>>>"Some Democratic politicians have called for data retention laws"
And I thought the Democrats were the party of freedom? Boy was I naive. Are they going on a "witch hunt" for people downloading photos of nude children? If so, I guess I better get used to wearing striped suits, because I was just visiting several Nudist websites looking for summer vacation options, which of course featured *whole families* without clothing. (Oh horror. I'm a filthy nudist. Here come the Democrats to nail me.)
Maybe it IS time to move to the European Union - at least they're not afraid of their own bodies.
"Middle English originating from the old French 'deserte' meaning 'to deserve'. This in turn is from the Latin 'deservire' which in Vulgar Latin means 'to gain or merit by giving service'."
Yes, sometimes Comcast provides good service. For example one morning I turned-on my television and discovered instead of my usual 15-channel service, I had 70-channel service. I was paying $7 a month (plus tax) for 70 channels!
Of course this was an ACCIDENT. It was not the result of a genuine desire by Comcast to make me happy.
AOL has not "always" sucked. It was a really good company in the 80s, when it provided Quantum Link service to Commodore=64 computers. We even had full-colored graphics! Pre-WWW. Neat. It was still a decent company when it first renamed itself to America Online.
It only truly went downhill circa 2000 when it tried to hand-out more customer contracts than bandwidth available, thus giving everybody the infamous "always busy" signal when they tried to dial-in. If Comcast is now run by former AOL managers, it's no surprise they think it's okay to over-sell. It's the same strategy, and they apparently learned nothing from the debacle.
(aside - I still use AOL except they bill themselves as "Netscape ISP". Joined in 2003 and I've never had any reason to complain. Even when I discontinued my brother's service, they politely closed the account without any hassle. AOL has improved while Comcast went downhill.)
I'd rather see this game developed privately. Why? Because I don't want to see 3,000,000 taxpayer dollars wasted on a stupid game! Rather than WASTE the money, refund it back to the taxpayers struggling to pay their gasoline/food/electricity bills (or give it to the Welfare Department to help the needy).
People feeding themselves is a more important priority.
I'm tired of politicians wasting our money when WE NEED IT for our own expenses.
I know you're thinking "cables", but could it also mean the healthcare system? How about food stores? Clothing stores? Or perhaps the land that everybody sits their house upon? Maybe the houses themselves could be considered "infrastructure" and should be owned collectively by the government?
Ooops, I just used the word collectivism. So much for free will of the individual.
"HISTORY has shown that Government is like fire: a troublesome servant & a DEADLY master. Never should it be allowed to trample upon the individual liberties we fought to secure." - George Washington. You can not have government control of the Infrastructure and individual freedom at the same time. When government is in control, it suppresses the individual to the will of the state, and imprisons or kills those who refuse to be trampled. Hence Washington's description of government as a "deadly" master.
It is a wiser course to pursue a "pro-choice" position that seeks to provide multiple choices, and places the power of decision in the hands of the citizen. i.e. A policy that empowers the individual.
>>>"has'nt history already proven that competition naturally drift towards monopolization?"
No. On the contrary history has shown that IF a company becomes a monopoly and starts "raping" its customers with outrageous prices, then another competitor will rise-up to provide cheaper alternatives:
- Itunes replaced the CD cartel - Dish television broke the back of local cable tv monopolies by offering cheaper service - And now FiOS is providing another form of competition
- The railroads had monopolized passenger travel in the 1880-90s... until someone invented a steam car, and then a gasoline car. Now the railroads don't have a monopoly. - Standard Oil has a monopoly on PA/Ohio oil fields... until somebody discovered oil in Texas and broke the back of Standard Oil. - And on - and on - and on.
A monopoly can not long exist in a natural state - it will soon be faced with other competing companies. The only monopoly that exists long-term is the type of monopoly that is in collusion with government. (Such as the DeBeers Company that has been granted monopoly in Southh Africa by the government.) If the government would step-aside, then real competition would return.
Which is why I've said many times, the government should allow 3-4 cables to run in parallel to each person's home, thus providing a real choice amongst Cable/Internet providers.
>>>"the 1600's before deciding to reinstate their monarch."
