Quotulatiousness

January 1, 2012

Bargain hunting: pay only $103,000 for a car costing $2.2 million

Filed under: Economics, Environment, Government, Technology — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 12:41

They’re pretty exclusive: so far they’ve only made 239 of them, and they start at $103,000 per unit. They have, however, taken on a bit of US federal government funding:

It’s another example of USA tax dollars at work — in Finland:

From ABC News, Oct 20th, 2011:

    With the approval of the Obama administration, an electric car company that received a $529 million federal government loan guarantee is assembling its first line of cars in Finland, saying it could not find a facility in the United States capable of doing the work.

    Vice President Joseph Biden heralded the Energy Department’s $529 million loan to the start-up electric car company called Fisker as a bright new path to thousands of American manufacturing jobs. But two years after the loan was announced, the company’s manufacturing jobs are still limited to the assembly of the flashy electric Fisker Karma sports car in Finland.

Let’s do the math.

239 cars produced for 2012 model year.

$529,000,000 USD in Government loans

That works out to $2,213,389 (2.2 million) per car.

Selling price $103,000 USD, that leaves only $2,110,389 in taxpayer funded overhead per vehicle. And, they’ve only sold 50 so far.

Such a deal.

Of course, when your promotion strategy revolves around a sitcom based on Charlie Sheen, such things are bound to happen

December 30, 2011

Next up on the global agenda: the “soft” dark ages

Filed under: History, Technology — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 11:20

Occasional commenter “Lickmuffin” sent a link to this article saying “Overly optimistic outlook here, I’m afraid. What good is digital storage when there won’t be any electricity?”:

We were discussing the dark ages, which not only were characterized by the disintegration of the Roman political order, but also the loss of an immense store of practical technological knowledge: agricultural practices and implements; construction techniques — it would take until the 19th century for Europeans to match the Romans’ road-building prowess — war machines; distribution and warehousing; science; art (which in Roman times was the realm of artisans, not self-absorbed “transgressive” pricks).

I said that I think we are headed for a “soft dark ages.” That took him aback. “How are we headed there,” he asked, “and how would they be ‘soft’?”

I answered his last question first. They would be “soft” because unlike what happened in Roman times, we have the ability to store gigantic amounts of information in small spaces. One person can carry around encyclopedic knowledge on a flash drive. Multiply him by the millions, and you have a vast repository of recoverable knowledge that is private, widely dispersed, and replicated many times over. No matter how determined or persistent this era’s barbarians — Marxists, Muslims, Democrats, unionists, academicians — they simply would not be able to track down and destroy all modern technological knowledge.

But beyond furtive individual efforts at hiding and protecting the knowledge we would need to create a New America or a New West, there would be vaster, more organized, more collective efforts to protect knowledge until better days. I suggested to Bob three institutions or concepts that would become the next dark ages’ hallmarks: The new castle fortress; the new monastic life; and the new Europe.

Revolution driven by social media? How 16th Century . . .

Filed under: History, Liberty, Media, Technology — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 10:33

The Economist shows that there’s nothing new in social media as a catalyst for change:

It is a familiar-sounding tale: after decades of simmering discontent a new form of media gives opponents of an authoritarian regime a way to express their views, register their solidarity and co-ordinate their actions. The protesters’ message spreads virally through social networks, making it impossible to suppress and highlighting the extent of public support for revolution. The combination of improved publishing technology and social networks is a catalyst for social change where previous efforts had failed.

That’s what happened in the Arab spring. It’s also what happened during the Reformation, nearly 500 years ago, when Martin Luther and his allies took the new media of their day—pamphlets, ballads and woodcuts—and circulated them through social networks to promote their message of religious reform.

Scholars have long debated the relative importance of printed media, oral transmission and images in rallying popular support for the Reformation. Some have championed the central role of printing, a relatively new technology at the time. Opponents of this view emphasise the importance of preaching and other forms of oral transmission. More recently historians have highlighted the role of media as a means of social signalling and co-ordinating public opinion in the Reformation.

