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User: stu72

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  1. Re: Go! Government! Go! on NYC Fines Airbnb Hosts For 'Illegal' Home Rentals (cnet.com) · · Score: 1

    If you support the right if people to do as they please with their homes, then support zoning reform to eliminate restrictions on what people can build.

    The restrictions on what can be built are what make being an AirBNB host profitable.

    On most (typically 80%) land in North American cities, the only thing that can be built is a single family detached, no matter how much demand there is. Cheaper options like townhouses, row houses, and apartments are either forbidden or squeezed into a few slivers of land designated for them.

    Allowing people to do as they please means allowing one's neighbor to build an apartment building if they want to, and not giving anyone a defacto veto through consultation.

    Without zoning laws there would be no need for AirBnB laws.

  2. Just Another Industry Begging for Subsidy on Tesla's Sales Increase - But Next Will We Need Smart Roads? (backchannel.com) · · Score: 1

    If robot cars need sensor roads, wouldn't a fair, free market approach say that the people using/buying/selling/building those robot cars should be the ones paying for it?

    If history is any guide, this is just step one in a large scheme to transfer public money (in the form of specialized infrastructure spending) from the public at large, to robot car builders (in the form of increased sales from more useful products made possible by those specialized infrastructure spending)

    We already saw this play out once in recent history, as the federal government took trillions of dollars and millions of people's homes & businesses to make daily long distance car travel first possible, then required, to line the pockets of contractors, the car companies and the oil companies.

    Welcome to motordom 2.0

  3. Re:What about pedestrians? on MIT Study Shows Stop Lights Won't Be Necessary In The Future (computerworld.com) · · Score: 1

    When you say heavier, I'm going to go ahead and assume you mean, "with higher kinetic energy". A heav car at 1mph can still kill but only if it's victim is unusually slow. A light car far at 100 mph will kill anything in its path.

    Do you also support applying this of logic to other objects possessing fatal amounts of kinetic energy? How about bullets? We could just dispense with the whole notion of law and justice and police and just say, "if you don't want to get shot, don't walk in front of bullets"

    People choosing to drive are choosing to escalate the energy available for property damage and harm to life. They should bear the responsibility of this, even if that means, *gasp* sowing down.

  4. Re:What about pedestrians? on MIT Study Shows Stop Lights Won't Be Necessary In The Future (computerworld.com) · · Score: 1

    Thank you, came here to say this 1000x

  5. Re:What about pedestrians? on MIT Study Shows Stop Lights Won't Be Necessary In The Future (computerworld.com) · · Score: 1

    Why force the humans to beg to cross safely? Why not all green for pedestrians and the machines have to ask permission to cross?

  6. Parking tickets are not a "trough"

    Driving is one of the most heavily subsidized personal actions in the world.

    Parking fees and fines are a very very small tip of the balance back toward something remotely resembling a level playing field. Just pay for your parking and if you screw up, pay the fine and move on. You're still tens of thousands of dollars ahead of whe you would be if you actually have to pay for all that infrastructure, hit to mention the war and the pollution.

  7. Re:Obligatory my ass ... on Uber's Smartphone-Based Gyrometer Monitoring Seems To Be the Future of Driving (thestack.com) · · Score: 0

    You've got it backwards.

    You are being monitored because of your decision to put others at risk by accelerating several tons of metal to fatal velocities.

    Unless you're doing it in a private track, you are endangering the public and they have a stake in how you do it,

  8. Re:End of life? on Replacement For Mozilla Thunderbird? · · Score: 3, Informative

    I think you've got it backwards.

    It's not that Google "deals with tags" in some new and novel way, it's that the underlying protocol, IMAP, has no support for any such concept at all. IMAP just has folders and the unstated assumption is that a given piece of mail is only ever in one folder. However, Google made tags look like folders to IMAP clients, but of course, they are not actually folders.

  9. Needs and Wants on Earth Home To 3 Trillion Trees, Half As Many As When Human Civilization Arose · · Score: 0

    I don't know that I would call any of those things, "needs"

    You may say, "semantics", but it's precisely this sort of cultural blindness to the idea that life could be any different than it is today, that prevents us from discussing solutions. Toilet paper and ranchland aren't needs, Hygiene is a need, and food is a need, but if we believe that the only way to fill those needs is to carry on what we've been doing for the last few decades, then we are dumb and deaf to any alternatives.

  10. Brought to you by Coca Cola on MIT Researchers Discover "Metabolic Master Switch" To Control Obesity · · Score: 2

    Spend half your money on coke, the other half on drugs to avoid gaining weight, what a life!

  11. Re:It all depends.... on Iowa Makes a Bold Admission: We Need Fewer Roads · · Score: 1

    If this hypothetical road is so important to the people living on it, they can always simply choose the free enterprise approach and maintain it themselves.

    The point the Iowa DOT is making isn't that there must be less roads but that government built roads have gotten way out of whack and there is far more asphalt per person than we could ever hope to afford. Nothing stops a few industrious folks from stepping up and maintaining their own roads.

    If the people living on a road can't afford to keep it upgraded, then it's a sign from the universe that they can't really afford the lifestyle they are trying to live and they have been subsidized for years. There are lots of options
    - gravel roads cost a tiny fraction of hardtop roads
    - hiking trails cost even less

  12. Per capita on The World's Most Wasteful Megacity · · Score: 0

    Worthless without looking at it per capita.

  13. Re: What about a bus? on New Study Suggests Flying Is Greener Than Driving · · Score: 1

    This is ludicrous. If your local bus company or transit agency has the authority to run like a business and run stick to profitable routes (higher density, straight lines) they will be plenty full and far more fuel - and most importantly - space efficient, than a car.

