Interestingly, this is almost exactly what the US headquarters of Lehman Brothers did immediately before the collapse - repatriated all the cash from overseas operations to pay US staff and creditors before anyone else.
I worked over the summer in a recruitment consultancy and I was the first point of contact for job-hunters. I was staggered to see the number of people that walked in accompanied by their parents or whose parents phoned up on their behalf. These were people with degrees, for crying out loud. I've also experienced a parent flipping out when I gently tried to explain that accompanying your child to a job interview might be seen negatively.
I always interpreted that statement as advice, not a threat. Google is not immune to having the NSA and FBI march in and grabbing a shopping cart full of back-up tapes, and the point was that you need to be aware of that.
Security is rubbish everywhere. In this fair city in which I live, there is a building open to the public. Within that building, there is a room, little used, but accessible. Within that room there is a cupboard. Within that cupboard there are twelve antique silver candelabras, each worth several thousands of pounds. And any member of the public could walk in with a rucksack stuffed with newspaper and be out in minutes.
The point is it is suspicious in aggregate. A 50% jump in claims is ridiculous - times between claims are presumably independent and Poisson, and for the rate to increase by a half and sustain for a month is well outside the realm of reasonable probability. Just because individual claims are difficult to analyse for integrity, does not mean we cannot be fairly certain that a certain number are likely to be fraudulent.
This is a competition issue. There isn't actually a huge premium difference between like-for-like and new-for-old policies, in general, so the market gravitates towards the latter. It's unusual with cars because they depreciate so fast, but in many areas of GI, home insurance being the canonical example, new-for-old policies are quite normal.
In theory, you could take out an insurance policy contingent on any risk for any amount, an actuary could price it, and give you a premium. Of course, in practice the set of practicably insurable risks is far smaller than theoretical risks - I can hardly go to an insurance company and demand a £50,000 policy for my toy car (since the premium to cover the risk would be £49,900 and the actuary's time to calculate the premium a few hundred, plus something for profit...). But in general, there's no problem offering policies which offer new for old - the main thing is that the expected losses are quantifiable, which makes it possible to price premiums accurately. It's rapidly becoming the norm here in Britain for home contents insurance, for example - if you destroy your living room in a small fire, you get new TV, sofa, etc, not replacements just as ugly as the ones you already had. Yes, such policies have higher premiums, but the market has responded very positively to them.
That's not strictly true, compelling though it is. From an actuarial viewpoint, assuming that you have correctly predicted and priced the risks on a policy population, the last thing you want is to start denying claims that are valid under the policy as written. You are running a whole dog-load of different risks when you start doing that, not least that of getting royally humped in court, which can be extremely expensive on many levels.
iPhone, meet microwave. Microwave, meet iPhone. Have them make love for ten-fifteen seconds on high. "Hi, Apple? Yeah, my iPhone isn't turning on. No, it just stopped working. Yeah, wierd, isn't it? Sure, I'll send it straight in, thanks."
Disclaimer: I have no idea what will actually happen when you do this, although I can pretty much guarantee it will fry it. You might want to stand back as I'm not familiar with the results of microwaving high capacity batteries (though this Saturday might change that, heh).
My choice is fuck you. Even if the possibility is true, behaviour should justify itself. Even if your afterlife was proved to be true tomorrow, I'm going down shouting. Nobody makes my ethical choices for me.
Upon researching, apparently the initial run were prone to problems, and it was fixed after a debacle of a recall. Presumably mine was either manufactured after this, or fixed. As for heat, just depends on the efficiency....
Huh. My first computer was a recycled Apple III and I had a lot of fun with it. Never overheated once, although it wasn't until after several years I got curious and popped off the case, and discovered a second memory module which had been rattling around loose all the time I had owned it. And nothing says technology like a 5MB hard drive.
Until you've worked in a multi-thousand person company under strict compliance rules, you don't realise just quite how onerous it can be to get permission to install even something as simple as R. It becomes a "project", which must be signed off, costed, and approved by multiple people. The problem is not the individuals, it is the network, and how to get round that is not a simple problem.
Since as far as I can tell the suggestion that these things will be carrying weaponry is entirely a fiction dreamt up by Wired, I wouldn't worry about it too much. Add that to chavs hunting them for sport and I don't really see much of an issue.
Quite often because the people who need to do number crunching involving significant programming logic can't get the authorisation to use anything other than standard desktop productivity tools. Excel comes with its own programming language, and so that is what is used. By the time the benefits from switching become apparent, the switching costs are too high.
I am very concerned about these new-fangled things they have, "factories" and "production lines". Apparently they massively reduce the need for labour per unit of output. I am worried that if these entities are allowed to exist, thousands or millions of poor people will no longer have jobs and will end up being too poor to eat properly, afford housing, and have healthcare.
Slashdot Mirror
Interestingly, this is almost exactly what the US headquarters of Lehman Brothers did immediately before the collapse - repatriated all the cash from overseas operations to pay US staff and creditors before anyone else.
