pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
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User ID: 278
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
37m ago
I'm not sure what changed all that much. They were just well positioned to tax computer industry growth and it grew massively. Hardly anyone can point to a brilliant innovation at Microsoft during this period.
The brilliant innovation was in Azure and especially Office 365, in leveraging their dominance in Office desktop application software to provide a superior and indispensable cloud-based service even as desktops starting becoming less relevant. This made them well-positioned to tax not just computer industry growth, but some fraction of all economic growth, basically the new IBM.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
47m ago
True, and I think that's because some his unique set of skills include ruthless business sense something that nerds are generally lousy at and/or lack experience with.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
52m ago
First, your premises are wrong. Each prototype Starship launch almost certainly doesn't cost $1 billion. Per SpaceX, the whole development program is expected not to exceed 10 billion dollars. Estimates of the production cost of the Raptor engine is about $250000 each, so round that up to 50 engines per flight, double and you're still at only about $25 million. The rest of the ship is made out of relatively inexpensive stainless steel coil sheet, and the thermal tiles are made in-house. $250 million would be a liberal estimate, and more conservative estimates are about $100 million per launch.
Second, there is no desire to just rake the cash in. As with Amazon, the goal of SpaceX is to rake in cash for the purpose of further development, so as to obtain a position that is not just nearly unassailable by competitors, but creates a completely new market. And of course, Musk, as the controlling owner of the company, has goals for the company that do require Starship, which is capable of orbiting more than 100 metric tons of payload per launch, such as establishing a continuous presence on Mars. This requires lots of bulk mass, which only Starship could possibly deliver. One reason it was selected for HLS despite the development work needed is because you'd be landing not just a small landing craft on every mission, but what amounts to an entire base.
SpaceX has been quite explicit that the goal with Starship is to completely cannibalize Falcon 9 launches, and to eventually discontinue Falcon 9 altogether, as they expect a fully reusable Starship launch cycle (even expending $1 million in propellant per launch) to cost less not just per kilogram but per launch than Falcon 9 which does requires a new upper stage for each launch. (Though I think Falcon 9 + Dragon will remain the preferred human launch system to LEO for longer, unless some kind of Starship transporter with more robust abort modes is developed.)
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1hr ago
EscaPADE
Each identical EscaPADE spacecraft has a mass under 90 kg. The spacecraft bus is 60 x 70 x 90 cm. The spacecraft is powered by two 480 x 70 cm solar panel wings extending from opposite sides of the spacecraft.
This doesn't make sense at all. Falcon 9 can already deliver about 4000 kg to Mars, so this hardly seems like a game-changing mission. If you want to talk about LEO, which is obviously what the DOD is more interested in, SpaceX in 2023 put over 1,000 metric tons into LEO. Even without Starship, there is no other company that can hope to do anything like those numbers anytime soon. The idea that the DoD is being held up by SpaceX is ludicrous. DOD is concerned about launch cadence, but with regards to ULA, not SpaceX. The only customer that could claim to be reasonably concerned about pace would be NASA with respect to HLS, but since the entire Artemis program is already underfunded and way behind for other reasons, they have little actual grievance.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
1hr ago
The ones that come out of hard drives are great for holding tools or key rings.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
2hr ago
I agree a lot with your sentiment. Musk does happen to share a lot of my values, but he's definitely a snake-oil salesman to some degree, and I'd hate to work for the man, not only because I don't agree with his goals, but he's also very petty from what I've heard, and too confident in his own abilities where he has no real expertise.
A more charitable reading would be that Musk is uniquely aspirational - not for money or power, but for real technological progress. He really, honestly believes taking a chance on a technological leap forward is worth large investments even if success is not guaranteed or even highly probable. This is refreshingly different than most other businesses, which either tend to sclerotic, bloated enterprises trying to squeeze every last bit of profit out of absurdly well-tread technological paths, or absolute grifters who don't even intend to try to accomplish the goals they set, but do plan to enrich themselves along the way. This is why I think he is so valuable - he has both the vision to see openings for large progress, and the ambition to make an honest try.
People tend to lump Musk into the "grifter" category because his vision and ambition is usually larger than what turns out to be possible, but they ignore that what does turn out to be possible is usually still well beyond what everyone else thought was possible. This happens because he actually does take the time to learn the fundamentals, and because he understands important concepts that we have tended to downplay in the West, such as the importance and the benefits of engineering for manufacturability and vertical integration. In way too many businesses, especially public companies, nearly every single person in management all the way up to the board of directors is far more concerned with ass-covering and deflecting failure than they are with taking on challenges and engineering solutions.
