If they do, they'll lose me as a customer, and thousands like me. They'll just pay Tivo's ransom, and raise my monthly bill by a little bit. Thanks a lot TIVO.
The interviewer answers the guy's question immediately after he says "I don't know who the injured party is here."
The victim was the investor, who was not getting accurate information about the options their companies were doling out. And in the case of backdating (in which shares are granted at prices below the market price on the day of the grant, guaranteeing the recipient paper profits), insiders were getting a better deal on shares than the company's public investors could get.
The CEO sounds like a real putz throughout the article. I dunno, maybe I'm cynical.
Just like there's a good side to piracy, Chris Rock found a good side to crack. For example, after midnight in the right part of town, you can get a plasma TV for $100 (out-of-box model;)
Here in DC, talking on your cell phone while driving is illegal unless you use an earpiece or speaker phone. From other studies I've read, they're just as distracting as holding the phone to your ear. It would have been interesting to see how they performed in a study like this.
To all those saying that other things in the car are distracting - that's quite true, and if you got into an accident while changing your CD player, you might get in trouble with the law.
How long till MACD and SACD lobby congress to raise the cell phone age to 21?
More seriously, I would have little problem with laws outlawing cell phones while operating the car. If they are more impairing than three screwdrivers, isn't that a good reason to ban them? Would you drive after drinking that much?
In March 2005, we renegotiated a $6,000 contingent obligation due upon the delivery of the final PC version of Duke Nukem Forever through the payment of $4,250 and issuance of a promissory note in the principal amount of $500. The payment of the promissory note is contingent upon the commercial release of such product prior to December 31, 2006.
Boarding passes seem easy enough to forge, at least if your goal is just to get past security. If you've flown somewhere, sometime in the past, save an image of the boarding pass. You can change the information on it to suit current conditions (e.g. the correct date, or a flight that's actually flying), and not worry about the machine readable stuff because TSA can't check that anyway.
Am I being paranoid, or does anyone else feel like they're about to be arrested just for reading this post? Ahh, I guess that's me just being sil*NO CARRIER*
IBM has refocused itself to a large degree as a service company, whereas HP still relies on shipping units.
In any event, neither company holds a candle to MSFT or GOOG in terms of market cap, and those are really the "top dogs of tech" if you want to use a clumsy phrase. HP is certainly more of a "top dog" in hardware, but who cares about that?
Brian Ross, Chief Investigative Correspondent for ABC news says a confidential source informed him that reporter's phone records are being used by the administration to track down leaks.
Man. I hope they didn't talk over the phone, or that confidential source is getting his door kicked in tonight:)
As others have said, the guy's comment in the lead-in is very wrong. Cleaning up smog doesn't lead to "global warming" in a strict sense; instead, there is less albedo (reflection of sunlight) by SO2-filled clouds, and more of it gets to the surface.
What this means is that thanks to all the smog we as a planet pump out, we are able to reflect enough sunlight to mask the warming effects of all the CO2 we've added to the atmosphere. Smog is as much a "solution" to anthropogenic warming as is wearing a long-sleeved sweatsuit to the beach to avoid skin cancer: it works superficially but it does nothing to address the root cause.
Good post. Although recognizing that the marginal cost of a digital music track for sale is zero doesn't mean that "[t]here is no way to regulate the prices by traditional means." The economics are still the same!
Imagine the physical CD media of a popular record. Marginal cost is now not zero, probably instead closer to $1. How should we price it - expensive, to acquire the price insensitive "gotta-have-it" types, or cheap, to attract the "it-could-be-cool" casual buyers?
As you surmise, the answer in both cases is to set price such that profit is maximized. In one case, there are no costs, so the optimum price could be lower than otherwise, but not necessarily. Either way, companies will want to experiment in order to model the price sensitivity of their customers.
---
I don't think that old tracks would necessarily be cheaper, either. Many customers of old and/or niche music are price insensitive -- other close substitutes don't satisfy them. Again, this isn't something that can be answered without real data as opposed to WAGs (we can try - this is slashdot, after all), but that's just a theory of mine.
I read a WSJ article about this last week. Cablevision et al are tired of fixing DVRs that break down every 1.28 seconds; they want the ability to provide customers with less failure-prone parts and handle storage in-house to minimize cost.
