Your point is valid but there is a further gotcha.

The company then files the 4 million as a loss-- which results in the irs counting it as income by you which results in taxes due on 4 million and the taxes are not forgivable by bankruptcy. After several years of harassment, wage garnishment, etc. you'll be allowed to settle the tax debt for a smaller amount. If you have the money to pay, it will be about 10 cents on the dollar. If you are really poor, you may not be able to get it forgiven and it just sorta hangs round for a very long time.

The roadster is very much a specialty car. It'll be hard to say how it'll look/perform if/when released in greater I agree with the others, if they 're-release it', it's going to be significantly changed, effectively a new model.

One thing they'll likely do is use their now more or less 'standard' model S 'skateboard' battery & drivetrain system.

I don't think there's a malaysian "race" so you're pretty clear of racism while still being insensitive :P

Actually the gravity of the black hole would cause the earth to fall "up" into the black hole. Also the difference in gravity from one random distance to another from the black hole would tear the earth apart. Don't mess with black holes. If they exist, that is...

Heat problem must be already solved, see the battlemaster ppc example. Also, while I can't imagine mounting an avenger cannon in a vehicle other than a warthog, I also can't imagine turning it into a giant pistol, either. I imagine that if I could do one, the other would be, if not easily achievable, at least something a good engineer skilled in the art could accomplish.

You know, I haven't had a conversation like this since rec.games.mecha died off. .. Brings back memories.

wouldn't a device like this with a fitting attachment solve some of the issues involved with this equipment?

You are talking about super regulated markets, markets where governments are heavily involved and declaring that the way they are regulated and corrupted by the governments is something that would prevent a bakery from changing prices on the fly should their market conditions change, for example a giant influx of consumers wouldn't change the market conditions for bakery enough to change prices. I showed that as market conditions change the producers quickly modify their behaviour. I don't know what you are even trying to say, however comparing stable and predictable market conditions to changing market conditions and declaring that changing market conditions do not cause producers to changing prices is too silly.

Yeah, I get the in universe explanation, what I question is why this was an issue in the first place. A mech carrying around a giant pistol should be all the inspiration you need to get from point a to point b , and it's not like it's a big engineering challenge given that you already managed to modularize the thing into a pistol form factor to begin with (especially when you civilization is keeping FTL travel going with spot and balling wire... You've got to have some seriously talented engineers).

Maybe they just had really aggressive patent attorneys in the star league era? Like "on the internet" patents turned into "on a battlemech" patents and ComStar held the IP with multi century terms, while the clans were the actual successor (no pun intended) in interest... The whole battle of Tukayyid thing was actually over who owned the omnimech rights, which is why they called it a trial. Make about as much sense as the actual storyline, I guess.

Do you reviewers understand!?

If buying a $40 3DBluray sure, but $5 movie, no.

Teens use their friends as guides, "Hey I saw this, you gota see it", or "X was so so sad, dont waste your money"

Yes up your butthole, or swallowed.

But data is being sneaker netted everywhere in NK, there are docos to show how they do it.

How do they get it in? Well, even the ones in the military smuggle stuff in, actually, they are the ones most often with the money and friends outside who can do it.

Eventually, it trickles down to the ultra poor, who might want that USB stick more desperately than food, it at least can be copied/traded for food.

There are a few cities that are one side china, one side NK. I am sure they have smuggled 3G devices in so people in NK can download from China. Put USBs on drones or baloons, or floated.

Taxes and store prices have nothing to do with CC theft, the money is recouped by the bank purely from the interest rates.
However what I think you are trying to say is that; - the "working poor" are the people who end up paying interest because they can't afford to keep the CC balance at zero, they can't "just say no" to the CC debt because they also can't afford not to fix the car that takes them to work.

Easier said than done if you're always broke before the next payday. And no, that scenario doesn't automatically mean you're a lazy or that you squander your money. Quite the opposite, it generally means you work 60-80hr weeks in retail or some other minimum wage (or less) industry. When the shit-box car that takes you to work dies a CC is normally the only way it can be revived/replaced.

The vast majority of the "working poor" know it's a financial trap when they get the card, but sometimes in life deliberately walking into a trap is the best option you have, thankfully I haven't been in that position for over 20yrs now.

I use a CC with a low limit specifically for internet purchases, I repay it straight away so I pay zero interest/fees. Over the last couple of decades I have known several people who have had their DC/CC emptied by hackers, in every case the bank was quick to accept blame and take the financial hit. It's in the bank's interest to do so because (like banknotes) CCs work on trust, if nobody trusts them nobody will use them. Nobody has ever emptied my CC (other than the ex-wife) but on a couple of occasions I have had a phone call from the bank telling me that my CC was being replaced by the bank because "it was involved in a data breach".

Dependency: Of course the people who can't afford to keep their CC balance at zero end up paying for my peace of mind via increased interest rates. Ultimately CC's are an unfair burden on the "working poor" and become "just another bill" when they inevitably hit their limit (been there, done that). The sad fact is that if everyone at every point in their life could afford to keep the balance at zero nobody would pay interest and CCs would not exist.

Never understood why the omnimech was supposed to be such a big deal... The battle master carried a ppc around in its hand for centuries.

I get the feeling that the programmers who are finding it difficult to find work at the moment are those with mediocre skills

Well, enjoy that feeling. It's worth every penny you paid for it.

As for Musk, he's a big corporate player. Calling him a "programmer" these days is pretty silly. Using him to justify outsourcing basically the majority of programming jobs is also pretty silly.

Note that my employer isn't farming out jobs to foreigners because they're trying to cut costs, but because it is genuinely difficult to find the skills

Yes, it does become difficult if "too old, too unhealthy, no degree, overqualified, wrong state, bad credit" are used as stacked pre-filters. But to argue that unemployed programmers in the US are "mediocre" isn't just silly, it's ridiculous.