ryanricard

"We learned that government officials are often wary of, if not downright hostile to, the kind of disruption that is an all-but-inevitable consequence of innovation."

"The original idea was straightforward: Replace “error” pages, which are generated when you type a mistake in your web browser... with search results that contained paid advertising."

Cognitive, meet dissonance.

I am fascinated at the idea that you wrote a 10KLOC iOS app in the time it took you to type it out. I had heard tales of programmers approaching the design, implementation, and then testing of a program as totally seperate steps, but only as a consequence of an environment that had severe technical limitations (IE, I'm going to hand my "code" over to the typist who will input it into the computer, which will then run it N hours later). To code in that manner intentionally sounds totally bonkers to me, although I accept your proposition that that may be a result of being raised as a Cowboy.

I'd love a series of technical blog posts about the iOS app. What artifacts did you create during the design phase? How many Modules/Features did you split the process in to (or did you do it all in one go)?

I don't know about typefaces, but taking a screenshot of rendered black-on-white text and saving as .jpg sure has an effect on credibility.

Hmm. Wonder why the de-duper didn't catch it. Ah well.

According to the "How it Works" page, "we know which dealers are the friendliest, which ones will give you the best prices, and which ones to avoid completely." Presumably they wouldn't send you any quotes from known bad dealers, but obviously the question is whether or not they can execute on that promise.

True, the dealer can still haggle you on trade-ins and financing, but removing the "price of new car" variable simplifies that negotiation quite a bit. One of the current tactics that works very well for dealerships is trying to throw as many variables at you as possible (Google the "four square method"). Plus you can always sell your car to someone else instead of the dealership, and/or get a loan from your own bank.

> And since Southwest can't grow by adding capacity to current routes (we know the negative cycle that creates), they must find new markets.

I don't think I "know the negative cycle that creates." Could I trouble someone to explain it to me?

...which also references 1984 and a Hanna Barbera cartoon. Of course it's less funny now that I've analyzed it, but still a good joke.

I dislike this framing of taxation in absolute terms. Yes, the government "takes" a portion of your earnings, but in doing so it provides a number of services, some of which were prerequisites to those earnings in the first place (paving the road that brought customers to your storefront).

Sure, we can argue about particulars of how the government chooses to allocate those "takings." I wish my government would spend less on its military, for instance. Other people might wish it to spend less on social welfare programs. But neither of us can honestly use absolute language like "Taking my earnings is a moral wrong. There is no two ways about it." Arguing that states cannot tax is arguing that states cannot exist.

My apologies if you are an honest defendant of some form of anarchism, but I feel like using such absolutist language to discuss a proposed three percent increase in the top marginal tax rate seems incongruous. It feels like you have the intent of inspiring knee-jerk emotions instead of rational discourse. It's fishy.

I think this is my first time encountering the "Grid Method," maybe I've seen it before but I was definitely taught the "old way" in school.

It's genius. I remember the thing I hated the most about long multiplication or division was having to go back and "do it all over again" if I got the answer wrong. The nice thing about the Grid, though, is if you screw up the answer in one of the cells, all the remaining cells might still be good. Then you only have to re-do the addition. Much more user-friendly.

I don't have kids, but it makes me sad that any parent could see their kid come home with that respond with anger. Hell, once you've let your kid show you their way, maybe you can teach him the old way too. The far more important lesson, I think, is that there's more than one way to do it.