176 karma · joined June 2, 2017
Actually, if mayer didn't sell a huge chunk of alibaba stake, the BABA stake by itself would be worth 120% of microsoft's bid.
YHOO owned 25% of alibaba. Alibaba is worth $400 B today. Microsoft's offer was $45 billion for YHOO.
That bid was terrible for YHOO shareholders. You do realize YHOO owned a ton of alibaba stock and yahoo!japan stock right? The alibaba shares alone that yahoo owned is now worth more than the $45 billion offer by MSFT. That's after Mayer foolishly sold off a huge chunk of alibaba shares a few years ago to go on her buying spree.
If steve ballmer had managed to buy YHOO, it would have been one of the greatest deals in history.
YHOO owned 25% of alibaba ( which is worth about $400 billion today ). YHOO also owned Yahoo!Japan which was worth $10 billion.
If MSFT bought YHOO back then, we would be calling Steve Ballmer and MSFT a genius today.
> I'm not sure how easy this would be. Does anyone know if something like this exists?
Don't know of any such thing that exists today. But it shouldn't be that difficult. A simple database linking journalists, news organizations, to topics/companies/keywords/etc.
The data set shouldn't even be that large.
We really need a more diversity media landscape. It's entirely liberal with pockets of conservatism. We need less liberal, more conservative and much more moderate media.
It's unhealthy for the media to be heavily skewed to one or the other side.
Not only that, we need this is academia and corporations and the banking sector. More diversity. More competing thoughts/ideas.
From your "context": "What are the accumulated losses so far? $5-10B?"
$5-10B Losses doesn't translate into "profitable".
> Would we have the Bolt, Spark, Fiat e500, eGolf without Tesla?
Maybe? Electric cars existed before TSLA and electric cars will exist after TSLA.
What is with you? I'm a fan of TSLA. I like electric vehicles. I just don't believe in the cult of it.
Honestly, I don't expect crazy comments like "What are the accumulated losses so far? $5-10B? Even if Tesla were to spend another $50B and go bankrupt, I would still maintain it's great. "
to be upvoted on HN.
Maybe on reddit or some other social media, but I feel there is a higher quality of people here. And when I see something odd, I'll point it out.
I'm not. But it's interesting how I just got swarmed by 3 commenters.
> The comment you are quoting is a snippet out of context.
The context makes it even worse.
"None of us can unlearn what Tesla has taught us. There is no way back now. Tesla has already won.'"
I can't believe you think that the "context" makes it any less cultish. The comment is almost messianic.
Have you read the comments and the replies?
"What are the accumulated losses so far? $5-10B? Even if Tesla were to spend another $50B and go bankrupt, I would still maintain it's great."
Seriously? This is being voted up?
Also, the top commenter here "simonsarris" is a top commenter in the other TSLA thread.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14914310
It's like a TSLA/Elon cult meeting in this thread.
There is so much agenda driven propaganda on social media now.
This was true for Germany but not for japan. Due to hard feelings over ww2 and of course racial animosity/hatred, our plan for japan was deindustrialization. We wanted japan to be at least a few decades behind the US and turn more of their nation into docile agrarian farmers. We also instituted starvation policy to thin out and subjugate the japanese. There was rampant starvation in japan in the first few years after ww2.
We had troops specifically assigned to destroy japanese industrial/engineering/science capacity. One of the most famous was the destruction of japan's cyclotron.
Keep in mind that we were an extremely racist nation 70 years ago and we had just nuked and firebombed japan into complete rubble. Whereas germans were "our white aryan brothers" ( it's absurd to think it now, but that's how the leaders of the US thought back then ) and we felt an obligation to rehabilitate them, the japanese were viewed as inferior asians with plenty of motive to attack the US again.
The only reason japan was allowed to reindustrialize was the soviet threat and the korean war. We needed japan to help seal off the soviets, chinese and north koreans.
It's fascinating stuff. If the communist threat didn't exist and the korean war never occurred, japan might be a more agrarian society today controlled by the US administrators.
