This could be a business opportunity for Valve and Steam. I know that they already publish third party titles on Steam, but these are mostly indie and small time studios (as far as I know). It would be a major coup if they could get one of the big studios like EA, Blizzard, or Activision to sign up for Steam distribution. Another company with a fairly mature online distribution system is Stardock (queue the boos for those who dislike WindowBlinds...yeah, yeah) with their Galactic Civilizations series.
This isn't the first time that developers have used the strict letter of the contract to their advantage when the publishers were trying to act like jerks. The publishers will probably just punish that Studio by not giving them advance money to develop any new games and refusing to distribute any new games which they do develop. At the very least, the will get nastier terms on their next contract (along with the no removing the DRM with subsequent patches clause). I commend the developers of Supreme Commander for doing the right thing by their paying customers, but I do not hold out much hope that publishers will see the light.
Have you saved copies of those stamped letters and responses to your correspondence (or records of lack thereof) over the years? It seems like that would be wonderful material for a series of blog articles carefully expounding and explaining your positions and presenting the paper trail of your attempts to reason with the game publishers over the years. If it was done well you might see your page rank soar on Google, get a lot of links back to your blog and articles, and maybe even an interview with a game magazine or other major trade publication. For example check out the How copy protection creates pirates article on the Stardock galactic civilizations page and the Pwned blog which collected together some of the relevant articles and discussion threads on the subject. Perhaps you have some original materials that you could add to the discussion? It might be worth a try to extend the reach and enhance the value of your previous efforts. Think of it as giving back to the gaming community that has given all of us so many good times over the years, but now is in danger of losing much of what made gaming great in the years past.
It still would have been better if you had not bought their game. By spending your money on their game you are signaling to EA that DRM is alright or that it doesn't matter. You will not be effective in getting EA to abandon the DRM route if you continue to buy their games and then crack them or download the crack. Take a stand against DRM if you don't like it or else just admit that you really don't have that big of a problem with it, you might now like it but it doesn't keep you from buying or pirating the game. Only a principled boycott combined with stamped and preferably hand-written letters to EA will induce them to change. If you don't believe that then just ask the lobbyists who are constantly pestering your Congressmen, even they will grudgingly admit that just a few hand-written letters can be quite powerful in effecting change, much more so than bags of anonymous money or a few million emails.
There have been numerous devices that have claimed this in the past, only to fail miserably, and it seems pretty reasonable to assume that this will fail as well.
Marketers and managers simply do not understand cryptography and security. To them it is all black magic. They will say whatever they think that they can get away with in order to promote their product whether it is true or not. If somebody calls them on it someday they will just plead ignorance of complex technical matters and claim that they were acting in "good faith belief" or else they will say that the "hackers" who broke in were just really good and that normal people cannot break in so it is good enough (forgetting that it only takes one smart horse to open the gate for the rest to follow).
Would work beautifully, but it's completely broken the day someone manages to get the private key out of it.
This is the same reason why DRM cannot provide a cryptographically strong guarantee. No matter how the private key is generated, hidden, or otherwise obfuscated it is still provided to the adversary (i.e. the owner - isn't DRM screwed up like that? You the owner are considered to be an adversary) and forms the "weak link" in the chain. The fact that public key cryptography is used means nothing if the private key needed for decryption is sent along with the package because any crypto system is only as strong as the weakest link. So unless the RFID or the DRM requires Internet access to perform remote attestation (ala Palladium) the private key must be provided and RFID or the DRM is weakened to the complexity of the private key obfuscation techniques (which are never as strong as the crypto itself). Incidentally, this is also why Microsoft and the Trusted Computing Group DO NOT want to implement owner override, because they know that it will break their attempt at strong DRM if they are NOT permitted to treat the owner of the computer or the RFID chip as an adversary via forced remote checks (i.e. using the Internet). I for one will never accept and refuse to use any software (or recommend that others use it) which requires trusted computing and does NOT include owner override. We should all of us refuse to purchase or use any Trusted Computing products which do NOT include owner override. Demand sovereignty over your computing devices, you paid for them and they should obey you.
We are already effectively conducting a vast uncontrolled experiment with many uncontrolled or poorly controlled variables by burning fossil fuels and continuing to live as we have been living. If a bad outcome is unavoidable without additional changes then we must at least try to change, even though the results might be unpredictable because what is the alternative?
Well, we could always arm the ships with automated weapons systems and IFF and program them to repel boarders who have not entered the proper codes or have the right IFF transponder. GPS tracking systems with silent alarms are another possibility. There are ways to mitigate the risks from pirates (the real at sea kind in this case).
