They are not a monopoly. Everyone accepts that various communication outlets are biased. Why are online communication channels any different than the older technologies?
Actually this could be very useful for digital zoom, HDR and image stabilization. According to TFA, they include signal processing on the sensor and it would certainly used for just this.
>I always wondered what it would have been like to live through the first dot com bubble.
Having started my company before the bubble burst and still in operation today I can tell you my experience.
It was much easier to sell a project. Back then, if it was on the web, people wanted it asap, almost no questions asked. Today there are so many options today customers are confused by all the competing options. Billing rates were higher 20 years ago than they are today, not adjusted for inflation.
People had a lot of respect for developers. Just being able to make something work astounded and impressed people. Today the average person assume that you can do what Google does for next to no money.
There was essentially no unfair foreign competition. I never crossed paths with offshore firms who claim to offer the same thing for $30/hr that we charge $135 an hour. We have to pay things like taxes, social security, health insurance, unemployment insurance, vacation and paid sick time that foreign staffing firms somehow find ways to avoid.
Back then getting jobs done quickly and efficiently was the order of the day. Today, there are so many factors related to security and regulatory compliance that much more time is spent hardening, testing and certifying for compliance. The perceived value proposition in the past was much higher.
TLDR; it was easier and more lucrative, but money wasn't raining from the sky like some would lead you to believe. You had to invent new technology and googling for an answer wasn't generally the option that it is today.
Want different legislators, appoint different judges.
In our imperfect world, judges can and commonly do legislate from the bench through interpreting laws as they see fit.
The world might be a much different place if one different vote on the supreme court forced a statewide recount in Florida - remember the hanging chads? Al Gore would have been president - not George W. Bush. We probably would not have invaded Iraq. We probably would have reigned in the mortgage backed securities that caused the crash in 2008. So much would be different
I'm sure we would have had different problems, but to say that judges don't interpret the law to wield political power is naive. I wish it weren't so, but there it is.
>But anyway, what is it with Americans and needing things explained to them?
Do you realize that Stanley Kubrick is American?
If you liked the book, I suggest you read the Rama series also by Arthur C. Clarke. The three book series is a bit long, but for me a very enjoyable read. In the end of that series you will have the correct answers about the premise of many of Clarke's works.
This actually might be a viable use case in the near term.
They will only support delivery on well understood pretested routes when weather conditions are safe. The ethical and legal challenges on accident avoidance are easy - you alway sacrifice the groceries. Making unnecessary emergency stops isn't an issue without passengers so the system can play it safe.
I think it's a great idea to perfect the technology with no risk to passengers.
As much as its nice to think that ET might come here with magic to wash away all our troubles, the fact is we wouldn't react to it well. Even if ET tried, those mentally ill and greedy among us would use their blessings to subvert the benefits
In all likelihood, ET would not care to preserve us and contact with ET would not be good for us.
Given the possibilities, we are better off alone until our society evolves to control the megalomaniacs.
Thanks for the introduction. You are pointing out one the many intractable problems I hadn't considered.
Clearly the design would have to be a delta wing or swing wing and would have to rapidly accelerate well beyond the speed of sound quickly and maintain that at exteremely high altitudes. Something along the lines of the SR-71 and Concord but much faster.
No conceivable battery technology could be practical for this application. We'll have to wait for lightweight fusion reactors powering atmospheric plasma thrusters. In other words science fiction right now.
You're absolutely right and I stand corrected. I ran the numbers and its silly.
A rough calculation from different direction is that a modern airliner's engines produce something like 200 megawatts of power, You would need the equivalent of several thousand Tesla car battery packs to fly a few hours.
Even if you make that work, there would be no room for payload and the cost would be prohibitive.
Ahh, the public musings of an non-aerospace engineer. I should know better than to spout off on things I don't have experience with. Upon further reflection there are many issues with electric aircraft and the weight to usable energy ratio of any conceivable Li-Ion battery make the idea impractical in the near term.
So, assuming there is some powerful light weight source of electricity on the order of 200 megawatts how could this possibly work? (That's a science fiction device right now and would have to be nuclear)
>how exactly is your electric plane going to propel itself without air?
There is air between 50 and 250 thousand feet, its just much thinner. Gas turbines are out because compressing the air and then accelerating it would cause a lot of friction and be inefficient. My hypothesis is that above 50,000 feet, air can be readily ionized. Using a high power plasma accelerator with the thin air as the plasma propellant, the desired levels of thrust should be attainable.
