scottkursk

They were amazing cars, very impressive. Though short of Volvo's idea of having NO HOOD WHATSOEVER that could be opened, it is the least user friendly car. Lessee, step 1, remove intake manifold, step 2, loosen transaxle mounts, step 3, still have trouble getting at the plugs.

I think that's more a problem of bad interface design like running straight up linux vs ubuntu like I do. But, then, interface is the meat and potatos if not most critical portion of design as it is the part of design that connects humans with technology. But I do agree that sometimes things are way overly complex. It's the Rube Goldberg approach that kills lots of things. Changing the spark plugs on an SHO Taurus or the design of the Caddy HT4100 are good examples. I used to be a mechanic. I focused on British and Japanese cars, especially tuning SU and multi-carb setups. I hated working on injection systems because they were much more complex to fix than carbs, but they do have distinct advantages. The complexity of injection systems (invariably German) were a pain to work on but once you got them dialed in, they were more reliable and needed less tuning than carbs. Still, my forte was carbs becuase I "got" the interface. When I worked on American cars, I would rather tune Edelbrock carbs than Holley's becuase though more complex, once you got it tuned it was as good if not better (IMO) than a Holley. I even shoehorned a 501 from a Caddy into my 72 Monte Carlo and still got decent gas mileage considering I had more torque and equal hp to a hemi. That tended to end most 1/4 mile arguments though hell on the tire budget.

Pardon me if this is a stupid question but how easily can you get parts for that in Hungary?

Touche Eric. I personally am a bit left of the scale and would prefer to own another Harvester truck wich is as close as you can get to Russian practicality. But, I have a real love of my old Volvo with all it's over-engineered glory.

Like anything Alvin Toffler predicts, just give it a chance. eh. There is a big market for genuine Saskatewan sealskin mucklucks to be had. Yes. I was interested in the distribution of posts by country/state. Say, Israeli people are more active vs the Brits given the smaller number of people but larger number of posts. Or the number of posts by Ohioans compared to Texans (not counting spelling or capitalization (wink/nudge)) Those are of course just examples. And also I would like to point out that I'm not comparing output to quality.

Saab also introduced a "clutchless" manual that while elegant, it failed to work. In that case, I'd agree with the idea of bad design. But, if it works, then I disagree with a design being bad. If the lack of moving parts or complicated designs while retaining functionality equals good design, then Russian designs would be extremely well engineered. Mind you, Russian designs I'm familiar with (sks, ak, and Ural bikes) all work really well once they are set up, they are good for very different reasons. As I said before, Russians would say we desperately over engineer our designs. Sure, they are reliable but they are overpriced and complicated. It think what we are arguing about is the number of parts to functionality scale. You have Russian engineering (which I'm not entirely defending because so much is total crap) on one end and German on the other. I think the argument is on what part of the scale does optimal efficiency fall. Even amongst the examples you cite there is a significant difference. Traditionally, Mustangs have had amazing 1/4 mile times compared to the Chevy F bodies. However, put a simple turn or curve into the equation and the Mustang really looses. Even better, make them stop. Again, F Body wins. Though there is a divergence in German designs. Compare the performance of a VW Corrado to that of a base model Prosche. It wasn't 1:1 but it was close enough to make people think. To bad it was butt ugly. Anyway, when you go to Europe, you see Mercedes sedans all over the place being used for things like cabs etc. Over there, they are realtively cheap. Minus issue like import duties etc, they are thought of like Chevy's and Lincon are here.

That's interesting. Glad to see the number of Texans. Though I find the most interesting distribution is people from overseas (ie not the US). Other than the UK, it seems to be a realtively fair distribution of members between Israel, Germany etc. Though I know I'll toss it in Excel and play around with them. I'd be interested in seeing a sort of distribution based on number of posts. Though I'm a total numbers geek that way.

Yojimbo is a favorite as well. I'm sorry but this reinforces my feeling that Toshiro Mifune should be in every movie made. There was also a 50's/60's detective movie that he played a private eye ala Nero Wolfe. The way he carried himself in this movie does strike a Roark-like stance. In fact, when he's not haggard and long bearded, he does look pretty striking. Given Mifune and Kurosawa's brilliance, I snapped up the boxed set when I first saw it.

