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Comment Re:cost? (Score 1) 165

Vacuum systems are really really really really expensive.

Really? And that does 75 microns. Which translates to slightly better than a 99.99% vacuum. The Hyperloop is expected to operate at about 1000 microns. The extra superlatives apply when you're trying to build a giant particle accelerator, but Elon Musk specifically chose the point on the vacuum pump curve where that reduced pressure is achievable without falling off a cliff in terms of cost. Expensive, yes. But not vastly more expensive than any other part of the system.

Comment Re:Money talks, electric car walks (Score 1) 181

I love the idea of electric cars, and Tesla is on my "lottery win" shopping list. With that said, if you apply hard numbers these cars do not make any sense at the current gas prices.

What's with this "current gas prices" meme? The current gas prices have applied for maaaybe 3 weeks, if you're lucky. And suddenly people are absolutely giddy. Yay! Gas is free again! What? No it's not. It's temporary, despite the pronouncements of random Saudi princes. It's probably short term temporary, and there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth when it rebounds.

Even if it's not short term temporary, I would be vastly surprised if gas prices stay this low for the lifetime of a new car purchased this year.

Comment Re:While I applaud his actions in principle... (Score 1) 417

Absolute nonsense. I can stream an HD movie easily at 10mpbs if the neighborhood lets me actually HAVE 10. WTF do you *need* 25mpbs for, much less to assert it's some sort of "bottom adequate floor"?

Got kids? Got a wife? Got a wife's parents, whose breadwinner got injured on the job and has been out of work for 2 years?

There are more households in the world besides the lone hipster.

Comment Re:Municipal Broadband? (Score 1) 417

I'm wondering why everyone seems to think so highly of their local officials. What cities have such great local officials that we want to give them all these new responsibilities?

Because some of us have local officials who can keep the roads paved? And not just paved, but straightened and leveled, with new fire hydrants and storm drains installed, in the case of the road nearest my house that I drive on every single day. The road all of my neighbors drive on every single day. The road the local fire department drives on, hopefully not every single day.

I don't want to hold my elected officials accountable

Full stop.

Just because you are fine with living in a Third World shithole that can't even meet the standards of the ancient Roman Empire, it doesn't mean the rest of us have this problem.

Comment Re:Obama: please stop helping us! (Score 1) 417

Funny thing. A lot of my family live in rural areas around the country, and many of these areas are gaining faster fiber than what's available in the cities. The common pattern that I'm seeing is the metro areas are taken over by incumbents and the incumbents are staying or running away from rural like the plague. Even with little to no competition in rural areas, they're starting to see faster, cheaper, more reliable internet because these areas are being serviced by ISPs less greedy than incumbents.

In Missouri, rural areas are getting fiber because the state government appropriated funds to help establish rural fiber co-ops. Charter and AT&T want no part of it. By the time the decade is out, rural Missouri will have better, cheaper bandwidth than any metro area in the state.

There is no cable service, and AT&T only provides phone service because the law demands it. DSL can not be had. The central offices are too widely scattered and AT&T has zero interest in installing DSLAMs for 6 subscriptions at a time.

Comment Re:Obama: please stop helping us! (Score 1) 417

But most rural people have TV and cable, won't they be able to get internet through that?

Most rural people do not have cable. Rural subscribers are the majority of satellite TV subscribers, because they have no access to cable television. My parents recently built a brand new house, in a subdivision large enough that it has a homeowner's association, in a cluster of three subdivisions—surrounded by farmland in rural Illinois. They don't have access to cable, nor do any of their neighbors. And it's not a matter of money, either. It can not be had for any price. The cable company flatly refuses to run wire, no matter what percentage of the neighborhood would sign up. It's rural. It's ignored.

Comment Re:Love how he had all these great ideas (Score 1) 417

You conveniently forget things that actually do get passed and signed, and focus only on your frustration when the agenda of one person is disliked by a majority of the people in the country...

Says who? Last I checked the majority of the country didn't even vote in the most recent national elections. 36%, says the New York Times and the Washington Post. The majority of the people in the country haven't expressed a meaningful opinion since 2012, and at that time, the majority of the country expressed agreement with his agenda.

... and by congress.

I don't give a flying fuck what congress likes or dislikes, since I am absolutely certain the only things they like are the things that bring in the most campaign contributions, and I'm not a billionaire.

The majority of the country find his foreign policy positions to be complete feckless, and clumsily handled even if they approve of them.

No, the 30% of the country that listens to Fox News thinks his foreign policy positions are completely feckless and clumsily handled. The rest of the country thinks he's substantially better at diplomacy than his predecessor, and for most of his terms in office, his foreign policy was roundly praised in the national media outlets most people consider important. Saying it ain't so doesn't make it not so.

The points where his own party dislikes his foreign policy are the points that, in a Republican president, the Republicans praise to the skies. Republicans like bombing the shit out of sand people. We have 8 years of quotes to prove it. We know damn well that had it been a Republican president bombing Libya, all Republican commentary would have been about how it's right and just and necessary to bring peace, democracy, mom, and apple pie to Libya, plus loud protestations that it's 100% constitutional and within his purview. We KNOW this, because those arguments have been made.

Obama and his party have solidly earned the opposition they've cultivated, and the recent mid-term election demonstrates once again how tone deaf they've been.

That's a remarkable echo chamber you have there. The recent mid-term election demonstrates that everyone hates Congress. It soundly demonstrated that the Republican Party is wildly tonedeaf to social issues. As noted by one of your own analysts, every Republican social initiative either failed to pass or was contradicted by votes. Republican economic positions failed too, with minimum wage hikes passing in every single state that had one on the ballot, including every single "red state".

Your entire argument consists of labeling. "We say it's bad, therefore it's bad. We say Obama is incompetent, therefore he is incompetent." The reality is somewhat different, and there are a few of you who have noticed, but not enough.

Anyway, I don't know what your beef is with Obama. He's the best moderate Republican president to come along in years.

Comment Re:dissent will be recorded (Score 1) 46

dissent will be recorded on your permanent record.

I'm going to hire the kid that has 100% of all available badges, including those that were only available for a limited time before s/he was born and those that are mutually exclusive because it's physically impossible to be in 3 places at once.

That kid understands computers and the system.

Comment Re:Government Permission Should Not Required (Score 1) 221

You are the proof of my point. You've literally got no fucking idea about local politics. You are so completely apathetic to it that you think these granted monopolies are not only multi-decade grants, but in fact you think that they are actually permanent.

Fuck fuck fuck and FUCK you you miserable sack of shit.

[R.O. 2009 111.011; Ord. No. 01-125, 6-20-2001]
It shall be unlawful for any person to construct, operate or maintain a cable system or to provide cable service or other competing multi-channel video services in the City without a franchise, unless otherwise specifically authorized under applicable Federal or State law.
[1]:
Cross Reference—As to penalty, 670.850.

See that date? I didn't live here then. Now go fuck yourself.

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