Yes and no. Germany isn't being nefarious. The crux of the issue is the same as it's always been - Greece should never have joined the EU. Germany and Greece have very different economies and different fiscal and monetary policies. Given Germany has more power in voting, Greece knew what they were getting into. In fact, they lied about their economy just to get in - because they wanted the benefits of the euro that all EU countries would enjoy plus the stability of the euro and the lower interest rate they could (and did) restructure their debt under when converting to the euro. This backfired during the Great Recession when they were disproportionately affected and subsequently every country in the EU was given a different interest rating for their government bonds based upon their individual risk where before, they were all given the same risk level - so they got currency stability, but lost interest rate stability.
Germany pushed for rules to entry that require a deficit lower than 3% of GDP - Greece cooked their books and lied when they showed numbers to the EU lower than that. There was also a rule that total debt had to be lower than 60% of GDP. Greece hadn't seen numbers like that in decades, but the rule was bent and they were allowed in. HUGE mistake for all parties. Greece wasn't a good fit even with lots of safeguards in place as their needs didn't match Germany and other players.
40% of Germany's GDP comes from exports... and they got rid of exchange rates between EU countries plus lower exchange rates worldwide because the euro wouldn't increase in value as quickly as the deutschmark - the trade-off for them was that they pay higher interest rates to support the overall euro. Greece got bonuses, too -- lower interest rates, lower inflation, and cheaper imports which briefly led to a higher standard of living. Greece was on track to lowering its debt and increasing GDP...
What happened? - the market crash, the housing crash, worldwide economic collapse basically. Everyone suffered, but not equally. Greece couldn't effectively use monetary policy to help recover from the injury because it was tied to the EU - and Germany, who weathered the slump like a champ and saw no need for such measures, had more power to control that monetary policy in the EU than Greece or other suffering countries.
So, the dominoes start falling. Greece takes one measure after another to compensate for the lack of monetary policy flexibility as it crushes under debt without the ability to change the money supply and/or interest rates, or ease trade with fluctuating exchange rates. Their credit rating is downgraded making it impossible to get decent interest rates on loans needed to get themselves through the recession. There was no money for a stimulus package and the crippling debt just made the situation worse. The bailouts and debt-restructurings are nice peace-offerings, but wow... when you see how Greece was dealing with up to nearly 30% interest rates for a while there, it still feels like they're being fleeced. The whole thing smells of usury.
Coupled with austerity measures during a recession, I'm surprised Greece didn't just get up and leave the EU long ago. I don't blame Germany for acting in their own best interests, but I do blame each EU country that allowed members to join that did not match the necessary economic requirements.
Spain and Greece are suffering high unemployment largely because their wages are in euros and they can't do much with fiscal and monetary policies to ease their current competitive disadvantage: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E...
If they hadn't joined the EU to begin with, they might have bee
They have The Disney Channel for free on every cable subscription for a reason -- their media is merely marketing for their overpriced toys, clothing, stuffed animals, and other more profitable products -- and maybe even trick you into going to Disney Land or Disney World and shell out a few thousand dollars to take the family for a week and see several of the parks.
Sure, they are rabid dogs when it comes to protecting their IP, but they'd much rather you watch their infomercials... er... movies than not.
Disney knows this already. It's the reason that The Disney Channel is free on every cable package. All of their movies, tv shows, and other media are merely advertisements for their other, more lucrative products.
As a former resident of NC, I call BS. Attorneys General are not puppets for the states. They are lawyers, but they're also elected (NOT appointed!) officials that offer legal advice and represent state governments in courts, but also have the right to represent the citizens of states and take legal action on their behalf as well. NC's Attorney General is also the state's highest law enforcement officer. They swear an oath not just to uphold NC state laws, but to uphold federal laws - and federal laws always take precedence. AGs have WIDE discretionary power to decide for themselves what action the state should take regarding legal challenges and court rulings.
As Attorney General, one can advise a state NOT to contest a federal ruling that strikes down the state ban. NC has no law compelling an Attorney General to contest federal rulings that strike down state laws, either. http://www.ncdoj.gov/About-DOJ...
The AG of VA did nothing that his previous AGs hadn't already done - he chose not to contest a ruling. He did not fail in his duties. VA is trying to pass a law requiring the AG to defend the state's position, but good luck - as it's in conflict with the AG's responsibility to protect citizen's civil rights and uphold federal law. Any attempt to argue that the gay marriage bans are constitutional given the legal precedents set by even SCOTUS themselves would be spurious at best - and any good AG would advise against a lawsuit and not go forward with one. http://www.washingtontimes.com...
NC is very upset with its AG for the statements he made declaring the state law indefensible as well as his personal belief that it's a bad law. Sure, he'll prepare the best case he can should the state force him to go to SCOTUS to defend their crap law, but anyone that's read the SCOTUS rulings and the federal court rulings based upon them knows there's no other way to interpret the law. SCOTUS will have to issue a ruling contrary to their earlier opinions for any state to have a chance to argue their marriage ban laws are constitutional within the framework they've been given.
It should be noted that the NC AG is only now giving up after exhausting ALL options because all arguments his office has proposed have been rejected by various federal courts in other cases. To continue would be expensive and futile. The VA AG simply came to the same conclusion much earlier.
Also, it's a bit stupid to declare "rigmarole" as the proper spelling over "rigamarole" when the term itself is a colloquial bastardization of "ragman roll."
That was... quite a wall of rambling text, so I apologize - was quite sleepy when I typed up that book above. lol.
But, to follow up:
Sony's Playstation 4 has never (to my knowledge) been modded and there are no hacks other than account sharing and cloning at the present time. It was released in Nov of 2013. I frequent homebrewer sites... and basically, they've given up trying to mod consoles altogether declaring the age of the mod chip over. People are also afraid of jail time as some have been charged with DMCA violations for selling mod chips.
The Playstation 3 was never modded either - it wasn't even really hacked as someone leaked the keys, so everyone used those to make software mods.
The hardware mods only worked b/c the manufacturers weren't expecting them. Now, they hide the internals better so you can't solder between chips and perform man-in-the-middle attacks. They also check firmware versions and test for mod chips, then disable online access if anything abnormal is found. I wouldn't say hardware modding is over yet, but it's getting there. Most mods I see these days are for controllers, not systems.
As for PC miniaturization, I thought this was impressive:
It's smaller than a Raspberry Pi 2, and only a bit bigger than the tiny Iphone 6 motherboard. It holds a Dual Core Pentium M 1.2 Ghz with hyperthreading and turboboost to 2.6 ghz with 8 GB of RAM and Intel HD Graphics 5300 that supports the retina display.
This article basically goes on to say what I've been saying - you can't service this kind of device, you just replace the entire mobo if it breaks: http://arstechnica.com/apple/2...
The system is hardly top of the line, but it does support the idea that the internals of PCs/laptops are shrinking to credit-card size at a rapid pace and that the current GHz speed plus a decent graphics chip are "good enough" for most people. The high end macbook pro and macbook air motherboards aren't much larger, really - just some additions for more I/O and fans. If it's that small now, just wait another 10 to 20 years. We already have the tech to put that entire mobo on a chip smaller than a dime, but it'd cost a fortune to design and get a decent yield off of a wafer that size.
Of course, in 10 to 20 years, desktops will be gone. We'll maybe have a something that looks like today's PCs acting as a "home media server" with lots of laptops, phones, and tablets that connect.. maybe all on the same domain or "home network" of some sort. Maybe a few small form factor devices like mac minis, roku, tivo, etc. None of the devices will be upgradable or repairable as it'd be cheaper to buy a new one than to bother. I expect in 30 years, all of them will be locked into one walled garden or another.
I'll grant you it seems a bit dystopian, but as someone who has been in the IT field for 20 years and has an engineering background and an MBA, I've seen this coming for a very long time... it's where things are going ; or, at the very least - where Microsoft is going to try to persuade everyone in the guise of it being for their own security. MS tried before with INTEL to create a "trusted computing" with signed boot loaders. They got it, but it can be turned off in the BIOS -- for now. There's been some discussion regarding whether or not MS will allow it to be disabled in their future Surface Pros.
As to the first law of computer security, look at Ipads and Iphones - Apple hardware and software with a locked bootloader and constant updates to patch the exploits used to jailbreak them. Jailbreaks used to come out within a few days of the IOS release, then a few weeks... now, it's been 4 months since 8.1.3 was released -- no jailbreak yet. If you upgraded to a version you can't jailbreak, you now can't go back to an earlier version as Apple has stopped signing the old firmware.
