While I'm not convinced, I see economics knows no borders. So while people get impoverished in the US, many more in China are having their standard of living raised.
IMO, the real problem of the US was not so much no longer producing things, but that we are a consumer society rather than a saving one to it's very core. I'm not even talking about buying doo-hickeys and doo-dads, compared to a country like Germany, we spend use 4x the oil per capita. That means so much more capital going out of the country to squander on a resource when we don't have to. There are many reasons for that, mostly inefficient housing (poor standards), and suburbanization. Go to any school in Germany and you'll see the front will have lots and lots of bike racks, and will actually be filled during school hours. Not so in most of America.
To amass wealth, one actually has to save. When you save, your opportunities and possibilities expand as well as society being able to use your savings to make investments. Many people here live paycheck to paycheck, paying off minimum balances on rising CC bills. I read somewhere that Americans spend 2.5-3x more time shopping. Not sure the cause of this, except maybe we aren't a very socially connected society?
The problem with just saying we need to make things, is that right now, the Chinese will just be cheaper. It certainly doesn't help that we are increasingly sending our more and more valuable jobs there (hence I'm not convinced of all that "let them build the low-end shit while we make better stuff" since the Japanese overtook our Car and Steel industries the same way - hell they worked hard for it while the Big 3 kept and keep pushing out inferior product)
While somewhat time consuming, I could see this being beneficial for the train and trucking industry (if they're not too heavy).
With trucks especially, you could send a convoy of 5 or so out, and then have 1 bring it back, and the other 4 haul something else. With trains, weight is less of an issue, but it's always good to use less cars just for empty space, as the frames themselves add weight.
While I don't enjoy it, I switch between my own home dvorak and qwerty at clients multiple times a week. It look a lot to get used to... but I did with a lot of stumbles on the way. I can understand the frustration, I guess, but I'd just stick with the calculator numpad. Dialing phone numbers is largely on the way out, isn't it?
Maybe she could focus less on protecting her work and focus more on marketing her skill. That's taking a strength of the internet and making it her own.
There was one author (of what type of work, Idk) who posted on here how he GPLed (iirc, otherwise just freewared) all his own work because he got commissioned more work that way. Maybe someone knows who I'm talking about and can provide more info.
the writers, producers, costume designers, actors, etc are really irrelevant in the creative process. no, its the talentless consumer thats really the creative wellspring of artistic work
Well, consumers do drive what is put out there. They are the source of demand, and much of the reason companies supply anything is to feed perceived demand. But that's rather like saying the professor owns the problem (he assigned you) and you own the solution (you handed in). If the professor never gave you the problem, you would never have worked it out to begin with, but the professor did not make the solution either.
But if you really want to go back, as an artist, everything around you affects what you put out. I'm only writing in a latin alphabet because that's what I learned in school, and if I learned another alphabet or writing system, I'd likely use that. So society and nature can be regarded as highly relevant as well. In that sense, art isn't so much different from science, people standing on the shoulders of giants and all that.
That's not to say the artist isn't important, but just to temper all the artist's life + billion years nonsense we see from corporations. As some point, there has to be giving back to the same society that freely gave so much to them. And if giving back means relinquishing an iron grip 20,30, or 50 years after you created a work and society protected it for you, then so be it.
Velcro ties do something similiar, are reusable, cheap as well. The proble with your basic cable tie comes when you need to add or change a cable. If it's a medium size, you need quite a decent cutter, and then you need to cut them all and used new ones - when adding cables, I've seen people forgo the cutting step and just add more and more cable ties around the existing bundle, it becomes a nightmare if you need to access one in the middle.
In less than 20 years, there will be iPad level capable devices, thinner, running color e-ink, which will cost $30 or less. Then it will no longer be a question of money, breakage, or if they get stolen. Bookbags will change noticeably (thinner) and might become a niche industry catering exclusive to outdoor gear sometime later like buggy whips.
