However they seem to have done a fair job of arranging the data in a manner that emulates word span. Though, their formatting forces you into a 2-3word span, which would be frustrating if you were used to a more liberal 6 to 7 word span.
Oh well, I don't think this will go anywhere due to printing arrangement problems and broken page down keys.
They weren't forced to buy anything, they were encouraged to buy shares under the premise that they would make a lot of money.
They ignored the first rule of investing; if something is going to make you a lot of money very quickly, there's a shitload of risk hidden in there somewhere.
They got jacked by their own greed. A very common affliction during the dot-bomb era. Unfortunately, 'creative accounting' didn't die with the dot-coms so you have watch your ass even more carefully.
I probably didn't illustrate to a great enough depth. (My wife complains of this frequently.)
Real-Estate isn't the hedge. It's an investment medium, of a different yield, but no different.
My hedge, and life lesson isn't money at all, it's the priority of effort. There is no law of physics governing the return of capital based on effort expended. However, the primacy of work and family in a moral ethos does guarantee a return. My father and I pay for the welfare of my two uncles and their children, both who've had very terrible happenstances visited upon them. My brothers help out when they can.
Thus, our wealth is increasing, and my cousins, who would otherwise be victims to destitution are able to enjoy a fairly normal childhood, and if they so choose, an education and a life far greater than their fathers could have dreamed.
That's worth busting your ass for. In all of that I still find time to be involved in competitive athletics, and my father and I have coached two nationally ranked rec teams in the last five years.
So, go ahead and believe that working for 42-45hrs a week is working hard, and that your investment acumen will save you ahead of all else. Me? I'll still be betting on iron will.
However, if instead of sitting on your overly bloated ego you worked your ass of _and_ invested the gains of that labor, then you and yours have a great hope of sitting pretty. See, your plan puts you at the mercy of the market. My plan puts me at the mercy of no man. My father and I have stitched together a business renovating and managing properties, all the while using our knowledge of the area and very stingy accounting to purchase properties at far below their market value. After that we add some value through renovation and regain our capital through increased rents or sale value.
WE do this while I work a full-time job that pays exceptionally well, and he just puts a lot more hours into the family business. That work ethic will preserve our children and our children's children... My great-grandfather stayed in OK during the dust-bowl years, and guess what he found? Hard working men with grit and knowledge stayed employed and fed their families, whereas the noveau rich or the intelligentsia had to swallow their pride and live on the dole, or go off to work camps because they had no chance of keeping up with a man that knew real work.
So, you keep on putting your money in the hands of people that could care less about your welfare, while me and mine continue taking everything we can out of world, holding it in the ironclad grip of endless drive.
Incidentally, your thought that 42-45hrs of work per week is hard work exposes your weakness... You have no concept of what hard work is. A sad state of affairs.
The family of the GP understands the truth and ownership of work. Maybe someday you'll have to learn as well.
I will disagree with you there. $59,000 is a pittance compared to the campaign funds. Considering the number of people that the campaign will reach through this site, it becomes an smaller number still.
What probably happened was: Obama finds out what this guy wants. He hears the number and balks. Someone finds out that MySpace will probably just take it from the originator and give it to the Obama campaign admins. They retract offer under the ostensible reason that the required price was unreasonable.
Sucks... Tis the cost of playing in someone else's sandbox.
# Open systems are customarily defined as those systems that can be supplied by hardware components from multiple vendors, and whose software can be operated from different platforms. They are opposite to closed or proprietary systems. dereng.com/tlas_glossary.htm
# Open Systems is used to describe information systems with the following characteristics: - the products used conform to relevant internationally agreed standards; - the standards are non-exclusive, non-proprietary and vendor independent; - applications can be moved as necessary between systems of different makes and sizes; - usable information can be exchanged when required between different Systems.
Are you not familiar with the term Open as in multiplatform? Go work at a shop that had a lot of mainframes and you'll broaden your definition of Open systems very quickly.
Clarity of vision is often increased by opening one's eyes.
Perhaps? However, what if we are just increasing the chance of acute exposure? You can metabolize mercury in small amounts over time. However, if the concentrations were to rise locally via a nearby landfill, you would not be able to cope and then you'd die.
Overall, it seems like the power plant would be more safe as the exhaust will tend to be distributed over a much larger area than, say, a landfill.
Although, those of us that live in expensive home probably live in an area where we'll never feel the negative affects on the area around the 'fill.
