"The real estate bubble is supossed to pop in the US any day now.... but it hasn't yet. While I have no doubt it will pop one day - probably soon - its a fools game to try and time the thing."
As long as the expected rate of return on real estate is significantly higher than inflation, the RE market will not bust. All the fed actions to keep inflation in check will prevent a real estate bust -- apparently we learned something from the 80s.
We're already seeing readjustments at the high end in certain markets of real estate, but it's just not happening in most markets, and likely won't. The only way I can see it happening is if there is a massive upwelling in speculation in a certain sector -- but I think most modern investors learned their lesson from the dotcom bust.
Some economists have said that the recent real estate boom is due to undervaluing of real estate in the past decade -- investors preferentially invested in dotcoms, or other risky-yet-having-the-potential-to-create-early-ret irement enterprises. When this busted, investors turned to the standard "safe" investment -- real estate, thus bringing the real estate market back up to its actual value (though over its value in certain areas).
"Ever since 2000, everytime anybody invests any significant amount into anything at all, people start proclaiming 'Bubble!!!'
The great bubble crash happened half a decade ago now. It's time to get over it."
Not really. Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it. The dotcom bust affected the economy at all levels, and we are still recovering from it. Not that other factors haven't affected the economy in the past decade, but the dotcom bubble is a major reason we're in this hole that we are still scrabbling to climb out of.
The community referred to is not the group of developers who work for the financially-successful open source project, but the outside community.
The success of a private R&D firm does not rest with the community at large outside the R&D firm.
The point of the quote is that financially successful open source projects depend upon the actions of the outside community, and thus must act to foster participation by the large open source community. This also means that the open source project in question does not have ultimate control over the project, which can be a stumbling block for many investors.
"Not everything that increases in value like this is necessarily a bubble"
Actually, an increase in value doesn't make a bubble -- an increase in invested capital without a corresponding increase in value is what creates a bubble.
The second part of creating a bubble is speculation; people investing in something not because of value, but because of expected ROI due to speculation. I know (well, believe) that the P/E ratio of Google was too high for me to get a good return on my investment through long-term investing -- but I also knew that the perceived value of Google shares would net me a good ROI when I sold. I wasn't investing in Google; I was investing in the public perception of Google as a good investment.
We're the first to call the bubble!1one Other analysts PWNED!
First off, it may be a bit premature to say that there is a bubble. The open-source movement is still an adolescent, and it remains to be seen if expected returns on investments justify the VC going in. The only people who think there is a bubble now are the people who firmly believe that open source business models aren't as profitable as proprietary software models -- which remains to be seen.
Unrelated to that thought:
FTA: Echoing those sentiments, Ron Rose, the chief information officer of Priceline.com, said that the company has become "predisposed" to buying open source products because they of the "economic benefits". A vibrant community behind a product also ensures a long-term road map, he added.
Yes, open source can be cheaper, Ron, and journalists sometimes use "quotation marks" for no apparent "reason," especially when they of the "paraphrased comments".
TFA & submitter seem to miss a very important point -- most of the Christian fundamentalists who are proponents of ID are not Catholic.
Furthermore, they don't take guidance or leadership from the Catholic church.
This is one of the reasons that the Xtian Fundies are so hard to convince of anything -- they aren't likely to take guidance from a hierarchical power. Instead, the individual (or the congregation) is supposed to interpret God's word themselves -- as related in the Bible, which is the source of their entire faith. Invalidating any part of the Bible therefore invalidates the Bible as the true word of God, and therefore invalidates their faith.
It's easy (relatively) for Catholics to accept that the Bible isn't literal; they have a hierarchy of leadership, and a set of dogma, that means that their religion is more than just the words in the Bible. The authority structure allows the Catholic faith to, as a whole, reinterpret the Bible as necessary.
So please, don't conflate Catholicism with Christian Fundamentalism.
Business Travel -- if you want to watch a movie at a hotel, you have to pay big bucks (US$10) for a limited selection via the hotel's distribution system.
Traveling with the kids -- makes road trips a lot easier to handle. And to stave off the "but good parents wouldn't need to foster the kids off on an electronic babysitter in the car" crowd -- it's a lot safer to drive when the kids aren't interrupting your focus every 20 seconds.
