Also don't restrict yourself to buildings by any means!
Ontario has sold freaking highways to private companies for pennies, who basically throw up tolls, do no maintenance, then when the lease is up let the government fix them up again... repeat.
Hell sell wholly owned corporations like Hydro... nothing can go wrong there... certainly no one will get ripped off by energy distributors and utilities? That is unheard of! Oh but because of the MASSIVE debt accrued over years of mismanagement, make sure we will have to pay that off as part of our bill each month, because you know that won't piss anyone off.
It is basically a way one government can try and make it self look fiscally responsible. Emphasis on "look".
The buildings are basically assets. Sell 'em for 50 Million to some company that leases them back to you. Does it matter that rather than maintaince costs of 2 million a year have now turned into 4 million a year? No, because political parties are short sighted and are more interested in getting re-elected than doing anything worthwhile. By doing this this they can now add 46 Million to their budget, helping them "balance" the budget. Never mind in the long term you lose money or it is a one shot deal. From their perspective if you don't get re-elected it doesn't matter anyway, and if you do you can deal with it then with some other short sighted plan. Likely you just say its these tough economic times, or the cost of doing business, and raise taxes (or cut programs) to cover you losses.
They do it all the time in Ontario, Canada as well as the feds. The best part is the kick backs to political friends. (or making new friends by selling them something worth 100 million for 50 million, etc...). Ah politics, ain't it grand? What makes you want to cry is every single one will talk about accountability during election time, but no one ever is, with perhaps the exception of a scape goat or two.
Not sure what it is like in the UK as I am from Canada. I know a while back I watched a TV show produced by the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) that looked at food labeled "Organic" in supermarkets. Bottom line in many cases it is complete marketing BS. Just like when you see some product labeled "Made in Canada" can mean that the packaging was produced in Canada, but the actual product itself is imported from China. Another example were products labeled "Heart Smart" supposedly being healthier for you. It found that companies basically paid an organization to be able to use the label, and the the standards were pretty low. Canada (and I am sure the UK) has standards as to what can legally label itself "Organic", the problem is that for the most part these standards are pretty low, and not enforced for the most part.
Your best bet for real organic food is to wake up early Saturday morning and go to a Farmers market, or your local butcher, and ask where your food comes from. It isn't that hard.
Yes and the reason why Klingons used to look a lot like humans with goatees was that plague that happened... but then they found a cure and got better, and turned back into the ridgeheads we love...
Also everything that ever happened in a comic book, ya well that was in an alternate universe X19...
Its called trying to makes stuff up so all the freaking inconsistencies make some kind of rational sense to the consumer.
BTW, there is a great idea for a movie plot for a post apocalyptic theme...
"We tried to save the world, but in the end we damned it..." "We seeded the atmosphere with sulpher, hoping it would slow climate change... it changed a lot of things." "Then the aliens came... all hell broke lose then" "Now we are just surviving, I wouldn't call it livin', we are zombies now, the walking dead."
Staring Nic Cage as "Rough Hackman" and Lindsay Lohan as "Herself".
Watched a special on Climate Change on TV last Sunday. Was a very well done piece, and the professor doing it was a good orator.
Normally I am not exactly a skeptic, but a skeptic of the scientific process, however this guy was pretty damn convincing.
He came at the problem from a different angle, primarily that of food production and what a 2% temperature increase would do to that, and what the political fallout and ramifications would be.
Pretty dire stuff. Made me want to go out and buy some guns and start hoarding food...
He went on to detail a solution, and then went on to say that practically there is no way we are going to hit that target in time due it being politically unpopular around the world.
He went on to say that the only saving grace may be geoengineering to postpone the target date so we can meet it politically. Problem is while he was more articulate and convincing about geoengineering, I am still convinced that A) it will not do enough, and B) we do know understand the full ramifications of doing some of these things and may do more harm than good. Having said that, I can only come to the conclusion that we are doomed to a MadMax sort of wasteland. Move aside! I need to get my guns and canned food!