Now the internet offers a new perspective on this long-running debate, namely that the important factor was not the printing press itself (which had been around since the 1450s), but the wider system of media sharing along social networks — what is called “social media” today. Luther, like the Arab revolutionaries, grasped the dynamics of this new media environment very quickly, and saw how it could spread his message.

December 28, 2011

Going beyond merely precut lumber for homebuilding

Filed under: Japan, Technology, Woodworking — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:52

Precut – Modern Japanese Timber Construction from BAKOKO on Vimeo.

H/T to Popular Woodworking for the link.

December 27, 2011

The plight of Japan’s “herbivore men”

Filed under: Japan, Media, Technology — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 10:52

Think you had it tough as a teen? It’s not a good time to be a teenage boy in Japan:

It’s not easy being a young man in Japan today. Every few months sees the release of a new set of figures, stats and stories trumpeting the same meme: today’s Japanese men are unmanly — and worse, they don’t seem bothered by it.

Tagged in the domestic media over the past few years as hikikomori (socially withdrawn boys), soshoku danshi (grass-eating/herbivore men, uninterested in meat, fleshly sex and physical or workplace competition), or just generally feckless, Japan’s Y-chromosomed youth today elicit shrugs of “why?”, followed by heaving sighs of disappointment from their postwar elders and members of the opposite sex. With the country’s economy stagnant at best, its geopolitical foothold rapidly slipping into the crevice between China and the United States, and its northeast coastline still struggling with the aftermath of disaster and an ongoing nuclear crisis, the reaction to a failure of Japan’s men to take the reins, even symbolically, has evolved from whispers of curiosity to charges of incompetence.

[. . .]

Why the generational malaise and indifference to sex? Theories abound. The most provocative to me, a Japanese-American and longtime Tokyo resident, is that Japanese women have become stronger socially and economically at the very same time that Japanese men have become more mole-ish and fully absorbed in virtual worlds, satiated by the very technological wizardry their forebears foisted upon them, and even preferring it to reality. “I don’t like real women,” one bloke superciliously sniffed on Japan’s 2channel, the world’s largest and most active internet bulletin board site. “They’re too picky nowadays. I’d much rather have a virtual girlfriend.”

[. . .]

The phrase “herbivore men” was coined by a female Japanese journalist in 2006. By 2009, the Japanese male’s lack of ambition, sexually or otherwise, had become a media meme. With the latest reports in Japan, of men who can’t get it up for real women who won’t get married or have kids, the mutual gender-chill phenomenon has become mainstream. It may be the future, but is it really Japanese?

“Maybe we’re just advanced human beings,” says a Japanese friend of mine over dinner this week in Tokyo, who won’t let me use her real name. She is an attractive, 40-something editor at one of Japan’s premier fashion magazines, and she is still single. “Maybe,” she adds, “we’ve learned how to service ourselves.”

December 23, 2011

“‘Sustainable Development’ is just an airy-fairy moonbeam fantasy”

Filed under: Environment, Science, Technology — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 10:56

Willis Eschenbach guest-posts on Watts Up With That?

So other than sunlight, wind, and rainbows … just what is sustainable development supposed to be built of? Cell phones are one of the most revolutionary tools of development … but we are depriving future generations of nickel and cadmium in doing so. That’s not sustainable.

Here’s the ugly truth. It’s simple, blunt, and bitter. Nothing is sustainable. Oh, like the sailors say, the wind is free. As is the sunshine. But everything else we mine or extract to make everything from shovels to cell phones will run out. The only question is, will it run out sooner, or later? Because nothing is sustainable. “Sustainable Development” is just an airy-fairy moonbeam fantasy, a New Age oxymoron. In the real world, it can’t happen. I find the term “sustainable development” useful for one thing only.

When people use it, I know they have not thought too hard about the issues.