As it happens, plasma accelerators are something I have experience with and know how to construct. When/if I have time, I'd like to build a small plasma thruster and put it on a balloon to get some real world numbers. My kind of fun:-)
New battery and motor technology enables things that weren't practical then. It's worth another look.
>- ZERO practical advantage
One major advantage is that electric aircraft can fly at far higher altitudes where jet engines don't work and where the wind drag is greatly reduced.
Large long distance aircraft is where electric airplanes will shine. Jet airplanes cannot fly over a 100,000 feet easily because there isn't enough air for the engines. Electric aircraft don't have that limitation and the greatly reduced wind drag is a gigantic win for speed and efficiency.
Unfortunately the designs that are actively used are really dual use, civilian and military for weapons programs. Breeder reactors and thorium reactors don't have strong military significance, so their designs and fuels are not subsidized by the iceberg of the economy that is our military budget. Most effective political support for nuclear power is generated by the military contractor lobby.
Fusion reactors are right around the corner and are a far better long term choice. Solar and wind with natural gas backup for peak loads are the right choice for today. This is also the opinion of the invisible hand of capitalism because that where the money is invested.
Fission reactors based upon today's designs are a bad idea at this point because the waste issue is intractable.
Here in the US, each state has tax laws that basically state that if someone works full time for a year, it constitutes "nexus". That means that the company is established in that state and is bound to obey tax and other laws in that particular state.
The real issue is enforcement. I imagine most places have all kinds of laws that negate the benefits of "fake self employment" but if they are not uniformly imposed, corruption takes root.
Slashdot Mirror
They are not a monopoly. Everyone accepts that various communication outlets are biased. Why are online communication channels any different than the older technologies?
... if you don't eat your meat.
I often have difficulty getting a parking space at our local library - its very popular.
My experience is that people who have the misguided opinion that libraries are obsolete haven't used them.
Actually this could be very useful for digital zoom, HDR and image stabilization. According to TFA, they include signal processing on the sensor and it would certainly used for just this.
>I always wondered what it would have been like to live through the first dot com bubble.
Having started my company before the bubble burst and still in operation today I can tell you my experience.
It was much easier to sell a project. Back then, if it was on the web, people wanted it asap, almost no questions asked. Today there are so many options today customers are confused by all the competing options. Billing rates were higher 20 years ago than they are today, not adjusted for inflation.
People had a lot of respect for developers. Just being able to make something work astounded and impressed people. Today the average person assume that you can do what Google does for next to no money.
There was essentially no unfair foreign competition. I never crossed paths with offshore firms who claim to offer the same thing for $30/hr that we charge $135 an hour. We have to pay things like taxes, social security, health insurance, unemployment insurance, vacation and paid sick time that foreign staffing firms somehow find ways to avoid.
Back then getting jobs done quickly and efficiently was the order of the day. Today, there are so many factors related to security and regulatory compliance that much more time is spent hardening, testing and certifying for compliance. The perceived value proposition in the past was much higher.
TLDR; it was easier and more lucrative, but money wasn't raining from the sky like some would lead you to believe. You had to invent new technology and googling for an answer wasn't generally the option that it is today.
Want different legislators, appoint different judges.
In our imperfect world, judges can and commonly do legislate from the bench through interpreting laws as they see fit.
The world might be a much different place if one different vote on the supreme court forced a statewide recount in Florida - remember the hanging chads? Al Gore would have been president - not George W. Bush. We probably would not have invaded Iraq. We probably would have reigned in the mortgage backed securities that caused the crash in 2008. So much would be different
I'm sure we would have had different problems, but to say that judges don't interpret the law to wield political power is naive. I wish it weren't so, but there it is.
http://dilbert.com/strip/2012-...
Thanks for the correction-it's been a few years :-)
I did read all four and the last is where the answers are IMHO.
>But anyway, what is it with Americans and needing things explained to them?
Do you realize that Stanley Kubrick is American?
If you liked the book, I suggest you read the Rama series also by Arthur C. Clarke. The three book series is a bit long, but for me a very enjoyable read. In the end of that series you will have the correct answers about the premise of many of Clarke's works.
Houses used to have "Milk Chutes" where delivery men had a safe place to leave dairy deliveries. I wonder if they will make a comeback?
This actually might be a viable use case in the near term.
