|
Yes, please let us have Valhalla DRO gang tagsI Am The Scum posted:The imminent domain of my axe is your skull. This is glorious
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 03:13
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 03:18 |
|
|
So this libertarian guy I knew from high school (who now works at Facebook I think?) posted a link to some blog post by Bill Gates that cited this AEI (lol) study* about how wealth inequality isn't actually increasing if you look at consumption rather than wealth or income. The first thing I thought when looking at the study was "Does this take into account lower income households having to go into debt to fund purchases?" and from what I've read about the consumption index they used it looks like it doesn't. Am I correct in this assumption? Not that it really matters, since current levels of inequality would be absurd even if the consumption gap between the rich and poor wasn't increasing. He's one of those strange libertarians that is really smart otherwise. In the sense that he got an almost perfect score on the SAT and went to Yale with a major in either Math or Physics, forget which. (He doesn't have aspergers and is pretty normally socially, since I realized this might paint the picture of some awkward spergy-type libertarian.) edit: I should mention that I replied to his post mentioning this. I read in some other study that the index they used doesn't take into account interest paid on debt. I really didn't feel like spending much time debunking a loving AEI study though, particularly since the author is apparently a total gently caress-up according to this Salon article I read. * http://www.aei.org/papers/economics/a-new-measure-of-consumption-inequality/ Ytlaya fucked around with this message at 03:46 on Oct 18, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 03:33
|
|
|
QuarkJets posted:Yes, please let us have Valhalla DRO gang tags I say the SA grenade wearing a viking helmet. 
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 03:45
|
|
|
Ytlaya posted:So this libertarian guy I knew from high school (who now works at Facebook I think?) posted a link to some blog post by Bill Gates that cited this AEI (lol) study* about how wealth inequality isn't actually increasing if you look at consumption rather than wealth or income. The first thing I thought when looking at the study was "Does this take into account lower income households having to go into debt to fund purchases?" and from what I've read about the consumption index they used it looks like it doesn't. Am I correct in this assumption? Not that it really matters, since current levels of inequality would be absurd even if the consumption gap between the rich and poor wasn't increasing. It's a consumption index, of course it doesn't take into account debt or income. It's not particularly useful as a measure of financial health for that and many other reasons
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 04:05
|
|
|
Lowtax heeding our wishes for a Valhalla DRO gang tag will really show those statist fuckers what's really good. On an unrelated note, does my dead body rotting in a gutter count as me mixing my labor with it and thus it being my property? President Kucinich fucked around with this message at 04:47 on Oct 18, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 04:44
|
|
|
President Kucinich posted:Lowtax heeding our wishes for a Valhalla DRO gang tag will really show those statist fuckers what's really good. Yes, but if I piss on your corpse, that means I mixed my labor with it and so your corpse becomes mine and everything your body rots becomes mine.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 05:26
|
|
|
QuarkJets posted:It's a consumption index, of course it doesn't take into account debt or income. It's not particularly useful as a measure of financial health for that and many other reasons Though consumption is a non-terrible metric in areas with underdeveloped credit markets. China might be an exception, but that requires believing that the Chinese government is on the verge of engaging in all sorts of productive projects.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 05:43
|
|
|
Consumption doesn't measure jack poo poo when wealth inequity is so far out of whack the only way for the ultra-rich to spend it all would be to give it away for others to spend it or start ... acting ... like ... states... poo poo ABORT ABORT!
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 05:58
|
|
|
RuanGacho posted:Consumption doesn't measure jack poo poo when wealth inequity is so far out of whack the only way for the ultra-rich to spend it all would be to give it away for others to spend it or start ... acting ... like ... states... poo poo ABORT ABORT! Is your objection that we should be looking at median and not mean consumption, or that even median consumption is meaningless when there exist very wealthy people?
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 06:12
|
|
|
rJames posted:Is your objection that we should be looking at median and not mean consumption, or that even median consumption is meaningless when there exist very wealthy people? The latter. The amount of wealth some people have makes the whole exercise an act in hand waving to justify wealth that is speaking in societal terms, a crime against humanity. No one person should have so much power and influence.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 06:27
|
|
|
DrProsek posted:Yes, but if I piss on your corpse, that means I mixed my labor with it and so your corpse becomes mine and everything your body rots becomes mine. But if I kill you and fashion your bones into fashionable summer wear, I get all the corpses you've pissed on and everything they've rotted on. 
