You say that as if you think we will have a choice in that matter. A centrally planned economy is the kind of numerical optimization problem that computers are far better at solving than humans are. Eventually, some country will implement an AI-driven centrally planned economy that will function far more efficiently than our current market-driven model, at which point everyone else will either out-competed by this new more efficient system, or adopt something similar.
I am with you. I cannot for the life of me imagine who would want this machine. Companies that mass produce frozen pizzas have industrial processes that would put this gizmo to shame in terms of consistency and output volume. For restaurants, this machine looks like it would require so much maintenance to keep it working and sufficiently sanitary for use in a commercial kitchen that I am not even sure that it would offer any labor savings over a traditional pizza operation, and that is before you consider the fact that those pizzas look completely unappetizing.
This was definitely true during the Blairite New Labor days, but it's extraordinarily disingenuous to claim that Corbyn doesn't understand the needs of working Britons.
I can’t really speak for NYC or LA, since I have never lived in either one for any appreciable amount of time, but in Chicago, it’s because of vastly unequal access to public transportation. Housing demand is skyrocketing in neighborhoods near L train stations, while the population is dwindling on the west and south sides of the city where train service is virtually non-existent. Nobody wants to commute to work via two 45-minute bus rides, and driving to the loop from those far-flung neighborhoods is cost-prohibitive for all but the wealthiest people (not to mention that it won’t save you much time, even if you can afford it).
>I genuinely don't understand your point. "Nanny state" and "welfare state" are synonymous, at least in the U.S.
The term "nanny state" typically refers to legislation that aims to protect people from their own worst impulses - laws that ban the sale of large-sized soft drinks, sin taxes on cigarettes and alcohol, and giving tickets to drivers who don't wear a seat belt would all be examples of the "nanny state". In contrast, the "welfare state" refers to redistributive social programs that aim to mitigate the effects of capitalism on vulnerable populations (i.e. Social Security, Medicare, Unemployment Insurance, etc. ).
But that doesn't really answer the question being asked. If the cryptocurrency is completely controlled by a centralized authority who has absolute rights over the system, why bother with the technical and cognitive hurdles of using a blockchain? A standard ledger in a centralized database is more than adequate for that task, and much easier to maintain.
Who is "we" in this scenario? Changes to antitrust legislation was largely foisted upon the public by financial oligarchs that used the new rules to cement their own wealth and power, and unfortunately for my great-grandchildren, I am not one of them.
Universities in the US are no longer institutions of higher learning; they are hedge funds with affiliated football and basketball teams. Because of this, universities have decided to drastically cut costs by replacing tenure-track positions with adjuncts. About 58% of faculty at American universities are non-tenure track, and that number is likely to increase over the coming decade as tenured professors retire [1].
I grew up in the suburbs, and starting at age 9 or so, my friends and I would frequently ride our bikes to each other's houses when we wanted to hang out, weather permitting. Often a group of 4-8 of us would wind up just generally riding around town, largely unsupervised. Keep in mind this was the mid 90s, so it's very possible things have changed since then.
Reinsurance funds typically market themselves as a source of alpha for large institutional investors. The reinsurance company sells bonds that promise a relatively high rate of return, with the caveat that in the event that the fund needs to pay out a large claim, the value of the bond may be nullified.
I think that B is going to be very difficult, if not impossible, for Uber/Lyft to overcome. The act of driving is the core business operation for ride-sharing companies; it’s the fundamental means by which they create value. I can’t see a good argument for how that could possibly fall outside of their “normal variety”.
Is that really the reason? If you are heading west because you want to farm, wouldn't it be better to leave in winter and arrive in time for planting season than leave in summer and wait 9 months to plant?
>This is why emergency exit doors must open outwards. People have died in fires in theaters trying to push on doors that said “Pull”. The crash bar on an emergency exit door is what’s known in design as an affordance.
Is this true? I always assumed it was because it's pretty much impossible to pull open a door when you are being crushed by people pressing against one another trying to escape.
