I used to love the old Model M keyboards. For a long time, they really were better than all the rest -- other keyboards had a definite low point in the 80s and 90s.
I don't feel that way anymore, though. Keyboards -- even the fairly short-throw models -- are now very good and require much less effort to type than the Model M (and clones). After a lifetime of typing (I learned to type on a manual typewriter, no joke) I have come to recognize that a light touch is both better for my hands and makes me a faster typist. That pretty much rules out the Model M. Just the thought of typing on one of those old tanks today makes my hands hurt.
Well, sort of. Even if you powered the kilns with nuclear power, you would still have to deal with the CO2 emissions that come directly from the heated limestone, which is roughly HALF of the overall carbon emissions involved in cement production.
This is a common misconception. Paying the workers to build the house in high cost areas is more expensive because they are paid more than people in low cost areas. Materials also cost more in high cost of living areas.
These are true statements, but they are a very small fraction of the worth of a "house", which is actually really land + house. If you want proof of that, all you need do is peruse the county tax records -- Santa Clara County will do, but you could also choose San Mateo County or San Francisco County -- and look at the assessed value of almost any given property. Included in those assessments will be a line item called "Improvements" (the exact wording varies) which refers to the structure(s) on the land.
Now subtract the improvements from the assessed value. What remains is almost invariably (in the Bay Area) a fairly big number that dwarfs the "Improvements".
It's not the land. It's the many layers of corrupt government. It is not possible to legally build a house.
I've seen actual houses being built, right here in my neighborhood, where none used to stand. I've also seen several large lots combined and then subdivided into Planned Unit Developments, basically single-family homes spaced fairly close together. I've seen apartment complexes (both large and small) built on former industrial or commercial space. I've seen the office park where I used to work torn down and turned into mixed-use residential / retail, a very popular option these days.
In fact, there are lots of housing projects going on here in the Bay Area.
So when you say that it's "not possible to legally build a house", I assume you mean that what you actually meant to say is that you really, truly have no idea what you're talking about.
Wrong again Captain Stainypants... It's the location.
The land isn't portable, so I would have thought location would be obvious. But please, by all means: go ahead and be snarky. Makes you look intelligent-like.
Also, hydrogen fuel is a dumb idea. There is no infrastructure, conversion/storage is inefficient and it makes metals brittle. It's much better to focus on electric battery cars.
Hydrogen may (or may not) be a viable form of energy storage. Infrastructure, though, is perhaps the weakest argument against it. First, some of the infrastructure is already in place -- there are two hydrogen filling stations near my house for use by the hydrogen-powered cars that are already on the market. So there's that.
Second, you can make hydrogen (inefficiently, at present) with water and electricity.
You know what kind of infrastructure is really well developed in the world? Water and electricity.
So why does a house you can build just about anywhere for $250,000 cost $1 Million in California.
This is a common misperception. The cost is in the land, not the house itself.
In places where land is cheap, the cost of the structure that sits on the land is significant. In California (and the Bay Area specifically) the cost of the structure is almost (but not entirely) irrelevant.
That's far from clear. Certainly there are people who are replaceable in any corporation. But that doesn't mean that these engineers are replaceable. The biggest tech companies in the valley exist because they hire the best and the brightest. If a company mistreats the best and the brightest, those engineers will have no problem applying their talents elsewhere -- probably for a competitor. This "gang of 9" obviously felt that they were able to refuse to work on military projects and get away with it. They're probably far more valuable to Google than the military contract, and they know it.
Shhhhh! Don't tell them! The news that California is failing is actually a clever PR campaign to keep people in the flyover states from coming here. As the nation's most populous state, we have too many people here already.
Left wing loves big government and spying on people. Republicans are for us and the little man who represent individuals and the free market will take care of the problem.
You can't be a liberal yet support privacy? It just can't happen
Did you really have to drag politics into the discussion?
If they are genuinely happy about it, this surprises me.
I can't speak to their happiness. I have no idea. But that wasn't really the question. I suspect that for many, the ability to charge at work is equivalent enough (given a sufficient supply of chargers). Is it ideal? Probably not. Do lots of people do it anyway, and continue to function for many years that way? Yes. Absolutely.
