True - From a purely anecdotal perspective; I had a Pontiac Bonneville with a 3.8 V6. These are typically 300K + motors. I purchased one that came off lease. At 120K it developed a motor knock from low oil pressure. This mean worn main bearings and the only fix is a major rebuilt or motor transplant. I did a title trace on the car an it turns out it was leased to an ethanol company. they must have run high percentage ethanol through the motor. The result was a 2/3 reduction in motor life. Of course this is not scientific, but I've run many 3.8's with 200K+ miles on them (in the early 90's I was in a partnership with a used car lot).

Since ethanol can't be piped due to it's corrosiveness, just think what that does to the inside of an aluminum block.
Not to mention rubber hoses, and plastic fuel pump parts.

I'm from a corn state and have posted on this topic before (see link).
It's amazing driving through the country side and view the castles that have erupted on the plains. These palatial residences funded by federal corn / ethanol subsidies - aka - our tax dollars. Often paired with massive motorhomes providing winter escape in a level of opulence previously unknown to agrarian workers.
From a pure energy perspective, ethanol has only 2/3 the BTU of gasoline.
76,000 = BTU of energy in a gallon of ethanol
116,090 = BTU of energy in a gallon of gasoline
Even vehicles rated to run ethanol should expect a 20%-30% decrease in fuel economy. I personally have experienced this. I drove with a coworker in a 2012 chevy truck rated for e85. We drove a 200 mile road trip (1 way) on trip there we used ethanol, on the trip back we used gasoline. True to form the return trip experienced more that 1/3 increase in fuel economy.
throw in the fact that ethanol must be distributed via semi-trucks and can't be piped (its too corrosive), it is usually distilled with propane, (an inefficient fuel in itself) and the reality is ethanol consumes more energy than it contains. Ethanol is a negative energy source. A Purdue university study came to that conclusion. Of course multitudes of ethanol funded studies have attempted to debunk that fact...
http://slashdot.org/comments.p...
to answer your question, yes, ethanol is a boondoggle. unfortunately lobbyists have taken away our choice and in many states we no longer can choose pure gasoline.

This is an issue we’ve already solved. Unused cpu cycles are used for other things. When you’re typing, your PC is for the most part doing nothing but waiting for you to press a key – why not have it defrag your drive, scan for viri, look for aliens in radio waves. The recognition that processing power of computers is largely underutilized has contributed to wide spread virtualization. Since your AI computer doesn't age as we do, why would care if you’re a few orders of magnitude slower, it just does other things while it waits for you.

The basis of VR is 3d.. How much market share did 3d VT grab? As of last year... 3%
There's no product, there's no users, there's no market share and FB isn't a gaming company.
Now, throw in FB wanting to grab, categorize and sell everything about users and having the potential to capture background conversations and recognize everyone in the room... now the corporate scab of personal information has jacked it up a notch... so, even of FB can get past the first 4 obstacles, sorry, I'm not letting it in my house

As an American, I really get tired of billionaires arguing with millionaires about money.... All that happens is I get screwed.
- the US has fallen from 16th in 2012 to 31st in 2014 for broadband speed...
- pro sports tickets are almost unaffordable to the average person
- US healthcare is the most expensive per capita in the developed world and is ranked 33 for infant mortality

We need to get of this 'we;re great, capitalism solves everything' fox news mantra and look at what's actually happening.
Otherwise, at some point, there's going to be just 2 jobs left in the US. The guy who owns everything and they guy who cleans his toilet.

SNAP benefits (food stamps) cut 11/2013

I've been debating several creationists on a different site for several weeks now. There arguments all boil down to 2:
1) the universe is beautiful therefore a god must have created it..
2) I'm an idiot for not seeing the beauty that god created.

When someone believes just because they have a need to believe, there's no room left for logical debate. it's over. Thought stops, insults start.

IMHO the smoking gun that proves evolution beyond any further discussion is the chromosomal difference between humans and great apes. Humans have 23 pair (46 total) apes have 24 pair (48 total). Lining up human chromosome #2 shows the exact fusion of 2 ancestral chromosomes. It has 2 centromeres and 3 telomores ( 2 centers and 3 ends on the same chromosome). The DNA on the chromosomes even lines up.

Plus.... we have fossils.

Equal time only applies to people running for political office so one station can't push a specific or candidate party. Everything else is wide open if you're willing to pay the bill. I love how Fox ''Fair and Balanced" land was selected for the series reboot. If this was on MSNBC, all the righties would just dismiss it out of hand as propaganda.

Unfortunately this is just another idea that bolsters the industrialist notion that environmentalists are idiots. This plan attacks the supply side but does nothing to stem demand – the key piece of capitalism. A more likely result would be in a spike of coal prices leading to a huge new land grab and expansion of strip mining by the newly enriched (and bought out coal companies) with race to be the new coal supplying Barron. The only way to beat them is to displace the coal industry with some other industry. Pure money into a clean fuel research, the next and more efficient battery technology, super conductivity, fusion . Anything but incentivizing the current model.

That infamous quote is still valid here. People on social security – no surprise – rise and fall with the unemployment numbers. This un-paralleled recession has created unpatrolled numbers of people ‘on the dole’. With the GOP slashing welfare, the alternative is skyrocketing disability recipients. No miracle that the highest rates of states on disability are those with the lowest education. Great article on tall this over at NPR http://apps.npr.org/unfit-for-... and you better read while available because most GOP’rs absolutely scream about public dollars to NPR.

I hate to be the Curmudgeon..however with a school you are guaranteed a pension. In the private sector, no matter how much you make, you will never make up the difference. At some point, you'll get tired of bits & bytes and just want to play with grand kids or go fishing. Stay with the school, and you'll be doing that by the time your 55. Leave for the private sector and 55 becomes a hard to reach retirement age.

As a manger in the tech field, I state for the record there is no pay gap. Starting pay is based on someone’s ability to negotiate and raises are based on skill. As far as a pay difference over all, a recent study says the entire pay gap is easily explained by choices of work. Women historically have selected employment that pays less. Teachers make less than engineers. The percentage of women in the teaching field is higher as is the percentage of men in the engineering field. Thus, if averaged just men vs women, men on average make more (in that example). However drawing that as a conclusion is erroneous, so people just need to get over themselves and do their best.

I’m 51 and been through many variations– upsized, downsized, self-employment, public, private, smalls, large, leveraged buyouts you name it.
. I’ve left for money, I’ve left bad bosses, I’ve left for security, and I’ve left for geography. Also know that I’ve never had any difficulty getting a new job at any age. I just jumped companies last year at age 50. Once I decided on a change, it took 3 months to find a new job across the county while keeping the old gig. (Middle age crazy, wanted a climate change). If you’re competent and can communicate, there is a need.. Granted I’m in management now (10+ years) rather than programming and we have to maximize the skill set we have as well as always keep growing.

Outside of Government work, if your name isn’t over the door, you (IT) are a disposable commodity. You are the first to get cut in lean times and the last to get hired in good ones. Also, know that nobody is ever indispensable. Leverage and balance those facts to your advantage. Nobody will watch out for your ass but you.

To answer your question: Know what makes you happy. Form an ultimate game plan of what you want and where you want to end up. Every opportunity must past a simple litmus test: Does it lead you closer to end game? Only you can answer that. Good Luck.

$16B!! Are they nucking futs? It feels to me – as someone who worked through InetBubbleBurst 1.0 - like FB is flailing at something, anything, using the huge cash cache it’s currently sitting on in a feeble and misdirected attempt at non-relevance. Just proof that huge dollars huge brains.

Shuttleworth ... Take heed from ... well ... everyone and dump Unity.