Trust me, if you don't like the idea of your entire livelihood hinging on weather or not a piece of equipment boots up, farming is NOT the career for you.
Why is this better than using a fiber optic cable? I guess light travels slightly faster through the air compared to either glass or plastic (the two typical optical media used for cables) which would reduce the transmission time, but I can't imagine that the slight decrease in latency is worth the massive increase in downtime due to atmospheric interference.
I would imagine that most companies that are in the market for this have already decided to trust Amazon with most, if not all, of their most sensitive applications and data.
Hmmmm. I don't know if I buy that. If the pattern is not cryptographically secure, then you're still vulnerable to man in the middle, and if it is cryptographically secure, wouldn't you get roughly the same security by just doing standard SSH key based auth?
I would imagine that it is about as useful to talk about "Depression" as it is to talk about "Cancer". There are so many forms, expressions, and causes of depression, requiring wildly different approaches to treatment, that I think we do a great disservice by lumping them all under the same umbrella term.
Can a moderator add "Golang Web Framework" or something to the title of this article? I would imagine that most readers would assume this is about a new version of the Amazon Echo, and the current title seems almost engineered to create that confusion.
I found this comment to be much better, and more interesting, than the original article:
>The other side of the third possibility is that LDL and HDL levels are indicators of some underlying process, and not causative at all. So CETP inhibitors might just be changing the indicator while doing nothing to the actual cause of the heart disease, while statins are doing something to the underlying cause, which in turn changes cholesterol levels. IE the old “correlation is not causation” coming to bite us yet again.
Nowhere did i say, "Dropbox should be the same size as 37 Signals." I merely suggested that they would have been better off trying to be the right size for their revenue profile (which is probably larger than 37 Signals, but certainly much smaller than their current growth target of Google/Facebook/Amazon/etc. size).
That's a great question, and one I won't pretend to have the answer to. On one hand, Basecamp has carved out a very profitable niche for themselves despite venture-backed competition from Jira and others, so it's certainly possible. I also think that there is a big difference between taking money when you are small with typical angel / seed-round terms and taking late-stage money with 2x VC liquidation preferences and a private valuation north of $1 billion. Then again, like you said, it can be very tough to turn a profit when you have to compete with companies undercutting you by subsidizing their prices with an enormous reserve of easy VC cash.
Dropbox has the same problem a lot of the moderately successful unicorns have; it's a good product managed by smart people that would be much better off as a right-sized stable lifestyle business a la 37 Signals / Basecamp than as an attempt at a world-beating massive-growth juggernaut like Google or Facebook. Unfortunately for them (and Evernote, and a whole host of others), once you've signed that deal for the huge late-stage VC cash infusion at a fantasy-land valuation, there's no going back.
>I still think Uber has the right idea long-term with a completely autonomous fleet...
I really disagree here. I think the biggest strength of Uber's business model is that they offload all of the maintenance, fuel, liability, registration, etc. costs (as well as the cost of managing all of that) to the drivers. In addition, local regulators have been treating Uber with kid gloves in a lot of markets because Uber "creates jobs"; when Uber starts getting in the business of putting drivers, both their own and drivers for other companies, out of work, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of markets start making it even harder for them to operate. Don't get me wrong, I'm very excited for autonomous cars, and absolutely think they will be omnipresent in the long-term future, but I don't think Uber will be the company that dominates that market, at least not in the short-to-medium term, and trying to do so will be their Waterloo.
The reality is that it is impossible for everyone to be an expert in everything. At some point, certain fields, medicine and finance for example, become so complex that it is impossible for a lay-person to make an informed decision. Historically, when lay-people are given the freedom to "use their money however they want" within these fields, hucksters and frauds have quite successfully conned them because it is impossible for a lay-person to tell the difference between a legitimate opportunity and a scam; they don't have the expertise, experience, and even the time to perform the due-diligence needed to make an informed decision. While these regulations are certainly a blunt instrument, and they do prevent a very small segment of the lay-population who could make an informed decision from doing so, the alternative is far worse.