You're probably correct that legal barriers will be erected. I'm not sure patent would work for that. If I understand correctly, you are allowed to use patented technology for your own purposes without a license. And you can publically document what you do. But you can't offer any physical product of your work to others.
However, if patent won't do the job, I'm sure the pharma companies will come up with something that will.
And I think the issue with "de facto" monopolies is that Congress in it's infinite wisdom authorized actual "de jure" monopolies for some "orphan drugs". The poster child for that nonsense is an ancient gout medication -- Colchicine. See:.http://www.rheumatologynetwork.com/gout/generic-colchicine-victory-one-battle-drug-prices
Especially if the pharma lobby has its way. They will not be too thrilled bout having this tech in hospitals either.
Safe bet. This stuff will be patented, will require years of testing, FDA approval, a maintenance contract, an internet connection, and will cost a fortune -- in the US anyway. It'll be sold by big pharma, not fought by big pharma.
If it does turn out to be cheap, easy and effective, you'll probably have to smuggle your equipment into the US from China, Cuba... or Botswana or buy it from some dude who hangs out at a decrepit bowling alley in bad part of town..
Sure. And I'd like to be able to buy a dumb TV that didn't take 20-40 seconds to come to life when turned on then present me with an incomprehensible menu. Guess what. "THEY" have decided that I don't really want/need that so they aren't going to make it.
THEY will likely decide that you need the exercise of walking out to the curb to get your dinner.
Hopefully they have better positional sensors and don't run over people..
Probably not in five years. More like ten. But when automated delivery does come about, it'll probably be done by three or four wheeled electric "motorbikes" that won't give up your pizza without a credit card swipe or scanning currency into their "vault". While being run into by one of those things won't be a lot of fun, it probably won't be like being run over by a car.
Probably at least somewhat true that you don't need much of a computer for many industrial control tasks. And even when not true, do the systems have significant sensitive information that needs to be hidden from other users? Is there any point in patching the software against spectre/meltdown if the patches cause trouble and the malware doesn't represent much of a threat to those systems?
OTOH, getting infrastructure OFF the damn internet as quickly as it can be done seems like a very good idea even if doing so will interfere with a lot of startup company visions of girls, fancy cars, mansions and yachts.
I cold buy to put in some pumped hydro. That type of base storage is where the next gold rush will be found.
Not awful logic, but it overlooks quite a few rather important factors
1. Pumped hydro can be cheap, but only if you use it a lot. Today, it is used to store energy generated during periods of low demand (wee hours of the morning) to store energy to be sold back during periods of high demand. That works because such periods occur predictably every day. Try that with things like wind and solar which are intermittent, with seasonal or 3-4 day supply peaks. The pumped storage costs -- which are mostly capital and maintenance --will be higher.
2. You need to pump a lot of water to do pumped storage. Very roughly, you need to lift 1 cubic meter (1 metric tonne) 100 meters to store 1Kwh. There aren't a lot of sites available that have both abundant water and terrain that will support both an upper and a lower pool.
3. Practical pumped storage efficiencies are typically 70% give or take a bit. That's put 4kwh in to get 3kwh back. That can work, but only when the differential between low demand and peak demand is substantial.
4. Capital costs for pumped storage are very high. Investment recovery time is probably decades. Battery technology IS improving, albeit slowly. It could make your facility obsolete before you've pocketed wealth beyond belief... or even paid off your loans. Likewise, widespread adoption of electric vehicles charged at off hours could reduce the peak load differential that your economics depend on.
Think of pumped storage as a huge battery that comes only in sizes humongous and even bigger. It has a very long lifetime -- decades, maybe centuries. Its self discharge rate (leaks,evaporation) is low.. No memory effects. Can discharge safely to zero (Don't try THAt with say Lion). . But it has rather low charging efficiency (70% give or take). And it can fail catastrophically (dam failure) which will likely be VERY costly.
Oh yes, and it's not all that great environmentally because of constantly varying pool levels -- plan on being sued... probably repeatedly -- once radical environmentalists figure that out.
i don't believe that's the case in 2017. the market is completely different in 2017
ABSOLUTELY Why it'd probably take at least six people to rig the Bitcoin market today.
I am curious why it is hypothecated that rigging a cryptocurrency market is a bad thing. Seems to me that if you have a bunch of this stuff stashed someplace safe (And, tangentially, where might THAT be?) You'd be rooting for someone to come along and arrange another quick 600% jolt.
Intel quantum computer. It'll compute and leak the passwords to every digital device within 200 meters in a single operation.... Whether you want it to or not.
Silly goose. What's this "Exchange" nonsense. You're supposed to BUY cryptocurrencies, not SELL them. Go find a Bitcoin ATM and do your part to support the currency revolution. https://www.coindesk.com/bitco...
Agree. Until we get issues like security and privacy straightened out in a century or two, we shouldn't let computers anywhere near the election process except where the computer operation can be manually verified. That includes registration, checking voter legitimacy, the act of voting, counting votes and posting results.