Or perhaps you aren't looking at the deeper philosophy of the problem? I am anti-abortion. I am also a state's rights person. Are those two goals opposite? Hardly. I think that groups of people should be allowed to form their own laws as long as they conform to the guidelines set down for our federation of states. So, I can live in a state that makes abortion illegal, and you can live in another one. We vote with our feet. Easy enough?
Regarding the very shaky argument of constructing a dichotomy within the platform of supporting the death penalty while opposing abortion. You'll find that the logic is consistent when you adopt an ethos of personal responsibility. When you have killed, molested, raped, or otherwise earned a death penalty, I am doing nothing more than meting out the rewards of your behavior. My burden is that I must be able to prove your guilt to prevent an overextension of the powers of the state so that they are not used unjustly.
Just so, if a person becomes pregnant, 99% of the time it was a consensual act that resulted in that condition. Less than 1% of abortions are therapeutic, meaning rape, incest, or medically necessary. Although Planned Parenthood is doing their part to increase that rate by including a feeling of psychological well-being as a 'therapeutic' treatment.
Also the screens for malformities and defects, including Down's, are getting far more aggressive.
Any which way that you look at it, it ends up that the majority of the fetuses are killed for being there at all, which is no fault of their own. Half of all abortions are performed on women who have had a previous abortions, which means that Planned Parenthood and friends have done their part to sell it as birth control.
To whit, does anyone remember when the argument was, "Abortion isn't birth control, it's a last measure procedure."? Recently, I have seen Planned Parenthood billboards that say, "Birth control is painless." WTF?
In my experience, CA companies in general, and companies with large names in particular are not very generous with benefits. The name on your resume is part of the compensation.
Luckily, I now work for a Fortune 10 company whose benefits are outstanding. They are an oil company with a long heritage of treating their employees right. A friend of mine worked for them back in the day, and his AC died in midsummer in TX. This company sent out AC repair guys to their house and had the AC repaired, on the company's dime. That's what happens when you have a network of people who care about you and yours.
Some of that has been scaled back, but we do have free athletics (basketball court, 8 lane Olympic length pool, well provisioned weight room, hot sauna, whirlpool spa), savings match plan at 9.25%, bonus up to 15%, health-care, vision plan, flexible spending plan matching, and a slew of other benefits including use of the facilities (athletic and health-care) if you retire from the company for the rest of your life.
They also recognize the value of hiring experienced employees. I was hired on with 12yrs credit toward retirement and vacation accrual.
That's why I moved back to the land where people still actually care about you...
Interestingly I have seen several anthropologists put forth a similar scenario as to why we are homo sapiens sapiens and not homo neanderthalensis.
They were likely faster and stronger, and possibly just as intelligent. However, they maintained a much greater muscle mass and lower bodyfat. Thus increased scarcity at the peak of the last Ice Age starved them out. Our greater ability to store fat saved our bacon...
Kind of reminds me of the primary element in "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers". In a review of economic and military knowledge of the great empires 1500-2000, the author found that an overly restrictive society forced innovation outside of its borders and thus was left behind in the annals of history.
Sucks to see it in action. The auto-industry(unions), the airline industry(unions), and now the ??AA(union of truly evil bastards) are attempting to close down our society and force innovation abroad. Oh well, it had to end sometime...
I think the problem would be more accurately stated as; Microsoft saw a revenue opportunity and chased it using Time-To-Market as the indicator of success.
They could have created a similar product with a similar feature-set and performed better as a software company if they had learned the lessons of the past (UNIX) and learned them early. Modularity rules all other design concepts. I hear they are picking up the banner of modularity but I certainly am not banking on it.
That is why the Unix mentality produces such a wide-use platform whilst Windows practically has to reinvent itself whenever it wishes to embrace a new technology.
This bug and its children are an example of that mentality and design choice.
I'm going to assume that you haven't really been observing your cats then. I currently have two, at one time or another I have had four. I also cat-sit and help re-domesticate feral cats for adoption...
My 20lb Bombay mix killed a cat that would not submit to him after it got it's ass whupped. It kept attacking, escalating the scale of violence until my cat found it intolerable and ended the problem. Unfortunately, I knew they were having issues but I didn't think they kill over it. I figured they'd end up avoiding each other...
Also, my Bombay (the far more expressive of the pair. The Bengal is more feral and reserved) gets pissed off when I remove him from something he was doing... often he will chew on the skull of the Bengal in retaliation.
Don't romanticize the nature of animals. It does no good to lie to yourself or others about the nature of a thing. Primitive human cultures were not beautiful pastoral utopias dotted throughout the planet living in harmony with nature. They killed, made war, used nature for whatever seemed useful, and died.