Actually, it really isn't over-engineering. It's simply a matter of different priorities. A friend owns a Russian made Ural motorcycle. The thing is so loosely built, it shakes like nobodys business and you can do literally anything to it. It's "poorly built" by anyones standards outside of the Eastern Block. The thing is, the bike is nearly indestructible and parts can be easily replaced, fixed, or swapped out with various pieces of farm equipment or stuff you have lying around. That is in start relief to my employees BMW. It is the most well machined piece of equipment I've ever ridden. Everything fits together like a glove. It's so well machined the bike almost never breaks. But when it does, he has hell to pay. The same is true with the AK-47 and the M16. The AK can be made, fixed, etc in a machine shop in someone's house practically. It's not as well fitted or accurate as the 16 but it can stand up to mud and alot of crap. The M16 on the other hand relies of high tech machining to produce alot of parts. Downside is they are hard/expensive to produce, not as easily repaired given the number of parts, but are much more reliable if taken care of. It's just a matter of view. Russian's build their stuff with alot of fault tolerance with the assumption you will break down or have to do a field expedient repair. Whereas Germans/Americans produce their equipment with ultimate efficiency in mind with the assumption that things will be well maintained with the goal of avoiding breakdowns. So the BMW is made with the idea that it's perfect the way it is and if you don't monkey with it, it will last. The Ford is made assuming that your going to be needing or will want to work on it. Each is well engineered for their purpose and goal. It is just a matter of identifying the design philosophy behind each item.

That is it. Use Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny as an alegorical tale. Just like any other fairy tale.

This is one of my all time favorite movies. Actually, Akira Kurosawa is one of my favorite directors and Toshiro Mifune is one of my favorite actors. Both are brilliant artists, especially Kurosawa and the movie Ran; simply breathtaking. Though as far as stories go, Seven Samurai is tops. The fact the villagers looked down on the samurai even though they knew it was what they needed to survive. The samurai themselves were a motley lot with varying motivations and levels of sanity. Though the compelling part of the story is when the two groups came to respect each other and the role each played. That is pretty well fleshed out by Kurosawa. Add to the well written story the amazing visuals, the characterizations, the technical aspects are all just about spot on. My favorite scene is the ambush scene in the hedgerows leading up to the village. I can't begin to describe the amazing visual of the samurai flailing his sword, the coordination of the horsemen, along with all the extras and the foley work, wow. Of course, the only thing the movie is missing is Yul Brenner which of course was made up for in the Magnificent Seven.

I received a gift of a game called Mad Gab. Mad Gab is a traditional game from Mattel. The basis of the game is a play on words that challenges your verbal and reasoning skills. You are given a very short time to decipher 3 phrases that are misspelled. Example: ACE LIP PUFF THAT HUNG if you speak it out becomes A SLIP OF THE TOUNGE. Try saying ACE LIP PUFF THAT HUNG quickly. It will somewhat sound like A SLIP OF THE TOUNGE. In theory, the game should take 45 minutes to play. My in-laws and my wife and I played for close to 2 hours straight. It is a challenge and we only played on the basic level. I enjoy this game because you really have to think. Having worked with people who are not familiar with English, I've learned to guess what people are saying. So maybe I have a bit of an edge. Either way, I really enjoyed the mental exercise. I heartily recomend the game Mad Gab. It's rated at ages 10+ but I found it challenging enough for four well educated adults to enjoy. Has anyone else played this game? If so, what are your thoughts? How about Pit, or Asimov Super Quiz? Anyone with kids probably has quite a few.

I wish I could claim full credit for that one. There was an Objectivist site that posted a celebration of December 25th. They renamed it "Producer's Day" and you would put something in your stocking that would be given an exchange of fair value for the Magical Robber Baron who came down your chimney. It was actually quite funny. I can't find the site right now but I do remember that one of the people had a print of Brian Larsen on the wall that I loved.

That is why I said you just have to stress the right values. For a kid that is so small they'd belive in Santa Claus, working on basic concepts of "good boy" vs. "bad boy" is enough. Trying to explain to a little kid that given their current production of refrigerator art is slacking off and their cuteness quotient is being superceded by the neighbor's kids, therefore they don't get a gameboy, then that is missing the point. Something as simple as basic concepts of don't lie, be honest, etc are enough for Santa or the tooth fairy to reward them. Sell Santa as a politeness coach in that sense. And with the Tooth Fairy, you are more importantly helping your kids out of the traumatic experience of losing teeth. If you want to get really technical, you could say the Tooth Fairy is buying the teeth.