Finally, there is an underlying arrogance about the concept that I find disturbing. Forty percent of the world’s people live on less than $2 per day. In China it’s sixty percent. In India, three-quarters of the population lives on under $2 per day.

Denying those men, women, and especially children the ability to improve their lives based on some professed concern about unborn generations doesn’t sit well with me at all. The obvious response from their side is “Easy for you to say, you made it already.” Which is true. The West got wealthy by means which “sustainable development” wants to deny to the world’s poor.

December 22, 2011

Perhaps the Cruze won’t be the salvation of Government Motors

Filed under: Government, Technology, USA — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 11:08

The Chevy Cruze was supposed to be a bellwether for the overall health of Government General Motors. If so, things are not looking as rosy for the 2012 model year as they did for the 2011 model:

Ever since emerging from bankruptcy, the Chevrolet Cruze has been something of a symbol of GM’s rebound. Widely hailed by the automotive media as General Motors’ strongest effort to date in a compact segment that has become increasingly important in recent years, the Cruze seemed to show that the “new” GM was capable of selling smaller cars on their merits, rather than as afterthoughts to more profitable truck, SUV and large car offerings. And indeed, through the first half of this year, it seemed that the Cruze was something of a roaring success, regularly outselling its segment competitors. But then, in June, when production shifted from 2011 models to 2012 models, something changed: sales started to slow, and inventories started to rise. As Cruzes began piling up on dealer lots, GM trimmed production moderately, but still, inventories began to grow out of control. Clearly something was going wrong.

Last week, GM shut down production of the Cruze, saying only that it had an unspecified “supplier issue.” But Automotive News [sub] reports that had already GM shut down the Lordstown plant for the entire week of November 28, after inventories shot from 33 days supply to 73 days supply during the months of September and October. As of December 1, inventories had risen higher still, to 88 days, as sales continue to slacken. Lordstown reopened yesterday, but with sales falling and inventories running out of control, another slowdown or stoppage of production seems inevitable.

December 18, 2011

Tyler Cowen on “aesthetic stagnation”

Filed under: Liberty, Media, Technology — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 11:34

Responding to an article in Vanity Fair by Kurt Andersen, Cowen lists a few things that must be taken into consideration:

1. Movies: The Hollywood product has regressed, though one can cite advances in 3-D and CGI as innovations in the medium if not always the aesthetics. The foreign product is robust in quality, though European films are not nearly as innovative as during the 1960s and 70s. Still, I don’t see a slowdown in global cinema as a whole.

2. TV: We just finished a major upswing in quality for the best shows, though I fear it is over, as no-episode-stands-alone series no longer seem to be supported by the economics.

3. Books/fiction: It’s wrong to call graphic novels “new,” but they have seen lots of innovation. If we look at writing more broadly, the internet has led to plenty of innovation, including of course blogs. The traditional novel is doing well in terms of quality even if this is not a high innovation era comparable to say the 1920s (Mann, Kafka, Proust, others).

4. Computer and video games: This major area of innovation is usually completely overlooked by such discussions.

He also includes something which — at least for me — counts as a “killer app” for this kind of discussion:

7. Your personal stream: This is arguably the biggest innovation in recent times, and it is almost completely overlooked. It’s about how you use modern information technology to create your own running blend of sources, influences, distractions, and diversions, usually taken from a blend of the genres and fields mentioned above. It’s really fun and most of us find it extremely compelling

That “personal stream” is so pervasive that we generally don’t notice that it’s a hallmark of the modern era. We don’t get our news from single sources anymore: not just a single local newspaper, or a single TV newscast. We can easily find like-minded communities for just about all our niche interests with relatively minimal effort. In the past, such communities were severely distance-challenged to even form, never mind to thrive.