On my planet, people are generally smart enough to know that textual representations of sarcasm are difficult to deliver effectively. The audience must know something about the speaker's worldview in order to surmise how to interpret the current statement, or some obvious cue has to exist (body language and intonation being absent) in order to understand the sarcastic intent.
But that's just my planet. Maybe you'll do better if you stay in yours.
Right from the very beginning I was talking about people who live in high density housing neighorhoods, and for which charging at home is completely impossible, not only logistically, but physically.
I agree that's what you were talking about. And I can personally point to many examples of people who are in that exact situation who do still in fact own EVs.
in some cases it would be less expensive for them to own their own detached home than to obtain charging because the number of people that are willing to front the costs for the necessary electrical infrastructure upgrades in the ear to support cars they don't own yet but might buy at some point in the future is too small to justify its installation.
Agreed here as well. But yet there are still plenty of people in that situation that own EVs. People actually really like them enough to put up with the supposedly disqualifying inconvenience.
I'd be honestly surprised it there's even one among them.
You'd be dead wrong. It's actually the subject of heated debate on the internal mailing lists where I work. Oddly enough, some of the worst entitlement comes from the people who DO have the ability to charge at home, and view the people who don't with disdain. I think it's opposite, but there is a very real contingent of people who are driving electric vehicles who absolutely cannot charge at home.
I would defy you or anyone else to find any electric vehicle owner that has no ability to charge at home who might assert otherwise.
Challenge accepted.
I know several people personally who drive EVs and don't have any ability to charge at home. At my place of work, I know of many tens (maybe even 100) more who only charge at work.
Any publication that doesn't allow comments these days is one that doesn't want to be challenged when it publishes complete and utter BULLSHIT like the article you linked to.
Any publication that doesn't allow comments these days has probably reached the conclusion that the trolls just aren't worth the page views. I disagree that availability of comments correlates in any way to the quality or veracity of the articles presented.
As a weekend warrior who ventures into the backcountry regularly, I am waiting for a EV with 500 miles range, in Canadian winter conditions. Until then, I will be sticking with ICE.
As well you should. Still, I fail to see how your use case is anything more than tangentially related to the discussion. Clearly, EVs are not suitable for you. But you're also clearly an outlier.
the ewaste factor alone should make people think twice about this. Also the fact that these vehicles are heavier then others, and cause more wear and tear on the highways. Causing more construction, more raping of our land for raw materials.
How do they compare (weight-wise) to the SUVs that are so popular on the roads today?
I'm sorry, but I have YET to see an electric vehicle that still does not harm the environment in all the same ways as our fossil fuel vehicles.
I suspect you're just anti, and any evidence we presented to negate your concern trolling would be largely disregarded. So I won't try. Your sig tells me you're not interested in actual discussion.
Plus they are not affordable for our lower income.
Neither were the first automobiles. It took years of development (plus the invention of the assembly line) to make them affordable for the masses. It's still early days for EVs -- battery technology is improving and cost is dropping. If we gave up on every new technology because of initial cost, we'd still be living in caves.
A "bug" is defined culturally, not scientifically, and culturally we tend to think of spiders as bugs. Then *your* culture must have changed considerably. A bug has wings... a spider has none.
Lots of bugs don't have wings. Pill bugs, for instance.
Slashdot Mirror
Elaborate, please. I'd like you to tell us why these aren't needed.
I used to love the old Model M keyboards. For a long time, they really were better than all the rest -- other keyboards had a definite low point in the 80s and 90s.
I don't feel that way anymore, though. Keyboards -- even the fairly short-throw models -- are now very good and require much less effort to type than the Model M (and clones). After a lifetime of typing (I learned to type on a manual typewriter, no joke) I have come to recognize that a light touch is both better for my hands and makes me a faster typist. That pretty much rules out the Model M. Just the thought of typing on one of those old tanks today makes my hands hurt.
Nukes can work for cement
Well, sort of. Even if you powered the kilns with nuclear power, you would still have to deal with the CO2 emissions that come directly from the heated limestone, which is roughly HALF of the overall carbon emissions involved in cement production.