Commuters -- Those of us who responsibly take mass transit to the office have another way to pass the time.
Crowded houses -- Allows someone to watch a movie without dominating the living room. Can easily be carried from room to room, a better solution than having a TV and DVD player in every room.
So you'd need to opt-in every time you open a session or change location? Kinda like flipping the The Doctor is IN/OUT" sign? Seems like a good idea to me.
" Did you even read the article? Students have to opt in. Not opt out."
You must be new here.
OTOH, even if students opt in, how secure is the system? Also, you're opting in to having your information displayed, not to be included in the mapping. Is it possible for someone to crack the system and tie in the personal data of a student who did not opt in to that student's location?
"It's also had the affect of providing some interesting research on study patterns"
Well, that is no surprise really. Reminds me of the College that didn't pave any walkways until after the first semester the campus was open... then just paved where people had worn paths. Should provide good, statistically reliable, insight into where resources for social/academic lounges should be located.
OTOH, does MIT have a graduate program in sociology? I'm thinking of a great study on nerd relationships and mating behavior...
FTA: "Jaffe was keen to point out that, far from his being an elitist point of view, he felt that journos should set themselves apart in order to do a better job of informing the public. There's something too cozy, he believes, in the people who inform the public about the game industry, viewing themselves as part of the game industry."
True. But I think that Jaffe misses a distinction -- there is a gamer culture that the journalists are identifying with, more than just the game industry.
It's kind of like pop culture -- there are those who read Entertainment Weekly, and are interested in what the stars are doing. Then there are the people who read the gossip column, to see if anyone they know is getting mentioned.
The game industry is like the pop culture industry -- lots of people play the games (or watch the movies and the TV shows, and wonder what Tom and Katie are up to), but few people know the individuals who are 'making the scene'.
The problem, like with pop culture, is that only insiders get the real scoop. The bigger problem, as I see it, is that the real scoop isn't even published -- it's the dross, that so many people are familiar with already, that gets the ink. And if you give a bad review (or negative gossip), forget the advance copy of the game the game (the next party invite).
Perhaps Jaffe should also realize that the game journalism industry is very similar to the game industry itself -- if you take risks, you're likely to get burned. Safe reporting and reviews tend tohelp with job/company solvency.
In the end, I'd like to see honest reporting by industry insiders, rather than 'game paparazzi' doing vacuous, cover-art reviews... it's the honest part that's hard to find.
"And if people have 500GB of data, or more, does that mean the police are going to want to detain them for even longer?
"
No. Please RTA.
The majority of the delay is due to waiting for the other hard-drives to be finished. TFA doesn't specify, but they can still probably get it done within 14 days with no problem, if they weren't bogged down with the large number of hard drives they were given earlier.
TFA states that this is unlikely to go through due to personal liberty issues:
"With the measure unlikely to make it into law thanks to widespread opposition from MPs due to its civil liberty implications..."
Also, this isn't about it taking 90 days to crack a hard drive, decrypt the contents, and translate them... it's about an overload of hard drives needing to be cracked, and the lack of resources to do it in a timely manner.
Also FTA: "Dr Mirza said: "There was a massive backlog of computers to analyse. Some of them couldn't be looked at for over 90 days." It could be just as likely that the police are looking at the controversial extension measures simply because the lack of resources mean terrorist hard drives could be part of a wider queuing system."
This is police FUD, they aren't getting a response to the fact that the people responsible for cracking HDs are overworked, with a serious backlog. This is publicity for adding more staff and beefing the budget. Although the FUD may certainly be valid in this case.
Article should be titled "How Long Does it Take to a Hard Drive to Move Through the Queu in Order to be Analyzed."
"Its what you are designed to do, everything else you do in life simply supports that goal. "
What do you mean designed?;)
I happen to disagree with you, since I don't really believe that I am just a member of a species. I am a symbiotic relationship of many species -- maybe my purpose is to propagate my mitochondria, or my gut bacteria, or something else.
One of the effects of my life may be to propagate the species -- but I don't think you can ascribe that as a purpose, for then you are suggesting the presence of a higher power.
"If we are successful in avoiding a catastrophe, then it obviously wasn't our time. There is no such thing as fate, we are in control of our destiny."
