Keep this in mind the next time you shop for your airline ticket based on price.
Yep. People love to blame 'evil' CEO's and 'greedy' businesses for cutting corners - but the root cause of their seemingly 'evil' and 'greedy' practices is the Wal-Mart mentality.
And it's the same over on Wall Street - Wall Street isn't some monolithic organism that gorges on increased profits. Wall Street is machine for appeasing the people who insist their retirement accounts have a high enough yield so they can wait till almost too late to establish a retirement account *and* with minimal investment yield enough that they can retire and not actually suffer a drop in income.
"Half the cost of anything else out there" is very nice, but doesn't tell us much. Wandering around the web, I find the lowest (retail) cost to be around $.50/gallon for single packaged filters. (Which will obviously be considerably lower in bulk and/or multi-packaged.)
How about asking "Is it moral for me to tell others how to live and what they can and cannot do?" What ever happened to freedom? Freedom of choice and to chose?
So why is it not moral for the government to tell women they cannot take the health risks (among other risks) of being a prostitute - yet it is moral for the government to tell the painter you just hired that he must wear a dust mask to avoid health risks?
Have you talked to many escorts to come to this conclusion? It really doesn't sound like it.
Talking to escorts about the world of prostitution is like talking to McDonalds CEO about the world of fast food workers. Try talking to the girls down on the low track instead.
They made the choice to go into the industry.
Yeah, the same way someone who can't find a job making a living wage and with a future 'chooses' to go to work with McDonalds or Best Buy.
You, and many others answering here, have a seriously rosy view of the world.
"Regardless, when you pay $1.65 billion for a business, you probably don't expect it to take three to four years before you start making your money back."
Once again, it's pretty obvious that the summary writer (like most slashdotters) knows roughly fuck all about business. Taking three to four years to start earning your money back is neither new, nor unique to Google, nor even notable.
Facebook helps me to get on with my life - I have some good friends that I would probably never have met without it.
And it helps me keep up with friends and family scattered across the (North American) continent. And I follow the pages of half a dozen local businesses *and* the pages of a dozen professional photographers whose work I am studying. (And much more besides.)
Facebook can be views as essentially being functionally the same as an RSS reader with a single login and a consistent protocol and interface across all the pages in your feed. And from my point of view, that's a damm good thing because it collects a lot of useful things in one place.
If there's one thing the history of the 'net has taught us, from portals back in the late 90's down to social networking sites today, is that the average net user likes single login's and consistent interfaces.
So, we need a new theory that gives the same predictions at QM and GR in the realms that we can measure them. This is where string theory etc comes in. But we do not yet have experimental data for very heavy and very small objects. If you want to complain about string theory not being testable, then accept that your same complaint is going to apply to EVERY grand-unified-theory that we know of.
And this is where your logic fails, you've pulled off the old trick of proving 1=2 by introducing a false assumption. In this case, the assumption that experimental data is required to create testable predictions.
Further falsifying your hypothesis is the presence of data in the realms other than very small and very heavy - the realms string theory is also supposed to be able to explain. (At least according to some proponents.)
TL;DR - People complain at string without proposing anything better.
Horse shit. Noting the flaws in your theory in no way burdens me with the requirement to produce something better. That's new age touchie-feelie crap.
I'm not too confident the market size is large enough for anything other than highly specialized scientific equipment. I don't see large format digital cameras even for professional photographers because of what it will probably cost to produce.
If they can get it under $10k out the door, I suspect there will be a fair size market. If they can get it under $5k, there will be a fairly large market.
Professionals aren't afraid to spend money. Nor do they shop for their gear at Wal-Mart.
You know, with how pervasive social networking is these days, and how poorly educated a lot of the public seems to be about how the legal system works
Unless Michigan is very different from Washington, the state of education about the legal process is irrelevant - because jurors and prospective jurors are briefed (multiple times) about what is and isn't appropriate behavior during the selection process and prior to trial.
Not only are you stupid enough to spell it as two words, you're stupid enough to think that one counterexample (or roughly one drop of water in an ocean) is meaningful.