But, Apple isn't sitting on its laurels. It's released 8.2, then 8.3, and soon 8.4 which is currently in beta. They're actively responding to jailbreaks - even calling the hacker teams by name that discovered the flaws and listing the specific exploits that have been patched. Hacker teams have even expressed their frustration as they've started to work on a possible exploit only to have Apple close the hole before releasing from BETA.
No one has a hardware hack for the Iphone or Ipad. It's all software exploits. Software will likely always have bugs, but Apple is hardening IOs against privilege escalation. I fear the low-hanging fruit is gone and jailbreaking will be a thing of the past for IOs in the very near future.
What's really telling is that my IT friends who used to jailbreak their Iphones (b/c it was cool... or they could hack it to install a browser with flash so they could watch HULU or some other such thing)... no longer care about jailbreaking their phones! They say it's too much trouble, they get stuck with older versions of IOs b/c the new ones aren't jailbroken yet... their TOS is invalidated if they have issues and want help at the Apple Store... and the Iphones really do everything they really want anyway without needing to jailbreak them. They've become accustomed to the DRM'd phone as-is!
If Apple can prevent jailbreaking their DRM'd Iphone and even get technically inclined (and pro-hacker, pro-pirate people at that) to not care their device is locked down, you bet MS could do the same for their Surface PRO and XBox.
But, it won't come as a hard sell. MS will say, "Here's an MS PC with MS OS, browser, office suite, games compatible with XBOX, Skype, etc etc... and it's locked down to only run our OS, our Apps, and a selection of approved apps through our store - and you must run all other non-approved programs in a sandbox/container/virtual machine so you can't get a virus from them. If you have a hardware or software issue, just call MS... and, if you upgrade to a new machine or have a hardware issue with your current one, your MS account has a record of your licenses and installation setup, so we can restore your PC (and your personal files are all backed up in the cloud for free through MS onedrive).
Don't think it won't happen -- Google practically did it themselves with Chromebooks.
Computers used to fill 2 story buildings, then a room, then a desktop PC... now most people are buying laptops that are desktop-replacements. Soon, our PCs may be as small as an Iphone. (the raspberry pi, arduino, mac mini, and a dozen other small form factors already exist). CPUs have incorporated math co-processors, modems, sound cards, gpus, northbridges, etc... it's only a matter of time before it's all system-on-a-chip the size of a credit card wit
I'm aware of the hardware and software mods... they're very inventive. On the whole, I agree with you that with current tech, DRM is relatively easy to circumvent.
I just don't agree that will be the case in the future.
Many of the bootloaders for systems took advantage of software vulnerabilities - mostly overflow bugs that would allow you to skirt the DRM. Those can be patched with updates. The hardware mods are necessary b/c the software mods are so easy to patch -- but, they require access to the motherboard and often a logic probe to determine how to create the mod in the first place. When we have system-on-a-chip, effectively the entire motherboard will be on one or more wafers of silicon encased on a housing. You won't be able to modify it without destroying it. It would be a monumental task like trying to add instructions to a CPU after it's been packaged.
In that future... if you have DRM, you're fucked. lol.
No. TFA states the new turbines cost half as much and can be spaced twice as dense as conventional blade style turbines. They capture 30% less energy than a conventional turbine, but considering you can put 2 in the same spot for roughly the same price as just one conventional turbine, you should get more energy for the same cost and land space.
In theory, lower total cost of ownership as well given the lack of moving parts to replace... but who knows what real-world issues the structure may see. Maybe the materials don't hold up as well as thought under heat, light, and vibration and will require maintenance or degrade their performance over time.
Oh, I hate DRM, and I generally agree with you regarding its pitfalls and shortcomings; but, when MS bakes the DRM into the EUFI/BIOS and couples that with DRM built into the CPU, it'll be quite a trick to hack the system... similar to how DirectTV is difficult to hack -- DRM'ed hardware plus encryption keys that rotate and updates that come with a self-destruct code should the update find a hardware or software issue. The PlayStation and Xbox already have safeguards that will disable a system from being able to play games on their networks if a system is identified as modified. MS will just use that to disable any pirated warez as well.
DRM, as you said, doesn't work when you can physically get to it -- but what do you do when the DRM is encased inside BIOS and CPU chips? You can't realistically crack them open and solder them... and you bet those will be hard to mod by design. You can't easily mod the software when the hard drive is an encrypted black box that only accepts encrypted updates via MS update either... and no user has admin/root access to modify system files.
As for the Intel laser tech, yes... it's awesome. It's totally cool that the pathways don't cause EM pulses that interfere with other pathways. It's also awesome that the light generally doesn't heat up the chips... downside is that it takes a lot of juice to produce a laser pulse.
Hardware tech currently is more concerned with lowering power usage and increasing battery storage capacities than in increasing CPU speed at the moment. Server farms would rather stack several slower low-power machines in a rack than use a single equivalent high speed system that was a power hog. It's a race to the lowest watt per flop right now in both mobile and server areas.
By the time INTEL gets around to using the fiber within the cpus, it'll have already had several die shrinks and probably have gone 3D chips... the most obvious use for the light circuit in them would be the clock pulse - chips today can suffer from race conditions and clock drift b/c the paths are so long and winding to deliver the clock pulses... go 3D, you shorten the paths... go fiber, you decrease the latency of the clock pulse reaching everywhere simultaneously. The clock pulse is already a power hog and produces a lot of heat, so it's a good target to replace.
I doubt we'll see fully optical chips except in fiber routers where decreasing the latency of the transmission takes precedence over the power consumption of the router. I do think we'll see, as INTEL has already stated, fiber from the CPU to other components - especially if they can use multimode fibers with different spectrum for each I/O port. Instead of all those trace lines from the CPU and capacitors and resistors all over, just one fiber to each chip it needs to talk to. PCBs will be much less complex and smaller - driving devices to be even smaller and more portable... again putting pressure on lower power & better batteries.
As for the foundries, TSMC is very competitive with INTEL in the 20nm and 28nm fabs... and catching up in the 14nm fabs. I expect INTEL will hit 7nm before TSMC. When Moore's Law ends, it'll likely be cheaper for INTEL to sell its fabs to TSMC than to run them themselves... so, as you say, they have to rely on their patents to survive.
All they have to do is continue to release SSE extensions or other MMX/SSE additions to the x86/amd64 architecture and license the tech to AMD (if they're still around) and others, and they get to extend their monopoly by another 14 years. It won't be hard - not like they have any serious competitors.
Depending on the state, sentences can even be active (prison time), probation, and/or community service. They can also be commuted so that the record shows you're guilty and sentenced to X years, but you serve no actual time. North Carolina has a "Prayer for Judgement Continued" option for judges to basically accept a guilty plea for even some felonies, yet give no punishment or sentence, so the person is guilty, but not convicted because a conviction requires a sentence. (This works by pleading guilty, praying for the judge to continue the judgement/sentencing at a later time - say 2 or 3 years from that date... and then the judge decides after that time not to sentence you if you have obeyed the law within that time frame.) Then, there's also deferred prosecution for first time offenders which many states have -- this lets you plead guilty to a crime, abide by certain rules, and then the prosecutor agrees not to take the case to trial and simply drops the charges after you've completed all the requirements. They then tear up your guilty plea and let you seal and/or expunge the record of your arrest, too.
I had a big, long, TL;DR reply for this, but Slashdot killed it. lol. Probably for the best as I tend to ramble on long posts.
Basically, Intel is already feeling the effects of diminishing returns from Moore's Law. They hit the max of 4 GHz over 10 years ago and have switched to focusing on system-on-a-chip things and multicore to make up for it... but, not a lot of software uses multi-core very well. I recently recycled a 12 year old laptop with a single core Pentium 4 - not because of the CPU exactly, but because neither the CPU nor the integrated GPU which I could not upgrade supported H.264. I could play 1080p MPEG2 just fine, but it struggled with 720p H.264 video with 90%CPU. Modern CPUs have H.264 support. Most are APUs with some sort of 4K video support and early H.265 as well. I have a couple desktops, but I have 5 laptops - the latest, I think will last me at least 10 years. It's a Republic of Gamers ASUS. Even if I replace it within 10 years, that just means my slowest laptop will be handed down to someone else. lol. I use the laptops mostly as media PCs connected to HDTVs.
Intel can shrink another 3 or 4 times, but then they're done. 3D chips are great for lower power, but they won't increase speed much - they also will require innovative liquid cooling between layers as they'll be a ball of hot wires otherwise. Optical transistors currently max out at 10 Ghz, but that's just 2x or 3x the silicon speed, and INTEL doesn't see any reason to use the tech save for CPU to mobo connections.... because the fiber optics require power hungry lasers that have their own drawbacks.