This is a contradiction -- saying 'it wasn't our time' is saying that we do have a fate.
Also, animals don't adapt in order to ensure the success of the species -- that's ascribing a motive. Species adapt because some kind of mutation provided a selective advantage. The selective survival of the species caused the adaptation, rather than the other way 'round.
"Are state sales and income taxes unfair to the poor? Generally no
"
I disagree. State sales taxes are definitely unfair to the poor, who pay a much higher percentage of their income on taxable goods. If you look at discretionary income, it gets even worse. State income taxes obviously vary widely by state, so I don't know how it is outside NJ.
And you leave out the most unfair tax of all (when looking at proportion of income), the local property tax. This is the dealbreaker, since it is skewed so far to the benefit of the wealthy, in terms of tax per income.
Our current system taxes both spending and income, which is a problem as I see it. But in order to talk about the tax burden, we have to include all taxes paid at all levels -- which includes both types.
"a) We need to learn to use other planets as resources so that when the population of earth is say... 16 billion people and the average life expectancy is say 5 times higher than it is now or even the possibility of death being a thing of the past, that we can ship people off into the universe like its no big deal. "
Or we could learn to be more efficient in our use of resources.
"b) Diversify, diversify, diversify. Right now we keep all our eggs in one basket. One meteor, one huge earthquake or mega volcanic eruption could wipe out anywhere from 25% to 95% after all of the side effects are taken into account (i.e. tsunamis and climate changes). By living on other planets the chances of our extinction as a species becomes much smaller.
Why is survival of the species necessary? If it's time to go, it's time to go...
"c) Exploration and knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Sure we can do most of that stuff with robots, but what fun is that... and while living in space we may learn a thing or two about the robustness (or lack thereof) of our bodies and ability to adapt. Perhaps new methods of farming or food creation will become the norm. There are many other benefits but I won't list them now. "
It's interesting that you say knowledge for the sake of knowledge... but then switch tracks to talk about uses of such knowledge. But, I think this reason is valid... probably the most valid.
"d) Like it or not, not only are we an intelligent species, but a moral one. The intelligence factor leads us to dominating our surrounding environment, the problem is we are smart enough to not be happy with what we have and instead modify it to our needs (I see nothing wrong with this, we are a part of nature, whatever we do is natural despite however many animals may die, even if we do it in a viral manner). As a result of this extra level of comfort we tend to take up more space and consume more resources. We also tend to live longer and longer... eventually reaching the point of no death according to many in the sciences. This is where the moral part kicks in... we won't enforce population control, we won't just start killing people for the sake of killing people. Therefore our population is bound to spiral out of control at some point within the next century or so.
We won't need to enforce population control. Starvation and disease will take care of that all by itself. Space exploration and colonization will not provide us the resources we need... competition for limited resources will continue to limit our population.
"You don't generally notice space stations disappearing when a shuttle explodes."
Of course not, you're too busy watching the shuttle explode!
Seriously, though, the US shuttle program & the Russian Soyuz program was the only way to service the ISS at the time of the Columbia crash... so grounding the shuttle program presented a real threat to the continuance of human occupation of the ISS, especially considering Russia's fiscal problems at the time.
So, yes, it is worth mentioning that inhabitance of the ISS continued during the fallout (no pun intended) of the Columbia crash.
Couldn't help butting in, I've been following this joker's (ifwm) comments since an exchange a couple days ago...
I'm trying to learn not to feed the troll. I recommended fark.com to him... no luck yet.
Slashdot Mirror
"The real estate bubble is supossed to pop in the US any day now.... but it hasn't yet. While I have no doubt it will pop one day - probably soon - its a fools game to try and time the thing."
t irement enterprises. When this busted, investors turned to the standard "safe" investment -- real estate, thus bringing the real estate market back up to its actual value (though over its value in certain areas).
As long as the expected rate of return on real estate is significantly higher than inflation, the RE market will not bust. All the fed actions to keep inflation in check will prevent a real estate bust -- apparently we learned something from the 80s.
We're already seeing readjustments at the high end in certain markets of real estate, but it's just not happening in most markets, and likely won't. The only way I can see it happening is if there is a massive upwelling in speculation in a certain sector -- but I think most modern investors learned their lesson from the dotcom bust.