Or, it allows the people "we're" bombing to craft a careful astroturf campaign designed to appeal to the prejudices of some portion of 'our' fellow citizens so that they then rage on Twitter, Facebook, Slashdot, etc... etc... The effects on the government are questionable at best because that 'some portion' of 'our fellow citizens' are deluded as to the actual effectiveness of said 'rage' and notably incompetent at questioning the validity and value of information that matches their prejudices.
Forgot to add the next paragraph:
Or the government can simply ignore the simulated rage, knowing full well the 'rage' will be directed towards some other target next week. The attention span of the 'net generation not being long enough to accomplish anything meaningful, that is when they aren't already off on the next viral kick. Bonsai kittens or bombs in Baghdad, it's all the same the 'net.
Right. And there used to be a market for the kind of journalism described by the parent post as well as the trash that currently passes as journalism but now it's all overwhelmingly trash.
As I asked the OP - which planet are you from? Because nothing has changed.
In the past newspapers could charge more and were less dependent on advertising.
You're right - journalism hasn't changed, the culture has. It used to be that a politician being corrupt was the biggest news of the day, and it garnered public outrage. We've gotten so used to this that it's no longer enraging, and it happens so frequently that it isn't interesting to the general public.
Well, no, what's happened (as you demonstrate) is the word corruption has been so devalued as to be meaningless. Nowadays, it's just a buzzword like 'fascist', it's been tossed around so long and so loudly by people ignorant of it's meaning, that people now ignore the cries of "Wolf!".
Celebrities, on the other hand, are always doing something unique and interesting.
If you think celebrity journalism is something new - you've either been living in a remote cave for the last couple of centuries, or you're utterly effing ignorant. It's pretty much a binary choice.
Journalism used to be about taking risks to bring critical public interest information to everyone, with a strong ethic and moral code.
On what planet? Here on earth journalism has always been about what will sell papers or garner eyeballs.
I mean seriously, the drek quoted above gets posted and moderated 'insightful' every time a story about the media posted - but it is not now and never has been true.
but the internet allows people of the country that "we're" bombing to communicate back to us so people push pressure on the government.
Or, it allows the people "we're" bombing to craft a careful astroturf campaign designed to appeal to the prejudices of some portion of 'our' fellow citizens so that they then rage on Twitter, Facebook, Slashdot, etc... etc... The effects on the government are questionable at best because that 'some portion' of 'our fellow citizens' are deluded as to the actual effectiveness of said 'rage' and notably incompetent at questioning the validity and value of information that matches their prejudices.
Imagine if Iraq or Afghanistan had common internet access, something tells me we wouldn't invade because public opinion would be very much against it.
Which is a consequence of our current system of government by soundbite and opinion poll, not a consequence of the existence of the 'net.
Honestly, who could be surprised that AT&T reads the history/design of the internet in such a way that it seems to say exactly what they'd like it to say?
I'm not surprised. But then I'm not surprised you read the history/design of the internet in such a way that it seems to say exactly what you'd like it to say.
Everyone does that - not just corporations and religions.
However, given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow.
If they eyes know nothing about the field, then it doesn't matter how many of them stare at the screen. They aren't going to write a decent article as they don't know enough to sort the krep from the quality.
Because it is reasonable to assume an article written by amateurs is much more reliable than an expert witness, a practicing psychologist, who actually interviewed the people in question.
Yes, it is. First, the "amateurs" who wrote the Wikipedia article are almost certainly people trained in its field, in the same way that the physics and computer articles are generally edited by physicists and computer people.
Almost certainly and generally - very nice weasel words that hide stark reality, which is that you can't tell which articles were written by experts and which were written by 'experts'.
And that's generally my problem with Wikipedia. Folks like you say "this group is generally written by experts" or "that group is usually written by experts", and imply that those articles are thus extremely trustworthy. But it never, ever, occurs to you to ask why in hell isn't the entire Wikipedia written by experts then?". Reviewing articles in fields that I am expert on, I routinely see errors of fact, of omission, of inference... How then am I supposed to trust the balance?
Using the cited sources isn't much help - because if an article is flawed as outlined above, how are the sources going to be any better? GIGO.
This was, as Roblimo points out, a Facebook chat. This wasn't an interview and I didn't know it was going to be the subject of an article. I was having a conversation with a friend, but when friends are reporters... well mea culpa.