It's just the nature of where we live and our propaganda.
We have been told over and over that we are the light of the world and we represent good. China/Russia/Muslims/others represent bad.
> If China doesn't do it, USA will, and in a generation will be swollen with a population so much more fit as to make the question of the Chinese standing toe-to-toe laughable. If USA doesn't, Russia will.
I'm sure there is. Human beings are human beings.
In the future, maybe instead of national/racial demarcations, we'll have "valid" and "invalid" demarcations a la "Gattaca".
The problem here is the pronoun "we" and "our". It isn't "we" who are going to control evolution. It is a select group of wealthy elites.
Also, just because china and russia might do it doesn't mean that we necessarily should do it. After all, the pioneers of illegal human experimentation was the US and britain but most of the world didn't follow along.
I agree with you that genetic engineering ( controlled evolution? ) is inevitable. But that doesn't mean we should ignore the ethical concerns and other such pitfalls.
Per capita doesn't matter when it comes to being a superpower.
The US is an economic superpower and norway isn't even though norway's per capita GDP is larger than the US.
People are so interested in pushing their agenda that they refuse to address my point.
My point was that canada isn't an education "SUPERPOWER". I'm not saying canada is a bad country. I'm not saying other nations don't produce nobel prize winners. My point was solely about the article's propagandistic use of term "superpower".
You can twist data/stats any way you want. Under no definition is canada a superpower of anything, let alone education.
I'm just pointing out what a absurd "article" BBC pushed out.
Your comment is a bit confused. So are you saying the europeans who invaded 500 years ago are immigrants or not? Because in your previous comment, you claimed they were.
> So for example, if now Germany attack Ethiopia, kill those people there are. After 500 years if the native Ethiopeans become 2% who according to you is Ethiopean?
The ethiopians are ethiopians. And if the germans created a new state called "Germania", then the colonizers/invaders would be "GERMANIANS". Or something like that.
Just like we have native americans and people of other ethnicities in the US. What's your confusion?
You haven't answered a single question of mine and now you are taking us on a nonsensical tangent.
I asked you, someone is born in ohio. Lives his entire life in ohio. You claim he is an immigrant. Where did he immigrate from.
The fact that you refuse to answer this basic question just means that you aren't interested in discourse but to push your agenda.
AMZN could get away with it because it was growing and expanding nearly monopolistic company. It was similar to a social media company in that regards. There is only ONE AMZN and was a pioneer in a new "industry/sector".
TSLA is different. They are trying to invade an industry/sector with a lot of heavy hitters and established companies with lots of money.
If you think TSLA is going to be the sole monopoly in the car/electric/etc sector, then you might have a shot. And if you think TSLA could expand into other sectors like AMZN did ( IE cloud ), then you are right.
> It's amazing just how many people on different sites (stocktwits, seeking alpha, reddit) continue the "they're losing money, why are they valued so highly?" comments.
It isn't amazing. It's sensible. The problem with a company like TSLA is that there are a lot of people with vested interests to only talk about the "good side".
I owned TSLA for a few years and I sold last year. Probably sold too early but couldn't justify not cashing out after more than a 400% gain.
I may buy back in if it drops significantly, but it looks like it's gonna keep going up for a while. Who knows. In an era of easy money it's hard to valuate a company. Especially an "all-or-nothing" stock like TSLA.
One similarity between TSLA and AMZN is the backing they both had from the hedge funds/wall street. And one of the reasons why I invested in TSLA is that Musk was able to get people with money to trust him. The same way bezos did.
But one thing I don't like is the near religious/cultish craze over musk that didn't exist with bezos.
I'm not saying canada doesn't have good schools. I'm saying the US has hundreds of top universities while canada has a handful.
In that respect, if you call canada an education superpower, you are making a mockery of the word superpower.
That's my point.
And a significant number of indians, chinese, etc also work in silicon valley. Wouldn't call india or china an education superpower either.