You seem to be confused about how the stock market works
Not really, I was simply trying to strip out all extraneous details from the discussion. You obviously aren't going to be convinced by me or probably anyone else that the stock market is not gambling. So be it, but let me ask you this: what exactly are you planning to do with any wealth (assuming that you believe that it is possible to accumulate wealth, since you also seem to doubt the existence of economic growth and the traditional definition(s) of wealth) that you manage to save? If you don't trust the stock market then why would you trust any other sort of investment (i.e. bonds, private equity, real estate)? What are you going to do? Stuff your cash in a mattress? Bury gold bricks in your backyard? Banks turn around and invest your deposits, which according to you is gambling, so why would you want someone else to be gambling your money for you?
Do you not call blackjack gambling?
Of course blackjack is gambling, but did you not read the linked article? The difference between gambling and investing is that gambling has ZERO chance of creating new wealth. I had previously conceded that gambling could conceivably provide entertainment as a service, but it does not and cannot create new wealth, it can only redistribute existing wealth. A zero-sum activity like the one just described that involves risk is gambling in the purest sense of the word, but investments distinguish themselves, even though they also involve risk of loss, due to the possibility that they can create new wealth which indirectly improves the lives of everyone living in that economy (quality of life at least in a material sense is roughly proportional to the amount of goods and services produced per person in an economy). Those facts are really not disputable, almost every economist that you could find anywhere would be substantially in agreement with those statements.
"Gambling, on the contrary, is a zero-sum game. It merely takes money from a loser and gives it to a winner. No value is ever created.". This is also false in practice. Since most 'gambling' is done in casinos, there are thousands of jobs created.
The jobs are created as part of the service of providing entertainment to the customers. That is really the only redeeming feature of Casinos, they can provide entertainment in some cases which is obviously a service that people are willing to pay for in the economy. Entertainment can provide satisfaction in the form of utility (the technical term economists use to describe happiness), but it does not create wealth. The casino employees are paid with existing wealth that has been transferred from the gamblers to the casino and then partially used to pay the employees but no new wealth is created in the process, it is merely transferred between parties.
The housing crash is a perfect example of what happens when people forget that 'investments' are often gambling.
It is an example of what can happen when people approach investments as they would a casino table game where no amount of skill can affect the outcome (I know that there are casino games were skill matters, but most people either don't know or practice those skills or are not nearly as good as they think they are. There are professionals who make their living in Vegas taking money from well healed but ignorant tourists at the poker tables for example) and how governments (who control the money supply) can make things worse by running a reckless loose money policy. It is also an example of greed on the part of unscrupulous professionals (appraisers and others) in the mortgage industry committing fraud.
I suppose that our disagreement stems primarily from a disagreement over the definition of gambl
Suppose that I make you a loan so that you can start a basket weaving business and the business profits and you pay back the loan with interest. Is that gambling? Certainly not. You needed money to get started producing goods which added to the total amount of value produced by the economy. Now what if instead of asking for the principle to be repaid with interest at a future time I asked instead for a share of the ownership of the basket weaving business (with a proportionate share in profits, business decisions, losses, and other aspects of the business). Is this gambling? Certainly not. I am simply taking a share of the business as compensation for fronting some of the capital in a productive activity (i.e. the business). I will grant you that both of these activities involve risks (i.e. the business might fail and you might default on your loan or I might lose my equity position because the business has entered liquidation), but not every activity that involves risk is logically equivalent to gambling. The stock market is basically the same as the above example (with hundreds of thousands of companies engaged not just in basket weaving but millions of other productive economic activities). The difference between the stock market, a place where equity stakes in productive businesses (or potentially productive anyway) are bought and sold, and gambling is that gambling is NOT productive in that it results in no additional goods or service (other than perhaps entertainment, but many people gamble way more than could reasonably be construed as merely for entertainment) entering the economy. It merely transfers existing wealth from one person or organization to another without producing anything of substantial value in the process. It is at best properly categorized as an entertainment business and at worst a complete waste of time. As I have stated above, while it is possible to approach investing as gambling, it is NOT in all circumstances the equivalent of gambling.
For a more comprehensive introduction to the common stock market myths, including stock market == gambling, might I suggest the following article?
One guy on there was asking for a $5,000 loan in order to buy stocks. That's the most retarded thing I can think of that you can do with a loan besides go to Las Vegas with it.
Sigh...it is very tiresome to hear the same wrong headed myths about investment == gambling that have been circulating for years and gaining currency among the younger generations. Although it is possible to approach investment as a form of gambling, doing no research and simply purchasing shares or options in a randomly selected entity for example, most people that I know who actually do invest their money do not approach investing in that way. The investing == gambling argument is most frequently mentioned, at least in my experience, by those who do not save very much of their own money and are looking to rationalize their overspending by suggesting that those of us who save and invest our money, in stocks perhaps, are no better than gamblers. As for borrowing money to invest in stocks, this is done all of the time by professional fund managers (it is called leverage) in order to boost returns on a good investment opportunity so it is not 'retarded' per se, although it is unusual for an individual investor to borrow such a small sum of money to invest (it would be far better for him to save up $5,000 of his own money and then start his investing career with that instead).
