There is an argument to be made that Iraq is currently in a civil war, and that most of the violence is sectarian violence between rival political/religious factions. The British (and U.S.) soldiers who are killed are often times NOT the intended targets of the attack - they just happen to be in the way when violence breaks out (or actively insert themselves into the violence when they decide interviene).
While I generally agree with you, there are a few flaws to your statement.
One of the differences in the cost of housing is the cost of labor. Cost of labor can explain some of the differences in the cost of a house in the Netherlands, Canada, and Portugal. Since this device is supposed to minimize the labor used, you should see housing prices converge somewhat.
Also, most houses are built of wood, stone, and other more expensive materials - where concrete is dirt cheap pretty much anywhere in the world. Once again, another thing that will cause housing prices to converge using this technology.
But yeah, most of the cost of the house comes from the value of the land (which can be influenced by amount of available land, zoning limits placed on the land, taxes), and also the cost of regulation compliance (if you are building a house in rural Canada, there are far less rules you have to follow than in downtown New York City, and therefor less cost in compliance and certification), and also the cost of connecting you to the local services (in rural Canada you can use a septic tank - no sewers are nessicary. In an urban area you are going to have to connect to the city sewers, as extra cost).
This is a blessing in disguise, really. Anything that makes it harder for the U.S. government to give away my money is good by me. If only they could remove the online processes entirely, that would be even better!
Of course people will cry "This money is going for important research, and stuff that does good for society". Even if I accept this to be true, and even if I accept that a free-for-all beg-for-money system is more viable than a system where government officials decide who to give money to without being petitioned... then making it easier to apply for a grant just gives the people who have to evaluate grant applications way more work having to evaluate more frivilous grant requests.
So the source code is his... plain and simple. This is why corporations usually make its employees sign an agreement giving the company all rights to source code developed for the company (and if they don't, it is usually just an oversight - it is not that they want the employees to own the code).
I want a telephone that can hold some serious music. A couple gigs just isn't going to do it for me!
Why can't they make a telephone, with some real music and photo storage capability?
Observation on Lisp...
on
Lisp and Ruby
·
· Score: 1
I was writing an application, where I needed to create a simple scripting system for it, and couldn't include any other pre-created scripting system, and I wanted to do it quickly. I was trying to use the absolute minimum code, and minimum overhead for parsing and running the code.
I realized, when I was done, that I had essentially created a variant of Lisp. It didn't quite have the same Lisp syntax or standard functions or whatnot... but basicly, it was Lisp. Lisp is the type of language that you can re-create by accident!
And that is why I think that Lisp didn't fade to obscurity, despite not ever being very widely used (Lisp zealots, please don't bother to flame!). Not because Lisp is particularly useful (I can think of a few areas where it would be useful, but it is more useful as ad addition to a standard OO language than an all-in-one tool for software development). But the design of Lisp, both in the language and how it is implemented, is just so *ELEGANT*. It is kind of like the programming language version of Legos - The way it works is just nifty. It has a certain functional simplicity with what it does. It sounds cheesy, but it is very zen.
And a Lisp interpreter is EASY TO IMPLEMENT!!! I wouldn't even know where to begin to write a C++ compiler... I would have to dust off a few books and really re-learn a lot of stuff that I have long forgot. But Lisp? Dead simple.
I probably won't ever use Lisp professionally, but I am happy that I had to write some Lisp programs in an AI class back in the day.
Except that significant stuff was added to the work. It is easy enough to argue that the sampling was 'fair use'. If it works for Negativeland, it will work for Timbaland.
Sorry guy, sex-crime hysteria is not unique to the U.S... and it is not just conservatives. Remember the the pediatrician in the U.K. who they tried to run out of town because the sign 'pediatrician' looks a lot like 'pedophile'? Remember the hysteria from the left about the Duke rape thing which turns out never really happened? Sex-crimes hysteria also appeals to the left, as it fits in with feminist views that because of paternalism rape and sexual victimization lurk around every corner.