Because yes, if you have a choice of crash landing on a planet that is hospitable and contains life like your own, or on the toxic silicoid life sustaining one you should defiantly choose the one most unlike yourself, you know, just for the sheer challenge.
Of course I don't know how desperate they were to crash, or what the range of the partially disabled craft was, or if they were low on fuel, because I am not an alien... and you know more importantly, I havn't seen the movie... and even more importantly, it is a freaking' movie.... you know, entertainment?
On a conceptual level I generally feel the same way about most Science Fiction particularly in movies and tv where 99% of all life encountered is pretty much identical to us with the exception of some forehead ridges, colour, or perhaps some weird facial hair or antennae or something. There has been some exceptions like the Lava monster in old star trek, or stuff like crystalline entity or tar monster later on... Bottom line the reason this is likely the case isn't due to lack of imagination, but rather the reason is for entertainment purposes. James T Kirk can't exactly sleep with the lava monster can he? (well he could try anyway). So they make a green woman alien and call it a day. People need to be able to interact in some meaningful way for it to be entertaining. Why do you think everyone can also communicate so easily? Because it would really suck if you had to sit through an hour of confusion. I can barely comprehend the Japanese language, how the fsck can we comprehend a language developed on another world with no context? Magic technology of course... but again... movie magic.
I think this is important to do. Classify your data, and keep it separate for easy backup. Back up in order and frequency by importance.
External USB HD are fine for this. HD are big enough that it shouldn't be an issue.
I have Terabyte+ system but really when you get down to it, most of it is not critical data. I would also go with the 3 tiered system, Critical, Important, and Annoying. Stuff like personal photos, tax information, personal documents etc.. would all be critical and would all take up the least amount of space, likely less than 10GB anyway. Maybe your Music collection falls into the next category, and your torrent video into the Annoying category.
Using online storage to back up everything would be overkill, but using it to only back up "critical" files might be worthwhile.
So they sue Pirate Bay into oblivion for enabling illegal music downloading...
Pirate Bay gets bought out and decides to go Legit...
So they then sue the bejesus out of Legit Pirate Bay, effectively putting it out of business...
Repeat.
Seems like mixed messaging to me. I understand their rational for doing it (the owners of Pirate Bay actually making a profit from what the RIAA feel are ill gotten gains), but I don't think they are really looking at the big picture.
Not that I am surprised at all.
As much lobby money as they might have, people grow up and eventually vote, at which point they are fcsked.
Gee a company operating outside of Canada does not adhere to Canadian Law? Impossible!
Seriously though this is just the Privacy Commissioner's Officer playing the political game. Target some company with "Gee Whiz" factor and make a stink. This is all to get PR and good vibes. See look, we do stuff, aren't you happy? Now back to work!
Granted Facebook does business in Canada, but it isn't like they are going to lose any business, nor can they be stopped from operating. If anything this warning may scare off a few Canadian customers, but in the large scheme of things really a drop in the bucket for Facebook.
Devil is usually in the details, but I know up here in Canada I can register a business or corporation by simply paying a fee and submitting documents.
I am sure it wouldn't take too much legerdemain to create a corporate entity that could use combined buying power to purchase health insurance.
The trouble would be starting off. Finding enough people willing to put money into it to make it worthwhile.
You could have a system where 100 people pay into it. Perhaps eventually you can find other similar companies and amalgamate with them.
Now Just keep doing that until the whole country is covered.
At this point you are big enough, why not just skip the middle man and buy your own health care managing you own money.
That is basically the definition of socialized health care.
The only difference is that people would be paying some sort of set fee rather than a percentage of income as it currently is in Canada.
I would assume this would be the ideal benefit of a Health Insurance type program in principle. Those in a higher cost bracket would pay more for their health care. Just like someone who smoke pays more for life insurance. (as smokers DO have a higher chance of dying earlier)
However we have seen time and time again how this doesn't work, mostly because of greedy corporations. However this does seem to make sense from the perspective that Obama is trying to socialize the system, but keeping it insurance based and not just free health care to all.
