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olentangy

23 karma · joined July 28, 2011

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olentangy··on How AltaVista, the first good search engine, fell into the digital abyss
Coulda, woulda, shoulda.

I remember when I left DEC for Apple in the mid-80's and my manager told me I was making a mistake going to work for a company making toy computers.

DEC was a true leader during the mini-computer era, but after that nope. Happens to a lot of companies.

olentangy··on Everyone’s Income Taxes Should Be Public
Even if you require all politicians to publish their tax returns, it wouldn't really be "holding politicians accountable." They have become more sophisticated in their pay offs and much of the graft flows to their children rather themselves. See Secret Empires by Peter Schweizer for a recent book diving into how this now works.
olentangy··on Tesla Second Quarter 2018 Update
SUVs sit up higher. This makes them easier to get into and out of.

SUVs are basically hatchbacks. I currently own a hatchback (GTI) and our old SUV was easier to get into and out of. The GTI is more fun to drive though.

olentangy··on All Tesla Cars Being Produced Now Have Full Self-Driving Hardware
That's ridiculous. My 2+ year old Mercedes self drives on the freeway quite nicely. They do require I keep my hands on the wheel, but other than that, it's doing the driving.

Other manufacturers aren't simply responding to Elan.

olentangy··on Dropbox Owns Cloud Storage on Mobile
Um, it's trivial to drag any file on a Mac into iCloud. Look in the sidebar in the Finder, between Favorites and Devices is iCloud. Click there to see the contents of your iCloud storage.

On iOS, the iCloud Drive app lets you see everything in iCloud storage as well.

Certainly iOS app integration is important in iCloud, but it functions perfectly well for any other use too.

olentangy··on Traffic-weary homeowners and Waze are at war
I want Waze to add new features: 1. Crowd source bad roads. Some interstates are atrocious, I'd happily turn on [X] avoid potholes and uneven pavement. Maybe use the motion sensors to do this automatically. 2. Get me know altitude. This would made planning trips through the mountains way better - avoiding high mountain passes would be very helpful. 3. Overlay radar when thunderstorms are hopscotching across the land.
olentangy··on Canada forgot to plan for its future by leaning on oil and the loonie
Here in Ohio we so look forward to what we call Alberta Clippers. Quick little snow storms followed by colder air.

So, yup, we tend to refer to snow and cold as coming from Canada.

olentangy··on Walmart Pay
The only reason I use the Starbucks "card" is that I get free drinks with it. Walmart will only succeed if they offered some similar type of kickback to the customer. I don't see it happening.
olentangy··on NASA’s New Horizons Discovers Frozen Plains in the Heart of Pluto’s ‘Heart’
It's just oxidized hydrogen.

Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe. Oxygen is the third most common.

olentangy··on Science’s Biggest Fail
Global warming is a weird example to pick on, because it's dominated by marketing, financial interest, media mis-reporting etc. Global warming works like this: your boss reads an article in some rag and thinks that there might be an opportunity to target a new market. They tell you to go find some studies or something that could back up your claims. Usually, this would not survive any kind of rigorous scientific investigation -- but it sounds good enough to use for marketing. Done. There's precious little science in global warming. Just follow the money.
olentangy··on Scots, What the Heck?
Sounds like a short sale.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_sale_(real_estate)

olentangy··on The Home Depot confirms payment systems breach
Most US banks are going for chip and signature.

I've received two new cards in the last month with a chip in them - both were chip and signature.

olentangy··on Not So Much ‘New York Poor’ as ‘Pittsburgh Rich’
The airport isn't what it used to be, but still has some good connections. This spring I took a direct flight to Paris. Not bad...
olentangy··on HTTP 2.0
Unix is dead?

Aren't Mac OS X, iOS, and Android basically unix OSes?

I'd say Unix won.

olentangy··on Why I Retired From Apple
I didn't work for Don, but as an engineer in another part of the company. I too was able to retire (at age 49).

It makes me sad that the stock options that made my retirement possible won't be available to the next generation of engineers because of bad tax law (Sarbanes-Oxley).

olentangy··on What Percent Are You?
I shouldn't have said "most". It's more like 34% of the top 20% fall to a lower quintile over six years according to a Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis study of households from 1002 to 2007. (http://www.minneapolisfed.org/research/qr/qr3411.pdf) I should have looked this up instead of just trusting my memory.

Still pretty significant.

olentangy··on What Percent Are You?
Why focus on income? It can so fleeting.

I cashed out a bunch of options last year that put me in into seven figures for ONE YEAR. Next year I'll be making no salary since I "retired" because of my windfall.

I'm way better off than I was when I was making a low six figure salary, but by this measure I'll be worse off.

People need to remember that salaries and wealth are dynamic. Most of the people in the 1% weren't there 10 years ago and certainly won't be there in 10 years.

olentangy··on Is Domestically Produced Ethanol Worth the Cost?
> its growth takes up a lot of water

I'm sure there are a few places that irrigate corn, but here in Ohio the water that grows the corn falls from the sky.