Yes it is complex. Unfortunately, except for the brakes perhaps, most of the costs you list for an I/C engine are negligible (at least in my experience). Modern cars require a $30 oil change (includes filter) every 5000 miles or less. My last car which I had to give up after 10 years -never- required exhaust system repairs (not even one muffler as far as I can recall). The state of Massachusetts charges $29 per year for safety/emissions inspections. Although I couldn't find the information in a few minutes searching, I seriously doubt they discount the price for electric vehicles: they probably just charge you $29 for the safety inspection alone.
On the other side of the scale, you have to consider the battery replacement cost. Will his battery pack last 10 years?
There will never be an element called MPAAium, since no element (or particle, for that matter) known to man has a half life that comes even close to the effectuve duration of copyright on "Steamboat Willy".
Protons might be close but they'll probably come up short.
Books are great for reading, but for the ultimate experience you have to unroll a papyrus.
Papyrus is great for reading, but for the ultimate experience you have to carry a clay tablet.
Books -are- great, but they're not the be-all and end-all of carrying words and pictures around. I was just on vacation and took 4 library books and 8 to 10 of my own purchased books with me, basically for no 'physical' cost because my phone, tablet and laptop were coming along anyway. No chance I could forget any of those library books on vacation either, and have to pay for them to be replaced. And of course I could have had 500 books to choose from instead of a dozen or so just as easily.
And another advantage nobody else mentioned yet is that all my devices tracked my place in each book automatically so I could switch devices depending on what was most convenient at the time, and pick up right where I left off.
I'm really looking forward to the day when I'm carrying around my entire library, all the time. I only wish there was a way to replace all my existing paperback books (save for a few sentimental items), with digital copies for cheap (and legal of course).
The Rosetta Disk http://rosettaproject.org/ is actually designed to give future humans some hint that the object contains microscopic data. Yes people have actually thought about these issues.
I'm not sure where this accidental deletion thing is coming from in all these comments. On my Windows computers, if I select a file and hit Del, I get a confirmation dialog asking whether I want to move the file to the Recycle Bin. I do not recall ever changing a setting to get this behavior. As far as I know it is the default.
Exactly. Windows RT = Windows on ARM. Windows 8 = Windows on x86. Microsoft announced this nomenclature a few months ago. In fact the Asus information includes a Windows 8 tablet running on an Intel Atom processor (starting at $799).
This always sounds to me like it would be equivalent to saying in this world: 'Reroute 120V from the mains to your TV antenna', and the results would be about as useful as one would expect. Seriously, was the deflector dish -designed- to accept warp power before the insane crew of the Enterprise came up with the idea?
Just skimming the comments here I can see that there are all kinds of opinion on this. Some folks are city people, some are not. Personally, I have never lived or worked in a city. I live and work in the Boston suburbs. The suburbs here are not exactly as 'sprawling' as those around larger cities in warmer climates. Office parks with high tech jobs follow all the ring roads around Boston. You can easily find a place to live near them, so that any supposed sprawl doesn't have to affect your daily life at all.
I see a lot of people here report that infrequent printing causes clogging, but I haven't had that problem. I believe this printer has the print heads attached to the ink cartridge, so replacing the ink replaces the heads. Finally, the printer is already 5 years old and still works fine: I think it has already earned it's keep.
I probably print less than 100 pages a year. Maybe even less than 50. Yet when I need to print something, I really need to print something so having a printer at home is essential. And while I usually print b/w, I do sometimes need color. With this kind of low-low use and an occasional color requirement, a compact, dirt-cheap inkjet makes much more sense than a laser, even after high-priced ink cartridges are considered. And the fact that the same unit is a page scanner is a great bonus.
I read a short story once where (based on my very limited memory of the story) a planet had lost its sun somehow and was near absolute zero on the surface. A small group of survivors lived underground in what they called 'the nest' and actually went to the surface periodically to gather some oxygen 'snow' to bring back down to the nest and boil into breathable air.
I -probably- read this in Issac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine.
And then you run into the random site that REQUIRES a non-alphanumeric character at the same time many other sites explicitly DISALLOW one. My simple system for 'generating' my password for each site I visit goes right out the window. And there are still a few isolated places where only a PIN is allowed. We don't need no stinkin' letters!
This is my thought as well. Would I love to own all hand-made, stained and rubbed solid wood furniture? Maybe. But I'm not willing to pay 3x (or more) the cost of flatpack assemble-your-self items that can 'do the job' just as well.
The 'real stuff' is also heavier, bulkier and requires more maintenance over time. All of this is counter to my desire for 'mobility', as in not being weighed down by 'stuff'. An heirloom quality piece of furniture might be more desirable if I planned to stay in the same place for the next 40 years. I'm not.