Without manual controls, how do you adjust it's position in a parking space or garage?...
The force man.. Use the force!!!
=============
Actually, putting the brake and accelerator controls on the steering wheel might --- and I emphasize MIGHT -- be an OK idea. Doing directional control with a mouse, joystick or verbal commands almost certainly isn't a good idea except for a small number of handicapped individuals who are used to controlling stuff with whatever parts of their body they can still move.
Can GM bring an autonomous vehicle to market in 2019? I suppose they could. Probably be viewed by the legal profession as a gift from God. I wonder if anybody will be willing to underwrite liability insurance policies for such a vehicle?
Better yet, unplug it from the internet, then unplug it from the power source, then encase it in quick setting concrete. THAT'll almost certainly block MS Update... at least for a while.
Also, my understanding is that current heat pumps can't produce hot enough water to work well with baseboard hot water heating systems which are quite common in New England.
Bitcoin is more like buying IMAGINARY real estate.
Would you be interested in purchasing a option to buy three contiguous buildable lots on the main street of the Emerald City in Oz? If so, please submit your bid accompanied by a non-refundable deposit of $1000 USD to P.O. Box 31416, Lagos Nigeria.
What could you possibly do with this? The idea makes me cringe
most things text based?
email (alpine,mutt)
text editing (emacs, vi, etc)
get news and weather (I generally read Google News with w3m as it is much faster and somewhat more likely to actually get news content from diverse sites than any of the five GUI browsers I have installed)
play mp3s?
read slashdot (Tried that via konsole on this decade old 5x86. I'm able to get to slashdot.org and read articles and replies with no problems. Could probably log in and possibly post a reply if I really wanted to).
Just for the record, I'm against arming wildlife. If you think mosquitoes are a problem now, just imagine when they get RPGs.
However, I think it should be pointed out that bats navigate by sonar and thus probably will not be greatly bothered by smoke or rain. Country and Western music played at high volume may be needed to defend against them.
India has been independent for 70 years. From what I've read of Vikas Swarup (Q&A,Six Suspects) and the tales of acquaintances who have worked there , the Indians managed the transition from looting by Europeans to domestically managed looting quickly and seamlessly.
If the software in your car's radio is ransacking protected memory, you probably ought to be a bit concerned about what other unadvertised "features" it has.
Slashdot Mirror
The Bronks? -- New England Patriots tight end. Roughly 8 feet tall? 300 kg or so? scores lots of touchdowns?
You're probably correct that legal barriers will be erected. I'm not sure patent would work for that. If I understand correctly, you are allowed to use patented technology for your own purposes without a license. And you can publically document what you do. But you can't offer any physical product of your work to others.
However, if patent won't do the job, I'm sure the pharma companies will come up with something that will.
And I think the issue with "de facto" monopolies is that Congress in it's infinite wisdom authorized actual "de jure" monopolies for some "orphan drugs". The poster child for that nonsense is an ancient gout medication -- Colchicine. See: .http://www.rheumatologynetwork.com/gout/generic-colchicine-victory-one-battle-drug-prices
Safe bet. This stuff will be patented, will require years of testing, FDA approval, a maintenance contract, an internet connection, and will cost a fortune -- in the US anyway. It'll be sold by big pharma, not fought by big pharma.
If it does turn out to be cheap, easy and effective, you'll probably have to smuggle your equipment into the US from China, Cuba ... or Botswana or buy it from some dude who hangs out at a decrepit bowling alley in bad part of town..
Quite possibly true, but this looks to be 3D-print your own meth LAB, not 3D-print your own methamphetamine.
Sure. And I'd like to be able to buy a dumb TV that didn't take 20-40 seconds to come to life when turned on then present me with an incomprehensible menu. Guess what. "THEY" have decided that I don't really want/need that so they aren't going to make it.
THEY will likely decide that you need the exercise of walking out to the curb to get your dinner.
Probably not in five years. More like ten. But when automated delivery does come about, it'll probably be done by three or four wheeled electric "motorbikes" that won't give up your pizza without a credit card swipe or scanning currency into their "vault". While being run into by one of those things won't be a lot of fun, it probably won't be like being run over by a car.
Probably at least somewhat true that you don't need much of a computer for many industrial control tasks. And even when not true, do the systems have significant sensitive information that needs to be hidden from other users? Is there any point in patching the software against spectre/meltdown if the patches cause trouble and the malware doesn't represent much of a threat to those systems?
OTOH, getting infrastructure OFF the damn internet as quickly as it can be done seems like a very good idea even if doing so will interfere with a lot of startup company visions of girls, fancy cars, mansions and yachts.