I have to agree with Roland and Eric. I see no harm is done as long as your kids know it is fiction. While I don't have children yet, I imagine I will here at some point. Having come from a big family and having lots of friends kids hanging around, I know that kids absolutely KNOW FOR A FACT that there is a street named Sesame, and if they could only find it, they'd drink tea with Mr Snuffalufagus. In the case of Santa etc, their is a real playfullness and benevolance (I think that is the word) with playing him. The joy of getting to watch kids eyes light up is neat. It could just as easily be named "Producer Claus" who runs a factory free of interfence from government in the North Pole who rewards kids who have saved and been productive year round. But that isn't going to quite catch on yet. It's just a matter of what you stress as the important values he rewards. Eventually, like all things, they learn to distinguish between the two. Though in the case of Santa I know he's real as he gave me a nice digital camera that I've wanted for a long time this very morning.

Aw man, and I didn't get him anything.

Ugh. That is a really good shaggy dog joke. I enjoy a good shaggy dog joke. Merry Christmas to all. A warm Texas Christmas greeting to you Dismuke.

Actually, it has. Or as one might say the chickens are coming home to roost. Local "community activists" who previously sued to the to create districts that are single race districs on the city council level, are threatening to sue the city again. That is unless the city doesn't perform a new census and redistrict the city so that they can gurantee "the council once again reflects the city." Or, in otherords, there aren't 3 or 4 more black council members. One of our beloved city council members said that we have to be tolerant of the new residents because they are having to adjust to our ways etc and we should be tolerant of them. So basically they aren't used to law and order and we need to just accept the gang warfare. The president of the teachers union said that she was contacted by the head of the LA teachers union and they basically said just expect the crime. They were kind of glad to have most of the bad students dumped on us as it is a break for them. Oh nice. Mind you, most of the people are productive. I would say a good 1 in 20 people in my complex are from Louisiana. They are all just like anyone else. The downside is, so many of their compadres from the old country are far from desirable. Luckily, Texas is MUCH harder to get welfare and social secutiry benefits compared to Louisiana. So the hope is once FEMA quits propping them up, they'll go home where they can get welfare more easily. As for Houston, the bulk of the hard working not lazy people will stay and help the local economy. Them we welcome with open arms.

Great to hear. I wasn't diagnosed until I was a junior in college. After some training classes, I learned to concentrate on spelling etc. I used to be famous for my retched spelling and nonsensical writing sometimes even though I was a state ranked debater. Plus, working with long stings of numbers at work really keeps me on my toes. It occasionally causes mistakes but I've learned to work around it.

My old employer had a poster in our web guys development office that said "change is change." Basically when it comes to change, it doesn't matter how minor it is someone is going to notice it. So we'd do all we could to extend the existing website interface instead of modifying the navigation. I've seen it on my current job. I have customer call me up completely flustered that we changed the shade of purple on our site and demanded to speak with someone over me about the change. Seriously. Again, you aren't paying just for the label. It's all the other stuff you mention. Plus, I really hate SYMS since I have to dig and dig to find a nice suit that fits me, etc. So that $300 is in a way worth it. Again, when you buy a brand name, you aren't just buying a label, you are buying everything that is associated with it. So when you buy a suit at D&G, you get a higher level of service, you know that you are getting a genuine article, and a real sense of the style. When I bought the suit at SYMS, I got a very different shopping experience. So even though the suit is the same, it's really impossible to say any two items are exactly the same. Even if you have two exact items, there will end up being something that differentiates the two. It may be something minor or ephemeral, but there is something. Actually, the label itself may have value. If you are in sales, you could use the label of the clothes to align yourself with a customer.I know someone that was in the last stages of negotiating a sale with a large computer company and at the last minute he pulled out his Palm Pilot to check a note. The thing is, Palm was one of their major competitors. They flat out said that if he didn't like the company enough to use their product over an inferior one (Palm) then they wouldn't do business with his company. Of course they lost out on the benefits of working with my friends firm but I could say that they have a valid point. I'd rather do business with someone who truly understands my product/service from multiple perspectives. So yes, in some cases a brand name or label can be rational to pay additonal amounts of money. It's a stretch and not something you see every day unless you are in sales.

