That falls into the category of saving a maximum of $2 per day in electricity, with huge and overwhelming consequenses that few people know how to see.

Hard wood floors change shape with even slight temperature changes -- because humidity is drastically affected, especially at floor level.

Fruit on the counter rots that much faster. Bread goes mouldy quicker.

I don't know what it does to the paint on your walls, but I do know that window seals degrade faster.

Think of everything that museums and art galleries do to preserve art. Odds are that you're running counter to everythign they do.

Oh yeah, you're probable destroying your art too.

And poor kitty, home alone all day, and it gets hotter too!

Got a computer sitting at home?

Appliances like your fridge work by exhausting heat. That heat exchange gets less efiicient for some model in a warmer home. So odds are that you save money on your air conditioner, and spend it on your appliances instead.

Oh, and if you've got real seasons like I do, this whole conversation is only relevant for 25% of the year.

I didn't say anything about paranoia. I said "read your homeowners insurance policy". We're not talking about the furnace, obviously. Sprinklers are somewhat borderline, because they are outside. The rest is just a poor decision on your part -- the oven particularly so.

So, basically, when you're too stupid to know how to leave your own house, for whatever reason, but damned lucky enough to be reminded later, and anti-social enough to not be neighbourly with any of your neighbours.

In my world, that's a call to the neighbours, who are already responsible for my house when I'm gone.

But see, that's just the thing. It was already automated -- you weren't lighting the lanterns, you were flipping a switch. Now you're clicking a button or touching a screen. I tend to flip light switches as I enter and exit rooms. Software automating it would either require motion detectors, light sensors, and psychic powers. Sure you could do it, but it's not convenient to install, and it's not free to purchase. It also didn't get carried to my house by storks and pixies. So it starts off very much not convenient, not saving energy, and we all know that it's anything but secure. So what's the ROI on convenience after shopping, paying, and transporting?

I just remember the dvd player's eject button on the remote control. I still need to get up and go retrieve the disk, so what's the benefit in being able to do it from across the room?

I'd put the awning in that same category. When I go to the backyard, I can turn the crank, or trigger the motor. I don't need to deploy the awning from the couch. And I really don't need the awning to be integrated with the microwave.

In my life, convenience doesn't mean more control, it actually means less control -- less need for it. So when it comes to heating, my house maintains the temperature that I want (that's why I adjust the registers rationally). I shouldn't need to touch it on hotter days nor on colder days. And indeed I don't -- not even when I open the windows for some fall-fresh air. Like I said, it's already automated, that's the "stat" in thermostat.

I still don't understand which problem these smart devices would solve for me. It's a light switch. It's on when I want the lights on. It's off when I flick it. The thermostat requires my attention four times per year, when the season changes -- and software doesn't help because the floor registers need to be adjusted manually, and it's still no more than 5 minutes of "effort" per year. I sure as hell ain't letting software turn on my oven, and I'm not letting water nor fire run when I'm not home -- because I've read my house insurance policy; can you say "negligent behaviour"? And again, none of this was difficult to begin with. How about solving a problem that I have, instead of trying to convince me that I have a problem?

Business has always had various levels. When it comes to most successful technology companies, be it Tesla, or a small web developer, there's the strategy and there's the execution.

In a technology company, there's no doubt that the execution needs to be done by a technically superior person, but there's a problem with academic structure: it fosters process and procedure. Curtainly a STEM degree imparts critical thinking in terms of experimentation and analysis and calculation. Once a direction exists, yeah those skills are going to run the execution to create the product, service, or effect desired.

But business doesn't start with execution.

Scientific method may be the basis of STEM, and it starts with a "falsifiable hypothesis". Business is very different. Innovative business starts with a "false thesis" -- this doesn't exist, it isn't making any money now, I say it will, let's do it.

It takes a liberally-minded strategist to come up with whatever "it" is. The artist dreams it up. The philosopher contemplates how it ought to exist. The grammarian discerns its structure. The thespian convinces others to invest in it.

The problem is that the scientist concludes that it's impossible before it's even been tried. Either there's simply no evidence in existence yet, or there's no way to experiment on the nothing in-advance of starting.

Inventors aren't STEM scientists. There's no scientific method for innovation, and you aren't likely to find a scientist who's willing to risk everything on a new business idea -- yes I can also list dozens of very famous scientists who did throughout history; contrast that to the number of musicians who spend every dollar they have to start a band.

