You are totally making an invalid comparison between the "massive polluting" you do by driving your car everywhere and the "massive pollution" that can be found in large cities. Living in a large city means that there is a lot of people in a small area (obviously) thus even a small amount of pollution from each person adds up to a lot in one concentrated area. On the flip side, a small number of people can pollute a lot if they are all living in suburban/rural communities and not have a great effect.
For example, 1 million people creating 1 pound of pollution is more than 10,000 people creating 10 pounds of pollution. And those smaller communities probably seem cleaner because everything is more spread out. However if you have 10 such communities surrounding one large city, those 10 communities are now making the same amount of pollution as the big city with only 10% of the people.
Anyway to get back to the point of people wanting to live where there isn't public transit. You say that you like to live in the open areas but what is going to happen in the next 9 years? As more people move away from the city the sprawl just continues out further and further. Instead of doing something to reduce the problems that make you want to leave you are just bringing them with you to new areas.
Of course maybe you just want to live in the open, away from everyone else. In that case move into a shack in the wilderness and leave your car, internet connection etc. in the city. Grow your own food and do everything for yourself. You can't expect to have everything good that a city provides (stores, internet etc) without the city.
I'm already helping bands sell their music at shows straight-to-iPod. A US$100 device (basically a memory stick, a button and an iPod cable) lets bands make infinite margins since they have zero distribution cost (no CDs, no printing costs, etc). It won't be long for CD to be forgotten, either.
Do you find that a lot of people actually bring an iPod to shows? That seems like a bizarre idea to me since in my mind I'm going to a show to see live music, what do I need to listen to my iPod for? Maybe there is a market but it seems rather strange to me. I would be worried about losing it or possibly breaking it if the show gets rowdy (which many a great show should)
On a (sorta) related note, technically any amount of sales divided by zero distribution cost equals undefined margins, not infinite:)
Finally: have you thought about the ethics of using your student loans in this way? Were the loans given to you in order to help you pay for your expenses as a student?
I think that right there is the big question. If this is a student loan (the original question didn't specify) then I think there is an ethical issue here. He obviously doesn't need the money to survive so if it's a student loan then its probably money that could have gone to someone else and allowed them to get an education. However, if this is just a standard bank loan then he can do whatever he wants with the money.
Sony is planning to sell the PS3 soon so Sony is going to actually produce some PS3s. Shocking! Astounding! Wait... isn't this generally how commerce works? Company makes product, company sells product. Must be a slow day for news.
If schools are privatized where does all of the money to run the school come from? If the answer is "the students and their family", how does that work for low-income families? Would there be something in place to ensure that everyone can still access education?
He continues: It is not our fault, the beta testers keep causing problems, which we then have to fix.
I just want to point out that nowhere in TFA is Gates quoted as blaming the beta-testers for the delays. I'm sure he's intelligent enough to know that the beta-testers can only find problems, not cause them. And really, is this a bad thing? They made some software, sent it to beta, got feedback and decided to fix some problems.
I'm sure if it was reversed people would be screaming bloody-blue-murder that MS wasn't listening to feedback from users. I'm not saying that MS has done everything the best way and that Vista isn't becoming a joke because of repeated delays, but listening to beta-tester feedback seems like a good thing to me.
There already is a "white history month", its pretty much the rest of the year. The need for things like black history month isn't to make sure everyone knows the people who did good things were black, but to make sure that people know who did these good things at all.
Slashdot Mirror
You are totally making an invalid comparison between the "massive polluting" you do by driving your car everywhere and the "massive pollution" that can be found in large cities. Living in a large city means that there is a lot of people in a small area (obviously) thus even a small amount of pollution from each person adds up to a lot in one concentrated area. On the flip side, a small number of people can pollute a lot if they are all living in suburban/rural communities and not have a great effect.
For example, 1 million people creating 1 pound of pollution is more than 10,000 people creating 10 pounds of pollution. And those smaller communities probably seem cleaner because everything is more spread out. However if you have 10 such communities surrounding one large city, those 10 communities are now making the same amount of pollution as the big city with only 10% of the people.
Anyway to get back to the point of people wanting to live where there isn't public transit. You say that you like to live in the open areas but what is going to happen in the next 9 years? As more people move away from the city the sprawl just continues out further and further. Instead of doing something to reduce the problems that make you want to leave you are just bringing them with you to new areas.
Of course maybe you just want to live in the open, away from everyone else. In that case move into a shack in the wilderness and leave your car, internet connection etc. in the city. Grow your own food and do everything for yourself. You can't expect to have everything good that a city provides (stores, internet etc) without the city.
Brendan
I'm already helping bands sell their music at shows straight-to-iPod. A US$100 device (basically a memory stick, a button and an iPod cable) lets bands make infinite margins since they have zero distribution cost (no CDs, no printing costs, etc). It won't be long for CD to be forgotten, either.
:)
Do you find that a lot of people actually bring an iPod to shows? That seems like a bizarre idea to me since in my mind I'm going to a show to see live music, what do I need to listen to my iPod for? Maybe there is a market but it seems rather strange to me. I would be worried about losing it or possibly breaking it if the show gets rowdy (which many a great show should)
On a (sorta) related note, technically any amount of sales divided by zero distribution cost equals undefined margins, not infinite
Finally: have you thought about the ethics of using your student loans in this way? Were the loans given to you in order to help you pay for your expenses as a student?
I think that right there is the big question. If this is a student loan (the original question didn't specify) then I think there is an ethical issue here. He obviously doesn't need the money to survive so if it's a student loan then its probably money that could have gone to someone else and allowed them to get an education. However, if this is just a standard bank loan then he can do whatever he wants with the money.
B
Not just any bell, it needs more cowbell. Not sure how the cowbell would stop theft but it worked great on my fever!
I don't possibly see what hilarious pun you could think of with Hillary Duff's name. Hillary just doesn't lend itself to any good jokes.
Sony is planning to sell the PS3 soon so Sony is going to actually produce some PS3s. Shocking! Astounding! Wait... isn't this generally how commerce works? Company makes product, company sells product. Must be a slow day for news.
B
If schools are privatized where does all of the money to run the school come from? If the answer is "the students and their family", how does that work for low-income families? Would there be something in place to ensure that everyone can still access education?
Yeah, all the really cool kids know that the place to post inane babble is on Slashdot :)
He continues: It is not our fault, the beta testers keep causing problems, which we then have to fix.
I just want to point out that nowhere in TFA is Gates quoted as blaming the beta-testers for the delays. I'm sure he's intelligent enough to know that the beta-testers can only find problems, not cause them. And really, is this a bad thing? They made some software, sent it to beta, got feedback and decided to fix some problems.
I'm sure if it was reversed people would be screaming bloody-blue-murder that MS wasn't listening to feedback from users. I'm not saying that MS has done everything the best way and that Vista isn't becoming a joke because of repeated delays, but listening to beta-tester feedback seems like a good thing to me.
There already is a "white history month", its pretty much the rest of the year. The need for things like black history month isn't to make sure everyone knows the people who did good things were black, but to make sure that people know who did these good things at all.