Apes are apes... They are very interesting, use tools, have sex for fun, can use a mirror... but they will still bite your face off and dismember your genitalia if they don't like the way you smell.
Love animals, work with them and appreciate their unique nature, but don't confuse them for humans.
Actually you're just looking at the surface of the issue...
You see, I am a person who simplifies my life because I am concerned that I may have only one trip. So I want to make the most of it. As an exercise I will respond to your post... "If I'm watching a movie, I'm not doing anything useful." Unless it is of educational content, agreed.
"If I'm working, I'm not doing anything useful." Interesting argument, but invalid. Useful implies that there is a product, some _work_ is being done. Just based on the simple meanings of the words you argument fails.
"If I'm hanging out with my friends, I'm not doing anything useful." Define 'hanging out'. Watching sports whilst consuming processed foods and beverages... Agreed. Discussing philosophy, technical merits of various scenarios, and/or insights on how to handle various life situations... See definition of useful again.
"If I'm playing tennis, I'm not doing anything useful." Far more useful than listening to music, if for nothing more that cardiovascular health.
"If I'm posting on Slashdot, I'm not doing anything useful." Gives me a moment to take pause and maybe make people think about things that they might not have thought of on their own i.e. [[You're honestly the first person I've ever heard say anything like that. And couldn't that be said about pretty much anything?]]
Usefulness is definitely personal and has several gradients...
No art or entertainment is essential. Imagine a wasteland where every moment is spent on keeping your spent husk of a body going... That sort of focus is primal and priceless.
When I die, I don't plan on leaving a corpse... just a burned out husk.
Actually working with Windows is voluntary. I work in a Winders free environment. I admin 300 or so firewalls (PIX, Nokia IPSO/CKP-NGX, or SPLAT/NGX), 20 IPS/IDS (Cisco, SourceFire), a cadre of Linux boxes (logging, SNMP, SMTP relay, NetFlow aggregation), and my workstations (Debian).
I have managed to not admin a single Winders installation for the last 7yrs. (Except for a favor to a buddy.)
Everything is voluntary, are you willing to do the work to get what you want?
And the greater question is... Is it an undo burden by the school on the student? Can the school legally force the student to consign their work to the intellectual property of a non-public third party?
Interesting... So what you're saying that it would make more sense for them to lay off the bottom off their workforce. Whatever that number would be... considering an employee who has been there longer might also have other costly benefits, such as medical, dental, and vacation.
So, back to my statement, You would rather they lay off ~8000(out-of-thin-air) employees so that service would degrade, less work would get done, and then the store ends up losing more money until they finally shrink their workforce down to the one very highly paid chap that closes the door on the last day?
As a business owner, you have to look at what asset gets the least return per dollar spent and figure out a way to get that dollar back. This is their best shot. Perhaps, in a year's time, or whenever they recover their footing they can pay their associates slightly more than the other Box-stores but provide a higher degree of service and efficiency, all the while keeping more people gainfully employed.
I hope that the OSU in you nick isn't Oklahoma State, I would think the Cow-Pokes could teach economics and business acumen more effectively than that.
Nope. Not a single one. Who cares? If I'm sitting on my ass listening to music, I'm not doing something useful.
It can be a nice accompaniment, but essential? Hardly. In fact, meditative silence or the sounds of the natural world are always far more refreshing.
This is coming from a guy who used to make some coin playing bass and rhythm guitar for a local band. My dad played Viola for the philharmonic and my little brother is enjoying a scholarship for vocals and drama.
Get a clue man! Music like any other entertainment is transient in it's value.
Can me a cynic or heartless or whatever. I don't really find that art benefits society as a whole by making money anyway... The music that has meant the most to me were passed down folk-tunes, and classical music that was paid for by audiences and sponsors.
Nobody has a right to make money. They depend solely upon the perception that their product is worth paying for. If a very talented performer needs more songs or scores... they'll pay the writer and make up the diff in ticket prices. It's business not welfare.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually more than a few of the "OIL" companies are really "ENERGY" companies, and they have more than ample assets in nuclear fuels.
They hedged that bet a long time ago.
So, fission, fusion, whatever the "ENERGY" companies have expertise and resources to do it on a huge scale, which will net them a profit...
Corporations are smarter than you think... for the most part.
That was my first response.
However they seem to have done a fair job of arranging the data in a manner that emulates word span.
Though, their formatting forces you into a 2-3word span, which would be frustrating if you were used to a more liberal 6 to 7 word span.