I like that. It looks like the inside of Kant's brain. Actually, I was refering to the 5 part trilogy of 6 books. The movie was a horrid bastardization of the books. I really messed it up. Took some of the good points and twisted it. Kind of like watching Atlas Shrugged and it turns out to be a movie about a train conductor and a goat that gets killed. I'm dyslexic as well. I have to give a great deal of concious thought when I type or I really miss things. The most used key on my keyboard is the backspace key. That and "PREVIEW POST" is your friend.

Actually, when you put Coke, Pepsi, and RC in a blind taste test, RC wins. Yet RC is sold at a discount compared to the big 2 and is but a mere fly on the windshield of the big drink makers. Why? Coke and Pepsi are known quantities. People are generally afraid of change. Marketing exists to either reinforce that or to allay fears of change by stressing the positive effects of change. I think my comment from the other thread makes more sense. I shop at SYMS which take remaindered suits and overurns from major manufacturers and retailers that have gone bankrupt, removes the labels, and then sells them at a deep discount. This is really the only case that I can think of your point. Correct me if I'm wrong. If I go to SYMS and buy what is a Dolce & Gabbana suit that had it's label removed by D&G and SYMS added their label in, I am buying the same suit for $300 less. Same suit, just a lower price. Significantly. Is what you are saying about irrationality that I would be irrational to go to a D&G shop and one of their suits off the rack and end up paying $300 more than I could otherwise?

I've read the Register for years. The journalistic qualities of it rate right up there with supermarket tabloids. They are very center of left and tend to print first, think later. It's like getting news from TheOnion.com. Make sure to read with a very large grain of salt. But yes, they are trying to smear Rand and Objecitivsm by making him look bad. Porn and Wall Street and rich to top it all: he must be evil. Esquire did an article on him and posted it on wikipedia and it was pretty quickly edited with only 1 factual error making it through after it got wikified. But yes, he did make a fortune on Wall Street and then parlayed that with a very early investment on selling porn over the internet. He did it by using a porn specific search engine and various "rings" (like the webrings you see on sites for people of a similar interest), along with the Bomis Babes. He then started wikipedia and focused on truth and not opinion. Though that is in theory since there are some problems with it. Basically he wanted to do somthing akin to the Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy. You have an infinte number of contributions and eventually you'll chronicle everything. The number of editors/contributors will end up having a smoothing effect on the data contained thereing.

Yes, sticking a D&G logo on an otherwise normal piece of clothing will make it more valuable than the same shirt bearing a WalMart logo. It's is because of the value that people put on the name itself. The best example is seen by going to a clothing store like Symms or other stack-em-deep suit stores. All they do is buy suits from manufacturerers and sell them at 60% off becuase they have simply removed the brand labels from them. That's all. I recently bought a D&G suit that they missed one label in, which is how I realized it was a D&G suit, for about $180. That was a steal. I've seen Ralph Lauren Purple Label's at an equally insane discount. By removing the label that says "D&G" or Ralph Lauren, you loose some of the cache. And that name brand means about 300 to the value of the suit. The reason it carries that disount by not being there is quite simply: I know what I am getting with the label Ralph Lauren, I don't know what I'm getting with a suit with no label or a labels that says syms.com

I had some problems with my laptop failing to recognize my wireless card and having other assorted windows related issues. So I decided to try Linux again. I got Ubuntu about 3 weeks ago and have been using it full time since. I also installed OpenOffice and decided to give it a whirl full time. As a WordPerfect bigot, I must say I'm really impressed by OpenOffice. The thing I was afraid of was Impress and how it would interop with PowerPoint. I've only had 1 problem in the 3 weeks and probably 100 slide shows I opened. The problem was with some of the sounds of a transition I previously used. It got a bit garbled. The only thing I don't really like is the thing I use the most which is Calc. I really love Quattro Pro over Excel and prefer it because of some really minor formatting things. I must retract my previous comment about avoiding OO if you used PowerPoint at work. I seriously think I could use it at work without problems. For home use, absolutely I'd recomend OO. Though I still stand by my earlier statement that if you can help it, avoid PowerPoint like a drunken encounter with a coworker. The more I use it and view other .ppt's, the more I come to think it's a productivity killer.