Even on a per capita basis, we outstrip canada easily. But raw numbers doesn't count? So the US has 7000 nukes and north korea has 5. So calling the US a nuclear superpower doesn't matter? The US has an $18 trillion economy. So it's wrong to call the US an economic superpower? Using your logic, north korea is a nuclear superpower and norway is an economic superpower?
So what's your definition of the word superpower? Just use it in a way that suits your agenda regardless of raw numbers?
I can't believe anyone on HN is advocating for the rejections of numbers and data on HN.
> Only if you measure the "start" of a country as the time of its declaration of independence.
No. If you measure when a nation became independent. Canada can't claim to be independent when their laws/government/etc was controlled by britain until 1983. You can't claim to be an independent nation when the final say rested with britain.
> For Canada, that's 1867, which a major politically significant event.
You mean when britain consolidated its territory? Canada was still ruled and controlled by britain. If that is independence, then once again, we have a difference on what words mean.
> By comparison, the Canada Act of 1983 was a formality.
Oh was it? When canada finally took control over its constitution?
Hong kong is more independent from china than canada was. Under whose rule did canada fight in ww1? Oh that's right. "Independent" canada fought under british rule. But certainly canada was "independent" by ww2 right? Nope. All the canadian soldiers fought under british commanders.
Instead of accepting reality, you are just changing the definition of words to suit your agenda. If you want to make up your own definition of superpower or independence, then so be it.
Because that's the more sensible definition for superpower?
> Good student performance consistently correlates with higher-paying jobs and higher quality of life. At the nation level, this correlates to higher Human-Development Index, which is generally considered a pretty good thing to have...
Great. I agree. Did I disagree anywhere? My issue is with the usage of the word superpower. And americans on average earn more than canadians.
> Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Mark Zuckerberg, Sean Parker, and Steve Jobs were all college dropouts.
And? They did go to college.
> They simply had the right idea at the right time.
Right.
> Their economic success has very little to do with the U.S. education system.
Ah I see. When the US education creates successes, it has nothing to do with the US education system. When canada's education system produces successes, canada is a superpower.
As I said, my only issue is with the BBC blatant propagandistic article. Their use of "superpower" and their perpetuating the lie of Canada's 150th year.
I'm for education. But canada is no more an education superpower than north korea is a nuclear superpower.
And I love your logic. Bill Gates, Zuckerburg, etc don't count. But kids taking silly tests count. Okay.
Really? What's your point? We are talking about the meaning of the word immigrants. Not racism.
> Yes, true for aboriginals
Not according to people like you. We are all immigrants. Right? Natives came from asia so they are immigrants too. Using your definition.
>Yes, they did all those "cool" things by coming from Europe and "Those aren't immigrants." ?
Did I say "cool" things? My point is that it is the opposite of "cool". My point is that there is a difference between immigrating and invading. Invading/colonizing/settling = bad. It is not immigrating.
> I don't have any of those intentions, in fact i dont care about them at all
Really. Your comment just reeks of agenda.
>This is so stupid
Is it? So lets say john was born in ohio and lived his entire life in ohio. He didn't even visit another state. You are claiming he is an immigrant. Right? So where did he immigrate from?
The smart/connected VC and the smart money are now cashing out to front run the recession. Soon the second-most connected will pull out and so on and so forth. And when the FED signals a low interest rate environment, the smartest/most connected will be the first to jump back in.
The US has been on an epic economic boom since 2009 and the economy has been drowning in cheap money for almost 10 years.
It worries me how so many people have an idealized fantasy about silicon valley, tech gurus and the industry itself. The tech industry is all about greed just like wall street, oil industry, clean energy industry, etc.
Elon Musk is just as greedy as Goldman Sachs CEO.
If silicon valley could make more money with juice machine for the top 1%, they'll keep investing in it even if it means 99% is starving. Musk, Page, Zuckerburg, etc aren't saints no more than wall street big wigs are saints. They all just want money. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing.
I agree.
> If that's the case then the US is not the only education superpower.
The US is easily the only education superpower.
Go check the nobel prizes of US vs Canada.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nobel_laureates_by_uni...