I worked over the summer in a recruitment consultancy and I was the first point of contact for job-hunters. I was staggered to see the number of people that walked in accompanied by their parents or whose parents phoned up on their behalf. These were people with degrees, for crying out loud. I've also experienced a parent flipping out when I gently tried to explain that accompanying your child to a job interview might be seen negatively.
I always interpreted that statement as advice, not a threat. Google is not immune to having the NSA and FBI march in and grabbing a shopping cart full of back-up tapes, and the point was that you need to be aware of that.
It's useful, but until everyone I want to work with sorts themselves out a Wave account, it's rather crippled.
And everyone should use antivirus, too. Sometimes, a good kick up the arse is what is needed.
Security is rubbish everywhere. In this fair city in which I live, there is a building open to the public. Within that building, there is a room, little used, but accessible. Within that room there is a cupboard. Within that cupboard there are twelve antique silver candelabras, each worth several thousands of pounds. And any member of the public could walk in with a rucksack stuffed with newspaper and be out in minutes.
Dude, I could do that, and I'm not even vermillion :p
That, Sir, is not how real scientists conduct their investigations. First observe if it explodes, *then* remove the battery.
The point is it is suspicious in aggregate. A 50% jump in claims is ridiculous - times between claims are presumably independent and Poisson, and for the rate to increase by a half and sustain for a month is well outside the realm of reasonable probability. Just because individual claims are difficult to analyse for integrity, does not mean we cannot be fairly certain that a certain number are likely to be fraudulent.
My TV went out the window years ago. Since then, I don't know where I found the time to watch it.
This is a competition issue. There isn't actually a huge premium difference between like-for-like and new-for-old policies, in general, so the market gravitates towards the latter. It's unusual with cars because they depreciate so fast, but in many areas of GI, home insurance being the canonical example, new-for-old policies are quite normal.
In theory, you could take out an insurance policy contingent on any risk for any amount, an actuary could price it, and give you a premium. Of course, in practice the set of practicably insurable risks is far smaller than theoretical risks - I can hardly go to an insurance company and demand a £50,000 policy for my toy car (since the premium to cover the risk would be £49,900 and the actuary's time to calculate the premium a few hundred, plus something for profit...). But in general, there's no problem offering policies which offer new for old - the main thing is that the expected losses are quantifiable, which makes it possible to price premiums accurately. It's rapidly becoming the norm here in Britain for home contents insurance, for example - if you destroy your living room in a small fire, you get new TV, sofa, etc, not replacements just as ugly as the ones you already had. Yes, such policies have higher premiums, but the market has responded very positively to them.
That's not strictly true, compelling though it is. From an actuarial viewpoint, assuming that you have correctly predicted and priced the risks on a policy population, the last thing you want is to start denying claims that are valid under the policy as written. You are running a whole dog-load of different risks when you start doing that, not least that of getting royally humped in court, which can be extremely expensive on many levels.
Disclaimer: I have no idea what will actually happen when you do this, although I can pretty much guarantee it will fry it. You might want to stand back as I'm not familiar with the results of microwaving high capacity batteries (though this Saturday might change that, heh).
That's such outrageous bullshit it's not even funny. Was it meant to be sly sarcasm or something? Or do you actually believe that?
My choice is fuck you. Even if the possibility is true, behaviour should justify itself. Even if your afterlife was proved to be true tomorrow, I'm going down shouting. Nobody makes my ethical choices for me.
Upon researching, apparently the initial run were prone to problems, and it was fixed after a debacle of a recall. Presumably mine was either manufactured after this, or fixed. As for heat, just depends on the efficiency....
Huh. My first computer was a recycled Apple III and I had a lot of fun with it. Never overheated once, although it wasn't until after several years I got curious and popped off the case, and discovered a second memory module which had been rattling around loose all the time I had owned it. And nothing says technology like a 5MB hard drive.
What about having rusty nails pounded into your eyeballs? That sounds worse to me.
Until you've worked in a multi-thousand person company under strict compliance rules, you don't realise just quite how onerous it can be to get permission to install even something as simple as R. It becomes a "project", which must be signed off, costed, and approved by multiple people. The problem is not the individuals, it is the network, and how to get round that is not a simple problem.
Since as far as I can tell the suggestion that these things will be carrying weaponry is entirely a fiction dreamt up by Wired, I wouldn't worry about it too much. Add that to chavs hunting them for sport and I don't really see much of an issue.
Quite often because the people who need to do number crunching involving significant programming logic can't get the authorisation to use anything other than standard desktop productivity tools. Excel comes with its own programming language, and so that is what is used. By the time the benefits from switching become apparent, the switching costs are too high.
As another /. poster pointed out, there's a point where porn becomes gynaecology.
I don't have any point to make, I just want to say, I hate you. Fna!
I am very concerned about these new-fangled things they have, "factories" and "production lines". Apparently they massively reduce the need for labour per unit of output. I am worried that if these entities are allowed to exist, thousands or millions of poor people will no longer have jobs and will end up being too poor to eat properly, afford housing, and have healthcare.