    If your local agency has a mandate from voters to run like a social service, providing transportation to all, regardless of location or profitability, then they won't be full or efficient, but then that's not what you asked the agency to do in this scenario.

    Studies like these are just sops to politicians and people living in areas where doing anything but driving is challenging, they convince them that 50 km grocery runs really aren't that ludicrous and hey, one day you'll fly 500 km to get your groceries and that will be more efficient thanks to "future tech"

  14. Privacy and Safety on Phone App That Watches Your Driving Habits Leads To Privacy Concerns · · Score: 0

    I'm sure /. is all familiar with, âoeThey that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.â âThose Who Sacrifice Liberty For Security Deserve Neither.â and it's tempting to apply it here.

    However I would disagree. The act of operating a 2 ton vehicle at fatal velocities is not unlike the act of pointing a loaded gun at people in public, but promising not to shoot anyone. Now imagine that hundreds of millions of people do this, and hundreds of thousands screw up every year and injure or kill someone, generating billions upon billions in insurance claims.

    If we treated cars like guns, keeping them securely locked in the garage at all times except a life or death emergency, and on every usage got law enforcement involved to investigate, then you could argue that you have a right to privacy as a car owner, just as a gun owner might. But once you endanger the public, whether by waving your gun around, or waving your car around, I would argue you give up that right.

    If you don't want anyone to care what you do with your vehicle, just choose a less dangerous vehicle. Like your feet, or a bike. Then no one will much care what you do, where you go, or how you operate it.

  15. Re: Awesome on Tesla Announces Dual Motors, 'Autopilot' For the Model S · · Score: 1

    I can live with people buying expensive toys they find thrilling. Why I can't understand is why they are allowed on public roads. If you want to drive at fatal speeds, be a real free market guy and build your own roadway to drive it on.

  16. Re:Bikes lanes are nice on Surprising Result of NYC Bike Lanes: Faster Traffic for Cars · · Score: 1

    Why is it the problem that one human is going slower than another? Couldn't the problem be the human that is going faster?

    Additionally, it's exceptionally easy to keep up with crowded city traffic on a bike. I would say most days you can easily beat it in fact.

  17. Re:Large homes on Samsung Announces Galaxy Alpha Featuring Metal Frame and Rounded Corners · · Score: 1

    Of course this is true.

    However there is significant strain of, "more is better" in much of North America, and it leads people to mistake wants with needs. People have lived perfectly happy lives and raised great kids in far less space than many suburban North Americans believe is a bare minimum. It doesn't mean you have to accept this for yourself, just be aware that when your local politician/developer/journalist starts talking about "needs" they might really be talking about "wants"

  18. Words != Actions on Lots Of People Really Want Slideout-Keyboard Phones: Where Are They? · · Score: 1

    Lots of people say.... ... They want to use less energy , but drive big SUV's ... They want to eat healthy, but stock up on sugary 'health' beverages
    Etc
    Etc

    Just because your poll suggests a preference, does not necessarily mean actions will follow.

    Product design and marketing has to focus on likely actions, not verbal intentions.

  19. Re:What's so Hard to Understand? on An Army Medal For Coding In Perl · · Score: 3, Informative

    It's hard to understand because..

    a) most people probably have little understanding of military awards outside of hollywood and might be forgiven for thinking they are all given for combat

    b) most managers, whether in the military or not, seem woefully clueless about the impact of cumbersome poorly designed systems and the payback on well designed ones (or well designed hacks running on top of the poor system) So that someone even noticed he was more productive, didn't freak out because he did something different, didn't freak out because the different thing involved "programming" *AND* gave him a medal... seems pretty remarkable.

  20. Re:But this price rise is artificial.... on The Specter of Gasoline At $5 a Gallon · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If you don't think the US should sell oil to foreign markets, why do you think Canadians should? Or Saudi Arabia for that matter?

  21. Carrier Subsidy on Chile Forbids Carriers From Selling Network-Locked Phones · · Score: 1

    I agree with this 100% but I hope everyone realizes that with no ability to force customers to stick around, there will be a dramatically reduced incentive for carriers to offer subsidies on fancy phones. I think this is fine but I wonder if there will be an uproar when $600 iPhones cost $600 instead of $200 + contract and/or lock.

  22. Re:Interesting... on Ask Slashdot: Is E-Learning a Viable Option? · · Score: 2

    This is a problem of expectations, not economics.

    Nobody needs a new car every 3 years, nobody needs 1/4 acre and nobody needs 4 bedrooms unless you have about 12 children, which no one on LI has.

    Adjust your expectations and I suspect you could live well on 65k, even on LI.

  23. Re:what progress? on Japan Battles Partial Nuclear Meltdown · · Score: 1

    Boric acid is to stop the reaction, there is no indication the nuclear reaction is still ongoing. The issue is residual decay heat can be many megawatts and needs to be dissipated. If they can't dissipate it, mother nature will take of that but the results will not be pretty (molten core, possibly breaching reactor vessel, etc etc)

  24. Re:Vulnerable on $30 GPS Jammer Can Wreak Havok · · Score: 1

    They generally have a backup inertial navigation system to fall back on if GPS is unavailable.

  25. Insanity on French Use Space Tech To Find Parking Spots · · Score: 1

    Parking spots in most cities in the world are scarce because they are priced well below what they are worth. By letting demand set the price (i.e. raise it dramatically) you deal with several problems all in one fell swoop:
    - parking unavailability
    - people polluting the air and causing congestion endlessly circling for a cheap/free spot
    - enforcement of time limits currently in place for free spots
    - using space age technology to detect free spaces

    The tech sounds neat but it's just over-complicating an already over-complicated situation.