Source: http://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2...
This is a common misconception. Paying the workers to build the house in high cost areas is more expensive because they are paid more than people in low cost areas. Materials also cost more in high cost of living areas.
These are true statements, but they are a very small fraction of the worth of a "house", which is actually really land + house. If you want proof of that, all you need do is peruse the county tax records -- Santa Clara County will do, but you could also choose San Mateo County or San Francisco County -- and look at the assessed value of almost any given property. Included in those assessments will be a line item called "Improvements" (the exact wording varies) which refers to the structure(s) on the land.
Now subtract the improvements from the assessed value. What remains is almost invariably (in the Bay Area) a fairly big number that dwarfs the "Improvements".
Go on, check it out. We'll wait.
It's not the land. It's the many layers of corrupt government. It is not possible to legally build a house.
I've seen actual houses being built, right here in my neighborhood, where none used to stand. I've also seen several large lots combined and then subdivided into Planned Unit Developments, basically single-family homes spaced fairly close together. I've seen apartment complexes (both large and small) built on former industrial or commercial space. I've seen the office park where I used to work torn down and turned into mixed-use residential / retail, a very popular option these days.
In fact, there are lots of housing projects going on here in the Bay Area.
So when you say that it's "not possible to legally build a house", I assume you mean that what you actually meant to say is that you really, truly have no idea what you're talking about.
Wrong again Captain Stainypants... It's the location.
The land isn't portable, so I would have thought location would be obvious. But please, by all means: go ahead and be snarky. Makes you look intelligent-like.
Also, hydrogen fuel is a dumb idea. There is no infrastructure, conversion/storage is inefficient and it makes metals brittle. It's much better to focus on electric battery cars.
Hydrogen may (or may not) be a viable form of energy storage. Infrastructure, though, is perhaps the weakest argument against it. First, some of the infrastructure is already in place -- there are two hydrogen filling stations near my house for use by the hydrogen-powered cars that are already on the market. So there's that.
Second, you can make hydrogen (inefficiently, at present) with water and electricity.
You know what kind of infrastructure is really well developed in the world? Water and electricity.
So why does a house you can build just about anywhere for $250,000 cost $1 Million in California.
This is a common misperception. The cost is in the land, not the house itself.
In places where land is cheap, the cost of the structure that sits on the land is significant. In California (and the Bay Area specifically) the cost of the structure is almost (but not entirely) irrelevant.
Fire them. Of course they are replaceable.
That's far from clear. Certainly there are people who are replaceable in any corporation. But that doesn't mean that these engineers are replaceable. The biggest tech companies in the valley exist because they hire the best and the brightest. If a company mistreats the best and the brightest, those engineers will have no problem applying their talents elsewhere -- probably for a competitor. This "gang of 9" obviously felt that they were able to refuse to work on military projects and get away with it. They're probably far more valuable to Google than the military contract, and they know it.
The water restrictions you just linked further proves my point because California can't even afford to build new dams to support the migrant influx!
You're pretty gullible, you know? No, you probably don't.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-ch...
You've been ingesting too much Fox News. They've been lying about California's economy for years.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion...
Shhhhh! Don't tell them! The news that California is failing is actually a clever PR campaign to keep people in the flyover states from coming here. As the nation's most populous state, we have too many people here already.
Earthquakes, mudslides, drought, riot, stay away!
Left wing loves big government and spying on people. Republicans are for us and the little man who represent individuals and the free market will take care of the problem.
You can't be a liberal yet support privacy? It just can't happen
Did you really have to drag politics into the discussion?
Christ, what an asshole.
If they are genuinely happy about it, this surprises me.
I can't speak to their happiness. I have no idea. But that wasn't really the question. I suspect that for many, the ability to charge at work is equivalent enough (given a sufficient supply of chargers). Is it ideal? Probably not. Do lots of people do it anyway, and continue to function for many years that way? Yes. Absolutely.
What? They don't have sarcasm on your planet?
On my planet, people are generally smart enough to know that textual representations of sarcasm are difficult to deliver effectively. The audience must know something about the speaker's worldview in order to surmise how to interpret the current statement, or some obvious cue has to exist (body language and intonation being absent) in order to understand the sarcastic intent.