I don't think Intel laments the end of Moore's Law. I think they look forward to not having to overhaul their foundries every couple years with expensive new equipment that always comes with yield issues. That would save them an immense expense on production costs. Also, they still own a ton of patents and a huge foundry they can leverage to maintain their leadership. With their R&D, they can continue to put more crypto, graphics, and components on the chips and re-design them for decades even if they don't get die shrinks. They aren't even using the die shrinks to get faster chips right now - just lower power as that's where the money is right now. They are killing the near-bankrupt AMD on all fronts, but ARM is still the leader in the mobile market which is hot right now.
Desktops have about an 8 to 10 year life cycle (used to be 3 years, then 5 years, then 7.. now approaching 10). Consoles have a forced 6 or 7 year life cycle (PlayStation release every 6 years, but it takes time... a year or more for people to buy in masse) Even Intel engineers see a future as early as 10 to 20 years from now where that life cycle extends to 15 or 20 years... and eventually even longer.
This is why most PC manufacturers are leaving the market as it's now a commodity - HP almost stopped making PCs a few years ago, but decided against it. IBM quit and sent their customers to Lenovo. Dell lost money for years and had its stock price fall until it went private (partly with MS loans) Now Dell has a huge pile of debt and may exit PCs for just corporate server and laptop contracts. HP, ACER, and Lenovo are most of what's left... and I bet MS would buy ACER in a heartbeat (likely after ACER trounces Lenovo or acquires it). HP, I dunno... I bet MS would let HP keep the server space if it gave MS the consumer space.
Why do I think this? Welll.... MS bought Nokia... and they make Surface and Surface Pros. They also make XBOX Ones -- which are modified low-end 8 core AMD DRM'd PCs with Radeon 7000 graphics that support 4K resolution. They also share a code base between Win 10, XBOX, and Windows Phone... and are giving away the phone OS while releasing Win 10 for free for users with Win 7 or higher. I can only guess that MS finally recognized that most people buy OSes with their new PCs and the OEMs and businesses pay for those licenses. It's pointless to fragment their user base
I wasn't aware SD had a lameness filter... In any case, I don't think your post was lame at all imho.:-) You make some very good points. I also have emulators on my PC and use a controller for them. Yay!
I didn't mean to imply that the PC was going away - simply that MS would prefer you buy their Surface line of products in conjunction with their Xbox and Windows Phone which they could lock down through DRM and tie to an online account they can control rather than have myriad hardware configurations of a PC to support - at least on the consumer side. Corporate users are a separate issue, but they also tend to purchase large numbers of fairly homogeneous boxen.
I don't see the benefit from MS's perspective of opening up their walled garden of game+Xbox to game+anyrandomWindowsBox. They can quickly modify an Xbox remotely to deal with bugs, hacks, or upgrades without worrying about interfering with any random windows setup (assuming a user would allow the update necessary to make that change on their PC.
Homogeneity is the key. Apple's hardware is largely homogeneous. Xbox hardware and software is homogeneous. PCs are anything but. It's hard to code for that, difficult to support, and even harder to push mandatory updates towards.
Also, game makers can enjoy making users pay for the same game TWICE if they want to play on Xbox and their Windows box. Ports between them aren't trivial, but not difficult either, so a thoughtful recode and recompile to make a port isn't expensive. Why would game makers (MS included ie HALO) want their games to be so portable? They'd also have to make sure the same portable game was coded to run on the slowest/weakest hardware, but possibly would ramp up to use the best hardware depending on the system... and deal with possible customer backlash over it running worse on one system or another.
Gah... I just see the whole idea as a bit of a nightmare until we reach the end of Moore's Law and can have fairly homogeneous hardware for coders to work with. There won't be much need for specialized cheap hardware for consoles when every PC and console has basically the same CPU/GPU/RAM/BUS configuration 30 or 40 years from now. Should be trivial to port games when hopefully every system is running some form of Linux on OpenGL graphics, too;-) *fingers crossed for STEAMBOX*
I think there's more to it that you seem to be glossing over.
Console gameplay is inherently different than PC gameplay because of the standard inputs: keyboard + mouse vs controller. Games have been redesigned to suit those I/O methods so that the PC version of a game is very different than the console version. Even with network play, Xbox will separate PC gamers from console players so that the PC gamers don't have an unfair advantage. Specifically, some games, you can highlight multiple units with a mouse and save those units as a group on an F1 key, then toggle between multiple groups of units from F1 to F12, but on the console, you cannot.
Xbox games are very easy to port to PC and vice versa, but there's some tweaking for the user experience done as well.
You also gloss over the hardware issue. Historically, many console games were designed specifically for the hardware they ran on - even taking advantage of CPU errata and other bugs as well as race conditions and timing issues which would not exist on any other configuration. Switching from Xbox to PC may not be as simple as switching out a driver or two - you may have to emulate other hardware nuances, too.
Not saying it can't be done. Emulators for consoles are easy to find for the PC. DirectX, x86 or AMD64 architecture, and similar code base in Xbox and Windows should make it much simpler to port, but games would have to be aware of whether they have keyboard + mouse or joystick to provide the proper interface options for the game and match people online fairly - and take into account any nuances between the Xbox and the PC setup with drivers and/or emulation.
Frankly, I think Microsoft has no interest in opening up their Xbox platform to other devices. They can DRM the heck out of the box and give homogeneous specs to publishers to code for. Game companies can already port their games to PCs if they wish. There's no reason for MS to bother.
MS sees the XBox as an entertainment portal - a Windows Media Center of sorts that can play Netflix and other content as well as games. If anything, I think they'd prefer your PC die by the wayside and everyone own an XBox, a Windows Phone, and a Surface instead -- all DRM locked down, controlled by MS and sync'ed to your Microsoft Account online.
I think jellomizer was referring to the fact that hormonal adolescents who do not yet have a fully formed prefrontal cortex have a much higher incidence of indulging in risky, violent, and/or unwise behavior as compared to fully grown adults due to the fact that they lack both the experience and the actual brain grey matter to fully think things through which would help inhibit such adolescent behavior. That does not excuse such behavior, but it does not mean we should treat children as if they were adults who generally have a better ability to control and channel their emotions.
I'm unsure why you believe "adult behavior" is on par with teenage adolescent behavior simply because adults can and do engage in similar behaviors (though it is worth noting that often when adults do this sort of thing, their judgement is impaired by alcohol or drugs which puts them into a more uninhibited mental state similar to juveniles). Psychologists would strongly disagree with you if you're making the case that adults and teenagers have the same incidence of such behavior.
You don't treat a 5 year old like you would a 12 year old... nor a 12 year old like a 16 year old. Even still, one should not treat a 15 year old like an 18 or 21 year old.
Personally, I say send the boy to counseling and to juvenile detention, make the family pay restitution. Wipe his record and seal it when he turns 18 so he can have a normal life. Maybe he'll make better decisions when his brain is fully formed and learn from his mistakes. Maybe not. Giving him a felony record and shoving him in a state prison with hardened felons is not great way to reform this child. It may just turn him into a lifetime criminal with new criminal connections and no job prospects due to his record.
When you are born into a country, you must obey that country's laws. Welcome to the planet Earth. I didn't choose to have the legal drinking age set for me at 21 in SC... but it is... and it was when I was born. Not just myself, but EVERYONE's right to self-determination is removed when you live in a country with laws - you are restricted by those laws, right or wrong. The Hawaiians born today are Americans by birth - and if they're of Hawaiian ancestry, they have additional rights to live on the Hawaiian Homelands if they choose. They even get minority status grants and such.
The ancient Hawaiian society is a myth - by the time the USA took over, the islands were heavily populated by foreigners and even the kingdom which was only around for a short time was built by subjugating tribes itself!
As for your hilarious argument about stealing from families generations ago, MY FAMILY had its houses BURNED during the Civil War - because we helped slaves escape to the north. Exactly whom should I call to get the large plantation houses rebuilt that society apparently OWES me?!?! No one! But then, I didn't buy those lands or build those houses in the first place, so who is anyone to say that simply because my ancestors owned something that was taken away from them that I am somehow the grieved party?
Also, take note that while you seem to imply that Americans are proud of our rebellion, yet deny others the same rebellion -- we also put down our own rebellious states in our Civil War. Personally, I believe the USA should have some legislative process for succession - not because I necessarily support any particular succession, but because there should at least be a process for it. Say if Hawaii were to decide to succeed and become an independent country or join the British Commonwealth. There should be a process of ratifying that succession peacefully.