Sex crime hysteria has popular support from all polical groups, in all countries.
Speaking of which, in all these conflicts, where was the US?
Because peace keeping is a lose-lose situation for the U.S... if they get involved, you will bitch about "U.S. Imperialism"... if they don't get involved, you will whine "Why doesn't the U.S. do anything to help".
Virtually every country besides China restricts speech. In the United States, it is illegal to advertise a candidate 30 days before a federal election. In most European countries, it is illegal to say something that "promotes hate". In Canada, all films need to be approved by the government.
When we complain about China, we aren't complaining about censorship... we are complaining about censorship that doesn't appeal to Western esthetics. Virtually all countries censor, though. The west, being hipcrites, just want China to censor in a way that they approve of. It is a battle for Western culture to dominate Eastern culture, not a battle against censorship.
In the Star Trek universe, everything seems happy and friendly, but there are some sinister things that bother me:
1. The Federation is supposedly an alliance of planets where aliens of many different races live in peace and harmony. Then why the hell are virtually everyone on Federation starships human? And the few token non-humans are clearly the more human looking. There are no six tentacled creatures serving on Federation starships... there are no non-physical energy beings. And everyone knows that Spock is far more intelligent, more physically capable, ages slower, and in general vastly superior to Kirk in all ways. It is only bigotry that an officer as talented as Spock has to play second fiddle to Kirk. Clearly there is some sort of racist conspiracy in the Federation!
2. Earth has become an enlightened place, where all races and cultures live in peace and harmony... yet I am supposed to believe that out of the billions of non-european people on the planet earth (who vastly outnumber europeans), that only one black person, and one asian person, qualified to be on the bridge crew, or an engineer, or something important that would make them a main character? In fact, if all races lived in peace and harmony and equality, and transporters allow instantanious teleportation around a planet, shouldn't all people have inter-married to the point where all humans would be a nice light brown color - a combination of all races and cultures?! Clearly, despite Earth and Federation propoganda and lies, White European Males still dominate not only Earth, but the Federation!
3. They have "abandoned money"? Wait a minute... money is nessicary when there is scarcity and a market economy... and they definitly didn't eliminate scarcity (after all, dilithium crystals are still rare and valuable... there is only one holideck on the Enterprise, not one for every crew memeber, definitly meaning it would require some sort of rationing... the Enterprise is always carrying medicine or supplies, implying that the replicators can only produce certain types of objects). Obviously, the Federation has adopted some sort of anti-free-market command economy - perhaps Soviet style Communism, or Nazi style National Socialism. Either way, despite the pleasant lies of abundance that is spread in Trek propoganda, the Federation is most likely stifling, beurocratic, totalitarian-economic nightmare, with shortages and people lining up Soviet style in order to buy the most basic of goods.
4. We are left to assume that the Federation is some sort of Democracy... then why don't starfleet officers ever talk politics? Why isn't Data a member of one political party, while Wharf is a memeber of another political party, and they have heated (though respectful) political discussions? Why isn't Pickard contiplating his civilian political career after his starfleet career? Why is there never any controversy about Federation policy?
It is because the Federation is a military dictatorship, controlled by Starfleet! The military elite of Starfleet control both the military and civilian governments (and clearly, from the series, there is no seperation of the two).
5. The Enterprise is supposedly on a "peaceful mission of exploration"... yet the Enterprise is the military flagship of Starfleet! How often do countries nowadays send a battleship, or aircraft carriers, or other military war machines on "exploration and science missions"? Scientific vessels are usually unarmed, or carrying a few small firearms... they aren't loaded with ICBMs and torpedos! The Enterprise is clearly on a scout mission for imperialist military expansion!
So here is my concept:
In my series or movie, the Federation is really a vast imperialist military dictatorship... and Empire that has been slowly and surely conquering the galaxy. The other Star Trek films and series are propoganda films put out by the Federation... (that explains why the Klingons look different in different series... because as the Federation continued is agressive war ag
LOTR almost completely failed to capture that Tolkienesque feel that I get from reading the books.