This however may also be based on the problem of all the illegal residents the US has as well. One of the things that I think kills health care up here in Canada is immigration.
Not to sound like an xenophobic bigot, but if someone wants to immigrate to Canada that is one thing. However what happens, is that when people do they usually eventually bring over their parents etc...
Which in principle is fine, but the problem is that the people paying for health care are becoming less and less and the old people on it (which by far cost the most) are becoming more and more. Effectively they haven't paid enough into the system to cover their costs and thus that tab gets paid by the general tax payer (who again are becoming less and less).
Dealing with the baby boomer shift will be bad enough without having to try and deal with this problem as well. The US has similar problems.
I saw a special on TV about the hybrid system they use in Singapore, where everyone has a mandatory health care savings fund (part of every paycheck automatically is deposited) and health care is additionally very subsidized as well. However it still has some disparages with the poor vs those who are not. A novel idea anyway.
Actually there was a recent study that was published in Europe about smoking and health care, and the findings were the opposite of what we were generally told.
Bottom line was that smokers in general die quicker, and those that don't live for a long time. The most expensive health care costs are those associated with caring for the really old who have long term medical problems. Smokers just die without the hassle of all the long term care.
Not saying morally one way or another, only that that particular excuse doesn't wash anymore. (There are plenty of reasons why people shouldn't smoke mind you)
Slashdot Mirror
Also don't restrict yourself to buildings by any means!
Ontario has sold freaking highways to private companies for pennies, who basically throw up tolls, do no maintenance, then when the lease is up let the government fix them up again... repeat.
Hell sell wholly owned corporations like Hydro... nothing can go wrong there... certainly no one will get ripped off by energy distributors and utilities? That is unheard of! Oh but because of the MASSIVE debt accrued over years of mismanagement, make sure we will have to pay that off as part of our bill each month, because you know that won't piss anyone off.
This was done in Canada years ago.
It is basically a way one government can try and make it self look fiscally responsible. Emphasis on "look".
The buildings are basically assets. Sell 'em for 50 Million to some company that leases them back to you. Does it matter that rather than maintaince costs of 2 million a year have now turned into 4 million a year? No, because political parties are short sighted and are more interested in getting re-elected than doing anything worthwhile. By doing this this they can now add 46 Million to their budget, helping them "balance" the budget. Never mind in the long term you lose money or it is a one shot deal. From their perspective if you don't get re-elected it doesn't matter anyway, and if you do you can deal with it then with some other short sighted plan. Likely you just say its these tough economic times, or the cost of doing business, and raise taxes (or cut programs) to cover you losses.
They do it all the time in Ontario, Canada as well as the feds. The best part is the kick backs to political friends. (or making new friends by selling them something worth 100 million for 50 million, etc...). Ah politics, ain't it grand? What makes you want to cry is every single one will talk about accountability during election time, but no one ever is, with perhaps the exception of a scape goat or two.
Good luck with that. Never gonna happen.
Why not deliver all medicine this way? They are basically tiny flying needles after all!
...used the wookie defence...
"There's only two things I hate in this world. People who are intolerant of other people's cultures and the Dutch."
Not sure what it is like in the UK as I am from Canada. I know a while back I watched a TV show produced by the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) that looked at food labeled "Organic" in supermarkets. Bottom line in many cases it is complete marketing BS. Just like when you see some product labeled "Made in Canada" can mean that the packaging was produced in Canada, but the actual product itself is imported from China. Another example were products labeled "Heart Smart" supposedly being healthier for you. It found that companies basically paid an organization to be able to use the label, and the the standards were pretty low. Canada (and I am sure the UK) has standards as to what can legally label itself "Organic", the problem is that for the most part these standards are pretty low, and not enforced for the most part.