Personally, I don't really care that other people took out loans they couldn't pay back, but when it starts to affect my life because of the national economic situation then it becomes bothersome.
I share your frustration on that count, truly I do, but the alternatives are probably worse (i.e. the gold standard) overall. The problem, at least in my opinion which is shared by Ron Paul who has shaped and brought it to the public attention, is that the politicization of the money supply and its management has led to the present situation. In theory, a well managed fiat money system can have almost all of the benefits of a gold standard without some of the hard limits on growth, although in practice the results have been somewhat mixed since then end of the 1970s. The government, in my opinion, has no business interfering in the housing market either by granting tax deductions on mortgage interest OR (even worse) backing loans with taxpayer money. I hope that everyone learns a clear lesson from the present Fannie and Freddie fiasco (a small recession might be just the thing to shock everyone back to reality...the proverbial bucket of cold water). These entities should be absorbed by the federal government, disolved, and NO new loans should be issued and in fact the existing loans should be sold into the private market. If people want a loan for any reason, whether to buy a car or a house or whatever else, then they can enter the private credit market and pay the market rate. Why should taxpayers, many of whom cannot afford to buy a home, subsidize the loans of those who want home mortgages (which is essentially what Fanny and Freddie have been doing all of these years)? Government interference in the markets is at the root of almost all of our present economic problems and we would all be much better off if government butted out and returned to its proper and constitutionally mandated roles.
Not everyone has kids and many people are not willing to endure even modest financial hardships in order to remain green. It costs money to be green and that is a luxury that most of the world's population cannot afford and yes environmental quality is a luxury good because we care more about it the better off we are. Take the recent oil drilling debate, many people have changed their tune about drilling when it became clear that maintaining their green position was going to hit them right where it really hurts...in the wallet. You can say that what you want about drilling and how it wont lower prices, but it is widely believed by Joe Sixpack, and not without cause I might add, that drilling does lower prices and Joe Sixpack is really hurting right now with the poor economic outlook so he is going to be in favor of drilling no matter what some Harvard educated environmentalist tries to tell him about bear shit being better than the buck wheat.
In practice US jurisdiction extends to anywhere our carrier battle groups are. If you want to plant your flag somewhere on this earth then you have to be able to defend it as well, because governments hate competition. Did the shool bully stop at the edge or his lawn when you were thumbing your nose at him on the other side or did he cross the street and kick your butt?
Yes, but Jerry Seinfeld had no part in Michael Richard's tirade unless one believes that we must immediately abandon our long time friends whenever they make mistakes or screw up in public. Personally, I believe that guilt by association is not the way to go and certainly not when a long time friend makes an uncharacteristic mistake and then subsequently makes a genuine apology for it.
Let me be clear: I am not criticizing people's choice of a Prius per se. I am criticizing their attempts to use purely logical financial reasoning to fully justify their purchase as the best economic choice in light of the opportunity costs of hybrid vehicles and completely divorced from any other considerations (i.e. no bringing up the environment, personal enjoyment, or any other non-money issue when making the dollars and cents argument).
because over the life of the car, the Prius owner saves more money, period.
That is the part that the financial geeks among us disagree with. I have seen NO convincing case made, when considered as a whole with all of the opportunity costs, time value of money, and other strictly financial issues taken together, that proves beyond even just a reasonable doubt that buying a new Prius is better financially than buying a comparable new alternative vehicle which costs at least $3000 less (this seems to be the average lower-bound of the hybrid premium at present) upfront AND is likely to have fewer maintenance issues (hybrids necessarily introduce more moving parts and greater complexity which never helps reliability or maintenance costs...even for a good brand like Toyota). I am not saying that buying a hybrid never makes sense for anyone for any reason, but merely that pure financial logic cannot reasonably be used as justification apart from any other considerations (like those listed above) or at the very least it is very likely that most people will NOT benefit more from operating a hybrid over a comparable non-hybrid alternative vehicle (if you want to bring in weighted probabilities on the costs and benefits of different outcomes).
Buying a car is not logical in any case, so why all the posts criticizing people's choice of a Prius?
That depends upon where one chooses to live (which may in turn be tied to other factors which may or may not be under the control of the individual or require greater effort than is worthwhile to change). In Southern California (California is a very large state with average commutes of 45+ minutes or even a couple of hours at freeway speeds not at all uncommon) owning a car can substantially increase available employment options and the flexibility of ones living situation (real estate prices and rents are also very high here). So the issue of whether the hybrid is a better financial decision, given that a car may be necessary, is not merely an academic one.