IMO, the apps of course can range from poor to excellent, as well as serving as textbooks (hopefully copylefted or otherwise open). I just hope something and more comprehensive than Rosetta Stone comes out, and for much less money.
The challenge will be keeping students off the internet. (And no, internet/wifi blocking won't do much against 3G/4G signals unless you're willing to block whole classrooms or schools). Oh well, there were always those who squandered their learning years.
Most of the money floating getting passed back and forth is from insurance companies, banks and various types of investment funds. Because each of these contributors is continually dumping more money into the market (when the economy is behaving normally, anyway), the odds of making a profit are generally in your favor-- which is where the stock market differs from gambling.
This would imply valuation would no longer matter, but it does. There are enough other competitive investments besides the stockmarket, like real estate, antiques, art, gold and commodities.
What you seem to be describing is a pure Ponzi scheme. It relies on infinite growth (and parts of our current economy unfortunately do) for prosperity. But what happens when Baby Boomers pull out their stock fund during their retirement and it's not replenished?
Sure, someone loses big every once in a while,
Bernie Madoff and Penny Stocks - people lose fortunes everyday.
Most game developers don't want to show up on Faux News' front page with the headline "X is promoting killing of civilians!"
I think I would. That type of publicity always drives up sales. Although the fox new audience is regularly would condone civilians to be killed in real life by shrugging and say "Unavoidable collateral damage! Oh well!"
I guess when it happens in a video game, it's that much more offensive Now, I disagree with the developer in the summary where he basically reflects societal hand holding and not allowing anyone doing something where they won't be caught as it's "naughty". It's a fucking video game, get real. Creators (of stories, movies) kill civilians and innocents all the time, but I guess they're the elite and thus much more enlightened. Us peons iz too stupid and need to be spoonfed what iz goods and what iz bads. Got it.
Now, if you had a work of the painted kind, it goes for sale in auction, a percentage has to go to the original artist. Each and every time (may be just Germany, or EU wide).
They totally bought into the arteeest mythos and bullshit.
Yeah, and where do you think that electricity will get routed to when both countries have outages?
And yeah, nuclear is SO MUCH SAFER when it's 50km west of you, we all know, despite the general wind direction being west-to-east, radioactive fallout respects national boundaries and will stop at the border!
It's stupid to be overly dependent on another nation. Russia has threatened to pull its oil/natural gas supply numerous times over different issues. It's just not an option any sane government would agree to as a long-term vision.
And for cutting grass. It really will affect your hearing over time if you don't wear protection for something that seems relative innocuous. And visiting your old parents. When I visit my parents, watching TV is just fucking painful with them. I resorted to bringing my ear protection with me just to eat dinner at their place.
Oh, and right now I will tell you where USPS absolutely lags behind where it could get an easy jump. For ebay, it absolutely sucks right now making international shipments for things under $300. You see, UPS and FedEx for a small guy will cost around $100 overseas (not something a buyer is likely to pay) to send a package. With USPS it costs 4-5 for really small items to, say $30 for something under 4lbs. The problem is that USPS lacks tracking - buyer says he never got it, Paypal will side with the buyer every time. Many sellers have given up selling overseas.
And forget registration (that's insured to 45 some odd dollars to many countries) -- many customs offices became absolutely anal retentive about packages. So if it's from the post office, it can get held... and held... and held.... months at a time even. But by paypal/ebay rules, if they don't get it within 21 days (or 28?) internationally , the seller is boned. If you declare the real value, the buyer gets to pay 30% of it or something mindboggling stupid in may places... they refuse, and the sender somehow never gets his package back. UPS and FedEx somehow managed to zip these items through customs, and if there are problems, often the item get back to you. (I swear, this shit was easier 10 years ago...)
Even if it gets through, if it's registers, the other PO system just doesn't know what to do with it. I got a registered package from China. The mail clerk tried to scan it in, and it just wouldn't work. He had me sign for it on a slip of paper because he couldn't understand the other PO system code (I'm sure they'd never find the signature again if I contested it).