Your best bet for real organic food is to wake up early Saturday morning and go to a Farmers market, or your local butcher, and ask where your food comes from. It isn't that hard.
Yes and the reason why Klingons used to look a lot like humans with goatees was that plague that happened... but then they found a cure and got better, and turned back into the ridgeheads we love...
Also everything that ever happened in a comic book, ya well that was in an alternate universe X19...
Its called trying to makes stuff up so all the freaking inconsistencies make some kind of rational sense to the consumer.
BTW, there is a great idea for a movie plot for a post apocalyptic theme...
"We tried to save the world, but in the end we damned it..." "We seeded the atmosphere with sulpher, hoping it would slow climate change... it changed a lot of things." "Then the aliens came... all hell broke lose then" "Now we are just surviving, I wouldn't call it livin', we are zombies now, the walking dead."
Staring Nic Cage as "Rough Hackman" and Lindsay Lohan as "Herself".
Watched a special on Climate Change on TV last Sunday. Was a very well done piece, and the professor doing it was a good orator.
Normally I am not exactly a skeptic, but a skeptic of the scientific process, however this guy was pretty damn convincing.
He came at the problem from a different angle, primarily that of food production and what a 2% temperature increase would do to that, and what the political fallout and ramifications would be.
Pretty dire stuff. Made me want to go out and buy some guns and start hoarding food...
He went on to detail a solution, and then went on to say that practically there is no way we are going to hit that target in time due it being politically unpopular around the world.
He went on to say that the only saving grace may be geoengineering to postpone the target date so we can meet it politically. Problem is while he was more articulate and convincing about geoengineering, I am still convinced that A) it will not do enough, and B) we do know understand the full ramifications of doing some of these things and may do more harm than good. Having said that, I can only come to the conclusion that we are doomed to a MadMax sort of wasteland. Move aside! I need to get my guns and canned food!
Cold war? Huh? huh?
Best Anti Piracy Tool out there... EA and others have been successfully using it for years....
Because yes, if you have a choice of crash landing on a planet that is hospitable and contains life like your own, or on the toxic silicoid life sustaining one you should defiantly choose the one most unlike yourself, you know, just for the sheer challenge.
Of course I don't know how desperate they were to crash, or what the range of the partially disabled craft was, or if they were low on fuel, because I am not an alien... and you know more importantly, I havn't seen the movie... and even more importantly, it is a freaking' movie.... you know, entertainment?
On a conceptual level I generally feel the same way about most Science Fiction particularly in movies and tv where 99% of all life encountered is pretty much identical to us with the exception of some forehead ridges, colour, or perhaps some weird facial hair or antennae or something. There has been some exceptions like the Lava monster in old star trek, or stuff like crystalline entity or tar monster later on... Bottom line the reason this is likely the case isn't due to lack of imagination, but rather the reason is for entertainment purposes. James T Kirk can't exactly sleep with the lava monster can he? (well he could try anyway). So they make a green woman alien and call it a day. People need to be able to interact in some meaningful way for it to be entertaining. Why do you think everyone can also communicate so easily? Because it would really suck if you had to sit through an hour of confusion. I can barely comprehend the Japanese language, how the fsck can we comprehend a language developed on another world with no context? Magic technology of course... but again... movie magic.
My Manager has one... but I think it might be broken.
"It's not as if he was a danger to people on the street"
The clients of Mr. Madoff may disagree.
In all seriousness though, it is a bit silly.
http://xkcd.com/538/
I guess the only alternative left is thermite!
Heh, I feel the same way about the Toronto Maple Leafs.
If the world cloned more Canadians, it would likely be a nicer place. :)
I think this is important to do. Classify your data, and keep it separate for easy backup. Back up in order and frequency by importance.
External USB HD are fine for this. HD are big enough that it shouldn't be an issue.