That we now can easily control and direct our personal streams to include and exclude in such fine gradations is something that few could even imagine 20 years ago. In a sense, we all have “clipping services” providing us with interesting and relevant snippets, but we can literally have hundreds of such services — at little or no cost — to chase down our merest whims for fresh information. It doesn’t show up on the GNP as a gain, but it’s very much a differentiator between today and just a few years back. Yet we don’t notice because we’re immersed in it.

December 17, 2011

We are “at the mercy of underachieving Congressional know-nothings that have more in common with the slacker students sitting in the back of math class than elected representatives”

Filed under: Government, Law, Liberty, Media, Technology — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 10:52

A great post on the folks who are currently debating — if so many declarations of ignorance can be called “debating” — hacking away at the very basis of the internet we’ve come to love:

Some background: Since its introduction, SOPA and its Senate twin PROTECT-IP have been staunchly condemned by countless engineers, technologists and lawyers intimately familiar with the inner functioning of the internet. Completely beside the fact that these bills as they currently stand would stifle free speech and potentially cripple legitimate businesses by giving corporations extrajudicial censorial powers, they have found an even more insidious threat: The method of DNS filtering proposed to block supposed infringing sites opens up enormous security holes that threaten the stability of the internet itself.

The only problem: Key members of the House Judiciary Committee still don’t understand how the internet works, and worse yet, it’s not clear whether they even want to.

It’s of course perfectly standard for members of Congress to not be exceptionally proficient in technological matters. But for some committee members, the issue did not stop at mere ignorance. Rather, it seemed there was in many cases an outright refusal to understand what is undoubtedly a complex issue dealing with highly-sensitive technologies.

When the security issue was brought up, Rep. Mel Watt of North Carolina seemed particularly comfortable about his own lack of understanding. Grinningly admitting “I’m not a nerd” before the committee, he nevertheless went on to dismiss without facts or justification the very evidence he didn’t understand and then downplay the need for a panel of experts. Rep. Maxine Waters of California followed up by saying that any discussion of security concerns is “wasting time” and that the bill should move forward without question, busted internets be damned.

The traditional lightbulb may be safe for a bit longer

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Law, Liberty, Technology — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:29

From the Washington Times:

Congressional negotiators struck a deal Thursday that overturns the new rules that were to have banned sales of traditional incandescent light bulbs beginning next year.

That agreement is tucked inside the massive 1,200-page spending bill that funds the government through the rest of this fiscal year, and which both houses of Congress will vote on Friday. Mr. Obama is expected to sign the bill, which heads off a looming government shutdown.

Congressional Republicans dropped almost all of the policy restrictions they tried to attach to the bill, but won inclusion of the light bulb provision, which prevents the Obama administration from carrying through a 2007 law that would have set energy efficiency standards that effectively made the traditional light bulb obsolete.

H/T to Virginia Postrel for the link.

Why is everyone upset about SOPA but not about all the other power grabs by the government?

Filed under: Government, Law, Liberty, Media, Technology — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:24

ESR wonders why SOPA seems to finally have woken up many people about their rapidly eroding liberties, but not all the other things the federal government has done:

A government that is big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take everything away from you — including your Internet freedom.

That’s the thought that keeps running through my head as I contemplate the full-scale panic going on right now about SOPA, the “Stop Internet Piracy Act”.

It’s a bad bill, all right. It’s a terrible bill — awful from start to finish, idiotic to the core, corruptly pandering to a powerful special-interest group at the cost of everyone else’s liberty.

But I can’t help noticing that a lot of the righteous panic about it is being ginned up by people who were cheerfully on board for the last seventeen or so government power grabs — cap and trade, campaign finance “reform”, the incandescent lightbulb ban, Obamacare, you name it — and I have to wonder…

Don’t these people ever learn? Anything? Do they even listen to themselves?

December 15, 2011

Google donates to the Bletchley Park restoration project

Filed under: Britain, History, Technology, WW2 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:15

Google has made a significant contribution to the preservation and restoration of the famous WW2 codebreaking site:

The centre has won a £4.6million grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund but needs to attract £1.7million in outside funding before the big grant can be delivered and the next stage of the development kickstarted.