No, it's not your fault - it's the fault of the unethical jackass who took a personal conversation and made a public post of it.
Even if it did perform as well, the 'prosumer' market of today didn't exist.
Yes it did, that's who Popular PHotography Magazine and those 35mm camera ads in National Geographic were for. Even when I was a youngun, at most school events there's be maybe 1 or 2 parents with 35mm cameras
The 35mm cameras advertised in National Geographic were largely the equivalent of today's point-and-shoot cameras. (That is, they did not have interchangeable lenses.) Professional gear, then and now, means SLR not 35mm.
Popular Photography was aimed at the serious hobbyist (a very different market from prosumer) - some of whom used high end 35mm fixed lens cameras, others of whom actually did use the lower end SLRs.
Why would anyone ever want to view his or her pictures on a TV?
Given the technology of the time, it's a valid question. Folks didn't have home computers. TVs were low-resolution. Hell, not even everyone had a TV.
Not only that - but a significant percentage of TV's out there were still black-and-white. (I remember seeing b&w sets offered for sale right alongside color ones up until the early/mid 80's) And even if you had a color set, the color quality was... often not the greatest in the world, and certainly not what we take for granted today.
Why would you go through the process of lugging around a giant camera and waiting several seconds for it to write to tape just to view a picture on a TV?
A giant expensive camera - which didn't perform as well as a cheaper camera. Even if it did perform as well, the 'prosumer' market of today didn't exist.
Slashdot Mirror
Yep. People love to blame 'evil' CEO's and 'greedy' businesses for cutting corners - but the root cause of their seemingly 'evil' and 'greedy' practices is the Wal-Mart mentality.
And it's the same over on Wall Street - Wall Street isn't some monolithic organism that gorges on increased profits. Wall Street is machine for appeasing the people who insist their retirement accounts have a high enough yield so they can wait till almost too late to establish a retirement account *and* with minimal investment yield enough that they can retire and not actually suffer a drop in income.
"Half the cost of anything else out there" is very nice, but doesn't tell us much. Wandering around the web, I find the lowest (retail) cost to be around $.50/gallon for single packaged filters. (Which will obviously be considerably lower in bulk and/or multi-packaged.)
And Shadowrun ripped it off from Heinlein, or any one of a dozen different SF authors who were describing 3D TV decades before Shadowrun existed.
So why is it not moral for the government to tell women they cannot take the health risks (among other risks) of being a prostitute - yet it is moral for the government to tell the painter you just hired that he must wear a dust mask to avoid health risks?
Talking to escorts about the world of prostitution is like talking to McDonalds CEO about the world of fast food workers. Try talking to the girls down on the low track instead.
Yeah, the same way someone who can't find a job making a living wage and with a future 'chooses' to go to work with McDonalds or Best Buy.
You, and many others answering here, have a seriously rosy view of the world.
"I sort of hate having to tell him 'no'"
Learning when to say 'no', and actually doing so, is a very important parenting skill. If you can't say it, you shouldn't be a parent.
"Regardless, when you pay $1.65 billion for a business, you probably don't expect it to take three to four years before you start making your money back."
Once again, it's pretty obvious that the summary writer (like most slashdotters) knows roughly fuck all about business. Taking three to four years to start earning your money back is neither new, nor unique to Google, nor even notable.
And it helps me keep up with friends and family scattered across the (North American) continent. And I follow the pages of half a dozen local businesses *and* the pages of a dozen professional photographers whose work I am studying. (And much more besides.)
Facebook can be views as essentially being functionally the same as an RSS reader with a single login and a consistent protocol and interface across all the pages in your feed. And from my point of view, that's a damm good thing because it collects a lot of useful things in one place.
If there's one thing the history of the 'net has taught us, from portals back in the late 90's down to social networking sites today, is that the average net user likes single login's and consistent interfaces.
And this is where your logic fails, you've pulled off the old trick of proving 1=2 by introducing a false assumption. In this case, the assumption that experimental data is required to create testable predictions.
Further falsifying your hypothesis is the presence of data in the realms other than very small and very heavy - the realms string theory is also supposed to be able to explain. (At least according to some proponents.)
Horse shit. Noting the flaws in your theory in no way burdens me with the requirement to produce something better. That's new age touchie-feelie crap.