$3000 is being generous. As previous posters in this thread have pointed out, the difference between a comparable Honda Civic (the EX model) and the Civic Hybrid is approximately $3,500 and although the Prius is not offered in a non-hybrid version it is reasonable to suppose that a non-hybrid version, if it was offered, would be at least $3,000 less expensive than the Prius hybrid currently available on the market. The argument holds water, its just that some people don't like the fact that their Prius was not a sound financial decision and are trying desperately to justify their purchase (or even worse, lease) decision on purely financial grounds. If you enjoy driving your hybrid and you believe that that extra enjoyment was worth the price of admission then by all means, enjoy your purchase and be happy...but don't try to tell the rest of us that we are suckers for not buying a hybrid car because it is cheaper than either the non-hybrid version or a comparable alternative non-hybrid vehicle.
You know there is a reason why they call it "fleasing" a car. It never makes financial sense to lease a car as your daily driver (not talking short term car rental on a trip, specialized entertainment industry leasing, and the like where the car is being leased as part of a short term business or recreational opportunity), it is extremely difficult to come out ahead by investing the difference between the payments and buying upfront (you would have to really outperform the market on your investments to justify making that lease payment instead of buying upfront). It is well known that leasing (aka "fleasing") is the most expensive possible way to pay for the use of a car (I say pay for the use of the car because you really don't actually own the car while the lease is active). The fact that you present leasing as a good option puts a big dent in your credibility on the financials of hybrid ownership.
You will never get 5% from a regular bank deposit. You might be able to get that from a certificate of deposit, but there will probably be at least a $30,000 minimum to get that rate. The government is paying less than 5% for 10 year treasury right now and they are the zero risk investment so why would the bank pay you more unless you deposited a HUGE amount? Most mutual funds also have a $3000 or so minimum initial investment. So you would have to save up your monthly gas savings in your regular bank account that pays little or no interest (you are lucky to pay no fees these days nevermind interest, unless you have a huge balance). We could go on quibling about the details, but face it: nobody buying a hybrid right now is doing it because it makes financial sense (or they are fooling themselves if they believe that). They buy the hybrid because they are environmentally conscious and enjoy driving a less polluting car OR they want to make a political statement AND they can afford it because they already have more wealth than average. If you enjoy driving your hybrid then great, but we are tired of hearing the "financial" argument for a new prius, it just doesn't pencil out.
The problem is that the hybrid costs $3000 more up front and money now is always worth more than money in the future, hence the reason why interest is charged and why money has a time value. so a stream of payments adding up to 3000 six (6) years from now is actually worth less than $3000 right now so you are paying $3000 more upfront for a savings of less than $3000 (i.e. a loss). In order for the investment to really "pay off" it would have to save you more money in gas than you could earn instead by investing the $3000 difference in treasury bills (4.75% yield or thereabouts) or in other words it would have to save you more than $3000 at the end of the 6 years to be worth it. If you are looking at it purely from a financial standpoint hybrids rarely make sense (for now) because there are almost always cheaper non-hybrid alternatives no matter what you are presently driving.
The sub $100 dollar notebook niche appears to be a bit too specialized for the needs of most people. They have all had a couple of good features or component choices here and there but, at least IMHO, none of them has yet hit the sweet spot. The use of the MIPS processor is an interesting play and the 1GB flash drive is also interesting but perhaps not the most appropriate choice given the current cost and rewrite performance of solid state drives. There are also the usual complaints about keyboard and screen size. I think that they could do better by increasing the screen and keyboard size a bit and substituting a good magnetic notebook disk (~80 GB would be cheap) for the flash drive. The ideal price range would probably be somewhere between $250 - $500, anything less than $100 generates too many compromises to be of general purpose use (or at least that has been true thus far).
Except that a Vermont judge recently ruled that password(s) contained in one's head are protected under the 5th Amendment to the United States Constitution. just like any other information in your head. It was discussed right here on Slashdot.
As for threatening law enforcement officers: say nothing, know your rights, and keep your cool. The law enforcement officer is NOT your friend and you shouldn't speak to them or answer their questions. You have a right to remain silent and you should use it. BTW every attorney that I have ever heard opine on the subject has said that it is better to say nothing than to answer some of the questions but not others. Don't let them scare you into giving up your rights with their Gestapo crap. Remember, if they are questioning you, especially if they are threatening, then there is NO way that you are NOT going to be held (i.e. arrested) for a while anyway until the matter either goes before a judge or they have to let you go (48 hours max w/out cause before any attorney can force them to let you out), so don't be dumb and tip your hand right at the start. Also, remember that if you ever get your equipment back then you can never use it or those passwords again (who knows what bugs they may have planted before releasing it back to you). You basically have to wipe and start over on new hardware.
Disclaimer: IANAL so if you find yourself in a situation like the one above find yourself one that you can trust and let them do the talking, but remember that the police are NOT your friends.
Slashdot Mirror
I fail to see how this helps the planet.