I have Terabyte+ system but really when you get down to it, most of it is not critical data. I would also go with the 3 tiered system, Critical, Important, and Annoying. Stuff like personal photos, tax information, personal documents etc.. would all be critical and would all take up the least amount of space, likely less than 10GB anyway. Maybe your Music collection falls into the next category, and your torrent video into the Annoying category.
Using online storage to back up everything would be overkill, but using it to only back up "critical" files might be worthwhile.
So they sue Pirate Bay into oblivion for enabling illegal music downloading...
Pirate Bay gets bought out and decides to go Legit...
So they then sue the bejesus out of Legit Pirate Bay, effectively putting it out of business...
Repeat.
Seems like mixed messaging to me. I understand their rational for doing it (the owners of Pirate Bay actually making a profit from what the RIAA feel are ill gotten gains), but I don't think they are really looking at the big picture.
Not that I am surprised at all.
As much lobby money as they might have, people grow up and eventually vote, at which point they are fcsked.
Gee a company operating outside of Canada does not adhere to Canadian Law? Impossible!
Seriously though this is just the Privacy Commissioner's Officer playing the political game. Target some company with "Gee Whiz" factor and make a stink. This is all to get PR and good vibes. See look, we do stuff, aren't you happy? Now back to work!
Granted Facebook does business in Canada, but it isn't like they are going to lose any business, nor can they be stopped from operating. If anything this warning may scare off a few Canadian customers, but in the large scheme of things really a drop in the bucket for Facebook.
Devil is usually in the details, but I know up here in Canada I can register a business or corporation by simply paying a fee and submitting documents.
I am sure it wouldn't take too much legerdemain to create a corporate entity that could use combined buying power to purchase health insurance.
The trouble would be starting off. Finding enough people willing to put money into it to make it worthwhile.
You could have a system where 100 people pay into it. Perhaps eventually you can find other similar companies and amalgamate with them.
Now Just keep doing that until the whole country is covered.
At this point you are big enough, why not just skip the middle man and buy your own health care managing you own money.
That is basically the definition of socialized health care.
The only difference is that people would be paying some sort of set fee rather than a percentage of income as it currently is in Canada.
I would assume this would be the ideal benefit of a Health Insurance type program in principle. Those in a higher cost bracket would pay more for their health care. Just like someone who smoke pays more for life insurance. (as smokers DO have a higher chance of dying earlier)
However we have seen time and time again how this doesn't work, mostly because of greedy corporations. However this does seem to make sense from the perspective that Obama is trying to socialize the system, but keeping it insurance based and not just free health care to all.
This however may also be based on the problem of all the illegal residents the US has as well. One of the things that I think kills health care up here in Canada is immigration.
Not to sound like an xenophobic bigot, but if someone wants to immigrate to Canada that is one thing. However what happens, is that when people do they usually eventually bring over their parents etc...
Which in principle is fine, but the problem is that the people paying for health care are becoming less and less and the old people on it (which by far cost the most) are becoming more and more. Effectively they haven't paid enough into the system to cover their costs and thus that tab gets paid by the general tax payer (who again are becoming less and less).
Dealing with the baby boomer shift will be bad enough without having to try and deal with this problem as well. The US has similar problems.
I saw a special on TV about the hybrid system they use in Singapore, where everyone has a mandatory health care savings fund (part of every paycheck automatically is deposited) and health care is additionally very subsidized as well. However it still has some disparages with the poor vs those who are not. A novel idea anyway.
he wants his book back!
Either that or in 50 years his relatives will sue everyone that posted on this forum...
Actually there was a recent study that was published in Europe about smoking and health care, and the findings were the opposite of what we were generally told.
Bottom line was that smokers in general die quicker, and those that don't live for a long time. The most expensive health care costs are those associated with caring for the really old who have long term medical problems. Smokers just die without the hassle of all the long term care.
Not saying morally one way or another, only that that particular excuse doesn't wash anymore. (There are plenty of reasons why people shouldn't smoke mind you)