So the weak point of the USPS system are the foreign post offices, which UPS and FedEx obviously don't have. Plus customs. USPS is trying to mitigate that with Global Express Guaranteed, which basically uses FedEx's system after it leaves our borders and is quite a bit cheaper than FedEx.
But if USPS could convene an international Congress, get the various customs offices to back off on the nickel and diming average people (good luck with that), work out an agreement with the foreign POs on a bunch of these issues, use universal forms that rely on easily recognizable symbols for registered mail (+ other services) that would be used in all countries, and have a universal scan code, they could really pick up business if they offered cheap, reliable package tracking on 1st class international parcels. Right now tracking even for a small business costs $0.17 or so. They could charge as much as $3 per package for 1st class intl tracking (as an option on top of the postage), and the the total postage would still be 10% of FedEx/UPS for 0-4 lb packages. They could earn a TON of intl business away from FedEx/UPS and generate a lot more from businesses that aren't willing or quit some time in the past.
But let's get real, such an effort even if successful may fund one postal worker. The USPS is one of the biggest employers out there.
I think they should do several measures: -Alternating day service. Route 1 gets Mo-We-Fr delivery, and Route 2 gets Tu-Th-Sa delivery. Mail carriers cut in 1/2. Express Mail already is handled by a different special carrier (I'm told) so that's unaffected. -Cut down all underperforming post offices that are within a certain radius of other, more successful, USPS locations. I'm close to such a one, that is in a shack of a location, and within 7 minutes drive of it's main branch. It has one guy working there, less than 75 PO Boxes, half of them unrented (the next most rural place I know has at least 300 boxes, 90% rented). USPS has been trying to close it down for years but the union is resisting, even if the worker is taken to the main branch. Hard to understand. -Open up automated kiosks to serve as advanced versions of blue mailboxes in malls/supermarkets/what_have_you. Emulate redbox, except for packages. Try a trial run. (All the USPS advertising is for flat rate boxes, they WANT the package business. Might as well try something novel.) -Back in WW2, Post Office has Vmail. It's mail on special sized letters, shrunk to microfiche, and reprinted. Save many cargo ships for other purposes - they used to be pioneers. They should have an email to mail service - afterall laywers and a ton of businesses need to send out certified mail all the time. But why should they have to print it, run someplace to mail it, and keep track of slips of "certified" this and that? Send it to the USPS server, let a central place print it out, and mail automatically, for postage plus a small fee. The software keeps track of what was sent.
Just a few ideas. The USPS has to change and fast. It has to reduce their workforce. It has to do a lot of things. But ceasing to exist should not be an options, lot of online and offline commerce depends on them and will do so until perfect replicas of objects can simply be generated, like in Star Trek, just like computers can copy data files. Then they can call it quits.
Sorry, I don't know "what happened" after Bill doesn't direct MS anymore. From my POV, Microsoft's malaise already began in the mid-90s, way before he left.
Microsoft was and still is a 2 trick pony. It's OS and Office. From everything I read, I'd say Bill Gates got lucky and was at the right place at the right time to supply IBM with DOS, which he bought from someone else. Had he missed his DOS opportunity, he'd have a midsize software business. Successful but not memorable. Everything MS was and is just built on that foundation.
Steve Jobs, otoh, started Pixar after Apple. And he made Apple successful TWICE. (Not to mention NeXT, which was not so much a success itself but instrumental in OS X). He made opportunities, and wasn't just there at the right place and right time. I'd say whatever he chose to get into, he'd be at the top.
and abet thieves by being their knowing customers. And at $60, you know that as a recent laptop it's stolen.
So cry me a river.
But still, I don't think it should compromise your right to privacy. Those pics were presumably taken in her home without her permission and should have been destroyed if it didn't add to the case.
Slashdot Mirror
It's just not going to happen. Some, like this article, argue that it's a good thing:
http://cafehayek.com/2011/09/artificial-scarcities-are-not-wealth.html
While I'm not convinced, I see economics knows no borders. So while people get impoverished in the US, many more in China are having their standard of living raised.