Oh well, I don't think this will go anywhere due to printing arrangement problems and broken page down keys.
One nit to pick.
They weren't forced to buy anything, they were encouraged to buy shares under the premise that they would make a lot of money.
They ignored the first rule of investing; if something is going to make you a lot of money very quickly, there's a shitload of risk hidden in there somewhere.
They got jacked by their own greed. A very common affliction during the dot-bomb era. Unfortunately, 'creative accounting' didn't die with the dot-coms so you have watch your ass even more carefully.
I probably didn't illustrate to a great enough depth. (My wife complains of this frequently.)
Real-Estate isn't the hedge. It's an investment medium, of a different yield, but no different.
My hedge, and life lesson isn't money at all, it's the priority of effort. There is no law of physics governing the return of capital based on effort expended. However, the primacy of work and family in a moral ethos does guarantee a return. My father and I pay for the welfare of my two uncles and their children, both who've had very terrible happenstances visited upon them. My brothers help out when they can.
Thus, our wealth is increasing, and my cousins, who would otherwise be victims to destitution are able to enjoy a fairly normal childhood, and if they so choose, an education and a life far greater than their fathers could have dreamed.
That's worth busting your ass for. In all of that I still find time to be involved in competitive athletics, and my father and I have coached two nationally ranked rec teams in the last five years.
So, go ahead and believe that working for 42-45hrs a week is working hard, and that your investment acumen will save you ahead of all else. Me? I'll still be betting on iron will.
If you're lucky.
However, if instead of sitting on your overly bloated ego you worked your ass of _and_ invested the gains of that labor, then you and yours have a great hope of sitting pretty. See, your plan puts you at the mercy of the market. My plan puts me at the mercy of no man. My father and I have stitched together a business renovating and managing properties, all the while using our knowledge of the area and very stingy accounting to purchase properties at far below their market value. After that we add some value through renovation and regain our capital through increased rents or sale value.
WE do this while I work a full-time job that pays exceptionally well, and he just puts a lot more hours into the family business. That work ethic will preserve our children and our children's children... My great-grandfather stayed in OK during the dust-bowl years, and guess what he found? Hard working men with grit and knowledge stayed employed and fed their families, whereas the noveau rich or the intelligentsia had to swallow their pride and live on the dole, or go off to work camps because they had no chance of keeping up with a man that knew real work.
So, you keep on putting your money in the hands of people that could care less about your welfare, while me and mine continue taking everything we can out of world, holding it in the ironclad grip of endless drive.
Incidentally, your thought that 42-45hrs of work per week is hard work exposes your weakness... You have no concept of what hard work is. A sad state of affairs.
The family of the GP understands the truth and ownership of work. Maybe someday you'll have to learn as well.
I will disagree with you there. $59,000 is a pittance compared to the campaign funds. Considering the number of people that the campaign will reach through this site, it becomes an smaller number still.
What probably happened was: Obama finds out what this guy wants. He hears the number and balks. Someone finds out that MySpace will probably just take it from the originator and give it to the Obama campaign admins. They retract offer under the ostensible reason that the required price was unreasonable.
Sucks... Tis the cost of playing in someone else's sandbox.
Unfortunately for China and fortunately for the US, it's locked position. Neither gov't benefits by injuring the other's economic status.
That will change... soon, but for now it's a deadlock.
Hopefully, the US manages to dig itself out before the debt becomes an unbearable burden. Only time will tell.
I hate to reply to my own post but:
# Open systems are customarily defined as those systems that can be supplied by hardware components from multiple vendors, and whose software can be operated from different platforms. They are opposite to closed or proprietary systems.
dereng.com/tlas_glossary.htm
# Open Systems is used to describe information systems with the following characteristics: - the products used conform to relevant internationally agreed standards; - the standards are non-exclusive, non-proprietary and vendor independent; - applications can be moved as necessary between systems of different makes and sizes; - usable information can be exchanged when required between different Systems.
Are you not familiar with the term Open as in multiplatform? Go work at a shop that had a lot of mainframes and you'll broaden your definition of Open systems very quickly.
Clarity of vision is often increased by opening one's eyes.
Perhaps? However, what if we are just increasing the chance of acute exposure? You can metabolize mercury in small amounts over time. However, if the concentrations were to rise locally via a nearby landfill, you would not be able to cope and then you'd die.
Overall, it seems like the power plant would be more safe as the exhaust will tend to be distributed over a much larger area than, say, a landfill.