The £550,000 Google contribution is the biggest single donation that the Bletchley Park Trust has received so far. It was given by the search engine’s charitable arm, which donated a total of $100 million (£64.4million) in 2011.

“It would be wonderful if other donors follow Google’s example to help preserve our computing heritage,” said Simon Greenish, CEO of the Bletchley Park Trust. “We could then proceed as soon as possible with restoration of the profoundly historically significant codebreaking huts.”

December 12, 2011

SpaceX Dragon to dock with ISS in February

Filed under: Space, Technology — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 09:31

Lewis Page on the recent announcement from NASA and SpaceX:

NASA has announced that — all being well — the first mission to the International Space Station by a privately built and operated spacecraft will lift off on February 7. The craft will be a Dragon capsule launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket, both made and handled by techbiz visionary Elon Musk’s new company SpaceX.

“We look forward to a successful mission, which will open up a new era in commercial cargo delivery for this international orbiting laboratory,” said NASA honcho William Gerstenmaier in tinned quotes announcing the planned date. However he didn’t stick his neck out, adding cautiously:

“There is still a significant amount of critical work to be completed before launch, but the teams have a sound plan to complete it and are prepared for unexpected challenges. As with all launches, we will adjust the launch date as needed to gain sufficient understanding of test and analysis results to ensure safety and mission success.”

Increasing calls to delay F-35 production until more design bugs are worked out

Filed under: Military, Technology, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:22

Strategy Page on the latest setback to the F-35 program:

U.S. Department of Defense officials are trying to slow down production of the new F-35 fighter because testing is revealing more design problems than anticipated. If the current production schedule remains in place there is a high risk that very expensive modifications will be needed for F-35s that have entered service. The air force has already ordered 58 F-35s to be produced before all testing is completed and plans to produce 472 F-35s this way. The Department of Defense is more concerned about the additional costs than the air force, which just wants to get the aircraft into production as quickly as possible. The air force fears that the production orders will be cut even further if the F-35 does not enter service quickly.

There are more disputes between the Department of Defense and the air force. For example, the two are trying to agree on what the F-35 will cost. The air force insists that it is $65 million each, while the Department of Defense says when all costs are included it will be more like $111 million each. Another number being debated is how many F-35s will actually be produced. The air force assumes 2,443 for the air force, navy, and marines but the Department of Defense is not so sure that many will eventually be built. Total development cost is now put at $65 billion, which comes to over $25 million per aircraft if 2,443 are built. Development costs for the new U.S. F-35 fighter-bomber has grown by more than a third over the last few years. The additional development costs are accompanied by additional delays. Current estimates are that the F-35 will enter service in another 6-7 years. The Department of Defense believes production and development costs will continue to rise and that the number to be built will decline. Both trends increase the average aircraft cost. Based on past experience the higher Department of Defense estimates are more likely to be accurate.

December 9, 2011

600 million “virtual war criminals” to be snagged in new virtual Geneva Convention

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Media, Technology — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 09:10

Look out FPS gamers — the Red Cross has you in their sights:

Move aside, Milosevic. Out of the way, al-Bashir. It’s the world’s videogamers who should be hauled up on war crimes charges, some members of the Red Cross seem to think.

During the 31st International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent, which took place in Geneva last week, attendees were asked to consider what response the organisations should make to the untold zillions of deaths that can be laid at the feet of videogamers.

[. . .]

There is “an audience of approximately 600 million gamers who may be virtually violating international humanitarian law (IHL),” it noted.

The key word there, folks, is ‘virtually’. Ruthlessly gunning down civilians, fellow combatants and/or extraterrestrial visitors may be a crime if you do it for real, but not if you merely imagine the action, even if helped by the realistic visuals of the likes of Battlefield 3 and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.

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