I would never imply that the USA is perfect - or even that it is right in many of the international politics it plays. I'm just a realist. We can't turn back the clock and we can't bow to pressure from "natives" just because their ancestors were there first. If two people are born in Hawaii - one of European descent and another of native descent, why should the one of native descent have any greater say in such issues? They're both Americans! You know, democracy is one person, one vote -- we don't weight the votes by ancestry.
I hear spam is much more popular than the poi there, but It could be a myth as I haven't seen any polling data to back it up - just anecdotal evidence. haha.
I have no issues with people protesting. I've had friends that got extra credit in their humanities studies for protesting, though so I find such uninformed student protests dubious.
I don't mean to imply that there is no sense of injustice with the US occupation of the island, but I see it as historical fact, not something we can turn back the clock on. Same with the Native Americans - terrible track record with wars (including biological warfare) and breaking peace treaties, trail of tears, etc. etc. But, their small consolation is the reservations and today, many of my friends are 1/4 or 1/8th of Native American descent. "Pure" native american populations have been declining for a long time and more of them identify as Americans rather than members of their native tribes. What's done is done, and it's too late for the Natives to have a say in who builds what on what mountaintop that someone else owns.
That's why I say the religious route is a good argument. The mountain should have been protected as part of the agreement to make the Hawaiian Homelands if it's sacred... but still, no one would stand for someone destroying Jerusalem or Mecca - even if the destroyers rightfully owned the land. I'm sure there's a way to lobby for protected status if it's that important.
Heck, I think Hawaii is gorgeous and maybe we shouldn't built giant telescopes on pretty mountains anyway;-) I'm sure the locals could make a zoning ordinance to scrap the construction easily.
I just don't think the simple fact that they're of native descent should hold much weight in the decision. I mean, who cares who their parents and grandparents were - they're Americans living in Hawaii now and if they choose to live a traditional Hawaiian lifestyle, they can live on the reservations... er... "homelands."
The Hawaiian Kingdom folks in particular are a bit nutty and want to "end the US occupation" of Hawaii. http://www.hawaiiankingdom.org... I have a hard time taking them seriously - especially since they're hypocritical in thinking that because the kingdom usurped other tribal lands and conquered the islands that they're the true stewards of Hawaii and not the USA which, in turn, usurped them.
Actually, I've known about the "reservations" on Hawaii for decades. Interesting how you're an anonymous coward that presumes to know me and what I know.
The luau wasn't a hotel one... geez... I don't think the hotel had the space for it anyway. Never claimed to be an expert on Hawaii btw - but at least I've visited and taken an interest unlike most armchair pundits.
1893 was 122 years ago. I sympathize with the actual natives living at the time, but they aren't alive anymore. Six "generations" later, I don't think anyone is entitled to reparations. There is an unspoken statute of limitations on this sort of thing. Not a single disgruntled Hawaiian today was born knowing anything other than living with the reality of the rule of the USA - same as any other citizen born in the USA. Why should their ancestry or DNA give them any privilege?
Did you know that my native South Carolina was once a British colony? Seems the demographics shifted a bit over time and the rebels stole her away to form the USA.... then she broke off that yoke to form a Confederacy with many other states... and was attacked by the USA and again re-absorbed into the union.
Should I as a native South Carolinian get reparations for not being part of the British Commonwealth? or the Confederacy? Nonsense.
Let's not forget that the Kingdom of Hawaii was forged from bloodshed, war, and usurping land itself from OTHER natives on various islands -- and it was a rather short-lived kingdom that lasted less than 100 years. Seems odd to opine for the bad old days of bloody island warfare and subjugation that spanned less time than the state of Hawaii has existed. Throughout the history of the world, countries have come and go. Hawaii was taken over by an internal rebellion - granted, mostly consisting of settled foreigners... but, still -- they lived there, so I can't fault them for fighting to become a state.
I've visited the lovely land of Hawaii. Beautiful place... the luau I attended was fantastic. I was served poi. Disgusting stuff that makes paper mache paste sound delicious (though the other food was quite good). The native serving the poi said "yeah, this is the nasty stuff we used to eat before foreigners visited the island. POI -- I assume it was named for the sound you make when you spit it out of your mouth.. poi poi poi."
But, I digress. I see all this Kingdom of Hawaii stuff as merely delusional fantasies of people's ancestral rights to govern themselves rather than appease the country they actually live within. I think the religious desecration angle is a more convincing argument if they truly believe the land is sacred.
Ah, I should clarify - I did not mean to imply most of the budget isspent on the military, but most of the DEBT Americans owe went towards the military - specifically IRAQ and Afghanistan wars alone are estimated to be around 3 or 4 trillion... plus the interest on that debt, and of course, yearly military spending (not that I don't think our military is important, but we do spend more than all other nations on Earth combined... and our Navy alone is larger than the next 7 largest Naval fleets combined.)
You are ALREADY paying for everyone using health care that cannot pay for it themselves. Most ERs cannot refuse anyone - even if they just have the sniffles. Hospitals have gone bankrupt because of this. You are paying through medicare/medicaid and through higher insurance premiums and medical fees... because so many never pay, but do recehive service. People who even have insurance have gone bankrupt because of medical fees - it's the leading cause of bankruptcy in the USA!
Different systems for different situations. I don't know about where you live, but many places have non-profit, government utilities that generate electricity. It's not single-payer because people pay what they use. Insurance does not and has never worked that way. Everyone pays in and it pays out only to those that need it when they need it in the amount they need it. Obviously it would be regulated to avoid abuse, but no one is going to break their bones just because - hey, they can get them re-set and in a cast for free! Woot!
Your comparison of government run electricity single payer and government run health insurance single payer makes zero sense.
You also fail to take into account that because we don't subsidize basic health care, people who have no insurance tend to have conditions that could have been treatable with a simple cheap checkup, but due to neglect their conditions festered and became expensive to treat -- ended up in the Emergency room and boom -- their huge bill became your bill b/c they can't pay. I'd rather our tax dollars pay for everyone to have regular teeth cleaning than to use them to pay for expensive oral surgeries and teeth removal, for instance.
Please work on your logic skills - they are lacking, you coward
FedEX and UPS have zero desire to take over the envelope business. You're clueless as to how inexpensive it is to send a letter from Hawaii to Florida via US Mail. Try that via FedEx - even put it in a box first...
The US Mail has a duty to deliver to each and every address for the cost of a stamp - and visit each and every address multiple times per week to not only deliver, but pick up mail. Good luck convincing any corporation that it would be a profitable business plan to compete in that market even if it were allowed.
I won't argue with you on the Medicaid/Medicare issue - my uncle tells me all the time the grief the govt gives him - but, his issue isn't the dollar amount so much as the regulations for the coding and paperwork. They have very specific forms that do not correspond well to usual medical coding and billing, and if not completed perfectly, they don't get paid at ALL.
There can NEVER be a FREE market for health care... it's inherently impossible. If you have a life-threatening situation like a heart attack, you must be sent by ambulance to usually the nearest facility and be worked on by the available physician and surgeon. You are in one physical location, and your health care options are tied to that location/region. Each region can only operate so many full health service options like hospitals. This inherently lends itself to a monopoly or oligopoly situation. Insurance COULD, in theory, be a free market, but it is not currently. There are laws preventing the insurance companies from selling nation-wide insurance plans and compete with one another more directly. I am not opposed to that idea, but why bother? We could simply have a federal insurance that says basic care is covered by taxes (who cares if you pay insurers directly or through your taxes? It's still money paid from tax payers to health care workers - and you pay anyway for basic health care for uninsured as most hospitals MUST treat all emergency medical issues whether people can pay or not. That comes out of your pocket from govt subsidies and higher insurance premiums and medical costs anyway)
Everything else in your post regarding good doctors is a fearmongering myth. The doctors I know are good doctors because they love helping people and saving lives, not because of the income. Some even work for doctors without borders and do charity mission work. If you want to help doctors out, help them refinance their student loans - or better yet, subsidize them!
I have lived in multiple states - NC, SC, and TN. I was in and out of the DMV in no time flat each time I moved. Don't know where you live, but maybe your state should invest more in their DMV if you have issues.
I've found TN to be particularly efficient. They have an electronic queue in Knoxville, TN branches, full staff, and no wait times.
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Yes and no. Germany isn't being nefarious. The crux of the issue is the same as it's always been - Greece should never have joined the EU. Germany and Greece have very different economies and different fiscal and monetary policies. Given Germany has more power in voting, Greece knew what they were getting into. In fact, they lied about their economy just to get in - because they wanted the benefits of the euro that all EU countries would enjoy plus the stability of the euro and the lower interest rate they could (and did) restructure their debt under when converting to the euro. This backfired during the Great Recession when they were disproportionately affected and subsequently every country in the EU was given a different interest rating for their government bonds based upon their individual risk where before, they were all given the same risk level - so they got currency stability, but lost interest rate stability.