Although, those of us that live in expensive home probably live in an area where we'll never feel the negative affects on the area around the 'fill.
Or perhaps you aren't looking at the deeper philosophy of the problem? I am anti-abortion. I am also a state's rights person. Are those two goals opposite? Hardly. I think that groups of people should be allowed to form their own laws as long as they conform to the guidelines set down for our federation of states. So, I can live in a state that makes abortion illegal, and you can live in another one. We vote with our feet. Easy enough?
Regarding the very shaky argument of constructing a dichotomy within the platform of supporting the death penalty while opposing abortion. You'll find that the logic is consistent when you adopt an ethos of personal responsibility. When you have killed, molested, raped, or otherwise earned a death penalty, I am doing nothing more than meting out the rewards of your behavior. My burden is that I must be able to prove your guilt to prevent an overextension of the powers of the state so that they are not used unjustly.
Just so, if a person becomes pregnant, 99% of the time it was a consensual act that resulted in that condition. Less than 1% of abortions are therapeutic, meaning rape, incest, or medically necessary. Although Planned Parenthood is doing their part to increase that rate by including a feeling of psychological well-being as a 'therapeutic' treatment.
Also the screens for malformities and defects, including Down's, are getting far more aggressive.
Any which way that you look at it, it ends up that the majority of the fetuses are killed for being there at all, which is no fault of their own. Half of all abortions are performed on women who have had a previous abortions, which means that Planned Parenthood and friends have done their part to sell it as birth control.
To whit, does anyone remember when the argument was, "Abortion isn't birth control, it's a last measure procedure."? Recently, I have seen Planned Parenthood billboards that say, "Birth control is painless."
WTF?
In my experience, CA companies in general, and companies with large names in particular are not very generous with benefits. The name on your resume is part of the compensation.
Luckily, I now work for a Fortune 10 company whose benefits are outstanding. They are an oil company with a long heritage of treating their employees right. A friend of mine worked for them back in the day, and his AC died in midsummer in TX. This company sent out AC repair guys to their house and had the AC repaired, on the company's dime. That's what happens when you have a network of people who care about you and yours.
Some of that has been scaled back, but we do have free athletics (basketball court, 8 lane Olympic length pool, well provisioned weight room, hot sauna, whirlpool spa), savings match plan at 9.25%, bonus up to 15%, health-care, vision plan, flexible spending plan matching, and a slew of other benefits including use of the facilities (athletic and health-care) if you retire from the company for the rest of your life.
They also recognize the value of hiring experienced employees. I was hired on with 12yrs credit toward retirement and vacation accrual.
That's why I moved back to the land where people still actually care about you...
Interestingly I have seen several anthropologists put forth a similar scenario as to why we are homo sapiens sapiens and not homo neanderthalensis.
They were likely faster and stronger, and possibly just as intelligent. However, they maintained a much greater muscle mass and lower bodyfat. Thus increased scarcity at the peak of the last Ice Age starved them out. Our greater ability to store fat saved our bacon...
Good for the fatties... }:-)
Kind of reminds me of the primary element in "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers".
In a review of economic and military knowledge of the great empires 1500-2000, the author found that an overly restrictive society forced innovation outside of its borders and thus was left behind in the annals of history.
Sucks to see it in action. The auto-industry(unions), the airline industry(unions), and now the ??AA(union of truly evil bastards) are attempting to close down our society and force innovation abroad. Oh well, it had to end sometime...
I think the problem would be more accurately stated as; Microsoft saw a revenue opportunity and chased it using Time-To-Market as the indicator of success.
They could have created a similar product with a similar feature-set and performed better as a software company if they had learned the lessons of the past (UNIX) and learned them early. Modularity rules all other design concepts. I hear they are picking up the banner of modularity but I certainly am not banking on it.
That is why the Unix mentality produces such a wide-use platform whilst Windows practically has to reinvent itself whenever it wishes to embrace a new technology.
This bug and its children are an example of that mentality and design choice.
I'm going to assume that you haven't really been observing your cats then. I currently have two, at one time or another I have had four. I also cat-sit and help re-domesticate feral cats for adoption...
My 20lb Bombay mix killed a cat that would not submit to him after it got it's ass whupped. It kept attacking, escalating the scale of violence until my cat found it intolerable and ended the problem. Unfortunately, I knew they were having issues but I didn't think they kill over it. I figured they'd end up avoiding each other...
Also, my Bombay (the far more expressive of the pair. The Bengal is more feral and reserved) gets pissed off when I remove him from something he was doing... often he will chew on the skull of the Bengal in retaliation.