They will only support delivery on well understood pretested routes when weather conditions are safe. The ethical and legal challenges on accident avoidance are easy - you alway sacrifice the groceries. Making unnecessary emergency stops isn't an issue without passengers so the system can play it safe.
I think it's a great idea to perfect the technology with no risk to passengers.
I wonder how many failed deliveries they will have when people don't come outside to unload their own groceries.
to passing the Turing test?
As much as its nice to think that ET might come here with magic to wash away all our troubles, the fact is we wouldn't react to it well. Even if ET tried, those mentally ill and greedy among us would use their blessings to subvert the benefits
In all likelihood, ET would not care to preserve us and contact with ET would not be good for us.
Given the possibilities, we are better off alone until our society evolves to control the megalomaniacs.
Maybe they'll target politicians next..
Imagine how powerful augmented lobbyists could become.
Thanks for the introduction. You are pointing out one the many intractable problems I hadn't considered.
Clearly the design would have to be a delta wing or swing wing and would have to rapidly accelerate well beyond the speed of sound quickly and maintain that at exteremely high altitudes. Something along the lines of the SR-71 and Concord but much faster.
No conceivable battery technology could be practical for this application. We'll have to wait for lightweight fusion reactors powering atmospheric plasma thrusters. In other words science fiction right now.
You're absolutely right and I stand corrected. I ran the numbers and its silly.
A rough calculation from different direction is that a modern airliner's engines produce something like 200 megawatts of power, You would need the equivalent of several thousand Tesla car battery packs to fly a few hours.
Even if you make that work, there would be no room for payload and the cost would be prohibitive.
Ahh, the public musings of an non-aerospace engineer. I should know better than to spout off on things I don't have experience with. Upon further reflection there are many issues with electric aircraft and the weight to usable energy ratio of any conceivable Li-Ion battery make the idea impractical in the near term.
:-)
So, assuming there is some powerful light weight source of electricity on the order of 200 megawatts how could this possibly work? (That's a science fiction device right now and would have to be nuclear)
>how exactly is your electric plane going to propel itself without air?
There is air between 50 and 250 thousand feet, its just much thinner. Gas turbines are out because compressing the air and then accelerating it would cause a lot of friction and be inefficient. My hypothesis is that above 50,000 feet, air can be readily ionized. Using a high power plasma accelerator with the thin air as the plasma propellant, the desired levels of thrust should be attainable. As it happens, plasma accelerators are something I have experience with and know how to construct. When/if I have time, I'd like to build a small plasma thruster and put it on a balloon to get some real world numbers. My kind of fun
New battery and motor technology enables things that weren't practical then. It's worth another look.
>- ZERO practical advantage
One major advantage is that electric aircraft can fly at far higher altitudes where jet engines don't work and where the wind drag is greatly reduced.
Large long distance aircraft is where electric airplanes will shine. Jet airplanes cannot fly over a 100,000 feet easily because there isn't enough air for the engines. Electric aircraft don't have that limitation and the greatly reduced wind drag is a gigantic win for speed and efficiency.
Lithium is one of the lightest elements. Better cell packaging designed for aviation should go a long way in addressing weight and safety issues.
Jet fuel is dangerous too. The new aircraft designs already rely heavily on Li-Ion cells. Remember in the new when they caught on fire?
It's a problem, but one that is manageable.
Unfortunately the designs that are actively used are really dual use, civilian and military for weapons programs. Breeder reactors and thorium reactors don't have strong military significance, so their designs and fuels are not subsidized by the iceberg of the economy that is our military budget. Most effective political support for nuclear power is generated by the military contractor lobby.
Fusion reactors are right around the corner and are a far better long term choice. Solar and wind with natural gas backup for peak loads are the right choice for today. This is also the opinion of the invisible hand of capitalism because that where the money is invested.
Fission reactors based upon today's designs are a bad idea at this point because the waste issue is intractable.
Here in the US, each state has tax laws that basically state that if someone works full time for a year, it constitutes "nexus". That means that the company is established in that state and is bound to obey tax and other laws in that particular state.
The real issue is enforcement. I imagine most places have all kinds of laws that negate the benefits of "fake self employment" but if they are not uniformly imposed, corruption takes root.
Maybe in 2040, there will be no jobs, but in the 2020's driving as a job will be in a steady decline.
This is just like printing over that last several decades. It hasn't gone away, but is a fraction of what it used to be.