Some economists have said that the recent real estate boom is due to undervaluing of real estate in the past decade -- investors preferentially invested in dotcoms, or other risky-yet-having-the-potential-to-create-early-re
"Ever since 2000, everytime anybody invests any significant amount into anything at all, people start proclaiming 'Bubble!!!'
The great bubble crash happened half a decade ago now. It's time to get over it."
Not really. Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it. The dotcom bust affected the economy at all levels, and we are still recovering from it. Not that other factors haven't affected the economy in the past decade, but the dotcom bubble is a major reason we're in this hole that we are still scrabbling to climb out of.
The community referred to is not the group of developers who work for the financially-successful open source project, but the outside community.
The success of a private R&D firm does not rest with the community at large outside the R&D firm.
The point of the quote is that financially successful open source projects depend upon the actions of the outside community, and thus must act to foster participation by the large open source community. This also means that the open source project in question does not have ultimate control over the project, which can be a stumbling block for many investors.
"Not everything that increases in value like this is necessarily a bubble"
Actually, an increase in value doesn't make a bubble -- an increase in invested capital without a corresponding increase in value is what creates a bubble.
The second part of creating a bubble is speculation; people investing in something not because of value, but because of expected ROI due to speculation. I know (well, believe) that the P/E ratio of Google was too high for me to get a good return on my investment through long-term investing -- but I also knew that the perceived value of Google shares would net me a good ROI when I sold. I wasn't investing in Google; I was investing in the public perception of Google as a good investment.
We're the first to call the bubble!1one Other analysts PWNED!
First off, it may be a bit premature to say that there is a bubble. The open-source movement is still an adolescent, and it remains to be seen if expected returns on investments justify the VC going in. The only people who think there is a bubble now are the people who firmly believe that open source business models aren't as profitable as proprietary software models -- which remains to be seen.
Unrelated to that thought:
FTA: Echoing those sentiments, Ron Rose, the chief information officer of Priceline.com, said that the company has become "predisposed" to buying open source products because they of the "economic benefits". A vibrant community behind a product also ensures a long-term road map, he added.
Yes, open source can be cheaper, Ron, and journalists sometimes use "quotation marks" for no apparent "reason," especially when they of the "paraphrased comments".
TFA & submitter seem to miss a very important point -- most of the Christian fundamentalists who are proponents of ID are not Catholic.
Furthermore, they don't take guidance or leadership from the Catholic church.
This is one of the reasons that the Xtian Fundies are so hard to convince of anything -- they aren't likely to take guidance from a hierarchical power. Instead, the individual (or the congregation) is supposed to interpret God's word themselves -- as related in the Bible, which is the source of their entire faith. Invalidating any part of the Bible therefore invalidates the Bible as the true word of God, and therefore invalidates their faith.
It's easy (relatively) for Catholics to accept that the Bible isn't literal; they have a hierarchy of leadership, and a set of dogma, that means that their religion is more than just the words in the Bible. The authority structure allows the Catholic faith to, as a whole, reinterpret the Bible as necessary.
So please, don't conflate Catholicism with Christian Fundamentalism.
" The Southern African Large Telescope (SALT) will officially be launched on Thursday 10th November"
I thought that the whole purpose of the SALT treaties were to prevent launches.
Several reasons there isa market for them:
Business Travel -- if you want to watch a movie at a hotel, you have to pay big bucks (US$10) for a limited selection via the hotel's distribution system.
Traveling with the kids -- makes road trips a lot easier to handle. And to stave off the "but good parents wouldn't need to foster the kids off on an electronic babysitter in the car" crowd -- it's a lot safer to drive when the kids aren't interrupting your focus every 20 seconds.
Commuters -- Those of us who responsibly take mass transit to the office have another way to pass the time.
Crowded houses -- Allows someone to watch a movie without dominating the living room. Can easily be carried from room to room, a better solution than having a TV and DVD player in every room.
I can't recall what college it was. For some reason, Cornell sticks in my mind, but I don't think that's correct.
So you'd need to opt-in every time you open a session or change location? Kinda like flipping the The Doctor is IN/OUT" sign? Seems like a good idea to me.