If you don't want it, build your own mythTV box or buy a TiVO or something! AFAIK there is nothing to stop you from doing so. I'm sure that cable cos are fine with any product you use provided they don't have to offer support for it or pay to keep it in working order.
This thing is basically a Nano, except that it's uglier, doesn't work with iTunes, and doesn't support Apple accessories (the fancy ones, not stuff like headphones that work on anything). Why would anyone choose it over the Nano itself? It's not cheaper and has no significant features to offer that the iPod doesn't (i guess battery life sort of counts, but once you're way up to 20+ hours it's not a huge difference. also, ask Sony how their ipod killer with great battery life did).
For example, if the words "stocks" and "down" started showing up a lot in sentences in online news stories, you might expect a downward trend.
So you wrote a program that would read some stories that said the stock market was going down, and it told you the market was down? Did your program also see if weather news reports contained words like "rain" and "downpour" and hence "predict" rain?
no idea what that number refers to, but GOOG only had about $4.1b in revenue (without acccounting for any costs, salaries, etc) through Q3 2005. So your number is incredibly wrong. Whatever the $17b number is, it ain't profit.
The event prompted talk-show hosts and newspaper columnists in Boston to lash out at Newton officials, arguing that they acted irresponsibly and could have jeopardized people's lives. But Mr. Cohen said he had also received many positive comments from people all over the country supporting his actions.
i don't believe you - in the latest version of xp, you can fairly trivially uninstall media player and ie. however, you still have to pay for them (there is no ie-free version that i know of).
If your statement that no one wants a version of Windows without virus protection is true, then there is no reason to disallow the bundle. Chicago-school economists don't really believe that one can leverage marker power for a bundling good (Windows) to the market for the tied good (browsers/AV software/etc). The only reason bundling is bad is that it forces people who prefer antivirus software from Symantec to subsidize MS' crappy software, which is included in the cost of Vista. If everyone would choose the bundle even when presented with an alternative, then consumers must see value in the bundle.
Of course, I have no idea what the EU said MS should charge for the other version (media playerless, i guess?) of XP. If they cost the same, then the EU has missed the point entirely and of course no one would choose the other version.
Slashdot Mirror
Six word haiku? Ok.
Disintermediation
Xenophobia.
how many comments did you apply this exact same response to?
If they do, they'll lose me as a customer, and thousands like me. They'll just pay Tivo's ransom, and raise my monthly bill by a little bit. Thanks a lot TIVO.
The CEO sounds like a real putz throughout the article. I dunno, maybe I'm cynical.
Just like there's a good side to piracy, Chris Rock found a good side to crack. For example, after midnight in the right part of town, you can get a plasma TV for $100 (out-of-box model ;)
Here in DC, talking on your cell phone while driving is illegal unless you use an earpiece or speaker phone. From other studies I've read, they're just as distracting as holding the phone to your ear. It would have been interesting to see how they performed in a study like this.
To all those saying that other things in the car are distracting - that's quite true, and if you got into an accident while changing your CD player, you might get in trouble with the law.
How long till MACD and SACD lobby congress to raise the cell phone age to 21?
More seriously, I would have little problem with laws outlawing cell phones while operating the car. If they are more impairing than three screwdrivers, isn't that a good reason to ban them? Would you drive after drinking that much?
I'm never shaking hands with a Linux user again.
oh well.
Boarding passes seem easy enough to forge, at least if your goal is just to get past security. If you've flown somewhere, sometime in the past, save an image of the boarding pass. You can change the information on it to suit current conditions (e.g. the correct date, or a flight that's actually flying), and not worry about the machine readable stuff because TSA can't check that anyway.
Am I being paranoid, or does anyone else feel like they're about to be arrested just for reading this post? Ahh, I guess that's me just being sil*NO CARRIER*
MSFT sure, but Googles market cap is 118B.
:)
Oops. I was channeling their market cap from January
IBM Market Cap: $120.5B
HP Market Cap: $84.3B
IBM has refocused itself to a large degree as a service company, whereas HP still relies on shipping units.
In any event, neither company holds a candle to MSFT or GOOG in terms of market cap, and those are really the "top dogs of tech" if you want to use a clumsy phrase. HP is certainly more of a "top dog" in hardware, but who cares about that?