Based on the limitations of the medium, do you think it would be remotely possible for LOTR to capture the feel that you got from reading the books? One is cinema, the other is books.
A movie can never be the book... if that was the case, they would have stopped selling the book when the movie was made!:)
Would a monitor and speed regulator on your car be Intrinsically Distasteful? Would a monitor that reports your TV viewing habits to the govt. be Intrinsically Distasteful? Would a monitor that only allows you to buy certain foods be Intrinsically Distasteful? Would a police force that inspects your home every day to ensure that you are not harboring criminals be Intrinsically Distasteful? Would a monitor that ensures you don't cook microwave food on the bbq be Intrinsically Distasteful?
Unfortunatly, that vast majority of people in North America and Europe would say, "YES"! People rail on about DRM, because they are antagonistic towards the big corporations that promote DRM (and I don't blame them). But no doubt something done by the government "for your own good", like monitoring and controlling diet, or observing traffic behavior, or other nannie-state social controls, would have massive popular support.
I think what the big media corporations need to do is piggyback DRM legislation into hot-button moral-panic issues. Tell people that if DRM isn't present in all media players, that media players will be used by racists to promote hate, be used by pedophiles to exploit children, and be used by terrorists to destroy America! It doesn't matter if there is no truth to any such wild claims, the "think of the children" crowd would be all over anyone who disagreed with DRM... and in 50 years we would learn in public schools that DRM was designed to "protect us from the corporations".
Yes, I hear what you are saying about high executive compensation. And in fact, a lot of it is true.
But what do you suggest should be done about? Are you suggesting that the government should implement some sort labor price controls? I am afraid you will find that tinkering with wages by the government is usually a disaster.
So they absolutely should have only used 2 white women - one dressed in white & the other in black - because using mixed races is offensive. Oh, and having 2 black women there would have been racists as portraying black women as violent.
Maybe they should have shown some cool games you could play on the PSP? Mention some features, like playing MP3s, or watching movies? Possible even include a picture of the product they are trying to sell?
But if they MUST make an ad that has nothing to do with the product, they could have shown a black woman and a white woman embracing, instead of locked in combat. Maybe even had them making out, if that wanted to make it "controversial" to create a buzz, without evoking racism or racial taboos. Instead, some lame creative director though they would do something "edgy" to impress the judges at the One Show. Not only is it sleazy, it is contrived.
Yes but how much does France's nuclear power industry get in subsidies?
It gets crazy subsidies. It is France dude! Street mimes get subsidies! But it doesn't get any more subsidies than anything else in France. It is competing on merit, as all other forms of power are also heavily subsidized. The point is, nuclear power is not some ultra-expensive impracticle boondoggle. It is not unrealistic at all that the U.S. could convert the majority of electric production to nuclear power, the rest being supplimented by wind and solar and geothermal.
And it is not like fossil fuels don't get big subsidies either in the U.S.... or what do you think that 100 billion dollar adventure in Iraq was about? Do you think the cost of the future consequences of global warming are being calculated into the bill for your coal generated electricity?
I am just as against subsidies as you... but if my money is going to be taken away from me at gunpoint for something, I rather it be spent on something that will most likely work, like nuclear power - than god knows what else it is going to be spent on.
Nuclear power is only "cheap" because the government gives them massive subsidies. If the Nuclear Power industry had to operate in a freemarket, ie buy their own insurance and pay for their own waste disposal without government assistance, the industry would not exist. The US has a number of laws and such to shield nuclear power thus "making it profitable". Get rip of all of them and it would no longer be profitable.
Nuclear power is neither cheap nor expensive... because nuclear power only exists in a handful of quasi-public facilities, all of them decades old. There aren't nearly enough nuclear reactors in the U.S., nor are there any working in any sort of market capacity, nor are they modern, for anyone to make a statement one way or another about it. Talking about the U.S. Nuclear Power Industry is like talking about the U.S. Space Tourism Industry... we are talking about something entirely imaginary on any real scale.