So, small game developers can learn from Turing bands...
Since when do AI musicians have anything to teach to small game developers?
Anyone else assume that Turing bands are composed only of organ players?
Sorry... late in the day... eyesight obliterated by LCD... misread the summary title.
" Did you even read the article? Students have to opt in. Not opt out."
You must be new here.
OTOH, even if students opt in, how secure is the system? Also, you're opting in to having your information displayed, not to be included in the mapping. Is it possible for someone to crack the system and tie in the personal data of a student who did not opt in to that student's location?
"It's also had the affect of providing some interesting research on study patterns"
Well, that is no surprise really. Reminds me of the College that didn't pave any walkways until after the first semester the campus was open... then just paved where people had worn paths. Should provide good, statistically reliable, insight into where resources for social/academic lounges should be located.
OTOH, does MIT have a graduate program in sociology? I'm thinking of a great study on nerd relationships and mating behavior...
FTA: "Jaffe was keen to point out that, far from his being an elitist point of view, he felt that journos should set themselves apart in order to do a better job of informing the public. There's something too cozy, he believes, in the people who inform the public about the game industry, viewing themselves as part of the game industry."
True. But I think that Jaffe misses a distinction -- there is a gamer culture that the journalists are identifying with, more than just the game industry.
It's kind of like pop culture -- there are those who read Entertainment Weekly, and are interested in what the stars are doing. Then there are the people who read the gossip column, to see if anyone they know is getting mentioned.
The game industry is like the pop culture industry -- lots of people play the games (or watch the movies and the TV shows, and wonder what Tom and Katie are up to), but few people know the individuals who are 'making the scene'.
The problem, like with pop culture, is that only insiders get the real scoop. The bigger problem, as I see it, is that the real scoop isn't even published -- it's the dross, that so many people are familiar with already, that gets the ink. And if you give a bad review (or negative gossip), forget the advance copy of the game the game (the next party invite).
Perhaps Jaffe should also realize that the game journalism industry is very similar to the game industry itself -- if you take risks, you're likely to get burned. Safe reporting and reviews tend tohelp with job/company solvency.
In the end, I'd like to see honest reporting by industry insiders, rather than 'game paparazzi' doing vacuous, cover-art reviews... it's the honest part that's hard to find.
"Size is definitely the focal point of the game"
Apparently, you've heard from my wife then.
"There is something exhilarating about climbing onto a gigantic beast and hanging on for dear life as it tries to shake you off."
And now you're calling her a gigantic beast?
Bastard.
"What, you think they'll start talking after 5 rounds of free beer?"
Give 'em Natural Light or Milwaukee's Best, that's punishment enough for any Englishman.
"And if people have 500GB of data, or more, does that mean the police are going to want to detain them for even longer? "
No. Please RTA.
The majority of the delay is due to waiting for the other hard-drives to be finished. TFA doesn't specify, but they can still probably get it done within 14 days with no problem, if they weren't bogged down with the large number of hard drives they were given earlier.
TFA states that this is unlikely to go through due to personal liberty issues:
"With the measure unlikely to make it into law thanks to widespread opposition from MPs due to its civil liberty implications..."
Also, this isn't about it taking 90 days to crack a hard drive, decrypt the contents, and translate them... it's about an overload of hard drives needing to be cracked, and the lack of resources to do it in a timely manner.
Also FTA: "Dr Mirza said: "There was a massive backlog of computers to analyse. Some of them couldn't be looked at for over 90 days." It could be just as likely that the police are looking at the controversial extension measures simply because the lack of resources mean terrorist hard drives could be part of a wider queuing system."
This is police FUD, they aren't getting a response to the fact that the people responsible for cracking HDs are overworked, with a serious backlog. This is publicity for adding more staff and beefing the budget. Although the FUD may certainly be valid in this case.
Article should be titled "How Long Does it Take to a Hard Drive to Move Through the Queu in Order to be Analyzed."
FTA:"In this case, we are trying to incent the consumer"
The MPAA spokesperson apparently skipped a couple lines in the dictionary... what he meant is that '[they] are trying to incense the customer'.
At which they are succeeding.
