Almost completely automatic -- I offered my 11-year old fifty cents per clock and only had to pay six bucks total. This includes him getting out ladders to get up to several clocks mounted above my reach, so he had fun and I didn't have to schlep ladders all over the house. He didn't break anything either!

Well it's true that if you want a MakerBot assembled instead of a kit the price doubles ($2499 vs. $1299). And the kit is not for beginners, nor do they guarantee anything at all if you choose the kit option. Nevertheless, it's a pretty impressive device.

But I do admit that if I didn't use for 3D prototypes in my job, it would probably just be infrequently used for toys / game bits and the occasional novelty item.

It's complicated to make, but it's not complicated to use -- any ten-year-old playing games like DND or Warhammer 30000 can use it easily to make any pieces they want -- and they can find thousands of them online. Saves more than the cost of the machine just in stupid pewter models.

Yes, of course. See for example http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:591.

My three pre-teenish kids are totally able to use our MakerBot Thing-o-Matic to do this already. It's only slightly over 1K$ and can print anything (almost) from thingiverse.com or things they make themselves in Google Sketchup.

So what makes this new thing better?

These aren't "new", they're the same images that were floating around last week -- they're from the 15th, for heaven's sake!

Simple. They print whatever money they need to run the government (i.e. the income they used to get from taxes). That way the currency automatically devalues by the same percentage as the effective tax rate.

For example, if the country "has" $1,000, and the government wants $200, then after the end of one year, they print $250. The people still have $1,000, but it's only worth 1000/1250 = 80% of what it used to be. The government has $250, but it's also only worth 80% of what it used to be (= $200 in old dollars, which is what they wanted in the first place).

Good idea, really, but you'd have to throw away the entire financial system and start again: for starters, five year loans would have to be paid off in ever-increasing installments, and salaries would have to go up at least as much as the government devalued the currency every year...

Sorry, I was unclear. I should have said "...to the penny. How many of those (cash transactions) do you actually make in a day?".

The point I was trying to make is:
- When using debit or credit cards, nothing changes;
- When buying more than one article, the total is rounded to the nearest nickle but it almost always balances out (because they can't know how many things you will buy);
- When buying one article, the cost is rounded to the nearest nickel, which some claim will usually wind up being upwards.

So one only loses out in the last case -- buying a single item with cash -- each instance of which will at worst cost you two cents.

No. At least not necessarily so.

If they do it in the same way as e.g. the (pre-Euro) Netherlands, the prices don't change at all. It's only rounded when you pay, and it's the total purchase amount that gets rounded up or down, not each item. So if you buy one carton of milk, it's $0.98, and you have to pay $1.00 -- thus they get 2 cents. But if you buy two, it's 1.96, and you pay $1.95 -- and you get a penny. So the most you can win or lose is two cents per store you visit, and even with clever pricing on the store's part, it often works in your favor anyway.

Anyway, it's only on cash transactions, as debit and credit transactions are still always done to the penny. How many of those do you actually make in a day?

Having more than once been in your boss's role, you mustn't forget the costs involved with doing what you ask. Since (we assume) the company is not yet public, then depending on the current structure, this could involve significant legal fees to set up. In my experience, which is limited, this has ranged from $5,000 to $30,000. Of course, this doesn't apply if the company already has a mechanism to provide equity to its employees.

In addition to the other suggestions, be sensitive to whether or not they can easily make this change.

In installations where the speakers are not near the amp (e.g. speakers in other rooms), a 50m run (= 100m round trip) of 14 gauge copper wire has a reactance of about 1.47 ohms at 1kHz. If your speakers are 8 ohms, this means your amp is trying to drive about 9.5 ohms, and about 16% of the power is being lost in the wire.

Not a huge amount, but worth evaluating the cost of upgraded wire vs. upgrading your amp.

Follow the "writes Wilson" link.

So much for "do no evil". Very depressing, especially for those of us who thought Google was our savior from Apple who was our savior from Microsoft who was our savior from IBM who...

Got rid of both the TV and cable 12 years ago when the first kid was born. Gave the kids a PC and lots of (video) DVDs that we approved of. Now they're older, they watch (mostly crappy) series on YouTube and get (a little better) TV series in DVD boxed sets (Firefly, Buffy, Red Dwarf, that kind of stuff).

A few years ago we set up an projection system, fed by BluRay, Wii, XBox or, in very rare cases, WinTV on a Boot-camped MacBook. But still (nearly) no commercials.

In the meantime, I can watch important events (elections, catastrophies, playoffs) when I want to, either on a web feed from some news organization, or in HD using the over-the-air digital TV on my Samsung desktop combination monitor/TV.

Still don't pay a penny to anyone except for DVDs, BluRays, and projector bulbs.