Hush you! You are spoiling the wonderful green vibe that we are all getting from doing something useless in the name of saving the environment.
This could be a business opportunity for Valve and Steam. I know that they already publish third party titles on Steam, but these are mostly indie and small time studios (as far as I know). It would be a major coup if they could get one of the big studios like EA, Blizzard, or Activision to sign up for Steam distribution. Another company with a fairly mature online distribution system is Stardock (queue the boos for those who dislike WindowBlinds...yeah, yeah) with their Galactic Civilizations series.
This isn't the first time that developers have used the strict letter of the contract to their advantage when the publishers were trying to act like jerks. The publishers will probably just punish that Studio by not giving them advance money to develop any new games and refusing to distribute any new games which they do develop. At the very least, the will get nastier terms on their next contract (along with the no removing the DRM with subsequent patches clause). I commend the developers of Supreme Commander for doing the right thing by their paying customers, but I do not hold out much hope that publishers will see the light.
Have you saved copies of those stamped letters and responses to your correspondence (or records of lack thereof) over the years? It seems like that would be wonderful material for a series of blog articles carefully expounding and explaining your positions and presenting the paper trail of your attempts to reason with the game publishers over the years. If it was done well you might see your page rank soar on Google, get a lot of links back to your blog and articles, and maybe even an interview with a game magazine or other major trade publication. For example check out the How copy protection creates pirates article on the Stardock galactic civilizations page and the Pwned blog which collected together some of the relevant articles and discussion threads on the subject. Perhaps you have some original materials that you could add to the discussion? It might be worth a try to extend the reach and enhance the value of your previous efforts. Think of it as giving back to the gaming community that has given all of us so many good times over the years, but now is in danger of losing much of what made gaming great in the years past.
It still would have been better if you had not bought their game. By spending your money on their game you are signaling to EA that DRM is alright or that it doesn't matter. You will not be effective in getting EA to abandon the DRM route if you continue to buy their games and then crack them or download the crack. Take a stand against DRM if you don't like it or else just admit that you really don't have that big of a problem with it, you might now like it but it doesn't keep you from buying or pirating the game. Only a principled boycott combined with stamped and preferably hand-written letters to EA will induce them to change. If you don't believe that then just ask the lobbyists who are constantly pestering your Congressmen, even they will grudgingly admit that just a few hand-written letters can be quite powerful in effecting change, much more so than bags of anonymous money or a few million emails.
There have been numerous devices that have claimed this in the past, only to fail miserably, and it seems pretty reasonable to assume that this will fail as well.
Marketers and managers simply do not understand cryptography and security. To them it is all black magic. They will say whatever they think that they can get away with in order to promote their product whether it is true or not. If somebody calls them on it someday they will just plead ignorance of complex technical matters and claim that they were acting in "good faith belief" or else they will say that the "hackers" who broke in were just really good and that normal people cannot break in so it is good enough (forgetting that it only takes one smart horse to open the gate for the rest to follow).
Would work beautifully, but it's completely broken the day someone manages to get the private key out of it.
This is the same reason why DRM cannot provide a cryptographically strong guarantee. No matter how the private key is generated, hidden, or otherwise obfuscated it is still provided to the adversary (i.e. the owner - isn't DRM screwed up like that? You the owner are considered to be an adversary) and forms the "weak link" in the chain. The fact that public key cryptography is used means nothing if the private key needed for decryption is sent along with the package because any crypto system is only as strong as the weakest link. So unless the RFID or the DRM requires Internet access to perform remote attestation (ala Palladium) the private key must be provided and RFID or the DRM is weakened to the complexity of the private key obfuscation techniques (which are never as strong as the crypto itself). Incidentally, this is also why Microsoft and the Trusted Computing Group DO NOT want to implement owner override, because they know that it will break their attempt at strong DRM if they are NOT permitted to treat the owner of the computer or the RFID chip as an adversary via forced remote checks (i.e. using the Internet). I for one will never accept and refuse to use any software (or recommend that others use it) which requires trusted computing and does NOT include owner override. We should all of us refuse to purchase or use any Trusted Computing products which do NOT include owner override. Demand sovereignty over your computing devices, you paid for them and they should obey you.
We are already effectively conducting a vast uncontrolled experiment with many uncontrolled or poorly controlled variables by burning fossil fuels and continuing to live as we have been living. If a bad outcome is unavoidable without additional changes then we must at least try to change, even though the results might be unpredictable because what is the alternative?
Well, we could always arm the ships with automated weapons systems and IFF and program them to repel boarders who have not entered the proper codes or have the right IFF transponder. GPS tracking systems with silent alarms are another possibility. There are ways to mitigate the risks from pirates (the real at sea kind in this case).