*HOWEVER*, France does have a very viable nuclear power industry. Nuclear power, in France, is cheaper than coal power is in the United States. Nuclear power in France is cheap, safe, and provides about 70% of the France's electricity.
It is not ideologically racist... Sony is not trying to promote a hate ideology or anything. What Sony is trying to do is "play" with racist taboos, in order to seem "edgy" and "provocotive". Unfortunatly, an ad for consumer electronics is not the place to be challenging taboos. It is not offensive in itself, but tasteless in it's context. I never said it was racist... I said it is sleazy. Sleazy != racist.
How are developing countries who can't afford welfare programs going to do so, if they are excluded from trading with richer countries and building their economy to a point where they can afford welfare programs?
Awesome! This was the first highly compelling and rational response I got! Way to go!
But there is strong belief among many workers that what Widget Company Y WILL do, is pay out that $4 mil dollar as a bonus to the owners / CEO / stockholders / etc. In that case, the Company gets cheap IT, the rich investors and owners get richer, and all the "real workers" get is the shaft.
That might happen. It is always a possibility. However, there is a long term cost to this kind of behavior. Companies that are willing to fire a bunch of employees in order to give the boss a big bonus, in the long run make themselves less desirable places to work. Or, more realisticly, if the company fires its IT staff to pump up the 3rd quarter profits and temporarily raise the cost of their shares, it only is a short term boost in the cost of the shares and makes the place a less desirable place to work. If they are not pumping the outsourcing savings into R&D, or significantly reducing prices to increase volume of sales, or doing something like that, the long term costs will outweigh the short term benefits. Outsourcing is not some magic bullet.
However, if every CEO and every corporation in America is just trying to make a buck and cash out as quick as possible, with no concern for the long term... and shareholders are happy enough to let them get away with it... then there are some problems in the U.S. that stopping outsourcing are not going to fix.
To be fair one of the ads had the black woman winning and another where they were evenly matched. But who wants to be fair right?
The ad was exploiting race roles and taboos. This kind of thing would be tasteful as a serious art piece in a gallery, but it is just sleazy when it is used to sell consumer electronics.
Maybe Sony could do a series of ads with Mohammed with dynamite on his chest playing a PSP before he blows himself up? Or perhaps run a series of ads on the Duke campus saying "It will rape your mind!".
I suppose you are talking about countries like Canada, which supposedly "subsidize" production costs. In reality, Canada doesn't subsidize production cost, they provide tax credits for production costs. The government of Canada is not giving away free money, they simply are stealing less money from film-producers than the United States government is stealing from film producers.
If you have a problem, it is with the U.S. government kleptocrats over-taxing film production, not with Canada (or New Zealand, or whereever). Perhaps you should ask the Governator for some tax breaks, instead of complaining about outsourcing. It is sad when a U.S. state with a Republican in office is being out-free-marketed by a bunch of socialist Canadians. The ol' Free Market Tax-Revolting Proud Californian Ronnie 'The Gipper' Reagan must be turning in his grave!
You don't have to burn the oil. When OPEC decreased export quotas in the 1970's there was a dramatic shift toward more fuel efficient cars. Similarly, countries with high taxes on gasoline also show a preference for more fuel efficient cars.
Yes, but we can't keep Chinese people in wells under the ground for future generations to use, like we can with oil.:) Every potential worker who is unemployed is essentially wasted, because people need good and services in order to live, regardless if they produce any goods and services.
The solution, as I see it, is to develop programs to provide everyone in the world with the basic necessities of life for free.
This is how it is right now in virtually every industrialized country. Unfortunatly, developing countries are too poor to be able to do this - Unless of course they can develop their own industry and capital, which is starting to happen with free trade.