But that's just my planet. Maybe you'll do better if you stay in yours.
you could not charge larger users more than lesser users.
This is complete bullcrap. Why would you believe something so stupid and nonsensical? Do you have any idea what NN is?
I think it's clear the answer to that is a resounding "NO"!
Little known fact - Netflix's entire Internet costs would be $100 per month if NN were in force!
I'm surprised you posted this under your username. Most people who spout obviously false garbage on slashdot are savvy enough to do so as ACs.
Yeah, NN would require that an ISP charge the same rate for a 4 Mbit service or a 100 Mbit service.
That's not only wrong, it's also incredibly stupid. Seriously, you have no idea what you're talking about.
You're either a troll or an idiot. Likely both.
Oh, the irony.
Touche... but the point remains.
No, I don't think it does.
Right from the very beginning I was talking about people who live in high density housing neighorhoods, and for which charging at home is completely impossible, not only logistically, but physically.
I agree that's what you were talking about. And I can personally point to many examples of people who are in that exact situation who do still in fact own EVs.
in some cases it would be less expensive for them to own their own detached home than to obtain charging because the number of people that are willing to front the costs for the necessary electrical infrastructure upgrades in the ear to support cars they don't own yet but might buy at some point in the future is too small to justify its installation.
Agreed here as well. But yet there are still plenty of people in that situation that own EVs. People actually really like them enough to put up with the supposedly disqualifying inconvenience.
Move yourself to a room with 100% pure oxygen.
You're being argumentative without actually making a point. An impressive feat, to be sure.
I'd be honestly surprised it there's even one among them.
You'd be dead wrong. It's actually the subject of heated debate on the internal mailing lists where I work. Oddly enough, some of the worst entitlement comes from the people who DO have the ability to charge at home, and view the people who don't with disdain. I think it's opposite, but there is a very real contingent of people who are driving electric vehicles who absolutely cannot charge at home.
I would defy you or anyone else to find any electric vehicle owner that has no ability to charge at home who might assert otherwise.
Challenge accepted.
I know several people personally who drive EVs and don't have any ability to charge at home. At my place of work, I know of many tens (maybe even 100) more who only charge at work.
Any other questions?
Any publication that doesn't allow comments these days is one that doesn't want to be challenged when it publishes complete and utter BULLSHIT like the article you linked to.
Any publication that doesn't allow comments these days has probably reached the conclusion that the trolls just aren't worth the page views. I disagree that availability of comments correlates in any way to the quality or veracity of the articles presented.
Want proof? Look no further than Slashdot.
As a weekend warrior who ventures into the backcountry regularly, I am waiting for a EV with 500 miles range, in Canadian winter conditions. Until then, I will be sticking with ICE.
As well you should. Still, I fail to see how your use case is anything more than tangentially related to the discussion. Clearly, EVs are not suitable for you. But you're also clearly an outlier.
the ewaste factor alone should make people think twice about this. Also the fact that these vehicles are heavier then others, and cause more wear and tear on the highways. Causing more construction, more raping of our land for raw materials.
How do they compare (weight-wise) to the SUVs that are so popular on the roads today?
I'm sorry, but I have YET to see an electric vehicle that still does not harm the environment in all the same ways as our fossil fuel vehicles.
I suspect you're just anti, and any evidence we presented to negate your concern trolling would be largely disregarded. So I won't try. Your sig tells me you're not interested in actual discussion.
Plus they are not affordable for our lower income.
Neither were the first automobiles. It took years of development (plus the invention of the assembly line) to make them affordable for the masses. It's still early days for EVs -- battery technology is improving and cost is dropping. If we gave up on every new technology because of initial cost, we'd still be living in caves.
Many do not, causing EVs to be more inconvenience than their benefits are worth.
Inconvenience being subjective, you don't actually get to decide whether the inconveniences outweigh the benefits.
A "bug" is defined culturally, not scientifically, and culturally we tend to think of spiders as bugs. ... a spider has none.
Then *your* culture must have changed considerably. A bug has wings
Lots of bugs don't have wings. Pill bugs, for instance.