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Comment It is really too bad (Score 2) 143

That the IT decision makers are generally:

a) beancounters who create this technological debt out of ignorance and generally against the recommendations of their subject matter experts.

or

b) IT people who are knowledgeable enough to avoid this problem, but not powerful enough in the organization to follow through because of the beancounters above them.

Comment Re:Haven't we heard this before? (Score 2) 195

That doesn't make sense. Private equity companies buy struggling companies at a multiple of what they are worth, in hopes of selling it for more later. It was purchased in 2005. I am sure the equity company who owns it isn't happy that they are going bankrupt.

No they don't. They buy them to suck them dry.

By the time these companies go bankrupt the private equity firm has usually gotten multiples of their actual investment back out.

Comment Re:Haven't we heard this before? (Score 1) 195

In this case it is deliberate bankruptcy. The 80s corporate raiders never retired, they became private equity firms. They buy companies and let them fail under the weight of debt servicing (the debt being serviced, for good measure, was incurred in order to buy the company). The only people who lose are the complete idiots who finance these takeovers -- oh, and everyone who works at the company in question.

Yup, they are vampires. Suck a company dry by loading them up on debt and taking the money in management (ha!) fees and special dividends.. and if the company goes bankrupt, oh well.

Comment Good. (Score 1) 442

At least we can reasonably assume that encryption is doing the job it is meant to.

As always, law enforcement and politicians calling for a backdoor is pure stupidity. No matter how good the intentions, the details will always fall into the wrong hands eventually. Or more likely (as demonstrated conclusively by law enforcement everywhere) they will end up using it in unwarranted ways.

Law enforcement needs to get over it and find other ways to do their job. You can't put the math genie back in the bottle.

Comment I'll just reiterate what I have said before (Score 2) 120

Tesla is most likely not going to survive as an independent car maker.

Maybe they'll make it as a niche luxury brand, but unless the miraculously start producing, they are going to be crushed by the real carmakers.

All the majors have EVs and hybrids on the way, and they can actually build them across the globe and in large quantities.

I think they are going to be bought up after their stock crashes, or turn into a battery company. Making money on cars is a very tough business.

Comment It was awful. (Score 1) 300

The main story arc was stupid and terrible.. and resulted in the slowest chase in movie history because they were low on gas!?

The secondary plotline was completely irrelevant to everything and everyone. Hating on rich people at a casino and then beating people over the head with heavy handed and incredibly simplistic morality before riding a pack of animals around and trashing the place!?

Most of the characters are two-dimensional and had no development whatsoever.

Annnnd they wasted Luke Skywalker's last appearance. After doing a very poor job of the build up throughout the (overly long) bloated mess of a movie, they wasted their last chance to redeem it with Luke going out like the legend he was despite his protestations.. and instead did a stupid gimmick for the final confrontation so it ended up having no emotional resonance at all.

Like it was bad, man. Just all around terrible storytelling.

But hey, it's making a ton of money so prepare for more of the same.

Comment Re:I only see a few outcomes for Tesla (Score 1) 260

Again you are being mislead by old technology. We're talking about their ability to service the EV market. The number of old tech ICE vehicles they produce is irrelevant. As you can see from the Bolt and Ioniq examples I gave.

Again, you are missing the point. Tesla can't actually build their cars. They can't meet their own tiny milestones.

Tesla is hoping to deliver 100,000 Model S and Model X delivers this year. They delivered 222 Model 3's this quarter.

I think in the US the number of cars and light trucks sold last year was in the neighbourhood of 17 million.

So stop trying to tell me how they are the only ones who can service this market. They are a niche player.

The established car makers are all sitting on upcoming EV models, and they can actually produce and deliver them --- in most cases, worldwide.

Tesla is just doing them a favour and popularizing the concept for them.

Comment Re:I only see a few outcomes for Tesla (Score 1) 260

You're giving the traditional car companies far too much credit. Look at Toyota for example, they are still trying to promote hydrogen fuel cells. They don't know that that technology has been beaten.

Yes, I'm sure they are unaware of what Tesla is doing.

GM and Hyundai have good EVs, but just like Tesla they can't produce even a fraction of what the market is demanding.

They produce millions of cars a year. If the market was demanding EVs they would be making them. We aren't there yet.

The only traditional car company that's doing as well as Tesla is Nissan.

Doing as well as Tesla? Tesla sells a rounding error worth of cars each year in comparison to the traditionals.

Comment I only see a few outcomes for Tesla (Score 3, Interesting) 260

1) After their ridiculous stock valuation drops to a reasonable amount, they get scooped up by a real automaker as a premium badge.

2) They remain a niche premium car maker.

3) They become a battery company.

They don't have the infrastructure to compete on a world wide scale with the big automakers.

As soon as electrics are well accepted by the public and hit critical mass, the big automakers are going to destroy Tesla.. because unlike Tesla they can actually build cars. Lots of them. They haven't been doing nothing and being disrupted by Tesla. They've been waiting until it makes sense economically.

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