A city kid might ask, "what are these 'woods' and 'streams' you speak of'? As well as a -safe- parking lot, baseball field, or place to play hide and seek. My image of a 'latch key' kid is one who is stuck at home between the time school ends and their parents' work ends, because there is nowhere else safe to be.
They did poke fun at this in the first Superman movie (with Christopher Reeve). By the time that movie came out, phone booths were already being replaced by the weather-shielded phones on a post.
This has enormous implications. I just wonder how many threats to 'take their ball and go home' will ensue, followed by threads of 'I'm getting my dad (the US government)'.
Here's my MicroCenter procedure these days:
1. Go to microcenter.com
2. Order everything online for pickup at the store.
3. Go to store and don't talk to anybody but the guy/gal at the pickup desk.
Salesman problem solved.
I guess it depends on whether you can time your purchases with sales. My last hard disk purchase was 2 TB for $79 from MicroCenter. I doubt the price was ever much lower than that anywhere.
I live near Boston. MicroCenter is a godsend. For cables I will say that 'U-Do-It' electronics in Needham is a better deal. Motherboards and power supplies at MicroCenter might not be good enough for real 'gamer enthusiasts', but for the mid-range systems I build they're cheap and work well.
I didn't know about this change. What a shame. My last HD purchase was an HD204UI that only cost $80 !!! And it works great. I'm sad to hear I might not be able to buy another like it in the future.
My uncle who served in WWII has mentioned that he worked as a driver and the army literally did "platoon" the trucks. The drivers had to learn how to all start together on signal without waiting for the vehicle in front to move, eliminating the caterpillar effect. It's not something that human drivers can do naturally without special coordination. It would be cool to see automated vehicles wipe out the backups as well.
I've wondered about this myself. The "platooning" scenario seems to assume all the cars are in top-top condition. What happens if a car in the middle of the pack throws a rod or gets a blowout at 70 mph?
On the other hand, weather conditions are easier to account for: just have the system slow down the cars and space them farther apart when conditions warrant it.
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Yes it is complex. Unfortunately, except for the brakes perhaps, most of the costs you list for an I/C engine are negligible (at least in my experience). Modern cars require a $30 oil change (includes filter) every 5000 miles or less. My last car which I had to give up after 10 years -never- required exhaust system repairs (not even one muffler as far as I can recall). The state of Massachusetts charges $29 per year for safety/emissions inspections. Although I couldn't find the information in a few minutes searching, I seriously doubt they discount the price for electric vehicles: they probably just charge you $29 for the safety inspection alone.
On the other side of the scale, you have to consider the battery replacement cost. Will his battery pack last 10 years?
There will never be an element called MPAAium, since no element (or particle, for that matter) known to man has a half life that comes even close to the effectuve duration of copyright on "Steamboat Willy".
Protons might be close but they'll probably come up short.
Books are great for reading, but for the ultimate experience you have to unroll a papyrus.
Papyrus is great for reading, but for the ultimate experience you have to carry a clay tablet.
Books -are- great, but they're not the be-all and end-all of carrying words and pictures around. I was just on vacation and took 4 library books and 8 to 10 of my own purchased books with me, basically for no 'physical' cost because my phone, tablet and laptop were coming along anyway. No chance I could forget any of those library books on vacation either, and have to pay for them to be replaced. And of course I could have had 500 books to choose from instead of a dozen or so just as easily.
And another advantage nobody else mentioned yet is that all my devices tracked my place in each book automatically so I could switch devices depending on what was most convenient at the time, and pick up right where I left off.
I'm really looking forward to the day when I'm carrying around my entire library, all the time. I only wish there was a way to replace all my existing paperback books (save for a few sentimental items), with digital copies for cheap (and legal of course).
The Rosetta Disk http://rosettaproject.org/ is actually designed to give future humans some hint that the object contains microscopic data. Yes people have actually thought about these issues.
Since we're all piling on under this comment: not in Massachusetts either. And that's been true for at least 5 years now.
I'm not sure where this accidental deletion thing is coming from in all these comments. On my Windows computers, if I select a file and hit Del, I get a confirmation dialog asking whether I want to move the file to the Recycle Bin. I do not recall ever changing a setting to get this behavior. As far as I know it is the default.
Exactly. Windows RT = Windows on ARM. Windows 8 = Windows on x86. Microsoft announced this nomenclature a few months ago. In fact the Asus information includes a Windows 8 tablet running on an Intel Atom processor (starting at $799).