Slashdot Mirror
There is an argument to be made that Iraq is currently in a civil war, and that most of the violence is sectarian violence between rival political/religious factions. The British (and U.S.) soldiers who are killed are often times NOT the intended targets of the attack - they just happen to be in the way when violence breaks out (or actively insert themselves into the violence when they decide interviene).
While I generally agree with you, there are a few flaws to your statement.
One of the differences in the cost of housing is the cost of labor. Cost of labor can explain some of the differences in the cost of a house in the Netherlands, Canada, and Portugal. Since this device is supposed to minimize the labor used, you should see housing prices converge somewhat.
Also, most houses are built of wood, stone, and other more expensive materials - where concrete is dirt cheap pretty much anywhere in the world. Once again, another thing that will cause housing prices to converge using this technology.
But yeah, most of the cost of the house comes from the value of the land (which can be influenced by amount of available land, zoning limits placed on the land, taxes), and also the cost of regulation compliance (if you are building a house in rural Canada, there are far less rules you have to follow than in downtown New York City, and therefor less cost in compliance and certification), and also the cost of connecting you to the local services (in rural Canada you can use a septic tank - no sewers are nessicary. In an urban area you are going to have to connect to the city sewers, as extra cost).
This is a blessing in disguise, really. Anything that makes it harder for the U.S. government to give away my money is good by me. If only they could remove the online processes entirely, that would be even better!
Of course people will cry "This money is going for important research, and stuff that does good for society". Even if I accept this to be true, and even if I accept that a free-for-all beg-for-money system is more viable than a system where government officials decide who to give money to without being petitioned... then making it easier to apply for a grant just gives the people who have to evaluate grant applications way more work having to evaluate more frivilous grant requests.
So the source code is his... plain and simple. This is why corporations usually make its employees sign an agreement giving the company all rights to source code developed for the company (and if they don't, it is usually just an oversight - it is not that they want the employees to own the code).
I want a telephone that can hold some serious music. A couple gigs just isn't going to do it for me!
Why can't they make a telephone, with some real music and photo storage capability?
I was writing an application, where I needed to create a simple scripting system for it, and couldn't include any other pre-created scripting system, and I wanted to do it quickly. I was trying to use the absolute minimum code, and minimum overhead for parsing and running the code.
I realized, when I was done, that I had essentially created a variant of Lisp. It didn't quite have the same Lisp syntax or standard functions or whatnot... but basicly, it was Lisp. Lisp is the type of language that you can re-create by accident!
And that is why I think that Lisp didn't fade to obscurity, despite not ever being very widely used (Lisp zealots, please don't bother to flame!). Not because Lisp is particularly useful (I can think of a few areas where it would be useful, but it is more useful as ad addition to a standard OO language than an all-in-one tool for software development). But the design of Lisp, both in the language and how it is implemented, is just so *ELEGANT*. It is kind of like the programming language version of Legos - The way it works is just nifty. It has a certain functional simplicity with what it does. It sounds cheesy, but it is very zen.
And a Lisp interpreter is EASY TO IMPLEMENT!!! I wouldn't even know where to begin to write a C++ compiler... I would have to dust off a few books and really re-learn a lot of stuff that I have long forgot. But Lisp? Dead simple.
I probably won't ever use Lisp professionally, but I am happy that I had to write some Lisp programs in an AI class back in the day.
Slashdot, help me know what to think!?!!
Do we support this behavior (DJ Danger Mouse) or do we not (the example above)???
That is the great thing about Slashdot - your ideas don't need to be consistant - just knee jerk and reactionary, in order to be popular!
Except that significant stuff was added to the work. It is easy enough to argue that the sampling was 'fair use'. If it works for Negativeland, it will work for Timbaland.
Sorry guy, sex-crime hysteria is not unique to the U.S... and it is not just conservatives. Remember the the pediatrician in the U.K. who they tried to run out of town because the sign 'pediatrician' looks a lot like 'pedophile'? Remember the hysteria from the left about the Duke rape thing which turns out never really happened? Sex-crimes hysteria also appeals to the left, as it fits in with feminist views that because of paternalism rape and sexual victimization lurk around every corner.