I don't think they "decided" to reinstall the monarch. The ruling class decided they didn't want the "mob" taking-away their power, and so they killed the republic on purpose, despite protests from the people.
BTW:
People keep talking about democracy. Democracy is simply "tyranny of the majority to squash the minority underfoot". A republic that protects the individual's rights & is ruled by the law (not a king or a parliament) is a better form of government for everyone. The Law makes everyone accountable for their crimes, and protects even the weakest of citizens.
>>>"Some of us drive Ford Living Room for a reason"
Yay for you. But you could have bought a nice hatchback Prius or Jetta TDI that did the same job with approximately Twice as many MPG.
(IMHO people driving cars below 30 mpg should be required to pay a pollution tax, to cover the extra costs of cleaning the crap out of the air, so I can BREATHE instead of suffer asthma attacks.)
>>>"The 3L version of the Lupo had 78 mpg, not 88"
Incorrect. 78 is the combined mpg; but I was quoting the Highway mpg of 88, because that is what most people use for comparison (70mpg insight on the highway; 51mpg Civic on the highway; 36 mpg Ford Escape Hybrid on the highway).
>>"Hybrid GAS cost may be half that of a traditional vehicle, but did you factor in what you pay to charge the batteries up with electricity? No? Try again."
As the saying goes, "People may think you're dumb; don't open your mouth and confirm their suspicions." My Honda Insight doesn't use ANY electricity. It doesn't even have a plug!!! It's 100% gasoline powered, with a battery to capture & recycle any excess energy (example: braking).
>>>"AFTER the electricity market was deregulated."
The California market was NEVER deregulated. You've fallen for the typical politician trap of calling something "patriot act" when it's actually a "spy on our citizens" act. The California electricity market was changed, but it was still strictly controlled & overseen by the California Legislature.
Simply put, the corporations were not free to buy/sell power without first getting an "okay" for the government... so it was NOT a free market.
>>>"Well, if you consider "practical" to mean a car that has a third of the range of a gasoline powered car, needs hours to refillIf you have an EV1 with 150 miles range, and you only drive 100 miles a day, then your point is irrelevant. Yes its true that an EV1 won't work for everybody, but it would work for ~75% of Americans commuting to work or store, and that would be significant reduction in gasoline usage.
>>>"costs twice as much (when you consider the federal subsidies), needs battery replacements every 18-24 months"
Modern NiMH batteries don't require replacement except every ten years or 200,000 miles (whichever happens first). In other words, about the same replacement interval as a gasoline engine. As for cost, there's no more cost to recharge the battery, than refueling your $60-per-tank gasoline engine.
>>>"They are flying off the showroom floors, aren't they? Aren't they? Hello?"
Not since close-minded people such as yourself (do you work for Exxon?) yanked them off the floor. Hard to sell something that you've purposefully drug to the junkyard (despite owners' demands to keep the cars) and crushed into metal bricks.
See the video Who Killed the Electric Car at isohunt.com
>>>"Most of the "Electric" cars out there are actually HYBRID cars. "
The original poster (me) was not talking about hybrid cars. Different animal entirely, where most hybrids are 99% gasoline-power and only 1% electric powered.
I was referring to 100% electricity with a battery for storage of the energy.
>>>"Currently electrics have an 85-90% efficiencey considering battery and motor loses. Gas vehicles have a 26% efficiency at best."
Actually the most efficient vehicles are "at best" 50%. I'm refering to cars like the 70mpg Insight and 88mpg Lupo. Electrics are efficient at the motor, but inefficient at the charger, usually achieving 60-70% overall. So yes EVs are more efficient, but not the huge dramatic difference you proclaim.
>>>"got off a piece-of-crap 256MB RAM/600MHz CPU system, move on to something half-way decent (my laptop has 2GB RAM, 256MB dedicated video RAM, Core 2 Duo 1.6GHz CPU)"
Ya know what? You're right. It's time I got rid of my perfectly-capable 512 megabyte/ 3000 megahertz XP machine and upgraded to the latest $3000 Vista machine with four times more RAM than I need. Yep.
Please give me your address, so I can send you the bill. (Hey it's your idea; you can pay for it too.) (I'm not rich contrary to what you might believe.)