I agree. I didn't deny that. Now compare how many top universities we have in the US? If the US has hundreds of top universities and Canada has a handful, how does that make canada an education superpower? If canada is an education superpower, then is north korea a nuclear superpower? Isn't the word superpower supposed to mean something?
> We're home to top-tier companies like Shopify.
Shopify is top-tier? It has revenues of $151 million/year.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shopify
>On account of the British North America Act that became law July 1st 1867, these British colonies would be recognized as an independent nation."
But they weren't an independent nation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_Act_1982
Canada became "independent" in 1983. Canada celebrated its first Canada Day in 1983.
To claim canada is 150 years old is a verifiable lie.
Listen, canada is a wonderful nation. I have nothing against canada. My complaint is about the article. Its assertions don't make any sense.
Nothing is ever all good or all bad.
> In other words education is important but the focusing on education especially higher but also on the elementary level as some sort of indication of how well a country is fairing is not really a useful metric.
It isn't even a good metric for determining a nation's education status. The number of quality universities is a far better indicator.
Canada has a handful of quality universities. The US has hundreds. So how much sense does it make to call canada an education superpower?
If you were born in the US or Canada or a citizen by birth, you aren't an immigrant.
Many of our ancestors were immigrants for sure. But not all of our ancestors were immigrants.
Many of our ancestors were invaders, colonizers and settlers. Those aren't immigrants.
Saying we are all immigrants is a political statement. It tries to make us identify with the immigrants and pro-immigrant policies and has the benefit of masking/absolving our invader/colonizer/settler ancestors.
If you were born in the US and you think you are an immigrant, ask yourself "where did I immigrate from"? And that assertion becomes silly. "I was born in ohio". Does that mean I immigrated to the US from Ohio? It doesn't make sense.
Canada isn't an education superpower. The silly international ranking of kids' test taking abilities is meaningless.
Real education superpowers are those with top universities which in turn produce economic gains/growth/etc.
If canada was a true economic superpower, we'd see them producing Google, Facebook, Microsoft, etc.
Frankly, there is only 1 education superpower - the US. Go check a list of top 100 universities. It's almost entirely US colleges. Britain is the next far distant competitor. The only other nation who may challenge the US to become an education superpower in the future is china as they are building tons of universities. This is something we did in the US in the 1800s. Build a incredible number of universities as our economy grew. The only question is whether china will be able to match our quality because they are going to surpass our quantity by a large margin.
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-35776555
Also, if the BBC journalist did any bit of research, they would know that Canada's "150th anniversary" is fake propaganda itself. Canada isn't 150 years old. They gained their independence in 1983.
China controls theirs. Russia controls their. EU theirs. We control ours.
That isn't global.
Yes. That's my point. If truly we are facing human extinction, shouldn't we ban even EV/hybrids?
You would think all these alarmists claiming end of the world wouldn't be driving ANYTHING.
Yes. That's why free speech was created. To protect the "abusers". This is something you learn in your first year of college. At least I did. As my jewish philosophy professor said, free speech rights that doesn't protect neo-nazi speech is worthless. Think about it? What use is free speech rights if it doesn't protect "offensive speech". We wouldn't need it if free speech only protected "acceptable speech".
> There's a difference between defending a controversial point of view and telling people to kill themselves and simply slinging slurs and insults.
Not really. If you believe in free speech. If you were correct, atheists who insult the religious would be banned. The civil rights movement that insulted racists would have been banned.
> Generally, reddit tries to allow free speech while keeping out the assholes
It really doesn't. Reddit is an openly hyperliberal free speech.
> whereas Voat let the assholes have free reign.
Absolutely. Voat is where the rightist assholes reign free. Reddit is where the leftist assholes reign free.
That is the problem you get when you don't have free speech. You get echo chambers.
The only people who defend reddit are the hyperliberal people with an agenda. Just like voat is filled with hyperconservatives.
If you don't like voat, you really shouldn't like reddit either. They are fundamentally, the same kind of anti-free speech madness. Unless you have a bias and a hatred for free speech.