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/...
Germany pushed for rules to entry that require a deficit lower than 3% of GDP - Greece cooked their books and lied when they showed numbers to the EU lower than that. There was also a rule that total debt had to be lower than 60% of GDP. Greece hadn't seen numbers like that in decades, but the rule was bent and they were allowed in. HUGE mistake for all parties. Greece wasn't a good fit even with lots of safeguards in place as their needs didn't match Germany and other players.
40% of Germany's GDP comes from exports... and they got rid of exchange rates between EU countries plus lower exchange rates worldwide because the euro wouldn't increase in value as quickly as the deutschmark - the trade-off for them was that they pay higher interest rates to support the overall euro. Greece got bonuses, too -- lower interest rates, lower inflation, and cheaper imports which briefly led to a higher standard of living. Greece was on track to lowering its debt and increasing GDP...
What happened? - the market crash, the housing crash, worldwide economic collapse basically. Everyone suffered, but not equally. Greece couldn't effectively use monetary policy to help recover from the injury because it was tied to the EU - and Germany, who weathered the slump like a champ and saw no need for such measures, had more power to control that monetary policy in the EU than Greece or other suffering countries.
So, the dominoes start falling. Greece takes one measure after another to compensate for the lack of monetary policy flexibility as it crushes under debt without the ability to change the money supply and/or interest rates, or ease trade with fluctuating exchange rates. Their credit rating is downgraded making it impossible to get decent interest rates on loans needed to get themselves through the recession. There was no money for a stimulus package and the crippling debt just made the situation worse. The bailouts and debt-restructurings are nice peace-offerings, but wow... when you see how Greece was dealing with up to nearly 30% interest rates for a while there, it still feels like they're being fleeced. The whole thing smells of usury.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wi...
Coupled with austerity measures during a recession, I'm surprised Greece didn't just get up and leave the EU long ago. I don't blame Germany for acting in their own best interests, but I do blame each EU country that allowed members to join that did not match the necessary economic requirements.
Spain and Greece are suffering high unemployment largely because their wages are in euros and they can't do much with fiscal and monetary policies to ease their current competitive disadvantage:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E...
If they hadn't joined the EU to begin with, they might have bee
Disney cares nothing about pirating.
They have The Disney Channel for free on every cable subscription for a reason -- their media is merely marketing for their overpriced toys, clothing, stuffed animals, and other more profitable products -- and maybe even trick you into going to Disney Land or Disney World and shell out a few thousand dollars to take the family for a week and see several of the parks.
Sure, they are rabid dogs when it comes to protecting their IP, but they'd much rather you watch their infomercials... er... movies than not.
Disney knows this already. It's the reason that The Disney Channel is free on every cable package. All of their movies, tv shows, and other media are merely advertisements for their other, more lucrative products.
As a former resident of NC, I call BS. Attorneys General are not puppets for the states. They are lawyers, but they're also elected (NOT appointed!) officials that offer legal advice and represent state governments in courts, but also have the right to represent the citizens of states and take legal action on their behalf as well. NC's Attorney General is also the state's highest law enforcement officer. They swear an oath not just to uphold NC state laws, but to uphold federal laws - and federal laws always take precedence. AGs have WIDE discretionary power to decide for themselves what action the state should take regarding legal challenges and court rulings.
As Attorney General, one can advise a state NOT to contest a federal ruling that strikes down the state ban. NC has no law compelling an Attorney General to contest federal rulings that strike down state laws, either.
http://www.ncdoj.gov/About-DOJ...
The AG of VA did nothing that his previous AGs hadn't already done - he chose not to contest a ruling. He did not fail in his duties. VA is trying to pass a law requiring the AG to defend the state's position, but good luck - as it's in conflict with the AG's responsibility to protect citizen's civil rights and uphold federal law. Any attempt to argue that the gay marriage bans are constitutional given the legal precedents set by even SCOTUS themselves would be spurious at best - and any good AG would advise against a lawsuit and not go forward with one.
http://www.washingtontimes.com...
NC is very upset with its AG for the statements he made declaring the state law indefensible as well as his personal belief that it's a bad law. Sure, he'll prepare the best case he can should the state force him to go to SCOTUS to defend their crap law, but anyone that's read the SCOTUS rulings and the federal court rulings based upon them knows there's no other way to interpret the law. SCOTUS will have to issue a ruling contrary to their earlier opinions for any state to have a chance to argue their marriage ban laws are constitutional within the framework they've been given.
http://equalitync.org/latest/n...
It should be noted that the NC AG is only now giving up after exhausting ALL options because all arguments his office has proposed have been rejected by various federal courts in other cases. To continue would be expensive and futile. The VA AG simply came to the same conclusion much earlier.
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/L...
Fun fact, words can have more than one spelling, and rigamarole is a perfectly acceptable spelling:
http://www.merriam-webster.com...
Also, it's a bit stupid to declare "rigmarole" as the proper spelling over "rigamarole" when the term itself is a colloquial bastardization of "ragman roll."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R...
That was... quite a wall of rambling text, so I apologize - was quite sleepy when I typed up that book above. lol.
But, to follow up:
Sony's Playstation 4 has never (to my knowledge) been modded and there are no hacks other than account sharing and cloning at the present time. It was released in Nov of 2013. I frequent homebrewer sites... and basically, they've given up trying to mod consoles altogether declaring the age of the mod chip over. People are also afraid of jail time as some have been charged with DMCA violations for selling mod chips.
The Playstation 3 was never modded either - it wasn't even really hacked as someone leaked the keys, so everyone used those to make software mods.
The hardware mods only worked b/c the manufacturers weren't expecting them. Now, they hide the internals better so you can't solder between chips and perform man-in-the-middle attacks. They also check firmware versions and test for mod chips, then disable online access if anything abnormal is found. I wouldn't say hardware modding is over yet, but it's getting there. Most mods I see these days are for controllers, not systems.
As for PC miniaturization, I thought this was impressive:
Look at the latest 12" Macbook motherboard:
http://cdn.cultofmac.com/wp-co...
http://i.imgur.com/19nDmFc.jpg
http://cdn.cultofmac.com/wp-co...
http://s3.amazonaws.com/digita...
It's smaller than a Raspberry Pi 2, and only a bit bigger than the tiny Iphone 6 motherboard. It holds a Dual Core Pentium M 1.2 Ghz with hyperthreading and turboboost to 2.6 ghz with 8 GB of RAM and Intel HD Graphics 5300 that supports the retina display.
This article basically goes on to say what I've been saying - you can't service this kind of device, you just replace the entire mobo if it breaks:
http://arstechnica.com/apple/2...
The system is hardly top of the line, but it does support the idea that the internals of PCs/laptops are shrinking to credit-card size at a rapid pace and that the current GHz speed plus a decent graphics chip are "good enough" for most people. The high end macbook pro and macbook air motherboards aren't much larger, really - just some additions for more I/O and fans. If it's that small now, just wait another 10 to 20 years. We already have the tech to put that entire mobo on a chip smaller than a dime, but it'd cost a fortune to design and get a decent yield off of a wafer that size.
Of course, in 10 to 20 years, desktops will be gone. We'll maybe have a something that looks like today's PCs acting as a "home media server" with lots of laptops, phones, and tablets that connect.. maybe all on the same domain or "home network" of some sort. Maybe a few small form factor devices like mac minis, roku, tivo, etc. None of the devices will be upgradable or repairable as it'd be cheaper to buy a new one than to bother. I expect in 30 years, all of them will be locked into one walled garden or another.
I'll grant you it seems a bit dystopian, but as someone who has been in the IT field for 20 years and has an engineering background and an MBA, I've seen this coming for a very long time... it's where things are going ; or, at the very least - where Microsoft is going to try to persuade everyone in the guise of it being for their own security. MS tried before with INTEL to create a "trusted computing" with signed boot loaders. They got it, but it can be turned off in the BIOS -- for now. There's been some discussion regarding whether or not MS will allow it to be disabled in their future Surface Pros.
As to the first law of computer security, look at Ipads and Iphones - Apple hardware and software with a locked bootloader and constant updates to patch the exploits used to jailbreak them. Jailbreaks used to come out within a few days of the IOS release, then a few weeks... now, it's been 4 months since 8.1.3 was released -- no jailbreak yet. If you upgraded to a version you can't jailbreak, you now can't go back to an earlier version as Apple has stopped signing the old firmware.
http://www.redmondpie.com/ios-...
