If less oil is burned by the rich industrialized nations who are using most of it now, it does not mean it won't be burned.
China, India, and other developing nations are more than willing to step in and use it up - with far fewer environmental controls.
Either way, all economically viable petroleum will be used. Do you want it burned up in a million clean-burning, catalytic converter equiped SUVs or 10 million smoke spewing put-put cars?
When the the change over from a petroleum based economy comes, the rich nations will be better able to cope no matter what.
As it happens, you caught me on a Saturday morning, cleaning up a few odds and ends on my desk, so I'll give the the courtesy of a reply.
First, I am not really following the case closely at all - I will just come right out and admit to being a troll who finds it humorous to post now and again just to see what will happen. So, I have no idea what the MSFT / South Korea deal is - maybe I'll google it when I am done here, if I don't forget. I have a short attention span.
As far as the court fining one for some offense, it really does depend on the offense, how just you think it is to be a crime, the severity of the penalty, the likelyhood of enforcement, etc. Here in the US there are literally millions of people who are in contempt of court, and/or other outstanding warrants for which there are no practical consequences if simply ignored (parking tickets, ignoring jury summons, and other various minor offenses. There are millions more who have taken up illegal residence here, lie to take jobs, etc.) A recent poll found that 20% of the people thought it was not wrong to cheat on your taxes, which implies a lot more felons on the loose.
I personally, would never find myself in a position to be standing before a judge for anything we both thought was wrong. If I were hauled up on charges I didn't think were right, then the severity issue comes into play. I'd pay a small fine for, say watering my lawn while conservation laws were in effect, but I might very well flee the country if I were facing jail time for something like illegal use of encryption (just to make up some random crime that is not morally "wrong".)
Just because government authorities do something doesn't make them right. How do you feel about the French pressure on Apple to "open" iTunes? (Another thing I don't know much about, just at first blush, it seems that the French are wrong.)
If the EU courts mandate that only Wal-Mart can sell Microsoft products, then the problem will be solved, right?
Cool people will no longer buy it, and Wal-Mart will beat the price down to where Microsoft makes no profit, so all the un-cool buyers will not be ripped off!
I know these are "stupid" questions, on many levels (especially in this venue), but does MSFT even make 200-million Euros a day in sales to the EU? No.
That seems like a rediculous amount, no matter how evil MSFT may be. Isn't that more than 2x MSFT world-wide REVENUE, much less, EU PROFIT?
What if they don't pay?
What if they said "screw you, I'm going home" and stopped officially selling product in the EU?
Of course, there would still be "grey-market" sales, and "3rd party" support, etc.
As much as many do not like MSFT, this stinks of some sort of politicical extortion, plain and simple.
I don't buy many DVDs and CDs, but I do BUY, when they are priced right.
What do I own? For both music or video it averages about $5 a disc (on sale, ebay, cdbaby, Costco...)
Priced more than that? I somehow find other distractions to fill the time.
For me (and I am in the uber-top % of wage earners, per this site) it just isn't worth more than about $2-3 for a whole CD of music or $4-5 for a DVD. For others it might be less - but it is worth something. Downloading stuff for "free" isn't free - it takes time, burning it to discs cost money, and hey, you have evidence of a felony laying around now... who needs that?
I do have an iPod - But I have spent $0 at iTunes. Why? Because CDEX and my own Discs work just fine, thank you.
All my CDs and DVDs are from eBay, Costco, the "bargin bin" at Circuit City, etc. Full-retail just doesn't cut it. Even the annoying "join-now-get-X-discs-free" clubs work out to about $6/disc if you join, do the minimum, and quit.
Whatever happened to the concept of "making more profit on volume?" Media companies are missing out on a lot of sales, IMO, with their current pricing strategy.
While broke kids will always download stuff "for free", regular honest folks will buy tons of stuff at "Wal-Mart" prices - or not at all, when it comes to non-essential items like music and videos.
My original point was that very very few high wage earners get their money because someone earns less.
Maybe there are more manufacturing moguls than I realize, but when I think of high earning folks, I think of professionals like doctors and lawyers who earn good livings. For the really rich, I think of entertainers and sports figures - none of these people earn their money because someone earns low wages.