Oh ye of little faith. The human ear can NOT hear the difference between a Dolby B Type II chrome cassette and a CD. They have virtually equal specifications for frequency (20-22,000 hertz). I can copy a CD to a cassette and it will sound exactly the same; you can not hear the difference.
>>>"The people left alive are the ones paying for the ceremony."
Not usually. Most of the time the money comes from the deceased, and I'd prefer they spent my money on something useful -like a new car- rather than waste it on my soon-to-be-wormfood body. (Perhaps I should put that in my will: "This money may not be used for burial services; go buy yourself a new car instead, or maybe a trip to Europe.")
>>>"That is where the buggy whip maker comparison breaks down, because they did not have to compete against their own product which has a zero cost factor."
First off, MP3s are not zero cost. They are very, very low cost but not zero.
Second, the buggy whip maker also had to compete against a low-cost item: the electric starter. In the past to make your wagon move, you used a whip. Today, we use an electric starter - much cheaper for the consumer. ----- That's progress.
>>>"Blacksmiths, buggy whip makers and all the other usual old time jobs that Slashdotters trot out each and every time they wish to denigrate a business case did not face competition from their own product being hawked with no requirement for any return on investment"
I don't think that was the point. The point was progress pushed people out of old jobs. Wagon wheelers were replaced by mass-produced steel wheels. Builders of wagons were replaced by builders of automobiles (which eventually became factories). Steam train engineers got laid-off because diesel trains are much, much easier to operate (flip a switch & it starts-up).
And on and on.
Now we see record stores becoming irrelevant because Singles are not sold on records anymore. They are sold via phone lines or cable lines fed directly to the home. Oh well. That's progress.
Slashdot Mirror
>>>"Some Democratic politicians have called for data retention laws"
And I thought the Democrats were the party of freedom?
Boy was I naive.
Are they going on a "witch hunt" for people downloading photos of nude children? If so, I guess I better get used to wearing striped suits, because I was just visiting several Nudist websites looking for summer vacation options, which of course featured *whole families* without clothing. (Oh horror. I'm a filthy nudist. Here come the Democrats to nail me.)
Maybe it IS time to move to the European Union - at least they're not afraid of their own bodies.
Here's a better link:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/just_deserts
"Middle English originating from the old French 'deserte' meaning 'to deserve'. This in turn is from the Latin 'deservire' which in Vulgar Latin means 'to gain or merit by giving service'."
Yes, sometimes Comcast provides good service. For example one morning I turned-on my television and discovered instead of my usual 15-channel service, I had 70-channel service. I was paying $7 a month (plus tax) for 70 channels!
Of course this was an ACCIDENT. It was not the result of a genuine desire by Comcast to make me happy.
AOL has not "always" sucked. It was a really good company in the 80s, when it provided Quantum Link service to Commodore=64 computers. We even had full-colored graphics! Pre-WWW. Neat. It was still a decent company when it first renamed itself to America Online.
It only truly went downhill circa 2000 when it tried to hand-out more customer contracts than bandwidth available, thus giving everybody the infamous "always busy" signal when they tried to dial-in. If Comcast is now run by former AOL managers, it's no surprise they think it's okay to over-sell. It's the same strategy, and they apparently learned nothing from the debacle.
(aside - I still use AOL except they bill themselves as "Netscape ISP". Joined in 2003 and I've never had any reason to complain. Even when I discontinued my brother's service, they politely closed the account without any hassle. AOL has improved while Comcast went downhill.)
I'd rather see this game developed privately. Why? Because I don't want to see 3,000,000 taxpayer dollars wasted on a stupid game! Rather than WASTE the money, refund it back to the taxpayers struggling to pay their gasoline/food/electricity bills (or give it to the Welfare Department to help the needy).
People feeding themselves is a more important priority.
I'm tired of politicians wasting our money when WE NEED IT for our own expenses.
Too bad some of us are stuck with ISPs that forbid use of P2P file sharing.
Too bad these ISPs don't realize P2P has legitimate uses.
Define infrastructure.
I know you're thinking "cables", but could it also mean the healthcare system? How about food stores? Clothing stores? Or perhaps the land that everybody sits their house upon? Maybe the houses themselves could be considered "infrastructure" and should be owned collectively by the government?