But, Apple isn't sitting on its laurels. It's released 8.2, then 8.3, and soon 8.4 which is currently in beta. They're actively responding to jailbreaks - even calling the hacker teams by name that discovered the flaws and listing the specific exploits that have been patched. Hacker teams have even expressed their frustration as they've started to work on a possible exploit only to have Apple close the hole before releasing from BETA.
No one has a hardware hack for the Iphone or Ipad. It's all software exploits. Software will likely always have bugs, but Apple is hardening IOs against privilege escalation. I fear the low-hanging fruit is gone and jailbreaking will be a thing of the past for IOs in the very near future.
What's really telling is that my IT friends who used to jailbreak their Iphones (b/c it was cool... or they could hack it to install a browser with flash so they could watch HULU or some other such thing)... no longer care about jailbreaking their phones! They say it's too much trouble, they get stuck with older versions of IOs b/c the new ones aren't jailbroken yet... their TOS is invalidated if they have issues and want help at the Apple Store... and the Iphones really do everything they really want anyway without needing to jailbreak them. They've become accustomed to the DRM'd phone as-is!
If Apple can prevent jailbreaking their DRM'd Iphone and even get technically inclined (and pro-hacker, pro-pirate people at that) to not care their device is locked down, you bet MS could do the same for their Surface PRO and XBox.
But, it won't come as a hard sell. MS will say, "Here's an MS PC with MS OS, browser, office suite, games compatible with XBOX, Skype, etc etc... and it's locked down to only run our OS, our Apps, and a selection of approved apps through our store - and you must run all other non-approved programs in a sandbox/container/virtual machine so you can't get a virus from them. If you have a hardware or software issue, just call MS... and, if you upgrade to a new machine or have a hardware issue with your current one, your MS account has a record of your licenses and installation setup, so we can restore your PC (and your personal files are all backed up in the cloud for free through MS onedrive).
Don't think it won't happen -- Google practically did it themselves with Chromebooks.
Computers used to fill 2 story buildings, then a room, then a desktop PC... now most people are buying laptops that are desktop-replacements. Soon, our PCs may be as small as an Iphone. (the raspberry pi, arduino, mac mini, and a dozen other small form factors already exist). CPUs have incorporated math co-processors, modems, sound cards, gpus, northbridges, etc... it's only a matter of time before it's all system-on-a-chip the size of a credit card wit
I'm aware of the hardware and software mods... they're very inventive. On the whole, I agree with you that with current tech, DRM is relatively easy to circumvent.
I just don't agree that will be the case in the future.
Many of the bootloaders for systems took advantage of software vulnerabilities - mostly overflow bugs that would allow you to skirt the DRM. Those can be patched with updates. The hardware mods are necessary b/c the software mods are so easy to patch -- but, they require access to the motherboard and often a logic probe to determine how to create the mod in the first place. When we have system-on-a-chip, effectively the entire motherboard will be on one or more wafers of silicon encased on a housing. You won't be able to modify it without destroying it. It would be a monumental task like trying to add instructions to a CPU after it's been packaged.
In that future... if you have DRM, you're fucked. lol.
No. TFA states the new turbines cost half as much and can be spaced twice as dense as conventional blade style turbines. They capture 30% less energy than a conventional turbine, but considering you can put 2 in the same spot for roughly the same price as just one conventional turbine, you should get more energy for the same cost and land space.
In theory, lower total cost of ownership as well given the lack of moving parts to replace... but who knows what real-world issues the structure may see. Maybe the materials don't hold up as well as thought under heat, light, and vibration and will require maintenance or degrade their performance over time.
Oh, I hate DRM, and I generally agree with you regarding its pitfalls and shortcomings; but, when MS bakes the DRM into the EUFI/BIOS and couples that with DRM built into the CPU, it'll be quite a trick to hack the system... similar to how DirectTV is difficult to hack -- DRM'ed hardware plus encryption keys that rotate and updates that come with a self-destruct code should the update find a hardware or software issue. The PlayStation and Xbox already have safeguards that will disable a system from being able to play games on their networks if a system is identified as modified. MS will just use that to disable any pirated warez as well.
DRM, as you said, doesn't work when you can physically get to it -- but what do you do when the DRM is encased inside BIOS and CPU chips? You can't realistically crack them open and solder them... and you bet those will be hard to mod by design. You can't easily mod the software when the hard drive is an encrypted black box that only accepts encrypted updates via MS update either... and no user has admin/root access to modify system files.
As for the Intel laser tech, yes... it's awesome. It's totally cool that the pathways don't cause EM pulses that interfere with other pathways. It's also awesome that the light generally doesn't heat up the chips... downside is that it takes a lot of juice to produce a laser pulse.
Hardware tech currently is more concerned with lowering power usage and increasing battery storage capacities than in increasing CPU speed at the moment. Server farms would rather stack several slower low-power machines in a rack than use a single equivalent high speed system that was a power hog. It's a race to the lowest watt per flop right now in both mobile and server areas.
By the time INTEL gets around to using the fiber within the cpus, it'll have already had several die shrinks and probably have gone 3D chips... the most obvious use for the light circuit in them would be the clock pulse - chips today can suffer from race conditions and clock drift b/c the paths are so long and winding to deliver the clock pulses... go 3D, you shorten the paths... go fiber, you decrease the latency of the clock pulse reaching everywhere simultaneously. The clock pulse is already a power hog and produces a lot of heat, so it's a good target to replace.
I doubt we'll see fully optical chips except in fiber routers where decreasing the latency of the transmission takes precedence over the power consumption of the router. I do think we'll see, as INTEL has already stated, fiber from the CPU to other components - especially if they can use multimode fibers with different spectrum for each I/O port. Instead of all those trace lines from the CPU and capacitors and resistors all over, just one fiber to each chip it needs to talk to. PCBs will be much less complex and smaller - driving devices to be even smaller and more portable... again putting pressure on lower power & better batteries.
As for the foundries, TSMC is very competitive with INTEL in the 20nm and 28nm fabs... and catching up in the 14nm fabs. I expect INTEL will hit 7nm before TSMC. When Moore's Law ends, it'll likely be cheaper for INTEL to sell its fabs to TSMC than to run them themselves... so, as you say, they have to rely on their patents to survive.
All they have to do is continue to release SSE extensions or other MMX/SSE additions to the x86/amd64 architecture and license the tech to AMD (if they're still around) and others, and they get to extend their monopoly by another 14 years. It won't be hard - not like they have any serious competitors.
Depending on the state, sentences can even be active (prison time), probation, and/or community service. They can also be commuted so that the record shows you're guilty and sentenced to X years, but you serve no actual time. North Carolina has a "Prayer for Judgement Continued" option for judges to basically accept a guilty plea for even some felonies, yet give no punishment or sentence, so the person is guilty, but not convicted because a conviction requires a sentence. (This works by pleading guilty, praying for the judge to continue the judgement/sentencing at a later time - say 2 or 3 years from that date... and then the judge decides after that time not to sentence you if you have obeyed the law within that time frame.) Then, there's also deferred prosecution for first time offenders which many states have -- this lets you plead guilty to a crime, abide by certain rules, and then the prosecutor agrees not to take the case to trial and simply drops the charges after you've completed all the requirements. They then tear up your guilty plea and let you seal and/or expunge the record of your arrest, too.
I had a big, long, TL;DR reply for this, but Slashdot killed it. lol. Probably for the best as I tend to ramble on long posts.
Basically, Intel is already feeling the effects of diminishing returns from Moore's Law. They hit the max of 4 GHz over 10 years ago and have switched to focusing on system-on-a-chip things and multicore to make up for it... but, not a lot of software uses multi-core very well. I recently recycled a 12 year old laptop with a single core Pentium 4 - not because of the CPU exactly, but because neither the CPU nor the integrated GPU which I could not upgrade supported H.264. I could play 1080p MPEG2 just fine, but it struggled with 720p H.264 video with 90%CPU. Modern CPUs have H.264 support. Most are APUs with some sort of 4K video support and early H.265 as well. I have a couple desktops, but I have 5 laptops - the latest, I think will last me at least 10 years. It's a Republic of Gamers ASUS. Even if I replace it within 10 years, that just means my slowest laptop will be handed down to someone else. lol. I use the laptops mostly as media PCs connected to HDTVs.
Intel can shrink another 3 or 4 times, but then they're done. 3D chips are great for lower power, but they won't increase speed much - they also will require innovative liquid cooling between layers as they'll be a ball of hot wires otherwise. Optical transistors currently max out at 10 Ghz, but that's just 2x or 3x the silicon speed, and INTEL doesn't see any reason to use the tech save for CPU to mobo connections.... because the fiber optics require power hungry lasers that have their own drawbacks.