You seem to be confused about how the stock market works
Not really, I was simply trying to strip out all extraneous details from the discussion. You obviously aren't going to be convinced by me or probably anyone else that the stock market is not gambling. So be it, but let me ask you this: what exactly are you planning to do with any wealth (assuming that you believe that it is possible to accumulate wealth, since you also seem to doubt the existence of economic growth and the traditional definition(s) of wealth) that you manage to save? If you don't trust the stock market then why would you trust any other sort of investment (i.e. bonds, private equity, real estate)? What are you going to do? Stuff your cash in a mattress? Bury gold bricks in your backyard? Banks turn around and invest your deposits, which according to you is gambling, so why would you want someone else to be gambling your money for you?
Do you not call blackjack gambling?
Of course blackjack is gambling, but did you not read the linked article? The difference between gambling and investing is that gambling has ZERO chance of creating new wealth. I had previously conceded that gambling could conceivably provide entertainment as a service, but it does not and cannot create new wealth, it can only redistribute existing wealth. A zero-sum activity like the one just described that involves risk is gambling in the purest sense of the word, but investments distinguish themselves, even though they also involve risk of loss, due to the possibility that they can create new wealth which indirectly improves the lives of everyone living in that economy (quality of life at least in a material sense is roughly proportional to the amount of goods and services produced per person in an economy). Those facts are really not disputable, almost every economist that you could find anywhere would be substantially in agreement with those statements.
"Gambling, on the contrary, is a zero-sum game. It merely takes money from a loser and gives it to a winner. No value is ever created.". This is also false in practice. Since most 'gambling' is done in casinos, there are thousands of jobs created.
The jobs are created as part of the service of providing entertainment to the customers. That is really the only redeeming feature of Casinos, they can provide entertainment in some cases which is obviously a service that people are willing to pay for in the economy. Entertainment can provide satisfaction in the form of utility (the technical term economists use to describe happiness), but it does not create wealth. The casino employees are paid with existing wealth that has been transferred from the gamblers to the casino and then partially used to pay the employees but no new wealth is created in the process, it is merely transferred between parties.
The housing crash is a perfect example of what happens when people forget that 'investments' are often gambling.
It is an example of what can happen when people approach investments as they would a casino table game where no amount of skill can affect the outcome (I know that there are casino games were skill matters, but most people either don't know or practice those skills or are not nearly as good as they think they are. There are professionals who make their living in Vegas taking money from well healed but ignorant tourists at the poker tables for example) and how governments (who control the money supply) can make things worse by running a reckless loose money policy. It is also an example of greed on the part of unscrupulous professionals (appraisers and others) in the mortgage industry committing fraud.
I suppose that our disagreement stems primarily from a disagreement over the definition of gambl
An argument for Open Source if ever there was one, but thanks for taking the time to explain.
I probably shouldn't, but I will bite:
Suppose that I make you a loan so that you can start a basket weaving business and the business profits and you pay back the loan with interest. Is that gambling? Certainly not. You needed money to get started producing goods which added to the total amount of value produced by the economy. Now what if instead of asking for the principle to be repaid with interest at a future time I asked instead for a share of the ownership of the basket weaving business (with a proportionate share in profits, business decisions, losses, and other aspects of the business). Is this gambling? Certainly not. I am simply taking a share of the business as compensation for fronting some of the capital in a productive activity (i.e. the business). I will grant you that both of these activities involve risks (i.e. the business might fail and you might default on your loan or I might lose my equity position because the business has entered liquidation), but not every activity that involves risk is logically equivalent to gambling. The stock market is basically the same as the above example (with hundreds of thousands of companies engaged not just in basket weaving but millions of other productive economic activities). The difference between the stock market, a place where equity stakes in productive businesses (or potentially productive anyway) are bought and sold, and gambling is that gambling is NOT productive in that it results in no additional goods or service (other than perhaps entertainment, but many people gamble way more than could reasonably be construed as merely for entertainment) entering the economy. It merely transfers existing wealth from one person or organization to another without producing anything of substantial value in the process. It is at best properly categorized as an entertainment business and at worst a complete waste of time. As I have stated above, while it is possible to approach investing as gambling, it is NOT in all circumstances the equivalent of gambling.
For a more comprehensive introduction to the common stock market myths, including stock market == gambling, might I suggest the following article?
One guy on there was asking for a $5,000 loan in order to buy stocks. That's the most retarded thing I can think of that you can do with a loan besides go to Las Vegas with it.
Sigh...it is very tiresome to hear the same wrong headed myths about investment == gambling that have been circulating for years and gaining currency among the younger generations. Although it is possible to approach investment as a form of gambling, doing no research and simply purchasing shares or options in a randomly selected entity for example, most people that I know who actually do invest their money do not approach investing in that way. The investing == gambling argument is most frequently mentioned, at least in my experience, by those who do not save very much of their own money and are looking to rationalize their overspending by suggesting that those of us who save and invest our money, in stocks perhaps, are no better than gamblers. As for borrowing money to invest in stocks, this is done all of the time by professional fund managers (it is called leverage) in order to boost returns on a good investment opportunity so it is not 'retarded' per se, although it is unusual for an individual investor to borrow such a small sum of money to invest (it would be far better for him to save up $5,000 of his own money and then start his investing career with that instead).