Ooops, I just used the word collectivism.
So much for free will of the individual.
"HISTORY has shown that Government is like fire: a troublesome servant & a DEADLY master. Never should it be allowed to trample upon the individual liberties we fought to secure." - George Washington. You can not have government control of the Infrastructure and individual freedom at the same time. When government is in control, it suppresses the individual to the will of the state, and imprisons or kills those who refuse to be trampled. Hence Washington's description of government as a "deadly" master.
It is a wiser course to pursue a "pro-choice" position that seeks to provide multiple choices, and places the power of decision in the hands of the citizen. i.e. A policy that empowers the individual.
>>>"has'nt history already proven that competition naturally drift towards monopolization?"
No. On the contrary history has shown that IF a company becomes a monopoly and starts "raping" its customers with outrageous prices, then another competitor will rise-up to provide cheaper alternatives:
- Itunes replaced the CD cartel
- Dish television broke the back of local cable tv monopolies by offering cheaper service
- And now FiOS is providing another form of competition
- The railroads had monopolized passenger travel in the 1880-90s... until someone invented a steam car, and then a gasoline car. Now the railroads don't have a monopoly.
- Standard Oil has a monopoly on PA/Ohio oil fields... until somebody discovered oil in Texas and broke the back of Standard Oil.
- And on
- and on
- and on.
A monopoly can not long exist in a natural state - it will soon be faced with other competing companies. The only monopoly that exists long-term is the type of monopoly that is in collusion with government. (Such as the DeBeers Company that has been granted monopoly in Southh Africa by the government.) If the government would step-aside, then real competition would return.
Which is why I've said many times, the government should allow 3-4 cables to run in parallel to each person's home, thus providing a real choice amongst Cable/Internet providers.
>>>"the 1600's before deciding to reinstate their monarch."
I don't think they "decided" to reinstall the monarch. The ruling class decided they didn't want the "mob" taking-away their power, and so they killed the republic on purpose, despite protests from the people.
BTW:
People keep talking about democracy. Democracy is simply "tyranny of the majority to squash the minority underfoot". A republic that protects the individual's rights & is ruled by the law (not a king or a parliament) is a better form of government for everyone. The Law makes everyone accountable for their crimes, and protects even the weakest of citizens.
Or do both (carpool with three or four of your buds, AND drive an 88mpg car).
I wasn't just picking on CNN. According to the article, they are ALL using pentagon-coached commentators. CNN, FOX, MSNBC... all of them are "guilty".
Therefore they ought to hire independents that are not being coached.
>>>"Some of us drive Ford Living Room for a reason"
Yay for you. But you could have bought a nice hatchback Prius or Jetta TDI that did the same job with approximately Twice as many MPG.
(IMHO people driving cars below 30 mpg should be required to pay a pollution tax, to cover the extra costs of cleaning the crap out of the air, so I can BREATHE instead of suffer asthma attacks.)
>>>"The 3L version of the Lupo had 78 mpg, not 88"
Incorrect. 78 is the combined mpg; but I was quoting the Highway mpg of 88, because that is what most people use for comparison (70mpg insight on the highway; 51mpg Civic on the highway; 36 mpg Ford Escape Hybrid on the highway).
>>"Hybrid GAS cost may be half that of a traditional vehicle, but did you factor in what you pay to charge the batteries up with electricity? No? Try again."
As the saying goes, "People may think you're dumb; don't open your mouth and confirm their suspicions." My Honda Insight doesn't use ANY electricity. It doesn't even have a plug!!! It's 100% gasoline powered, with a battery to capture & recycle any excess energy (example: braking).
NiMH batteries aren't dangerous for the environment. You can toss them in the landfill along with the rest of the car, and no harm will happen.
>>>"AFTER the electricity market was deregulated."
The California market was NEVER deregulated. You've fallen for the typical politician trap of calling something "patriot act" when it's actually a "spy on our citizens" act. The California electricity market was changed, but it was still strictly controlled & overseen by the California Legislature.
Simply put, the corporations were not free to buy/sell power without first getting an "okay" for the government... so it was NOT a free market.
re: Coal.