I don't think Intel laments the end of Moore's Law. I think they look forward to not having to overhaul their foundries every couple years with expensive new equipment that always comes with yield issues. That would save them an immense expense on production costs. Also, they still own a ton of patents and a huge foundry they can leverage to maintain their leadership. With their R&D, they can continue to put more crypto, graphics, and components on the chips and re-design them for decades even if they don't get die shrinks. They aren't even using the die shrinks to get faster chips right now - just lower power as that's where the money is right now. They are killing the near-bankrupt AMD on all fronts, but ARM is still the leader in the mobile market which is hot right now.
Desktops have about an 8 to 10 year life cycle (used to be 3 years, then 5 years, then 7.. now approaching 10). Consoles have a forced 6 or 7 year life cycle (PlayStation release every 6 years, but it takes time... a year or more for people to buy in masse) Even Intel engineers see a future as early as 10 to 20 years from now where that life cycle extends to 15 or 20 years... and eventually even longer.
This is why most PC manufacturers are leaving the market as it's now a commodity - HP almost stopped making PCs a few years ago, but decided against it. IBM quit and sent their customers to Lenovo. Dell lost money for years and had its stock price fall until it went private (partly with MS loans) Now Dell has a huge pile of debt and may exit PCs for just corporate server and laptop contracts. HP, ACER, and Lenovo are most of what's left... and I bet MS would buy ACER in a heartbeat (likely after ACER trounces Lenovo or acquires it). HP, I dunno... I bet MS would let HP keep the server space if it gave MS the consumer space.
Why do I think this? Welll.... MS bought Nokia... and they make Surface and Surface Pros. They also make XBOX Ones -- which are modified low-end 8 core AMD DRM'd PCs with Radeon 7000 graphics that support 4K resolution. They also share a code base between Win 10, XBOX, and Windows Phone... and are giving away the phone OS while releasing Win 10 for free for users with Win 7 or higher. I can only guess that MS finally recognized that most people buy OSes with their new PCs and the OEMs and businesses pay for those licenses. It's pointless to fragment their user base
I wasn't aware SD had a lameness filter... In any case, I don't think your post was lame at all imho. :-) You make some very good points. I also have emulators on my PC and use a controller for them. Yay!
I didn't mean to imply that the PC was going away - simply that MS would prefer you buy their Surface line of products in conjunction with their Xbox and Windows Phone which they could lock down through DRM and tie to an online account they can control rather than have myriad hardware configurations of a PC to support - at least on the consumer side. Corporate users are a separate issue, but they also tend to purchase large numbers of fairly homogeneous boxen.
I don't see the benefit from MS's perspective of opening up their walled garden of game+Xbox to game+anyrandomWindowsBox. They can quickly modify an Xbox remotely to deal with bugs, hacks, or upgrades without worrying about interfering with any random windows setup (assuming a user would allow the update necessary to make that change on their PC.
Homogeneity is the key. Apple's hardware is largely homogeneous. Xbox hardware and software is homogeneous. PCs are anything but. It's hard to code for that, difficult to support, and even harder to push mandatory updates towards.
Also, game makers can enjoy making users pay for the same game TWICE if they want to play on Xbox and their Windows box. Ports between them aren't trivial, but not difficult either, so a thoughtful recode and recompile to make a port isn't expensive. Why would game makers (MS included ie HALO) want their games to be so portable? They'd also have to make sure the same portable game was coded to run on the slowest/weakest hardware, but possibly would ramp up to use the best hardware depending on the system... and deal with possible customer backlash over it running worse on one system or another.
Gah... I just see the whole idea as a bit of a nightmare until we reach the end of Moore's Law and can have fairly homogeneous hardware for coders to work with. There won't be much need for specialized cheap hardware for consoles when every PC and console has basically the same CPU/GPU/RAM/BUS configuration 30 or 40 years from now. Should be trivial to port games when hopefully every system is running some form of Linux on OpenGL graphics, too ;-) *fingers crossed for STEAMBOX*
I think there's more to it that you seem to be glossing over.
Console gameplay is inherently different than PC gameplay because of the standard inputs: keyboard + mouse vs controller. Games have been redesigned to suit those I/O methods so that the PC version of a game is very different than the console version. Even with network play, Xbox will separate PC gamers from console players so that the PC gamers don't have an unfair advantage. Specifically, some games, you can highlight multiple units with a mouse and save those units as a group on an F1 key, then toggle between multiple groups of units from F1 to F12, but on the console, you cannot.
Xbox games are very easy to port to PC and vice versa, but there's some tweaking for the user experience done as well.
You also gloss over the hardware issue. Historically, many console games were designed specifically for the hardware they ran on - even taking advantage of CPU errata and other bugs as well as race conditions and timing issues which would not exist on any other configuration. Switching from Xbox to PC may not be as simple as switching out a driver or two - you may have to emulate other hardware nuances, too.
Not saying it can't be done. Emulators for consoles are easy to find for the PC. DirectX, x86 or AMD64 architecture, and similar code base in Xbox and Windows should make it much simpler to port, but games would have to be aware of whether they have keyboard + mouse or joystick to provide the proper interface options for the game and match people online fairly - and take into account any nuances between the Xbox and the PC setup with drivers and/or emulation.
Frankly, I think Microsoft has no interest in opening up their Xbox platform to other devices. They can DRM the heck out of the box and give homogeneous specs to publishers to code for. Game companies can already port their games to PCs if they wish. There's no reason for MS to bother.
MS sees the XBox as an entertainment portal - a Windows Media Center of sorts that can play Netflix and other content as well as games. If anything, I think they'd prefer your PC die by the wayside and everyone own an XBox, a Windows Phone, and a Surface instead -- all DRM locked down, controlled by MS and sync'ed to your Microsoft Account online.
I think jellomizer was referring to the fact that hormonal adolescents who do not yet have a fully formed prefrontal cortex have a much higher incidence of indulging in risky, violent, and/or unwise behavior as compared to fully grown adults due to the fact that they lack both the experience and the actual brain grey matter to fully think things through which would help inhibit such adolescent behavior. That does not excuse such behavior, but it does not mean we should treat children as if they were adults who generally have a better ability to control and channel their emotions.
I'm unsure why you believe "adult behavior" is on par with teenage adolescent behavior simply because adults can and do engage in similar behaviors (though it is worth noting that often when adults do this sort of thing, their judgement is impaired by alcohol or drugs which puts them into a more uninhibited mental state similar to juveniles). Psychologists would strongly disagree with you if you're making the case that adults and teenagers have the same incidence of such behavior.
You don't treat a 5 year old like you would a 12 year old... nor a 12 year old like a 16 year old. Even still, one should not treat a 15 year old like an 18 or 21 year old.
Personally, I say send the boy to counseling and to juvenile detention, make the family pay restitution. Wipe his record and seal it when he turns 18 so he can have a normal life. Maybe he'll make better decisions when his brain is fully formed and learn from his mistakes. Maybe not. Giving him a felony record and shoving him in a state prison with hardened felons is not great way to reform this child. It may just turn him into a lifetime criminal with new criminal connections and no job prospects due to his record.
Wow, that was a lot of hogwash. lol.
When you are born into a country, you must obey that country's laws. Welcome to the planet Earth. I didn't choose to have the legal drinking age set for me at 21 in SC... but it is... and it was when I was born. Not just myself, but EVERYONE's right to self-determination is removed when you live in a country with laws - you are restricted by those laws, right or wrong. The Hawaiians born today are Americans by birth - and if they're of Hawaiian ancestry, they have additional rights to live on the Hawaiian Homelands if they choose. They even get minority status grants and such.
The ancient Hawaiian society is a myth - by the time the USA took over, the islands were heavily populated by foreigners and even the kingdom which was only around for a short time was built by subjugating tribes itself!
As for your hilarious argument about stealing from families generations ago, MY FAMILY had its houses BURNED during the Civil War - because we helped slaves escape to the north. Exactly whom should I call to get the large plantation houses rebuilt that society apparently OWES me?!?! No one! But then, I didn't buy those lands or build those houses in the first place, so who is anyone to say that simply because my ancestors owned something that was taken away from them that I am somehow the grieved party?
Also, take note that while you seem to imply that Americans are proud of our rebellion, yet deny others the same rebellion -- we also put down our own rebellious states in our Civil War. Personally, I believe the USA should have some legislative process for succession - not because I necessarily support any particular succession, but because there should at least be a process for it. Say if Hawaii were to decide to succeed and become an independent country or join the British Commonwealth. There should be a process of ratifying that succession peacefully.