Not awful logic, but it overlooks quite a few rather important factors
1. Pumped hydro can be cheap, but only if you use it a lot. Today, it is used to store energy generated during periods of low demand (wee hours of the morning) to store energy to be sold back during periods of high demand. That works because such periods occur predictably every day. Try that with things like wind and solar which are intermittent, with seasonal or 3-4 day supply peaks. The pumped storage costs -- which are mostly capital and maintenance --will be higher.
2. You need to pump a lot of water to do pumped storage. Very roughly, you need to lift 1 cubic meter (1 metric tonne) 100 meters to store 1Kwh. There aren't a lot of sites available that have both abundant water and terrain that will support both an upper and a lower pool.
3. Practical pumped storage efficiencies are typically 70% give or take a bit. That's put 4kwh in to get 3kwh back. That can work, but only when the differential between low demand and peak demand is substantial.
4. Capital costs for pumped storage are very high. Investment recovery time is probably decades. Battery technology IS improving, albeit slowly. It could make your facility obsolete before you've pocketed wealth beyond belief ... or even paid off your loans. Likewise, widespread adoption of electric vehicles charged at off hours could reduce the peak load differential that your economics depend on.
Think of pumped storage as a huge battery that comes only in sizes humongous and even bigger. It has a very long lifetime -- decades, maybe centuries. Its self discharge rate (leaks,evaporation) is low.. No memory effects. Can discharge safely to zero (Don't try THAt with say Lion). . But it has rather low charging efficiency (70% give or take). And it can fail catastrophically (dam failure) which will likely be VERY costly.
Oh yes, and it's not all that great environmentally because of constantly varying pool levels -- plan on being sued ... probably repeatedly -- once radical environmentalists figure that out.
Of course they care about equality. They just want to be most equal.
(Oh, OK, George Orwell said it first and better "Some animals are more equal than others" Animal Farm 1945)
ABSOLUTELY Why it'd probably take at least six people to rig the Bitcoin market today.
I am curious why it is hypothecated that rigging a cryptocurrency market is a bad thing. Seems to me that if you have a bunch of this stuff stashed someplace safe (And, tangentially, where might THAT be?) You'd be rooting for someone to come along and arrange another quick 600% jolt.
Intel quantum computer. It'll compute and leak the passwords to every digital device within 200 meters in a single operation. ... Whether you want it to or not.
Silly goose. What's this "Exchange" nonsense. You're supposed to BUY cryptocurrencies, not SELL them. Go find a Bitcoin ATM and do your part to support the currency revolution. https://www.coindesk.com/bitco...
"I would not use computers! Paper"
Agree. Until we get issues like security and privacy straightened out in a century or two, we shouldn't let computers anywhere near the election process except where the computer operation can be manually verified. That includes registration, checking voter legitimacy, the act of voting, counting votes and posting results.
The force man .. Use the force!!!
=============
Actually, putting the brake and accelerator controls on the steering wheel might --- and I emphasize MIGHT -- be an OK idea. Doing directional control with a mouse, joystick or verbal commands almost certainly isn't a good idea except for a small number of handicapped individuals who are used to controlling stuff with whatever parts of their body they can still move.
Can GM bring an autonomous vehicle to market in 2019? I suppose they could. Probably be viewed by the legal profession as a gift from God. I wonder if anybody will be willing to underwrite liability insurance policies for such a vehicle?
Alternatively, if a mere network command can brick Uber in a region ... er, well, insert devastating finish here.
"just unplug from the Interwebs."
Better yet, unplug it from the internet, then unplug it from the power source, then encase it in quick setting concrete. THAT'll almost certainly block MS Update ... at least for a while.
Also, my understanding is that current heat pumps can't produce hot enough water to work well with baseboard hot water heating systems which are quite common in New England.
Bitcoin is more like buying IMAGINARY real estate.
Would you be interested in purchasing a option to buy three contiguous buildable lots on the main street of the Emerald City in Oz? If so, please submit your bid accompanied by a non-refundable deposit of $1000 USD to P.O. Box 31416, Lagos Nigeria.
most things text based?
Just for the record, I'm against arming wildlife. If you think mosquitoes are a problem now, just imagine when they get RPGs.
However, I think it should be pointed out that bats navigate by sonar and thus probably will not be greatly bothered by smoke or rain. Country and Western music played at high volume may be needed to defend against them.
The Donald. He got a bigger laser than anyone. He'll tweet about it in the morning.
India has been independent for 70 years. From what I've read of Vikas Swarup (Q&A,Six Suspects) and the tales of acquaintances who have worked there , the Indians managed the transition from looting by Europeans to domestically managed looting quickly and seamlessly.
So, what's the largest data base that can be secured? 100 million entries? 10 million? 1 million? Maybe more like 10 entries? ... 5 entries? ... one?
If you're correct -- and for all I know, you are dead on -- it does not bode well for our shiny new digital universe.
If the software in your car's radio is ransacking protected memory, you probably ought to be a bit concerned about what other unadvertised "features" it has.
Wouldn't having a conscience be detrimental to the interests of the shareholders?