and innocent bystanders if their child self destructs. You want to see what irresponsable parenting leads too, look at our prison population. Nothing but broken homes and parental abuse. If you belive in Responsiblity why aren't the Parents who created them held responsible?
Hmm, this is a very off topic discussion. I will say this though, Addicts are Addicts all of their lives even after they no longer using the substance of choice, its not something they 'catch' because they take a drink or smoke a joint. Its an inability to function in life with out being in an altered state.
I don't blame society, I blame parents who else could possiably be to blame for the actions of a person who was in their care since their birth?
Later,
MarkV.
If we start doing gene therapy for alcoholism (a horrible example, Katz) we are truly the laziest, most worthless society to ever have existed. Hey look, i've created a huge problem for myself, anybody got a Quick Fix(tm). Quick Fixes lead to nuclear weapons.
I think you don't understand Addiction. Its a disorder, maybe genetic maybe not, whose seeds are sown in childhood. Do you really think a 12 year old is at fault when they start drinking? How about a 10 year old?
Addicts aren't taught how to cope with the highs and lows of life from their parents so they turn to substances or behaviors that can push the stress of life down to a manageable level.
I'm even more radical then Singer, I think we should take away everyones reproductive rights untill they prove they can be good parents. I'm not talking feeding and clothing your children. I'm talking being there for your children so they lead happy productive lives and can cope with life even if its not happy and productive with out self destructing.
Later,
MarkV.
Hi,
So please don't automatically assume that "anyone" who wants to attend college can. It's actually depressed me so much, watching him struggle to come up with a way to go, that I agreed to front him $20k for living expenses to ease the load a bit (over four years of course). I find it extremely sad that there are still highly talented young geeks out there who are stuck because of financial situations out of their control.
I'm going to say something evil... Community College. If he can live at home and doesn't mind working during college or taking 5+ years its very easy.
Later,
MarkV.
I'd really like to see it. It would be a good example of how not to design software and how not to document the design of the software.
A simple code review would have caught the error.
Ok, I'm going to say it, If they'd Open Sourced it this wouldn't have happened either.
Later,
MarkV.
My point was all the symptoms of Asperger Syndrome and Autism are also symptoms of children and adult children of physical, sexual or emotional abuse. "miserable childhood" was me trying to be a delicate.
My point that AS and Autism like symptoms 'geeks' tend exhibit are more likely from childhood issues then biological issues.
Even if the 'geek' population has say 4x the distrubution of the rest of the population that leaves a large number of 'geeks' with no biological reason for their symptoms.
Later,
MarkV.
You're also describing a Social Phobia or a Post Traumatic Stress disorder.
My observations have been that most 'geeks' over intellectualize to make up for a painfull childhood. Supressing their emotions, since acknowledging them would be very painfull and we don't have a support system to deal with the pain, and focusing on their intellectual interests.
Social interaction can be very scary and painfull if you didn't learn how to connect to another human being or how to handle an unpleasent human being because your upbringing was lacking.
Most people won't admit to it, again since admiting to it would mean acknowledging their past. I know its an easy cop out, but its true.
The previous comment about the simplist answer, its not a rare brain disorder, but simple side effects of a poor childhood that are self reinforcing. You are affriad in social situations and thus get hurt, so you are even more affraid the next time around.
Later,
MarkV.
As do most ROV's also. Every electrical bit that you can't put in pressure tested bottles is suspended in oil.
Later,
MarkV.