Don't romanticize the nature of animals. It does no good to lie to yourself or others about the nature of a thing. Primitive human cultures were not beautiful pastoral utopias dotted throughout the planet living in harmony with nature. They killed, made war, used nature for whatever seemed useful, and died.
Apes are apes... They are very interesting, use tools, have sex for fun, can use a mirror... but they will still bite your face off and dismember your genitalia if they don't like the way you smell.
Love animals, work with them and appreciate their unique nature, but don't confuse them for humans.
Actually you're just looking at the surface of the issue...
You see, I am a person who simplifies my life because I am concerned that I may have only one trip. So I want to make the most of it. As an exercise I will respond to your post...
"If I'm watching a movie, I'm not doing anything useful." Unless it is of educational content, agreed.
"If I'm working, I'm not doing anything useful."
Interesting argument, but invalid. Useful implies that there is a product, some _work_ is being done. Just based on the simple meanings of the words you argument fails.
"If I'm hanging out with my friends, I'm not doing anything useful."
Define 'hanging out'. Watching sports whilst consuming processed foods and beverages... Agreed.
Discussing philosophy, technical merits of various scenarios, and/or insights on how to handle various life situations... See definition of useful again.
"If I'm playing tennis, I'm not doing anything useful."
Far more useful than listening to music, if for nothing more that cardiovascular health.
"If I'm posting on Slashdot, I'm not doing anything useful."
Gives me a moment to take pause and maybe make people think about things that they might not have thought of on their own i.e. [[You're honestly the first person I've ever heard say anything like that. And couldn't that be said about pretty much anything?]]
Usefulness is definitely personal and has several gradients...
No art or entertainment is essential. Imagine a wasteland where every moment is spent on keeping your spent husk of a body going... That sort of focus is primal and priceless.
When I die, I don't plan on leaving a corpse... just a burned out husk.
Thanksalot. That's what I get for not previewing... [;-P
Actually working with Windows is voluntary. I work in a Winders free environment. I admin 300 or so firewalls (PIX, Nokia IPSO/CKP-NGX, or SPLAT/NGX), 20 IPS/IDS (Cisco, SourceFire), a cadre of Linux boxes (logging, SNMP, SMTP relay, NetFlow aggregation), and my workstations (Debian).
I have managed to not admin a single Winders installation for the last 7yrs. (Except for a favor to a buddy.)
Everything is voluntary, are you willing to do the work to get what you want?
And the greater question is... Is it an undo burden by the school on the student? Can the school legally force the student to consign their work to the intellectual property of a non-public third party?
Interesting... So what you're saying that it would make more sense for them to lay off the bottom off their workforce. Whatever that number would be... considering an employee who has been there longer might also have other costly benefits, such as medical, dental, and vacation.
So, back to my statement, You would rather they lay off ~8000(out-of-thin-air) employees so that service would degrade, less work would get done, and then the store ends up losing more money until they finally shrink their workforce down to the one very highly paid chap that closes the door on the last day?
As a business owner, you have to look at what asset gets the least return per dollar spent and figure out a way to get that dollar back. This is their best shot. Perhaps, in a year's time, or whenever they recover their footing they can pay their associates slightly more than the other Box-stores but provide a higher degree of service and efficiency, all the while keeping more people gainfully employed.
I hope that the OSU in you nick isn't Oklahoma State, I would think the Cow-Pokes could teach economics and business acumen more effectively than that.
Unless you never gave that money to spend in the first place.
Nope. Not a single one. Who cares? If I'm sitting on my ass listening to music, I'm not doing something useful.
It can be a nice accompaniment, but essential? Hardly. In fact, meditative silence or the sounds of the natural world are always far more refreshing.
This is coming from a guy who used to make some coin playing bass and rhythm guitar for a local band. My dad played Viola for the philharmonic and my little brother is enjoying a scholarship for vocals and drama.
Get a clue man! Music like any other entertainment is transient in it's value.
Meh...
Can me a cynic or heartless or whatever. I don't really find that art benefits society as a whole by making money anyway... The music that has meant the most to me were passed down folk-tunes, and classical music that was paid for by audiences and sponsors.
Nobody has a right to make money. They depend solely upon the perception that their product is worth paying for. If a very talented performer needs more songs or scores... they'll pay the writer and make up the diff in ticket prices. It's business not welfare.
Same reason that your body prefers sugar to protein and protein to fat... Ease of use. It takes less energy to get the process started.