Man. I hope they didn't talk over the phone, or that confidential source is getting his door kicked in tonight
for some reason, it's not in the headline.
Technology & Marketing Law Blog
They filed their S-1 a while back. The story is true, despite commenters' claims to the contrary.
Vonage S-1
As others have said, the guy's comment in the lead-in is very wrong. Cleaning up smog doesn't lead to "global warming" in a strict sense; instead, there is less albedo (reflection of sunlight) by SO2-filled clouds, and more of it gets to the surface.
What this means is that thanks to all the smog we as a planet pump out, we are able to reflect enough sunlight to mask the warming effects of all the CO2 we've added to the atmosphere. Smog is as much a "solution" to anthropogenic warming as is wearing a long-sleeved sweatsuit to the beach to avoid skin cancer: it works superficially but it does nothing to address the root cause.
Good post. Although recognizing that the marginal cost of a digital music track for sale is zero doesn't mean that "[t]here is no way to regulate the prices by traditional means." The economics are still the same!
Imagine the physical CD media of a popular record. Marginal cost is now not zero, probably instead closer to $1. How should we price it - expensive, to acquire the price insensitive "gotta-have-it" types, or cheap, to attract the "it-could-be-cool" casual buyers?
As you surmise, the answer in both cases is to set price such that profit is maximized. In one case, there are no costs, so the optimum price could be lower than otherwise, but not necessarily. Either way, companies will want to experiment in order to model the price sensitivity of their customers.
---
I don't think that old tracks would necessarily be cheaper, either. Many customers of old and/or niche music are price insensitive -- other close substitutes don't satisfy them. Again, this isn't something that can be answered without real data as opposed to WAGs (we can try - this is slashdot, after all), but that's just a theory of mine.
I read a WSJ article about this last week. Cablevision et al are tired of fixing DVRs that break down every 1.28 seconds; they want the ability to provide customers with less failure-prone parts and handle storage in-house to minimize cost.
If you don't want it, build your own mythTV box or buy a TiVO or something! AFAIK there is nothing to stop you from doing so. I'm sure that cable cos are fine with any product you use provided they don't have to offer support for it or pay to keep it in working order.
this is a much better reason that people might buy this thing than 'ogg vorbis support.' guess which gets more mod points? :)
what's hysterical is that his comment is moderated higher than mine. good old slashdot.
This thing is basically a Nano, except that it's uglier, doesn't work with iTunes, and doesn't support Apple accessories (the fancy ones, not stuff like headphones that work on anything). Why would anyone choose it over the Nano itself? It's not cheaper and has no significant features to offer that the iPod doesn't (i guess battery life sort of counts, but once you're way up to 20+ hours it's not a huge difference. also, ask Sony how their ipod killer with great battery life did).
So you wrote a program that would read some stories that said the stock market was going down, and it told you the market was down? Did your program also see if weather news reports contained words like "rain" and "downpour" and hence "predict" rain?
no idea what that number refers to, but GOOG only had about $4.1b in revenue (without acccounting for any costs, salaries, etc) through Q3 2005. So your number is incredibly wrong. Whatever the $17b number is, it ain't profit.
The event prompted talk-show hosts and newspaper columnists in Boston to lash out at Newton officials, arguing that they acted irresponsibly and could have jeopardized people's lives. But Mr. Cohen said he had also received many positive comments from people all over the country supporting his actions.
Says a thing or two about talk radio, doesn't it?
i don't believe you - in the latest version of xp, you can fairly trivially uninstall media player and ie. however, you still have to pay for them (there is no ie-free version that i know of).
If your statement that no one wants a version of Windows without virus protection is true, then there is no reason to disallow the bundle. Chicago-school economists don't really believe that one can leverage marker power for a bundling good (Windows) to the market for the tied good (browsers/AV software/etc). The only reason bundling is bad is that it forces people who prefer antivirus software from Symantec to subsidize MS' crappy software, which is included in the cost of Vista. If everyone would choose the bundle even when presented with an alternative, then consumers must see value in the bundle.
Of course, I have no idea what the EU said MS should charge for the other version (media playerless, i guess?) of XP. If they cost the same, then the EU has missed the point entirely and of course no one would choose the other version.