hnnewguy

>"But it's ok to destroy the ability of normal people to save or conduct business."

I will never understand this argument. What right do people have to a return on their savings? None. It's an economic transaction.

You realize that when you "save" money, there's someone on the other side of that transaction that is taking that money, along with some risk and ingenuity, and putting it to work economically?

If you want return now, take more risk. The world is awash in capital, safe assets earn nothing.

As far as "conducting business", the largest corporations are selling massive amounts of debt at historically low rates; it's not a bad environment to conduct business.

In what way does that sentence imply that you are a militia man or Tea Partier, given your beliefs?

The sentence reads: "Militia men and Tea Partiers hate fiat money". Not "people who hate fiat money are Tea Partiers or militiamen".

Some people love to be offended, I guess.

Huh? You say you disagree, but then state that programmers can range from bad to okay to good to excellent? That isn't bimodal, and is precisely the authors point?

>And did you really say that there are no cheaper alternatives for an electric car than a $100,000 Tesla? You might want to have a look at what's actually available, if that's what you actually meant to say.

If you want an electric car with 200+ mile range, what are the alternatives?

>has pushed other car manufacturers to follow suit,

This is Tesla's biggest accomplishment, in my opinion. And we will all benefit greatly from it.

Costs aren't being added to the gas cars, which would make sense. Instead, normal people are subsidizing luxury cars. That's stupid.

Is this what passes for clever? It's hardly a "tech" article, that's for sure.

>The engine was also extremely hot, we burned ourselves when we touched it.

Electric motors run cold, I guess?

>We started calculating price versus consumption and came to the shocking conclusion that a petrol car costs unimaginable €12 per 100km! Sure, electric cars could also theoretically come up to these amounts if they quick charged at one of the most expensive charging stations in the country – but for petrol cars there are no cheaper alternatives!

You can buy a $12,000 gas car, but for electric cars there are no cheaper alternatives. Work that into the cost vs a $100,000 Tesla. The 99% of the world are not complete idiots; electric cars aren't mainstream yet.

I get the impression from HN commentary that the minute you receive your MBA you become a sociopath whose IQ drops 40 points.

Obviously, the person from your anecdote is representative of MBAs in general, right? If not, what's the point of the comment? I have a stupid conversation with someone from some occupation every day.

Everyone has known what this announcement was going to be for a month.

>*"What toxic materials are you referring to? I'm not aware of anything that stands out, especially compared to coal mining, or tar sands production"

Water usage, along with the carbon emissions from the large diesel vehicles that are actually digging the stuff up.

Tangentially related, but interesting, EconTalk episode that goes into p-values related to investment strategies, LHC experiments and other stuff:

Campbell Harvey of Duke University talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about his research evaluating various investment and trading strategies and the challenge of measuring their effectiveness. Topics discussed include skill vs. luck, self-deception, the measures of statistical significance, skewness in investment returns, and the potential of big data.

http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2015/03/campbell_harvey.htm...

Spending a dollar to earn $0.50 isn't sustainable.

I use Twitter daily, and would hate to see it disappear. But how much of current revenues are a product of companies still "experimenting" with the Twitter ad ecosystem? What happens if those channels provide less ROI than everyone expects? That's the way the trends appear to be heading.

>"The major U.S. tournaments are usually held in either Hilton or Sheraton hotel ballrooms...in Canada, chess tournaments are often held in church basements, schools, community centers, etc., resulting in a large group of people crammed into a small, dark and over-heated space."

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that in the US, tournaments are also "often" held in church basements and schools. Most often, in fact. Where else are all the small tournaments to be held?

As far as major tournaments, the Canadian Open last year was at the Montreal Fairmont, which is a beautiful venue.

The idea that someone gets "chess culture shock" between Canada and the US is absurd.

I suppose it's just that much more validation, one last-ditch-effort to reveal flaws behind the facade.

But you're right; who would offer up anything but a stellar reference?

I trust Gladwell and his research and interview access more than I trust your blanket, ad hominem dismissal of his work.

The essay covered lots of things about the subject matter. Do you not think social scientists understand confounding variables, or do you assume they are idiots?

>what kind of cretins can find such an exam "too complicated"?

There is absolutely no context in that article, and it shows a single question from the exam, yet you deduce that everyone that wrote and complained about it is a moron?

This is a two-way street: I've seen ridiculous student complaints, but I've also had terrible instructors. There are "cretins" on both sides of the table.

>a 5% increase in interest payments for the federal government would cause the level of federal debt to rise to $85 trillion over the next 20 year"

So if interest rates suddenly rise to 5% and the US didn't make a single debt payment for twenty years, total debt would explode? What insight! Then again, if nobody cares that no debt payment was made for 20 years, who cares what the total debt is!

The article says at 5% the debt payment is $900BB annually, which is 5% of GDP. High, but hardly debilitating. First you need to explain what purpose the would be served by the Fed raising rates to 5% tomorrow, though.

>"I know it sounds unpopular but this is the way people get promoted vs fired, kind of obvious, but many people still think that if "They do the right thing" that they are clear"

We need more people to prioritize "doing the right thing" over "getting promoted", not fewer.

>Not really true. Spam accounts degrade the quality of the experience, leading to an eventual collapse of real users.

You say it isn't true, then describe the scenario that is actually happening today, described in this article: a lower quality experience for users and advertisers. The problem exists because of misaligned incentives. Sure, if advertising and users growth plummet due to the problem, Facebook will be forced to do something. But it's happening now and little is being done.

The spam accounts are not new. I worked for a relatively successful gaming company during the social gaming goldrush a few years ago. While doing some research into cheating in our game, we looked at trying to determine players who were using multiple accounts. We figured that close to half of the daily user accounts were fake. Half.

Hell, each of us had multiple accounts ourselves, since we did a lot of testing and market-research, and didn't want to inundate our real-life streams with spammy game updates.

Of course, when the value of your company rests on those DAU figures, no one is going to talk about it. Just report what it says.

There has been very little incentive to verify any accounts when part of the selling point of your platform is "we have x billions of active accounts", where or not the accounts are real.

>If Sony broke the law, they could have selectively published those emails.

I think the point is to not be selective. Release the info, and let people do with it as they may.

>"This publicity stunt by Uber actually creates a perverse incentive for drinkers to increase their blood alcohol level.

So what, as long as it keeps people who would otherwise drive drunk off the road?

>"But if your blood alcohol level is high enough to impair your ability to drive safely, who's to say what other abilities it might impair?"

Give me a break. I don't care if you are so drunk you can hardly walk, and fall and smash your face. That's your problem. Better than killing my friends and family behind the wheel. That's my problem.

>"With future technology, it could be even longer."

This sort of misses the point that under this thought experiment there is no future technology, and that to get at the vast reserves we have left would require that technology. We won't be deep sea drilling or fracking if we get rebooted. Nor will we be digging holes in the prairies and having crude gush to the surface.

I guess SV has better PR.

>"that you should actively pursue building a monopoly, since "competition is for losers"

Because from your business' perspective, you want a monopoly to have the greatest potential success. This doesn't preclude competition; your competitors are also trying to build a monopoly.

>Buy low, sell high. For now, at least.

Being as how a transaction requires two parties, this is not possible for everyone.

>It's like having a tank of gas in your garage all the time.

And how many people care to have a tank of gas in their garage all the time, even though the idea is completely feasible today?

>That business could one day replace most petrol charging stations.

Why wouldn't gas stations merely re-equip with electric charging equipment? They already have the best real estate.

There are also competing standards for DC charging, so I find it highly unlikely that the other manufacturers will license anything from Tesla, rather than settling on another standard.