There are plenty of people who make good money in insurance, real estate, advertising, etc.
Oh, and your stock broker example? They make money selling stuff like goog, msft, ebay, orcl - yeah those companies all exploit their workers (gee those names also come up promenently in the list of the absolute richest folks.)
Even if someone with low-wage employees does earn six or seven figures, it is probably not because of that fact. That's all I was saying.
BTW - did you know that earning the lowly sum of $14,000 a year puts that wage earner ahead of 87% of the people in the world? See this calculator.
someone making $1.8M per year is earning their income precisely because others are making $14k per year
That is a pretty whack view of how the economy works. There may be a few instances where that statement is true, but by far and away it is false. The economy is not a zero sum game.
Most people who earn a lot of money earn it by selling stuff to other people with money.
Everyone gets caught up what would be a "Fair Tax" when they are really arguing tax collection schemes.
Here is how to calculate a fair tax; Take the Budget (B) and divide it by the total number of Citizens (C). The result is the Tax (T). By definition, each citizen's fair share to run the government is T.
Of course it isn't practical to collect "T" from each citizen, but it certainly would be fair.
No matter how you slice it, the taxes come from those who have money, because, fair or not, the poor don't have it.
A big part of the problem is how absurdly large "B" has become. It can be argued that, especially at a federal level, the government has gone "beyond the scope of the original project". The incentive to make "B" a smaller number becomes less and less as the fewer and fewer citizens pay their share of "T".
My take-away from this is that some people are simply addicted. If the game can be so boring, that, at times, a player watches movies while playing, what kind of entertainment is that? Sounds like classic addiction - small rewards at random times("wins" of enjoyment, I presume)keep you coming back despite the overall "loss" tedium, time-wasted, monthly fee.
Slashdot Mirror
Please read previous posts before modding... (apologies to Linquizic ;-)
Either way, all economically viable petroleum will be used. Do you want it burned up in a million clean-burning, catalytic converter equiped SUVs or 10 million smoke spewing put-put cars?
When the the change over from a petroleum based economy comes, the rich nations will be better able to cope no matter what.
First, I am not really following the case closely at all - I will just come right out and admit to being a troll who finds it humorous to post now and again just to see what will happen. So, I have no idea what the MSFT / South Korea deal is - maybe I'll google it when I am done here, if I don't forget. I have a short attention span.
As far as the court fining one for some offense, it really does depend on the offense, how just you think it is to be a crime, the severity of the penalty, the likelyhood of enforcement, etc. Here in the US there are literally millions of people who are in contempt of court, and/or other outstanding warrants for which there are no practical consequences if simply ignored (parking tickets, ignoring jury summons, and other various minor offenses. There are millions more who have taken up illegal residence here, lie to take jobs, etc.) A recent poll found that 20% of the people thought it was not wrong to cheat on your taxes, which implies a lot more felons on the loose.
I personally, would never find myself in a position to be standing before a judge for anything we both thought was wrong. If I were hauled up on charges I didn't think were right, then the severity issue comes into play. I'd pay a small fine for, say watering my lawn while conservation laws were in effect, but I might very well flee the country if I were facing jail time for something like illegal use of encryption (just to make up some random crime that is not morally "wrong".)
Just because government authorities do something doesn't make them right. How do you feel about the French pressure on Apple to "open" iTunes? (Another thing I don't know much about, just at first blush, it seems that the French are wrong.)
Talk about an easy way to break any Slashdot addiction you thought you might have had!
Cool people will no longer buy it, and Wal-Mart will beat the price down to where Microsoft makes no profit, so all the un-cool buyers will not be ripped off!
win-win-win!
Compare and contrast: ruthless business, ruthless politicians... ewwww!
That seems like a rediculous amount, no matter how evil MSFT may be. Isn't that more than 2x MSFT world-wide REVENUE, much less, EU PROFIT?
What if they don't pay?
What if they said "screw you, I'm going home" and stopped officially selling product in the EU?
Of course, there would still be "grey-market" sales, and "3rd party" support, etc.
As much as many do not like MSFT, this stinks of some sort of politicical extortion, plain and simple.