Personally, I don't really care that other people took out loans they couldn't pay back, but when it starts to affect my life because of the national economic situation then it becomes bothersome.
I share your frustration on that count, truly I do, but the alternatives are probably worse (i.e. the gold standard) overall. The problem, at least in my opinion which is shared by Ron Paul who has shaped and brought it to the public attention, is that the politicization of the money supply and its management has led to the present situation. In theory, a well managed fiat money system can have almost all of the benefits of a gold standard without some of the hard limits on growth, although in practice the results have been somewhat mixed since then end of the 1970s. The government, in my opinion, has no business interfering in the housing market either by granting tax deductions on mortgage interest OR (even worse) backing loans with taxpayer money. I hope that everyone learns a clear lesson from the present Fannie and Freddie fiasco (a small recession might be just the thing to shock everyone back to reality...the proverbial bucket of cold water). These entities should be absorbed by the federal government, disolved, and NO new loans should be issued and in fact the existing loans should be sold into the private market. If people want a loan for any reason, whether to buy a car or a house or whatever else, then they can enter the private credit market and pay the market rate. Why should taxpayers, many of whom cannot afford to buy a home, subsidize the loans of those who want home mortgages (which is essentially what Fanny and Freddie have been doing all of these years)? Government interference in the markets is at the root of almost all of our present economic problems and we would all be much better off if government butted out and returned to its proper and constitutionally mandated roles.
Ever tried cobbling together an emergency replacement JSP engine inside 3 hours?
I cannot imagine the circumstances. Perhaps you could elaborate on why it was necessary to reinvent the wheel in that particular case?
Not everyone has kids and many people are not willing to endure even modest financial hardships in order to remain green. It costs money to be green and that is a luxury that most of the world's population cannot afford and yes environmental quality is a luxury good because we care more about it the better off we are. Take the recent oil drilling debate, many people have changed their tune about drilling when it became clear that maintaining their green position was going to hit them right where it really hurts...in the wallet. You can say that what you want about drilling and how it wont lower prices, but it is widely believed by Joe Sixpack, and not without cause I might add, that drilling does lower prices and Joe Sixpack is really hurting right now with the poor economic outlook so he is going to be in favor of drilling no matter what some Harvard educated environmentalist tries to tell him about bear shit being better than the buck wheat.
In practice US jurisdiction extends to anywhere our carrier battle groups are. If you want to plant your flag somewhere on this earth then you have to be able to defend it as well, because governments hate competition. Did the shool bully stop at the edge or his lawn when you were thumbing your nose at him on the other side or did he cross the street and kick your butt?
Yes, but Jerry Seinfeld had no part in Michael Richard's tirade unless one believes that we must immediately abandon our long time friends whenever they make mistakes or screw up in public. Personally, I believe that guilt by association is not the way to go and certainly not when a long time friend makes an uncharacteristic mistake and then subsequently makes a genuine apology for it.
because over the life of the car, the Prius owner saves more money, period.
That is the part that the financial geeks among us disagree with. I have seen NO convincing case made, when considered as a whole with all of the opportunity costs, time value of money, and other strictly financial issues taken together, that proves beyond even just a reasonable doubt that buying a new Prius is better financially than buying a comparable new alternative vehicle which costs at least $3000 less (this seems to be the average lower-bound of the hybrid premium at present) upfront AND is likely to have fewer maintenance issues (hybrids necessarily introduce more moving parts and greater complexity which never helps reliability or maintenance costs...even for a good brand like Toyota). I am not saying that buying a hybrid never makes sense for anyone for any reason, but merely that pure financial logic cannot reasonably be used as justification apart from any other considerations (like those listed above) or at the very least it is very likely that most people will NOT benefit more from operating a hybrid over a comparable non-hybrid alternative vehicle (if you want to bring in weighted probabilities on the costs and benefits of different outcomes).
Buying a car is not logical in any case, so why all the posts criticizing people's choice of a Prius?
That depends upon where one chooses to live (which may in turn be tied to other factors which may or may not be under the control of the individual or require greater effort than is worthwhile to change). In Southern California (California is a very large state with average commutes of 45+ minutes or even a couple of hours at freeway speeds not at all uncommon) owning a car can substantially increase available employment options and the flexibility of ones living situation (real estate prices and rents are also very high here). So the issue of whether the hybrid is a better financial decision, given that a car may be necessary, is not merely an academic one.