Sex crime hysteria has popular support from all polical groups, in all countries.
Speaking of which, in all these conflicts, where was the US?
Because peace keeping is a lose-lose situation for the U.S... if they get involved, you will bitch about "U.S. Imperialism"... if they don't get involved, you will whine "Why doesn't the U.S. do anything to help".
Virtually every country besides China restricts speech. In the United States, it is illegal to advertise a candidate 30 days before a federal election. In most European countries, it is illegal to say something that "promotes hate". In Canada, all films need to be approved by the government.
When we complain about China, we aren't complaining about censorship... we are complaining about censorship that doesn't appeal to Western esthetics. Virtually all countries censor, though. The west, being hipcrites, just want China to censor in a way that they approve of. It is a battle for Western culture to dominate Eastern culture, not a battle against censorship.
In the Star Trek universe, everything seems happy and friendly, but there are some sinister things that bother me:
1. The Federation is supposedly an alliance of planets where aliens of many different races live in peace and harmony. Then why the hell are virtually everyone on Federation starships human? And the few token non-humans are clearly the more human looking. There are no six tentacled creatures serving on Federation starships... there are no non-physical energy beings. And everyone knows that Spock is far more intelligent, more physically capable, ages slower, and in general vastly superior to Kirk in all ways. It is only bigotry that an officer as talented as Spock has to play second fiddle to Kirk. Clearly there is some sort of racist conspiracy in the Federation!
2. Earth has become an enlightened place, where all races and cultures live in peace and harmony... yet I am supposed to believe that out of the billions of non-european people on the planet earth (who vastly outnumber europeans), that only one black person, and one asian person, qualified to be on the bridge crew, or an engineer, or something important that would make them a main character? In fact, if all races lived in peace and harmony and equality, and transporters allow instantanious teleportation around a planet, shouldn't all people have inter-married to the point where all humans would be a nice light brown color - a combination of all races and cultures?! Clearly, despite Earth and Federation propoganda and lies, White European Males still dominate not only Earth, but the Federation!
3. They have "abandoned money"? Wait a minute... money is nessicary when there is scarcity and a market economy... and they definitly didn't eliminate scarcity (after all, dilithium crystals are still rare and valuable... there is only one holideck on the Enterprise, not one for every crew memeber, definitly meaning it would require some sort of rationing... the Enterprise is always carrying medicine or supplies, implying that the replicators can only produce certain types of objects). Obviously, the Federation has adopted some sort of anti-free-market command economy - perhaps Soviet style Communism, or Nazi style National Socialism. Either way, despite the pleasant lies of abundance that is spread in Trek propoganda, the Federation is most likely stifling, beurocratic, totalitarian-economic nightmare, with shortages and people lining up Soviet style in order to buy the most basic of goods.
4. We are left to assume that the Federation is some sort of Democracy... then why don't starfleet officers ever talk politics? Why isn't Data a member of one political party, while Wharf is a memeber of another political party, and they have heated (though respectful) political discussions? Why isn't Pickard contiplating his civilian political career after his starfleet career? Why is there never any controversy about Federation policy?
It is because the Federation is a military dictatorship, controlled by Starfleet! The military elite of Starfleet control both the military and civilian governments (and clearly, from the series, there is no seperation of the two).
5. The Enterprise is supposedly on a "peaceful mission of exploration"... yet the Enterprise is the military flagship of Starfleet! How often do countries nowadays send a battleship, or aircraft carriers, or other military war machines on "exploration and science missions"? Scientific vessels are usually unarmed, or carrying a few small firearms... they aren't loaded with ICBMs and torpedos! The Enterprise is clearly on a scout mission for imperialist military expansion!
So here is my concept:
In my series or movie, the Federation is really a vast imperialist military dictatorship... and Empire that has been slowly and surely conquering the galaxy. The other Star Trek films and series are propoganda films put out by the Federation... (that explains why the Klingons look different in different series... because as the Federation continued is agressive war ag
LOTR almost completely failed to capture that Tolkienesque feel that I get from reading the books.