I never said an EV would be cleaner. Only that it would be an alternative to gasoline/diesel/ethanol that is in short supply.
>>>"Well, if you consider "practical" to mean a car that has a third of the range of a gasoline powered car, needs hours to refillIf you have an EV1 with 150 miles range, and you only drive 100 miles a day, then your point is irrelevant. Yes its true that an EV1 won't work for everybody, but it would work for ~75% of Americans commuting to work or store, and that would be significant reduction in gasoline usage.
>>>"costs twice as much (when you consider the federal subsidies), needs battery replacements every 18-24 months"
Modern NiMH batteries don't require replacement except every ten years or 200,000 miles (whichever happens first). In other words, about the same replacement interval as a gasoline engine. As for cost, there's no more cost to recharge the battery, than refueling your $60-per-tank gasoline engine.
>>>"They are flying off the showroom floors, aren't they? Aren't they? Hello?"
Not since close-minded people such as yourself (do you work for Exxon?) yanked them off the floor. Hard to sell something that you've purposefully drug to the junkyard (despite owners' demands to keep the cars) and crushed into metal bricks.
See the video Who Killed the Electric Car at isohunt.com
>>>"Most of the "Electric" cars out there are actually HYBRID cars. "
The original poster (me) was not talking about hybrid cars. Different animal entirely, where most hybrids are 99% gasoline-power and only 1% electric powered.
I was referring to 100% electricity with a battery for storage of the energy.
>>>"Currently electrics have an 85-90% efficiencey considering battery and motor loses. Gas vehicles have a 26% efficiency at best."
Actually the most efficient vehicles are "at best" 50%. I'm refering to cars like the 70mpg Insight and 88mpg Lupo. Electrics are efficient at the motor, but inefficient at the charger, usually achieving 60-70% overall. So yes EVs are more efficient, but not the huge dramatic difference you proclaim.
>>>"got off a piece-of-crap 256MB RAM/600MHz CPU system, move on to something half-way decent (my laptop has 2GB RAM, 256MB dedicated video RAM, Core 2 Duo 1.6GHz CPU)"
Ya know what? You're right. It's time I got rid of my perfectly-capable 512 megabyte/ 3000 megahertz XP machine and upgraded to the latest $3000 Vista machine with four times more RAM than I need. Yep.
Please give me your address, so I can send you the bill. (Hey it's your idea; you can pay for it too.) (I'm not rich contrary to what you might believe.)
>>>>>compact cassette features CD quality sound
>"Not even with type IV metal.
Oh ye of little faith. The human ear can NOT hear the difference between a Dolby B Type II chrome cassette and a CD. They have virtually equal specifications for frequency (20-22,000 hertz). I can copy a CD to a cassette and it will sound exactly the same; you can not hear the difference.
>>>"The people left alive are the ones paying for the ceremony."
Not usually. Most of the time the money comes from the deceased, and I'd prefer they spent my money on something useful -like a new car- rather than waste it on my soon-to-be-wormfood body. (Perhaps I should put that in my will: "This money may not be used for burial services; go buy yourself a new car instead, or maybe a trip to Europe.")
>>>"That is where the buggy whip maker comparison breaks down, because they did not have to compete against their own product which has a zero cost factor."
First off, MP3s are not zero cost. They are very, very low cost but not zero.
Second, the buggy whip maker also had to compete against a low-cost item: the electric starter. In the past to make your wagon move, you used a whip. Today, we use an electric starter - much cheaper for the consumer. ----- That's progress.
>>>"Blacksmiths, buggy whip makers and all the other usual old time jobs that Slashdotters trot out each and every time they wish to denigrate a business case did not face competition from their own product being hawked with no requirement for any return on investment"
I don't think that was the point. The point was progress pushed people out of old jobs. Wagon wheelers were replaced by mass-produced steel wheels. Builders of wagons were replaced by builders of automobiles (which eventually became factories). Steam train engineers got laid-off because diesel trains are much, much easier to operate (flip a switch & it starts-up).
And on and on.
Now we see record stores becoming irrelevant because Singles are not sold on records anymore. They are sold via phone lines or cable lines fed directly to the home. Oh well. That's progress.