$3000 is being generous. As previous posters in this thread have pointed out, the difference between a comparable Honda Civic (the EX model) and the Civic Hybrid is approximately $3,500 and although the Prius is not offered in a non-hybrid version it is reasonable to suppose that a non-hybrid version, if it was offered, would be at least $3,000 less expensive than the Prius hybrid currently available on the market. The argument holds water, its just that some people don't like the fact that their Prius was not a sound financial decision and are trying desperately to justify their purchase (or even worse, lease) decision on purely financial grounds. If you enjoy driving your hybrid and you believe that that extra enjoyment was worth the price of admission then by all means, enjoy your purchase and be happy...but don't try to tell the rest of us that we are suckers for not buying a hybrid car because it is cheaper than either the non-hybrid version or a comparable alternative non-hybrid vehicle.
You know there is a reason why they call it "fleasing" a car. It never makes financial sense to lease a car as your daily driver (not talking short term car rental on a trip, specialized entertainment industry leasing, and the like where the car is being leased as part of a short term business or recreational opportunity), it is extremely difficult to come out ahead by investing the difference between the payments and buying upfront (you would have to really outperform the market on your investments to justify making that lease payment instead of buying upfront). It is well known that leasing (aka "fleasing") is the most expensive possible way to pay for the use of a car (I say pay for the use of the car because you really don't actually own the car while the lease is active). The fact that you present leasing as a good option puts a big dent in your credibility on the financials of hybrid ownership.
You will never get 5% from a regular bank deposit. You might be able to get that from a certificate of deposit, but there will probably be at least a $30,000 minimum to get that rate. The government is paying less than 5% for 10 year treasury right now and they are the zero risk investment so why would the bank pay you more unless you deposited a HUGE amount? Most mutual funds also have a $3000 or so minimum initial investment. So you would have to save up your monthly gas savings in your regular bank account that pays little or no interest (you are lucky to pay no fees these days nevermind interest, unless you have a huge balance). We could go on quibling about the details, but face it: nobody buying a hybrid right now is doing it because it makes financial sense (or they are fooling themselves if they believe that). They buy the hybrid because they are environmentally conscious and enjoy driving a less polluting car OR they want to make a political statement AND they can afford it because they already have more wealth than average. If you enjoy driving your hybrid then great, but we are tired of hearing the "financial" argument for a new prius, it just doesn't pencil out.
The problem is that the hybrid costs $3000 more up front and money now is always worth more than money in the future, hence the reason why interest is charged and why money has a time value. so a stream of payments adding up to 3000 six (6) years from now is actually worth less than $3000 right now so you are paying $3000 more upfront for a savings of less than $3000 (i.e. a loss). In order for the investment to really "pay off" it would have to save you more money in gas than you could earn instead by investing the $3000 difference in treasury bills (4.75% yield or thereabouts) or in other words it would have to save you more than $3000 at the end of the 6 years to be worth it. If you are looking at it purely from a financial standpoint hybrids rarely make sense (for now) because there are almost always cheaper non-hybrid alternatives no matter what you are presently driving.
Unexplained fires are a matter for the courts! Canyonero! Hee-yahh! Canyooonerooo!
The sub $100 dollar notebook niche appears to be a bit too specialized for the needs of most people. They have all had a couple of good features or component choices here and there but, at least IMHO, none of them has yet hit the sweet spot. The use of the MIPS processor is an interesting play and the 1GB flash drive is also interesting but perhaps not the most appropriate choice given the current cost and rewrite performance of solid state drives. There are also the usual complaints about keyboard and screen size. I think that they could do better by increasing the screen and keyboard size a bit and substituting a good magnetic notebook disk (~80 GB would be cheap) for the flash drive. The ideal price range would probably be somewhere between $250 - $500, anything less than $100 generates too many compromises to be of general purpose use (or at least that has been true thus far).
Except that a Vermont judge recently ruled that password(s) contained in one's head are protected under the 5th Amendment to the United States Constitution. just like any other information in your head. It was discussed right here on Slashdot.
As for threatening law enforcement officers: say nothing, know your rights, and keep your cool. The law enforcement officer is NOT your friend and you shouldn't speak to them or answer their questions. You have a right to remain silent and you should use it. BTW every attorney that I have ever heard opine on the subject has said that it is better to say nothing than to answer some of the questions but not others. Don't let them scare you into giving up your rights with their Gestapo crap. Remember, if they are questioning you, especially if they are threatening, then there is NO way that you are NOT going to be held (i.e. arrested) for a while anyway until the matter either goes before a judge or they have to let you go (48 hours max w/out cause before any attorney can force them to let you out), so don't be dumb and tip your hand right at the start. Also, remember that if you ever get your equipment back then you can never use it or those passwords again (who knows what bugs they may have planted before releasing it back to you). You basically have to wipe and start over on new hardware.
Disclaimer: IANAL so if you find yourself in a situation like the one above find yourself one that you can trust and let them do the talking, but remember that the police are NOT your friends.