Learning has nothing to do with anything. Try invoicing. I was invoicing at age 14 when I started my programming business -- the one that/s paid for my house, my sportscar, and a generous flower budget for my beloved. That's programming, whether or not it meets your definition.

v-sit. feet on ottoman, back reclined, butt low, torso-weight on back, leg weight on heels and haunches, arm weight on elbows, hand weight on the heel of the hand, proper security-guard chair, well padded, designed for long-term sitting. wrist flexed downward (by the bigger muscle), neck flexed downward (by the bigger muscle), abs flexed instead of lower back -- again, the bigger muscle works, the smaller muscle doesn't.

it's been 21 years of programming, 15 in this same exact chair. good weight, good energy, good appetite, good drive. healthy all around, no pain, no injuries (typical broken bones as a child, including a wrist), age 35.

http://www.globaltotaloffice.c...

The Rolling Stones make a lot of money, that doesn't mean that you should start a band. There are countless garage bands that make no money.

Sure COBOL can net you big bucks, and a really great set of very stable clients; but how many of those do you think there are? and how many near you? that you can approach? and have the "other" industry qualifications that they require?

Look, if you are passionate about old industrial equipment, then sure, you may be the guy for the job.

one day, computers will be twice as fast and ten times as big -- vacuum tubes? meet transistors.
computers can't get any more popular because we'll run out of copper. . . zinc. . . nickel -- welcome to silicon. Is there enough sand for you?

everything will stay the way it is now forever. things will never get any faster because these issues that aren't problems today will eventually become completely insurmountable.

relax. take it easy. we don't solve problems in-advance. capitalism is about quickly solving huge problems, while totally ignoring small and medium problems.

wait for it. computers will be different in twenty years. I promise.

Have you ever read the back of your ticket? Check out your MLB baseball tickets too. You've agreed to not talk to a small gathering of your own friends about the game too.

So, without commenting on accuracy, precision, completion, mis-diagnoses, missed symptoms, bias, colour correctness, nor smell, I think convenience is the all-time most important part of a doctor's check-up.

Oh yeah, house-calls. Remember? That's where we started. We are where we are because we made it convenient for the doctors, not for the patients. Remember? The guy with the expertise gets the convenience. Remember? The guy getting paid gets to make the rules. Remember?

Quite well actually. With an aim for artificial intelligence, I started in the computer science set of courses, hated what it was in terms of mathematical algorithms, shifted to the psychology set of courses and wound up in cognitive modelling with lisp and neural networks. Of course, as with any independent learner, I then focused on my own business, programming web-oriented business solutions for small and medium business. I still program the odd neural network solution now and then.

All of that said, apparently it was a very odd and very unusual university experience. Completely unstructured, and no one else in the same "stream" of courses. Obviously I had no appreciation for how unusual that is. But as an entrepreneur, that's been true for ages.

University got me through the years of friends and family telling me to "get a real job" and to "get a degree to fall back on". With six-months left to get my degree, I left the world of academia behind me forever, to focus on my successful business, which worked out splendidly.

So yes, I see it as two-and-a-half years wasted in that I'd have rather spent it developing my business full-time; but I didn't know that before hand, so I see it as the limbo-time to realize that I don't fall back on things, I fall forward, and that my own business is infinitely more stable than any real job, and it's a much better lifestyle too.

How did it work out for me? It got me what I wanted, when I wanted it, the way I wanted it. So, perfectly.

I did that 15 years ago.

You drive your car quite fast on roads with on-coming traffic separated by nothing more than a stripe of paint.

There's no limit to the amount of security that you can add to a network. But in the end, the odds are fairly good that fixing the few problems likely to occur is far simpler and more cost-effective than preventing them in the first place.

Obviously, we're talking about a small business, that isn't subject to large and persistent attacks. And should the day come when it is, that's when increased security can come around.

Regarding the ecommerce side of things, most small companies use ecommerce to receive money. So the worst thing that can happen is that they receive more money. That'll be noticed. Providing they aren't storing credit cards, then there's nothing to lose.

Safety third: first the job needs to actually get done, otherwise there was no point in starting it. second, the job needs to be worth doing, or there was no benefit to having done it. third it needs to be done safely. think of all of the great achievements that came from numbers one and two without any degree of reasonable safety. think the discovery of new worlds, exploration, animals, major construction, and every dangerous job out there. the line of what's considered "safe" moves quite freely to accomodate the other two priorities.

Safety Third.