:)
Based on the limitations of the medium, do you think it would be remotely possible for LOTR to capture the feel that you got from reading the books? One is cinema, the other is books.
A movie can never be the book... if that was the case, they would have stopped selling the book when the movie was made!
Would a monitor and speed regulator on your car be Intrinsically Distasteful?
Would a monitor that reports your TV viewing habits to the govt. be Intrinsically Distasteful?
Would a monitor that only allows you to buy certain foods be Intrinsically Distasteful?
Would a police force that inspects your home every day to ensure that you are not harboring criminals be Intrinsically Distasteful?
Would a monitor that ensures you don't cook microwave food on the bbq be Intrinsically Distasteful?
Unfortunatly, that vast majority of people in North America and Europe would say, "YES"! People rail on about DRM, because they are antagonistic towards the big corporations that promote DRM (and I don't blame them). But no doubt something done by the government "for your own good", like monitoring and controlling diet, or observing traffic behavior, or other nannie-state social controls, would have massive popular support.
I think what the big media corporations need to do is piggyback DRM legislation into hot-button moral-panic issues. Tell people that if DRM isn't present in all media players, that media players will be used by racists to promote hate, be used by pedophiles to exploit children, and be used by terrorists to destroy America! It doesn't matter if there is no truth to any such wild claims, the "think of the children" crowd would be all over anyone who disagreed with DRM... and in 50 years we would learn in public schools that DRM was designed to "protect us from the corporations".
Yes, I hear what you are saying about high executive compensation. And in fact, a lot of it is true.
But what do you suggest should be done about? Are you suggesting that the government should implement some sort labor price controls? I am afraid you will find that tinkering with wages by the government is usually a disaster.
So they absolutely should have only used 2 white women - one dressed in white & the other in black - because using mixed races is offensive. Oh, and having 2 black women there would have been racists as portraying black women as violent.
Maybe they should have shown some cool games you could play on the PSP? Mention some features, like playing MP3s, or watching movies? Possible even include a picture of the product they are trying to sell?
But if they MUST make an ad that has nothing to do with the product, they could have shown a black woman and a white woman embracing, instead of locked in combat. Maybe even had them making out, if that wanted to make it "controversial" to create a buzz, without evoking racism or racial taboos. Instead, some lame creative director though they would do something "edgy" to impress the judges at the One Show. Not only is it sleazy, it is contrived.
Yes but how much does France's nuclear power industry get in subsidies?
... or what do you think that 100 billion dollar adventure in Iraq was about? Do you think the cost of the future consequences of global warming are being calculated into the bill for your coal generated electricity?
It gets crazy subsidies. It is France dude! Street mimes get subsidies! But it doesn't get any more subsidies than anything else in France. It is competing on merit, as all other forms of power are also heavily subsidized. The point is, nuclear power is not some ultra-expensive impracticle boondoggle. It is not unrealistic at all that the U.S. could convert the majority of electric production to nuclear power, the rest being supplimented by wind and solar and geothermal.
And it is not like fossil fuels don't get big subsidies either in the U.S.
I am just as against subsidies as you... but if my money is going to be taken away from me at gunpoint for something, I rather it be spent on something that will most likely work, like nuclear power - than god knows what else it is going to be spent on.
Nuclear power is only "cheap" because the government gives them massive subsidies. If the Nuclear Power industry had to operate in a freemarket, ie buy their own insurance and pay for their own waste disposal without government assistance, the industry would not exist. The US has a number of laws and such to shield nuclear power thus "making it profitable". Get rip of all of them and it would no longer be profitable.
Nuclear power is neither cheap nor expensive... because nuclear power only exists in a handful of quasi-public facilities, all of them decades old. There aren't nearly enough nuclear reactors in the U.S., nor are there any working in any sort of market capacity, nor are they modern, for anyone to make a statement one way or another about it. Talking about the U.S. Nuclear Power Industry is like talking about the U.S. Space Tourism Industry... we are talking about something entirely imaginary on any real scale.
