HN user

matterhorn

53 karma
Posts0
Comments29
View on HN
No posts found.

No.

The article makes several references to "licensing" and "pricing." These are euphemisms for shakedowns.

Patent trolls shakedown developers with patents that never should have existed in the first place. Why should a developer have to pay ANYTHING to a patent troll? Why should a developer have pay ANYTHING to defend themselves against a patent troll?

The only solution is to eliminate software patents. Entirely.

Capitalism also means DDT, which kills mosquitoes that are vectors for malaria. However, statist intervention bans DDT and allows mosquito populations to thrive, thus killing large numbers of people in places like Gambia where...wait a minute! Places like Gambia where malaria rates are in free-fall! And why? Because of the use of insecticide treated netting...(kinda makes you wonder what kind of drop in malaria rates could be achieved through DDT, huh?)

See: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081030203243.ht...

So, socialism and enviro-wacko statist intervention gets people killed by malaria through bans on insecticides, which turn out to be the most effective counters to malaria.

My impression is that EA has some great creative talent, but that the business management function is entrusted to people who have honesty and competence issues.

One of the big problems with American business is the focus on academic credentials, particularly with regard to "soft skills" (no skills?) in areas such as management. You will not learn management in a classroom. Furthermore, if you can't grasp the fundamentals of what you are supposedly managing, then you are just in the way.

The path ought to be:

Become an engineer -> Become a high-performing engineer -> Get some business education -> Do management

If you can't handle the engineering phases, why on earth should anybody put you in a decision-making position in an engineer endeavor?

While the practice should not be barred, it is unproductive for universities to offer "management" degrees at the undergraduate level, unless such degrees require the demonstration of significant prior work experience. Graduate management programs should not accept twentysomethings arriving straight from undergraduate programs.

Less fluff, more umpf.

"...don't focus on those with big-business credentials who may be accustomed to having a lot of rules to follow."

This is EXACTLY the kind of rule that a big business uses. It involves no judgement, no thinking, no consideration of the individual situation being addressed.

"For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong." - H.L. Mencken

Freelancers are a good bet for small companies and also for side-projects. All Hail the Freelancers. But that rule about candidates who worked at a large business is not reasonable.

Good ole socialist wealth envy class warfare blah blah blah.

Wealth is produced. If there were a fixed amount of it, we'd all still be nomadic hunter-gatherers. Therefore, the gain of wealth is NOT a zero sum game. When some CEO (good, bad, or hopelessly incompetent) makes 14 bazillion dollars, that does nothing whatsoever to take anything from you. You don't need to worry about what that CEO makes. You need to worry about what YOU make.

Consider the White House Chief Calligrapher makes $96,725 per year. What a complete and utter waste of tax money. If it were not for the fact that its our tax money, it wouldn't matter a hill of beans. If Microsoft or Apple wanted to hire a Chief Calligrapher at $96,725 or $967,250 it wouldn't matter a hill of beans except to the shareholders of each company who might not think such an expenditure is going to pay off all that well.

I recommend reading Henry Hazlitt's Economics in One Lesson: http://www.fee.org/library/detail/economics-in-one-lesson-pd...

[dead] 13 years ago

Anything that uses the term "denialists" is just AGW cult propaganda. What climate change there is is a natural process we are unable to significantly speed up or slow down. By the way, has Mann stopped falsely claiming to be a Nobel Prize winner yet?

Wyoming Joins Texas as Second State to Issue Own Currency In Wake of U.S. Dollar Collapse

Following Dennis Rodman Visit, Switzerland Declares War on U.S.

Bloomberg Bans Bottled Water: Claims It Robs Our "Precious Bodily Fluids"

Patent Troll Claims Rights to Inhalation of Air - Demands Licensing Fees From All Breathers

The government of the United States is divided into three branches: executive, judicial, and legislative. Federal laws require either the agreement of the legislative and executive branches, or overwhelming support within the legislative branch alone. (A president can sign a bill passed by both houses of congress or he can veto it. A veto can be overridden by a two-thirds vote in each chamber of congress.)

Therefore, petitioning the White House for a law is ineffective and reflects a lack of understanding of constitutional government in the United States. Instead, try contacting your congressional representative or one of your senators.

Government handouts of taxpayer money only creates dependency. If you wish to give money to the poor, then give YOUR money to the poor. Do not vote to have government give your neighbor's money to the poor. Your neighbor's money does not belong to you. When you vote for politicians who favor government handouts of taxpayer money, then you are acting as a thief who lacks the courage to perform the act of robbery himself. Socialism is therefore simply a cowardly form of theft.

The minimum wage, however, while not theft, is a destroyer of jobs. The minimum wage increases unemployment. Raising it, further increases unemployment. Additionally, you are telling people under what terms they may enter into voluntary business arrangements with each other, which is none of your concern. You have no natural right to direct the affairs of others.

Wha-huh? Of course not. Neither is 35, 45, 55... I plan to work until I'm at least 80, if I live that long. I was still playing in the Army at 25. Take a look at MIT's Open Course Wear videos for Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs - half the class looks past 30 and some have gray hair. Go for it.

Green energy is a scam. Government-directed economic activity is a scam. Jobs will come and go with cyclical economic activity. Right now, most of the developed world is suffering from the effects of cronyism and socialism, which are economically inefficient. The massive debt situation in Europe, Japan, and the United States will have significant effects on politics and economics sometime in the next 10 to 20 years. Might get better, might get worse. We'll find out when it happens.

No intelligent person thinks food magically pops onto shelves. It is not necessary to play farmer in order to know where food comes from. Do you know how make your own steel? Neither do I. I'm not worried about it.

Uncopyright 13 years ago

I am a big fan of copyright and not a fan of thievery. If rights-holders want to put their work in the public domain, fine. But you have no claim on the IP rights of others.

Certainly, when individuals vote to turn over personal responsibilities to the the government, things will turn out badly in the end. However, the break down of personal responsibilities within families is not the result of economic success. Has the article's author considered their implied message - that if only Koreans had experienced economic failure, then everybody would just happy as pigs in slop? That's absurd, of course, as their northern neighbors provide the perfect example for the comparison. If there is a breakdown in familial responsibilities, it is not likely to be the result of economic success. Many people around the world work not just in a distant city, but in a distant country in order to send the fruits of higher earnings home to family - so it is not reasonable to assume that moving to a different city somehow forces a person to lose their sense of familial responsibility. If such a breakdown is occurring, the explanation for its cause lies somewhere other than economic success.