IMO, the real problem of the US was not so much no longer producing things, but that we are a consumer society rather than a saving one to it's very core. I'm not even talking about buying doo-hickeys and doo-dads, compared to a country like Germany, we spend use 4x the oil per capita. That means so much more capital going out of the country to squander on a resource when we don't have to. There are many reasons for that, mostly inefficient housing (poor standards), and suburbanization. Go to any school in Germany and you'll see the front will have lots and lots of bike racks, and will actually be filled during school hours. Not so in most of America.
To amass wealth, one actually has to save. When you save, your opportunities and possibilities expand as well as society being able to use your savings to make investments. Many people here live paycheck to paycheck, paying off minimum balances on rising CC bills. I read somewhere that Americans spend 2.5-3x more time shopping. Not sure the cause of this, except maybe we aren't a very socially connected society?
The problem with just saying we need to make things, is that right now, the Chinese will just be cheaper. It certainly doesn't help that we are increasingly sending our more and more valuable jobs there (hence I'm not convinced of all that "let them build the low-end shit while we make better stuff" since the Japanese overtook our Car and Steel industries the same way - hell they worked hard for it while the Big 3 kept and keep pushing out inferior product)
While somewhat time consuming, I could see this being beneficial for the train and trucking industry (if they're not too heavy).
With trucks especially, you could send a convoy of 5 or so out, and then have 1 bring it back, and the other 4 haul something else. With trains, weight is less of an issue, but it's always good to use less cars just for empty space, as the frames themselves add weight.
While I don't enjoy it, I switch between my own home dvorak and qwerty at clients multiple times a week. It look a lot to get used to... but I did with a lot of stumbles on the way. I can understand the frustration, I guess, but I'd just stick with the calculator numpad. Dialing phone numbers is largely on the way out, isn't it?
Eh, our 386 computer looked about the same, I'd say it was par for the course aesthetically.
Maybe she could focus less on protecting her work and focus more on marketing her skill. That's taking a strength of the internet and making it her own.
There was one author (of what type of work, Idk) who posted on here how he GPLed (iirc, otherwise just freewared) all his own work because he got commissioned more work that way. Maybe someone knows who I'm talking about and can provide more info.
Well, consumers do drive what is put out there. They are the source of demand, and much of the reason companies supply anything is to feed perceived demand. But that's rather like saying the professor owns the problem (he assigned you) and you own the solution (you handed in). If the professor never gave you the problem, you would never have worked it out to begin with, but the professor did not make the solution either.
But if you really want to go back, as an artist, everything around you affects what you put out. I'm only writing in a latin alphabet because that's what I learned in school, and if I learned another alphabet or writing system, I'd likely use that. So society and nature can be regarded as highly relevant as well. In that sense, art isn't so much different from science, people standing on the shoulders of giants and all that.
That's not to say the artist isn't important, but just to temper all the artist's life + billion years nonsense we see from corporations. As some point, there has to be giving back to the same society that freely gave so much to them. And if giving back means relinquishing an iron grip 20,30, or 50 years after you created a work and society protected it for you, then so be it.
Big three? Window Phone 7?
Velcro ties do something similiar, are reusable, cheap as well. The proble with your basic cable tie comes when you need to add or change a cable. If it's a medium size, you need quite a decent cutter, and then you need to cut them all and used new ones - when adding cables, I've seen people forgo the cutting step and just add more and more cable ties around the existing bundle, it becomes a nightmare if you need to access one in the middle.
In less than 20 years, there will be iPad level capable devices, thinner, running color e-ink, which will cost $30 or less. Then it will no longer be a question of money, breakage, or if they get stolen. Bookbags will change noticeably (thinner) and might become a niche industry catering exclusive to outdoor gear sometime later like buggy whips.
IMO, the apps of course can range from poor to excellent, as well as serving as textbooks (hopefully copylefted or otherwise open). I just hope something and more comprehensive than Rosetta Stone comes out, and for much less money.