*HOWEVER*, France does have a very viable nuclear power industry. Nuclear power, in France, is cheaper than coal power is in the United States. Nuclear power in France is cheap, safe, and provides about 70% of the France's electricity.
It is not ideologically racist... Sony is not trying to promote a hate ideology or anything. What Sony is trying to do is "play" with racist taboos, in order to seem "edgy" and "provocotive". Unfortunatly, an ad for consumer electronics is not the place to be challenging taboos. It is not offensive in itself, but tasteless in it's context. I never said it was racist... I said it is sleazy. Sleazy != racist.
How are developing countries who can't afford welfare programs going to do so, if they are excluded from trading with richer countries and building their economy to a point where they can afford welfare programs?
Awesome! This was the first highly compelling and rational response I got! Way to go!
But there is strong belief among many workers that what Widget Company Y WILL do, is pay out that $4 mil dollar as a bonus to the owners / CEO / stockholders / etc. In that case, the Company gets cheap IT, the rich investors and owners get richer, and all the "real workers" get is the shaft.
That might happen. It is always a possibility. However, there is a long term cost to this kind of behavior. Companies that are willing to fire a bunch of employees in order to give the boss a big bonus, in the long run make themselves less desirable places to work. Or, more realisticly, if the company fires its IT staff to pump up the 3rd quarter profits and temporarily raise the cost of their shares, it only is a short term boost in the cost of the shares and makes the place a less desirable place to work. If they are not pumping the outsourcing savings into R&D, or significantly reducing prices to increase volume of sales, or doing something like that, the long term costs will outweigh the short term benefits. Outsourcing is not some magic bullet.
However, if every CEO and every corporation in America is just trying to make a buck and cash out as quick as possible, with no concern for the long term... and shareholders are happy enough to let them get away with it... then there are some problems in the U.S. that stopping outsourcing are not going to fix.
To be fair one of the ads had the black woman winning and another where they were evenly matched. But who wants to be fair right?
The ad was exploiting race roles and taboos. This kind of thing would be tasteful as a serious art piece in a gallery, but it is just sleazy when it is used to sell consumer electronics.
Maybe Sony could do a series of ads with Mohammed with dynamite on his chest playing a PSP before he blows himself up? Or perhaps run a series of ads on the Duke campus saying "It will rape your mind!".
I suppose you are talking about countries like Canada, which supposedly "subsidize" production costs. In reality, Canada doesn't subsidize production cost, they provide tax credits for production costs. The government of Canada is not giving away free money, they simply are stealing less money from film-producers than the United States government is stealing from film producers.
If you have a problem, it is with the U.S. government kleptocrats over-taxing film production, not with Canada (or New Zealand, or whereever). Perhaps you should ask the Governator for some tax breaks, instead of complaining about outsourcing. It is sad when a U.S. state with a Republican in office is being out-free-marketed by a bunch of socialist Canadians. The ol' Free Market Tax-Revolting Proud Californian Ronnie 'The Gipper' Reagan must be turning in his grave!
You don't have to burn the oil. When OPEC decreased export quotas in the 1970's there was a dramatic shift toward more fuel efficient cars. Similarly, countries with high taxes on gasoline also show a preference for more fuel efficient cars.
:) Every potential worker who is unemployed is essentially wasted, because people need good and services in order to live, regardless if they produce any goods and services.
Yes, but we can't keep Chinese people in wells under the ground for future generations to use, like we can with oil.
The solution, as I see it, is to develop programs to provide everyone in the world with the basic necessities of life for free.
This is how it is right now in virtually every industrialized country. Unfortunatly, developing countries are too poor to be able to do this - Unless of course they can develop their own industry and capital, which is starting to happen with free trade.
Or perhaps when they featured a white woman beating up a black woman, to celebrate the new white PSPs?!