If they can get it under $10k out the door, I suspect there will be a fair size market. If they can get it under $5k, there will be a fairly large market.
Professionals aren't afraid to spend money. Nor do they shop for their gear at Wal-Mart.
Unless Michigan is very different from Washington, the state of education about the legal process is irrelevant - because jurors and prospective jurors are briefed (multiple times) about what is and isn't appropriate behavior during the selection process and prior to trial.
Not only are you stupid enough to spell it as two words, you're stupid enough to think that one counterexample (or roughly one drop of water in an ocean) is meaningful.
Forgot to add the next paragraph:
Or the government can simply ignore the simulated rage, knowing full well the 'rage' will be directed towards some other target next week. The attention span of the 'net generation not being long enough to accomplish anything meaningful, that is when they aren't already off on the next viral kick. Bonsai kittens or bombs in Baghdad, it's all the same the 'net.
As I asked the OP - which planet are you from? Because nothing has changed.
Maybe on your planet. Not here on Earth.
Well, no, what's happened (as you demonstrate) is the word corruption has been so devalued as to be meaningless. Nowadays, it's just a buzzword like 'fascist', it's been tossed around so long and so loudly by people ignorant of it's meaning, that people now ignore the cries of "Wolf!".
If you think celebrity journalism is something new - you've either been living in a remote cave for the last couple of centuries, or you're utterly effing ignorant. It's pretty much a binary choice.
On what planet? Here on earth journalism has always been about what will sell papers or garner eyeballs.
I mean seriously, the drek quoted above gets posted and moderated 'insightful' every time a story about the media posted - but it is not now and never has been true.
Or, it allows the people "we're" bombing to craft a careful astroturf campaign designed to appeal to the prejudices of some portion of 'our' fellow citizens so that they then rage on Twitter, Facebook, Slashdot, etc... etc... The effects on the government are questionable at best because that 'some portion' of 'our fellow citizens' are deluded as to the actual effectiveness of said 'rage' and notably incompetent at questioning the validity and value of information that matches their prejudices.
Which is a consequence of our current system of government by soundbite and opinion poll, not a consequence of the existence of the 'net.
I'm not surprised. But then I'm not surprised you read the history/design of the internet in such a way that it seems to say exactly what you'd like it to say.
Everyone does that - not just corporations and religions.
If they eyes know nothing about the field, then it doesn't matter how many of them stare at the screen. They aren't going to write a decent article as they don't know enough to sort the krep from the quality.
Almost certainly and generally - very nice weasel words that hide stark reality, which is that you can't tell which articles were written by experts and which were written by 'experts'.
And that's generally my problem with Wikipedia. Folks like you say "this group is generally written by experts" or "that group is usually written by experts", and imply that those articles are thus extremely trustworthy. But it never, ever, occurs to you to ask why in hell isn't the entire Wikipedia written by experts then?". Reviewing articles in fields that I am expert on, I routinely see errors of fact, of omission, of inference... How then am I supposed to trust the balance?
Using the cited sources isn't much help - because if an article is flawed as outlined above, how are the sources going to be any better? GIGO.
No, it's not your fault - it's the fault of the unethical jackass who took a personal conversation and made a public post of it.
The 35mm cameras advertised in National Geographic were largely the equivalent of today's point-and-shoot cameras. (That is, they did not have interchangeable lenses.) Professional gear, then and now, means SLR not 35mm.
Popular Photography was aimed at the serious hobbyist (a very different market from prosumer) - some of whom used high end 35mm fixed lens cameras, others of whom actually did use the lower end SLRs.
Not only that - but a significant percentage of TV's out there were still black-and-white. (I remember seeing b&w sets offered for sale right alongside color ones up until the early/mid 80's) And even if you had a color set, the color quality was... often not the greatest in the world, and certainly not what we take for granted today.
A giant expensive camera - which didn't perform as well as a cheaper camera. Even if it did perform as well, the 'prosumer' market of today didn't exist.
Garmin has provided a site to check if yours is one of the affected units: https://my.garmin.com/rma/recallLanding.faces.
Neither CNN or Fox News are in the habit of reporting minor local incidents (unless they need a little filler).