The challenge will be keeping students off the internet. (And no, internet/wifi blocking won't do much against 3G/4G signals unless you're willing to block whole classrooms or schools). Oh well, there were always those who squandered their learning years.
That's not a plan, just wishful thinking when shortages do come. (Hint: summers, AC, and global warming).
This would imply valuation would no longer matter, but it does. There are enough other competitive investments besides the stockmarket, like real estate, antiques, art, gold and commodities.
What you seem to be describing is a pure Ponzi scheme. It relies on infinite growth (and parts of our current economy unfortunately do) for prosperity. But what happens when Baby Boomers pull out their stock fund during their retirement and it's not replenished?
Bernie Madoff and Penny Stocks - people lose fortunes everyday.
I think I would. That type of publicity always drives up sales. Although the fox new audience is regularly would condone civilians to be killed in real life by shrugging and say "Unavoidable collateral damage! Oh well!"
I guess when it happens in a video game, it's that much more offensive Now, I disagree with the developer in the summary where he basically reflects societal hand holding and not allowing anyone doing something where they won't be caught as it's "naughty". It's a fucking video game, get real. Creators (of stories, movies) kill civilians and innocents all the time, but I guess they're the elite and thus much more enlightened. Us peons iz too stupid and need to be spoonfed what iz goods and what iz bads. Got it.
To suck American's and other peoples' money out of their wallets from overhead. Same basic effect.
Europe is batshit insane anyway with "artists".
Now, if you had a work of the painted kind, it goes for sale in auction, a percentage has to go to the original artist. Each and every time (may be just Germany, or EU wide).
They totally bought into the arteeest mythos and bullshit.
This might be a self-fulfilling prophecy, especially when you make electricity too expensive...
Yeah, and where do you think that electricity will get routed to when both countries have outages?
And yeah, nuclear is SO MUCH SAFER when it's 50km west of you, we all know, despite the general wind direction being west-to-east, radioactive fallout respects national boundaries and will stop at the border!
It's stupid to be overly dependent on another nation. Russia has threatened to pull its oil/natural gas supply numerous times over different issues. It's just not an option any sane government would agree to as a long-term vision.
And for cutting grass. It really will affect your hearing over time if you don't wear protection for something that seems relative innocuous. And visiting your old parents. When I visit my parents, watching TV is just fucking painful with them. I resorted to bringing my ear protection with me just to eat dinner at their place.
All it does for me is getting junk faxes. At least spam email doesn't waste my toner/paper.
Oh, and right now I will tell you where USPS absolutely lags behind where it could get an easy jump. For ebay, it absolutely sucks right now making international shipments for things under $300. You see, UPS and FedEx for a small guy will cost around $100 overseas (not something a buyer is likely to pay) to send a package. With USPS it costs 4-5 for really small items to, say $30 for something under 4lbs. The problem is that USPS lacks tracking - buyer says he never got it, Paypal will side with the buyer every time. Many sellers have given up selling overseas.
And forget registration (that's insured to 45 some odd dollars to many countries) -- many customs offices became absolutely anal retentive about packages. So if it's from the post office, it can get held... and held... and held.... months at a time even. But by paypal/ebay rules, if they don't get it within 21 days (or 28?) internationally , the seller is boned. If you declare the real value, the buyer gets to pay 30% of it or something mindboggling stupid in may places... they refuse, and the sender somehow never gets his package back. UPS and FedEx somehow managed to zip these items through customs, and if there are problems, often the item get back to you. (I swear, this shit was easier 10 years ago...)
Even if it gets through, if it's registers, the other PO system just doesn't know what to do with it. I got a registered package from China. The mail clerk tried to scan it in, and it just wouldn't work. He had me sign for it on a slip of paper because he couldn't understand the other PO system code (I'm sure they'd never find the signature again if I contested it).
So the weak point of the USPS system are the foreign post offices, which UPS and FedEx obviously don't have. Plus customs. USPS is trying to mitigate that with Global Express Guaranteed, which basically uses FedEx's system after it leaves our borders and is quite a bit cheaper than FedEx.