This always sounds to me like it would be equivalent to saying in this world: 'Reroute 120V from the mains to your TV antenna', and the results would be about as useful as one would expect. Seriously, was the deflector dish -designed- to accept warp power before the insane crew of the Enterprise came up with the idea?
Just skimming the comments here I can see that there are all kinds of opinion on this. Some folks are city people, some are not. Personally, I have never lived or worked in a city. I live and work in the Boston suburbs. The suburbs here are not exactly as 'sprawling' as those around larger cities in warmer climates. Office parks with high tech jobs follow all the ring roads around Boston. You can easily find a place to live near them, so that any supposed sprawl doesn't have to affect your daily life at all.
I see a lot of people here report that infrequent printing causes clogging, but I haven't had that problem. I believe this printer has the print heads attached to the ink cartridge, so replacing the ink replaces the heads. Finally, the printer is already 5 years old and still works fine: I think it has already earned it's keep.
I probably print less than 100 pages a year. Maybe even less than 50. Yet when I need to print something, I really need to print something so having a printer at home is essential. And while I usually print b/w, I do sometimes need color. With this kind of low-low use and an occasional color requirement, a compact, dirt-cheap inkjet makes much more sense than a laser, even after high-priced ink cartridges are considered. And the fact that the same unit is a page scanner is a great bonus.
I read a short story once where (based on my very limited memory of the story) a planet had lost its sun somehow and was near absolute zero on the surface. A small group of survivors lived underground in what they called 'the nest' and actually went to the surface periodically to gather some oxygen 'snow' to bring back down to the nest and boil into breathable air.
I -probably- read this in Issac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine.
Have we all forgotten about Ellen Feiss: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2-UuIEOcss
And then you run into the random site that REQUIRES a non-alphanumeric character at the same time many other sites explicitly DISALLOW one. My simple system for 'generating' my password for each site I visit goes right out the window. And there are still a few isolated places where only a PIN is allowed. We don't need no stinkin' letters!
This is my thought as well. Would I love to own all hand-made, stained and rubbed solid wood furniture? Maybe. But I'm not willing to pay 3x (or more) the cost of flatpack assemble-your-self items that can 'do the job' just as well. The 'real stuff' is also heavier, bulkier and requires more maintenance over time. All of this is counter to my desire for 'mobility', as in not being weighed down by 'stuff'. An heirloom quality piece of furniture might be more desirable if I planned to stay in the same place for the next 40 years. I'm not.
A city kid might ask, "what are these 'woods' and 'streams' you speak of'? As well as a -safe- parking lot, baseball field, or place to play hide and seek. My image of a 'latch key' kid is one who is stuck at home between the time school ends and their parents' work ends, because there is nowhere else safe to be.
They did poke fun at this in the first Superman movie (with Christopher Reeve). By the time that movie came out, phone booths were already being replaced by the weather-shielded phones on a post.
This has enormous implications. I just wonder how many threats to 'take their ball and go home' will ensue, followed by threads of 'I'm getting my dad (the US government)'.
Oh don't worry, the EULA will stipulate that you forfeit your right to class action if you turn the thing on.
Here's my MicroCenter procedure these days:
1. Go to microcenter.com
2. Order everything online for pickup at the store.
3. Go to store and don't talk to anybody but the guy/gal at the pickup desk.
Salesman problem solved.
I guess it depends on whether you can time your purchases with sales. My last hard disk purchase was 2 TB for $79 from MicroCenter. I doubt the price was ever much lower than that anywhere.
I live near Boston. MicroCenter is a godsend. For cables I will say that 'U-Do-It' electronics in Needham is a better deal. Motherboards and power supplies at MicroCenter might not be good enough for real 'gamer enthusiasts', but for the mid-range systems I build they're cheap and work well.
I am reminded of this ancient Onion article: http://www.theonion.com/articles/mir-scientists-study-effects-of-weightlessness-on,1211/
I didn't know about this change. What a shame. My last HD purchase was an HD204UI that only cost $80 !!! And it works great. I'm sad to hear I might not be able to buy another like it in the future.
My uncle who served in WWII has mentioned that he worked as a driver and the army literally did "platoon" the trucks. The drivers had to learn how to all start together on signal without waiting for the vehicle in front to move, eliminating the caterpillar effect. It's not something that human drivers can do naturally without special coordination. It would be cool to see automated vehicles wipe out the backups as well.
I've wondered about this myself. The "platooning" scenario seems to assume all the cars are in top-top condition. What happens if a car in the middle of the pack throws a rod or gets a blowout at 70 mph?
On the other hand, weather conditions are easier to account for: just have the system slow down the cars and space them farther apart when conditions warrant it.