A huge bureaucracy playing politics is now the good guys?
BTW, if you need it, I can forward some good spam that advertises palm-hair remover.
Apple fine being a fruity computer company, but now that they sell music... that's the issue.
What do I own? For both music or video it averages about $5 a disc (on sale, ebay, cdbaby, Costco...)
Priced more than that? I somehow find other distractions to fill the time.
For me (and I am in the uber-top % of wage earners, per this site) it just isn't worth more than about $2-3 for a whole CD of music or $4-5 for a DVD. For others it might be less - but it is worth something. Downloading stuff for "free" isn't free - it takes time, burning it to discs cost money, and hey, you have evidence of a felony laying around now... who needs that?
I do have an iPod - But I have spent $0 at iTunes. Why? Because CDEX and my own Discs work just fine, thank you.
All my CDs and DVDs are from eBay, Costco, the "bargin bin" at Circuit City, etc. Full-retail just doesn't cut it. Even the annoying "join-now-get-X-discs-free" clubs work out to about $6/disc if you join, do the minimum, and quit.
Whatever happened to the concept of "making more profit on volume?" Media companies are missing out on a lot of sales, IMO, with their current pricing strategy.
While broke kids will always download stuff "for free", regular honest folks will buy tons of stuff at "Wal-Mart" prices - or not at all, when it comes to non-essential items like music and videos.
He was in the house because he was on hold. It said so, right in the summary.
But I only have informal studies to back that claim.
But it is only 45 more years until we get to see 100 year old I Love Lucy re-runs!
Maybe there are more manufacturing moguls than I realize, but when I think of high earning folks, I think of professionals like doctors and lawyers who earn good livings. For the really rich, I think of entertainers and sports figures - none of these people earn their money because someone earns low wages. There are plenty of people who make good money in insurance, real estate, advertising, etc.
Oh, and your stock broker example? They make money selling stuff like goog, msft, ebay, orcl - yeah those companies all exploit their workers (gee those names also come up promenently in the list of the absolute richest folks.)
Even if someone with low-wage employees does earn six or seven figures, it is probably not because of that fact. That's all I was saying.
BTW - did you know that earning the lowly sum of $14,000 a year puts that wage earner ahead of 87% of the people in the world? See this calculator.
That is a pretty whack view of how the economy works. There may be a few instances where that statement is true, but by far and away it is false. The economy is not a zero sum game.
Most people who earn a lot of money earn it by selling stuff to other people with money.
Here is how to calculate a fair tax; Take the Budget (B) and divide it by the total number of Citizens (C). The result is the Tax (T). By definition, each citizen's fair share to run the government is T.
Of course it isn't practical to collect "T" from each citizen, but it certainly would be fair. No matter how you slice it, the taxes come from those who have money, because, fair or not, the poor don't have it.
A big part of the problem is how absurdly large "B" has become. It can be argued that, especially at a federal level, the government has gone "beyond the scope of the original project". The incentive to make "B" a smaller number becomes less and less as the fewer and fewer citizens pay their share of "T".
A: No, they, they haven't because not many people really give a shit.
Note: I the preceding does not imply a position on whether or not they should [give a shit].
My take-away from this is that some people are simply addicted. If the game can be so boring, that, at times, a player watches movies while playing, what kind of entertainment is that? Sounds like classic addiction - small rewards at random times("wins" of enjoyment, I presume)keep you coming back despite the overall "loss" tedium, time-wasted, monthly fee.
Instead of "give us the records." It should have been "How much for this information..."
THEN they would have gotten somewhere with Google.
Our friends at MIT have shown that tin foil hats enhance reception of government transmitters.
I shudder to think what a whole body suit could do!
I'd say as long as possible... "infrastructure" == "assets", aka, "sunk costs".
Do you replace your car before you need to?
Do you replace your carpet if it can just be steam-cleaned back to "presentable"?
Sheesh - no grand conspiracy here... if they can make a buck on what they have, they will.
They even have a public research website
Hypothetically, what would a good estimate of the actual damages suffered by the people that Microsoft wronged?
Would that be The Sims - PETA edition or Chinese Restaurant Tycoon? I'm up for either!