But if USPS could convene an international Congress, get the various customs offices to back off on the nickel and diming average people (good luck with that), work out an agreement with the foreign POs on a bunch of these issues, use universal forms that rely on easily recognizable symbols for registered mail (+ other services) that would be used in all countries, and have a universal scan code, they could really pick up business if they offered cheap, reliable package tracking on 1st class international parcels. Right now tracking even for a small business costs $0.17 or so. They could charge as much as $3 per package for 1st class intl tracking (as an option on top of the postage), and the the total postage would still be 10% of FedEx/UPS for 0-4 lb packages. They could earn a TON of intl business away from FedEx/UPS and generate a lot more from businesses that aren't willing or quit some time in the past.
But let's get real, such an effort even if successful may fund one postal worker. The USPS is one of the biggest employers out there.
I think they should do several measures:
-Alternating day service. Route 1 gets Mo-We-Fr delivery, and Route 2 gets Tu-Th-Sa delivery. Mail carriers cut in 1/2. Express Mail already is handled by a different special carrier (I'm told) so that's unaffected.
-Cut down all underperforming post offices that are within a certain radius of other, more successful, USPS locations. I'm close to such a one, that is in a shack of a location, and within 7 minutes drive of it's main branch. It has one guy working there, less than 75 PO Boxes, half of them unrented (the next most rural place I know has at least 300 boxes, 90% rented). USPS has been trying to close it down for years but the union is resisting, even if the worker is taken to the main branch. Hard to understand.
-Open up automated kiosks to serve as advanced versions of blue mailboxes in malls/supermarkets/what_have_you. Emulate redbox, except for packages. Try a trial run. (All the USPS advertising is for flat rate boxes, they WANT the package business. Might as well try something novel.)
-Back in WW2, Post Office has Vmail. It's mail on special sized letters, shrunk to microfiche, and reprinted. Save many cargo ships for other purposes - they used to be pioneers. They should have an email to mail service - afterall laywers and a ton of businesses need to send out certified mail all the time. But why should they have to print it, run someplace to mail it, and keep track of slips of "certified" this and that? Send it to the USPS server, let a central place print it out, and mail automatically, for postage plus a small fee. The software keeps track of what was sent.
Just a few ideas. The USPS has to change and fast. It has to reduce their workforce. It has to do a lot of things. But ceasing to exist should not be an options, lot of online and offline commerce depends on them and will do so until perfect replicas of objects can simply be generated, like in Star Trek, just like computers can copy data files. Then they can call it quits.
I can use LCD outside (I use my phone all the time outside, not sure what people are complaining about).
But I only read inside anyways. I don't think I ever read outside in my life.
Reading this thread, I'm thinking, isn't it great we have choices and aren't subject to just one approach?
Having tried both devices, I prefer the iPad, but I can see why people prefer e-ink.
Sorry, I don't know "what happened" after Bill doesn't direct MS anymore. From my POV, Microsoft's malaise already began in the mid-90s, way before he left.
Microsoft was and still is a 2 trick pony. It's OS and Office. From everything I read, I'd say Bill Gates got lucky and was at the right place at the right time to supply IBM with DOS, which he bought from someone else. Had he missed his DOS opportunity, he'd have a midsize software business. Successful but not memorable. Everything MS was and is just built on that foundation.
Steve Jobs, otoh, started Pixar after Apple. And he made Apple successful TWICE. (Not to mention NeXT, which was not so much a success itself but instrumental in OS X). He made opportunities, and wasn't just there at the right place and right time. I'd say whatever he chose to get into, he'd be at the top.
Of course I didn't read the story. Why else would I be on /.?
and abet thieves by being their knowing customers. And at $60, you know that as a recent laptop it's stolen.
So cry me a river.
But still, I don't think it should compromise your right to privacy. Those pics were presumably taken in her home without her permission and should have been destroyed if it didn't add to the case.