"Its what you are designed to do, everything else you do in life simply supports that goal. "
;)
What do you mean designed?
I happen to disagree with you, since I don't really believe that I am just a member of a species. I am a symbiotic relationship of many species -- maybe my purpose is to propagate my mitochondria, or my gut bacteria, or something else.
One of the effects of my life may be to propagate the species -- but I don't think you can ascribe that as a purpose, for then you are suggesting the presence of a higher power.
"If we are successful in avoiding a catastrophe, then it obviously wasn't our time. There is no such thing as fate, we are in control of our destiny."
This is a contradiction -- saying 'it wasn't our time' is saying that we do have a fate.
Also, animals don't adapt in order to ensure the success of the species -- that's ascribing a motive. Species adapt because some kind of mutation provided a selective advantage. The selective survival of the species caused the adaptation, rather than the other way 'round.
"Are state sales and income taxes unfair to the poor? Generally no "
I disagree. State sales taxes are definitely unfair to the poor, who pay a much higher percentage of their income on taxable goods. If you look at discretionary income, it gets even worse. State income taxes obviously vary widely by state, so I don't know how it is outside NJ.
And you leave out the most unfair tax of all (when looking at proportion of income), the local property tax. This is the dealbreaker, since it is skewed so far to the benefit of the wealthy, in terms of tax per income.
Our current system taxes both spending and income, which is a problem as I see it. But in order to talk about the tax burden, we have to include all taxes paid at all levels -- which includes both types.
"a) We need to learn to use other planets as resources so that when the population of earth is say... 16 billion people and the average life expectancy is say 5 times higher than it is now or even the possibility of death being a thing of the past, that we can ship people off into the universe like its no big deal. "
Or we could learn to be more efficient in our use of resources.
"b) Diversify, diversify, diversify. Right now we keep all our eggs in one basket. One meteor, one huge earthquake or mega volcanic eruption could wipe out anywhere from 25% to 95% after all of the side effects are taken into account (i.e. tsunamis and climate changes). By living on other planets the chances of our extinction as a species becomes much smaller.
Why is survival of the species necessary? If it's time to go, it's time to go...
"c) Exploration and knowledge for the sake of knowledge. Sure we can do most of that stuff with robots, but what fun is that... and while living in space we may learn a thing or two about the robustness (or lack thereof) of our bodies and ability to adapt. Perhaps new methods of farming or food creation will become the norm. There are many other benefits but I won't list them now. "
It's interesting that you say knowledge for the sake of knowledge... but then switch tracks to talk about uses of such knowledge. But, I think this reason is valid... probably the most valid.
"d) Like it or not, not only are we an intelligent species, but a moral one. The intelligence factor leads us to dominating our surrounding environment, the problem is we are smart enough to not be happy with what we have and instead modify it to our needs (I see nothing wrong with this, we are a part of nature, whatever we do is natural despite however many animals may die, even if we do it in a viral manner). As a result of this extra level of comfort we tend to take up more space and consume more resources. We also tend to live longer and longer... eventually reaching the point of no death according to many in the sciences. This is where the moral part kicks in... we won't enforce population control, we won't just start killing people for the sake of killing people. Therefore our population is bound to spiral out of control at some point within the next century or so.
We won't need to enforce population control. Starvation and disease will take care of that all by itself. Space exploration and colonization will not provide us the resources we need... competition for limited resources will continue to limit our population.
"I hope the major accomplishment of the ISS isn't just keeping it in orbit"
1 9/1449246&tid=160&tid=14
Yes, especially since even that accomplishment seems to be in doubt...
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/10/
"You don't generally notice space stations disappearing when a shuttle explodes."
Of course not, you're too busy watching the shuttle explode!
Seriously, though, the US shuttle program & the Russian Soyuz program was the only way to service the ISS at the time of the Columbia crash... so grounding the shuttle program presented a real threat to the continuance of human occupation of the ISS, especially considering Russia's fiscal problems at the time.
So, yes, it is worth mentioning that inhabitance of the ISS continued during the fallout (no pun intended) of the Columbia crash.
Couldn't help butting in, I've been following this joker's (ifwm) comments since an exchange a couple days ago... I'm trying to learn not to feed the troll. I recommended fark.com to him... no luck yet.