That is why, to a mild degree, I am a Musk supporter. The future belongs to those who show up, and the rewards belong to those who take chances and solve problems. Humanity will stagnate if everything is left in the hands of committees and study groups, people who are not "too confident", and if failing to achieve total victory is deemed more shameful than never trying. Musk is, for whatever faults, a Man in the Arena. He's not a prophet, but he has a unique set of skills that has put him in a position to be a singular force for technological and material progress.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
3d ago
Premium Android phones in the iPhone price range are almost unheard of in the US
That seems overstated. If you walk into any carrier store, at least half the shelf space is usually for higher end Samsung, Motorola, Google, or even OnePlus devices. Maybe it's because I'm in the midwest, but Android easily outnumbers iPhone among my friends and family.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
6d ago
Yes. In point of fact, intelligent people have already thought about this and brandishing is a crime even if openly carrying is not: https://california.public.law/codes/ca_penal_code_section_417
(1)Every person who, except in self-defense, in the presence of any other person, draws or exhibits any deadly weapon whatsoever, other than a firearm, in a rude, angry, or threatening manner, or who in any manner, unlawfully uses a deadly weapon other than a firearm in any fight or quarrel is guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by imprisonment in a county jail for not less than 30 days. Every person who, except in self-defense, in the presence of any other person, draws or exhibits any firearm, whether loaded or unloaded, in a rude, angry, or threatening manner, or who in any manner, unlawfully uses a firearm in any fight or quarrel is punishable as follows:
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
7d ago
The Spanish crown then won a political struggle with the Papacy, asserted control over the office in the area under its secular jurisdiction, then started using it as a secret police against perceived fifth columnists and as a revenue source.
Unexpectedly.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
7d ago
Even him winning 45% -- which I think he's likely to do -- would be a solid and profound rebuke of the attempts to use weird lawsuits and criminal trials to bring down a major political candidate.
Can you explain this logic to me? Surely the point of underhanded maneuvers is no more than winning the election, which only necessitates winning the marginal voter without losing your base. Successfully accomplishing your goal by a comfortable margin does not seem like a rebuke at all, it seems like a strong validation of the strategy.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
10d ago
The cherry on top is the recent fracas with Bumble, who got in hot water and profusely apologized for the offensive insinuation that some women may desire sex.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
11d ago
So to speak
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
12d ago
IMO at least some of that should be back-loaded. For example, count child-rearing years as median income or last earned income (whichever is higher) * number of children for the purpose of calculating social security benefits. Advantage: selects for low time-preference. Advantage: Defers payout contingent on future taxbase able to support it. Advantage: Provides the long-term spousal independence that women seem to crave.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
12d ago
Almost all of them? Even in the heavily male dominated industries you mention women are somewhere between 10 and 30% of all workers. Do you think if 36% of all farmers disappeared no one would notice? What about 10% of all construction workers? Or hell, how about healthcare. Would no one notice if 88% of all nurses disappeared overnight? What about 38% of all physicians?
You're equivocating between "wouldn't notice" and "wouldn't grind to a halt".
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
12d ago
The market is not perfectly efficient, of course, but I am not sure why I should believe you are more likely to be correct than the people actually making the decision to hire them.
Not OP, but the obvious rejoinder is that the company but outsources all of the opportunity cost to the employees. The real question is why the prospective employee is so heavily discounting the opportunity cost.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
12d ago
Presumably to avoid a repeat of the 60's-80's
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
12d ago
An urban growth boundary would be a terrible thing. Letting people build on farmland they own is no different to letting people build on urban land they own.
Without this, how would you stop white people from moving out to the suburbs again?
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
13d ago
I think the word you were looking for was "attrition".
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
14d ago
I think that a higher court could issue a Writ of Mandamus requiring them to apply the law as directed. Defiance of that would lead to contempt of court and jail time.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
14d ago
Wouldn't you rather die in a war?
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
18d ago
In most cases, nobody. Bureaucrats have made obtaining legal remedies so time-consuming that, if you can't make do with private arbitration, it's almost always better to just cut your losses and walk away from a broken deal. But in the business world, reputation matters - if you fail to honor your agreements, you are choosing exile from much of the world of profitable enterprise.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
18d ago
Last year or so I've it seems like I've had more bronchitis than I've ever had in my life combined, but I also know I'm not alone among my friends, family, and coworkers on this, so I think it's just something going around. And around and around.
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
19d ago
Despite those restrictions, under the current numbers Biden would be required to use the authority.
Or else what?
pusher_robot
PLEASE GO STAND BY THE STAIRS
20d ago
The case of MIT having to delete open-access free knowledge for lack of being able to cost-justify captioning everything soured me greatly on the law, and was probably a major red pill for me in my life as it opened my eyes to the massive amount of ordinary altruistic good-doing that is suppressed by government bureaucracy and regulation, seemingly intentionally.
Not necessarily; they could block it through legal and regulatory mechanisms.
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