At least in this case they made significant savings - or at least, so they claim. The question is now of course, how was this calculated, and will it pass muster if an independent accountant checks the figures.

It's harder to give economic returns of a F1 race track; even harder to make an overall profit on one.

Those customers will just get disconnected.

You're giving Verizon too much credit: the way you write this, you imply they care about their customers and the service they offer.

You can easily convert to more useful measures using Google.

Of course it'd have been nice had they use their own tools to advance science. Or maybe that should be: to have the US catch up with the rest of the world.

Google requires AC output, so even if you're adding batteries in the mix, you still need to build the inverter, with even less space for your inverter part as added bonus.

Also Google provides a DC input, and a conversion efficiency. So they'll measure what goes in and what comes out. Having batteries in the box providing the power will show itself quickly there and then.

Of course - but I hope you realise that the source of the income is rather irrelevant - it even works like that when the income they receive is something like an unemployment benefit that's almost as much as what they make when working, or under a guaranteed "basic income" system where the state provides an basic income to everyone.

inflation != economic growth.

They're often not even closely related.

Just have a look at the rate of inflation in Zimbabwe over the past years (thousands of percent a month of even a week it has been) vs. the economic growth (highly negative) for an example.

Money is just one motivation for people to get a job.

There are other motivations as well: to have a life, for starters. To feel (somewhat) useful. To get out of the house, meet other people.

You may have heard of the concept of volunteering, people spending many hours every week doing unpaid work. In those cases, money is obviously not a motivation.

You're nicely mixing up things.

Coal in power plants is a fossil fuel and has nothing to do with wood/charcoal burning in stoves.

China is very aware of the environmental issues of burning coal. The main reason for them to use coal is because they happen to have lots if it, even though they'd rather use other fuels. They also have a significant nuclear power supply.

Interesting you give this totally flawed example. It's telling, really.

Burning wood is carbon-neutral. It's carbon that would've been released back to the atmosphere after the death of the tree anyway. It's burning fossil fuels that is the main cause of climate change, and that's what we do in the developed world at a massive scale.

Now there are serious environmental issues related to burning wood or charcoal, most notably air pollution. But climate change is not one of them.

My argument is the exact opposite. It is that by being smart, you can improve your standard of living for a lower overall cost, benefiting yourself and benefiting the environment in the process.

At least one of my banks complained of a too long password when I used an 8-character password. I had to shorten it to no more than 6 characters.

Some forums don't even accept that short passwords.

I have three bank accounts, two PayPal accounts and a credit card account. That's six highly sensitive logins.

Then I have my local computer (remote ssh login) and a remote cloud server (remote ssh login). Also requiring decent passwords. That's eight already. Plus one generic password for slashdot and all the other forums.

So that's nine passwords to remember. Well, I may be able to manage that.

Now the second part: remember which password belongs to which service, without making your passwords something like (still have to remember the first part separately), which in turn would compromise your password's security.

For added difficulty: I don't use all the above accounts actively. It is quite OK to remember a rather complex password you use on a daily basis, it gets harder if you check your bank maybe once a week, let alone that dormant account that is accessed maybe once or twice a year.

That just doesn't work. As a result, the banks that don't allow me to use my password manager have a relative weak password, something that at least I can remember easily and link to the correct account, for actual security relying on the second factor in the authentication chain there. The alternative would be the good old post-it note, or having them written down (or stored in a plain text file) somewhere.

People are not computers. Memories falter and fail, and are inaccurate. We'll have to live with that.

If so I doubt it'll pass the "right to be forgotten" criteria, one of which is that it is about something so long time ago that it is not relevant for the present. Can't say that about this case, which is positively current.

It's change, but it's not a change that necessarily costs a lot of money. On the contrary, many environmentally friendly changes to people's ways of life can save them money.

Key to climate change is the amount of fossil fuels we use. Reduce that amount, by saving energy, and you can save money. A CFL costs less money over its lifetime than an incandescent bulb, an LED may end up even cheaper. Sure it's a bit more of an upfront investment, in the end you save money.

Buying a smaller fridge that's got better energy efficiency (more efficient cooling system, better isolation) and you're going to save a lot of energy - you save money.

Get a more fuel efficient car, less trips to the gas station, save money. Even better: use public transport or a bicycle. Especially a bicycle is a really cheap, fast and even healthy (gives your exercise in the process) way of getting around town.

Get proper isolation for your home. Double glazing, foam isolation in between the double brick walls. Save a lot of energy, and have a more comfortable home (no matter whether you try to cool it or heat it) to boot. It's an upfront investment that saves money over time. Get a fan, so you don't have to switch on that A/C when it gets warmer.

And the "few people changing is meaningless" argument is downright stupid. A few people changing IS meaningful. It has to start somewhere! Those few people that do change may well inspire other people to follow suit. Their changes in consumption patterns may prompt manufacturers to cater for them the moment the movement is big enough, again prompting more people to follow suit.

Change the world, start with yourself. Otherwise your whole "we've got to change!" argument IS meaningless.