I would never imply that the USA is perfect - or even that it is right in many of the international politics it plays. I'm just a realist. We can't turn back the clock and we can't bow to pressure from "natives" just because their ancestors were there first. If two people are born in Hawaii - one of European descent and another of native descent, why should the one of native descent have any greater say in such issues? They're both Americans! You know, democracy is one person, one vote -- we don't weight the votes by ancestry.
I have no idea what Pa'i'ai is, but I shall have to put it on my list of things to try next! :-)
I hear spam is much more popular than the poi there, but It could be a myth as I haven't seen any polling data to back it up - just anecdotal evidence. haha.
I have no issues with people protesting. I've had friends that got extra credit in their humanities studies for protesting, though so I find such uninformed student protests dubious.
I don't mean to imply that there is no sense of injustice with the US occupation of the island, but I see it as historical fact, not something we can turn back the clock on. Same with the Native Americans - terrible track record with wars (including biological warfare) and breaking peace treaties, trail of tears, etc. etc. But, their small consolation is the reservations and today, many of my friends are 1/4 or 1/8th of Native American descent. "Pure" native american populations have been declining for a long time and more of them identify as Americans rather than members of their native tribes. What's done is done, and it's too late for the Natives to have a say in who builds what on what mountaintop that someone else owns.
That's why I say the religious route is a good argument. The mountain should have been protected as part of the agreement to make the Hawaiian Homelands if it's sacred... but still, no one would stand for someone destroying Jerusalem or Mecca - even if the destroyers rightfully owned the land. I'm sure there's a way to lobby for protected status if it's that important.
Heck, I think Hawaii is gorgeous and maybe we shouldn't built giant telescopes on pretty mountains anyway ;-) I'm sure the locals could make a zoning ordinance to scrap the construction easily.
I just don't think the simple fact that they're of native descent should hold much weight in the decision. I mean, who cares who their parents and grandparents were - they're Americans living in Hawaii now and if they choose to live a traditional Hawaiian lifestyle, they can live on the reservations... er... "homelands."
The Hawaiian Kingdom folks in particular are a bit nutty and want to "end the US occupation" of Hawaii.
http://www.hawaiiankingdom.org... I have a hard time taking them seriously - especially since they're hypocritical in thinking that because the kingdom usurped other tribal lands and conquered the islands that they're the true stewards of Hawaii and not the USA which, in turn, usurped them.
Actually, I've known about the "reservations" on Hawaii for decades. Interesting how you're an anonymous coward that presumes to know me and what I know.
The luau wasn't a hotel one... geez... I don't think the hotel had the space for it anyway. Never claimed to be an expert on Hawaii btw - but at least I've visited and taken an interest unlike most armchair pundits.
1893 was 122 years ago. I sympathize with the actual natives living at the time, but they aren't alive anymore. Six "generations" later, I don't think anyone is entitled to reparations. There is an unspoken statute of limitations on this sort of thing. Not a single disgruntled Hawaiian today was born knowing anything other than living with the reality of the rule of the USA - same as any other citizen born in the USA. Why should their ancestry or DNA give them any privilege?
Did you know that my native South Carolina was once a British colony? Seems the demographics shifted a bit over time and the rebels stole her away to form the USA.... then she broke off that yoke to form a Confederacy with many other states... and was attacked by the USA and again re-absorbed into the union.
Should I as a native South Carolinian get reparations for not being part of the British Commonwealth? or the Confederacy? Nonsense.
I believe the Hawaiian Homelands is sufficient restitution.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H...
Let's not forget that the Kingdom of Hawaii was forged from bloodshed, war, and usurping land itself from OTHER natives on various islands -- and it was a rather short-lived kingdom that lasted less than 100 years. Seems odd to opine for the bad old days of bloody island warfare and subjugation that spanned less time than the state of Hawaii has existed. Throughout the history of the world, countries have come and go. Hawaii was taken over by an internal rebellion - granted, mostly consisting of settled foreigners... but, still -- they lived there, so I can't fault them for fighting to become a state.
I've visited the lovely land of Hawaii. Beautiful place... the luau I attended was fantastic. I was served poi. Disgusting stuff that makes paper mache paste sound delicious (though the other food was quite good). The native serving the poi said "yeah, this is the nasty stuff we used to eat before foreigners visited the island. POI -- I assume it was named for the sound you make when you spit it out of your mouth.. poi poi poi."
But, I digress. I see all this Kingdom of Hawaii stuff as merely delusional fantasies of people's ancestral rights to govern themselves rather than appease the country they actually live within. I think the religious desecration angle is a more convincing argument if they truly believe the land is sacred.
Ah, I should clarify - I did not mean to imply most of the budget isspent on the military, but most of the DEBT Americans owe went towards the military - specifically IRAQ and Afghanistan wars alone are estimated to be around 3 or 4 trillion... plus the interest on that debt, and of course, yearly military spending (not that I don't think our military is important, but we do spend more than all other nations on Earth combined... and our Navy alone is larger than the next 7 largest Naval fleets combined.)
http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/27/...
um... no.
You are ALREADY paying for everyone using health care that cannot pay for it themselves. Most ERs cannot refuse anyone - even if they just have the sniffles. Hospitals have gone bankrupt because of this. You are paying through medicare/medicaid and through higher insurance premiums and medical fees... because so many never pay, but do recehive service. People who even have insurance have gone bankrupt because of medical fees - it's the leading cause of bankruptcy in the USA!
Different systems for different situations. I don't know about where you live, but many places have non-profit, government utilities that generate electricity. It's not single-payer because people pay what they use. Insurance does not and has never worked that way. Everyone pays in and it pays out only to those that need it when they need it in the amount they need it. Obviously it would be regulated to avoid abuse, but no one is going to break their bones just because - hey, they can get them re-set and in a cast for free! Woot!
Your comparison of government run electricity single payer and government run health insurance single payer makes zero sense.
You also fail to take into account that because we don't subsidize basic health care, people who have no insurance tend to have conditions that could have been treatable with a simple cheap checkup, but due to neglect their conditions festered and became expensive to treat -- ended up in the Emergency room and boom -- their huge bill became your bill b/c they can't pay. I'd rather our tax dollars pay for everyone to have regular teeth cleaning than to use them to pay for expensive oral surgeries and teeth removal, for instance.
Please work on your logic skills - they are lacking, you coward
FedEX and UPS have zero desire to take over the envelope business. You're clueless as to how inexpensive it is to send a letter from Hawaii to Florida via US Mail. Try that via FedEx - even put it in a box first...
The US Mail has a duty to deliver to each and every address for the cost of a stamp - and visit each and every address multiple times per week to not only deliver, but pick up mail. Good luck convincing any corporation that it would be a profitable business plan to compete in that market even if it were allowed.
I won't argue with you on the Medicaid/Medicare issue - my uncle tells me all the time the grief the govt gives him - but, his issue isn't the dollar amount so much as the regulations for the coding and paperwork. They have very specific forms that do not correspond well to usual medical coding and billing, and if not completed perfectly, they don't get paid at ALL.
There can NEVER be a FREE market for health care... it's inherently impossible. If you have a life-threatening situation like a heart attack, you must be sent by ambulance to usually the nearest facility and be worked on by the available physician and surgeon. You are in one physical location, and your health care options are tied to that location/region. Each region can only operate so many full health service options like hospitals. This inherently lends itself to a monopoly or oligopoly situation. Insurance COULD, in theory, be a free market, but it is not currently. There are laws preventing the insurance companies from selling nation-wide insurance plans and compete with one another more directly. I am not opposed to that idea, but why bother? We could simply have a federal insurance that says basic care is covered by taxes (who cares if you pay insurers directly or through your taxes? It's still money paid from tax payers to health care workers - and you pay anyway for basic health care for uninsured as most hospitals MUST treat all emergency medical issues whether people can pay or not. That comes out of your pocket from govt subsidies and higher insurance premiums and medical costs anyway)
Everything else in your post regarding good doctors is a fearmongering myth. The doctors I know are good doctors because they love helping people and saving lives, not because of the income. Some even work for doctors without borders and do charity mission work. If you want to help doctors out, help them refinance their student loans - or better yet, subsidize them!
I have lived in multiple states - NC, SC, and TN. I was in and out of the DMV in no time flat each time I moved. Don't know where you live, but maybe your state should invest more in their DMV if you have issues.
I've found TN to be particularly efficient. They have an electronic queue in Knoxville, TN branches, full staff, and no wait times.