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 07:27
|
|
|
twodot posted:AnCap land... That does not exist. I mean, even if the multiverse thing is true, and enything that has some chance of happening happens somewhere, you won't find AnCap land in any of them.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 12:34
|
|
|
The only worlds in which AnCap land would work are worlds where there would be no need for AnCap land.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 17:28
|
|
|
paragon1 posted:But if I kill you and fashion your bones into fashionable summer wear, I get all the corpses you've pissed on and everything they've rotted on. *slams mace into table* THIS DEBATE IS POINTLESS, can a dead man hold his place in a shield wall?
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 17:31
|
|
|
RuanGacho posted:Modern communications are technically impossible in an cap society, I'll probably do a giant dump of why this weekend since its my favorite 2x4 for libertarians, and maybe if I lay out the totality of it they'll finally tell me how I'm wrong. Most of them don't really understand how technology works or how radio waves work. I got a hardcore libertarian to agree to disagree with me on the existence of the FCC, which basically is a way of saying "you're right but I won't admit the statist won. Sorry for the long post, but this is something I know a lot about, and I can really run circles around a lot of opinionated idiots with. I grew up in Jersey. And when I started driving, the big thing to have was the FM transmitter for your iPod. It was a way to listen to your iPod and not have to worry about not having a tape-deck. There was one problem - it didn't work really well. See, Jersey is a densely populated state in the North East, which means that you have a lot of radio stations in the area, and you also have a lot of people with FM transmitters for their iPods. Basically, if you had a station where you could get a good transmission on your iPod, you would have to give up soon enough and change to a different station because someone else would be on the station and causing interference, or you would start to get to an area where your transmitter couldn't overpower the station that was broadcasting. Basically, your best bet was using a number in the low 80s and hope that you could get good reception. Why am I mentioning this? Because this is probably your only real interaction with radio frequencies that didn't involve just using a receiver. You were using a low power transmitter, and you experienced all the problems that can happen with the radio airwaves. It's like having a conversation in a loud restaurant. In order to be heard, you have to speak loudly. And if you can't speak loudly enough, you won't be heard. Anything using radio waves are incredibly prone to interference that can hurt operations. For example, when my mom would use a hairdryer when my dad was listening to an AM radio station, there would be a sudden drop in the quality of our reception. That's why for a long time when you were on an airplane, you couldn't use electronics while taking off and landing because they were concerned about the possibility of interference from radio signals. There's a big problem with radio signals as well - they don't play nicely within the rules. For example, a station that's broadcasting on 101.1 can likely be heard on 101.3, with lesser fidelity, provided the airwaves are clear. In fact, this "bleed" impacted my college radio station. We were 88.3 on the dial, and we needed to move our antennae. But our proposed location would have interfered with Channel 6's television broadcasts because we were so close in frequency. And it's not unheard of to have radio stations overpower other radio stations. For example, you may have heard of the border-blasters. These were Mexican radio stations that broadcasted at a very high power and aimed their signals into America. In fact, the signals from these Mexican radio stations could overpower American radio stations. This is also why you have clear channel radio stations (not the company), since AM radio waves get more powerful at night because the ionosphere is not as active due to the sun. Finally, radio signals don't stop at clearly demarcated property lines. Going back to New Jersey, would you believe that a good number of New York stations can actually be found in New Jersey. For example, Z100, the top 40 radio station, broadcasts out of Jersey City. A lot of TV stations broadcast by bouncing their signal off of the Empire State Building - including stations in New Jersey. How can I stop your radio station from encroaching on my space? Simple. You need a third party to define where your signal can be and where my signal can be. And what about standards for broadcast specifications. I mean, you get a TV, you can pick up television signals with no worries. You get an FM radio, you can pick up FM radio stations, usually in stereo, with no worries. And AM radio, you can pick up AM radio stations in glorious one channel mono... Wait. Why are all AM radio stations only mono? There's nothing about the AM radio broadcasting specification that keeps it mono only. Well, you're right. AM radio is typically mono only, but there are AM Stereo broadcast specifications. Four of them, in fact. Well, back in the 1980s, the FCC decided that they weren't going to set a standard for AM Stereo. They were going to let the free market decided. So there were 4 different standards, and guess what. None of them took off. There were a lot of reasons. First off, a lot of AM radio stations primarily broadcast news or talk shows, stuff that doesn't really benefit from being in stereo. The other thing was that because there were four different standards, Americans didn't know which one to buy. It was a more expensive radio that you might not ever use, or be able to use. So in the end, AM Stereo became a novelty. Yeah, it's still out there, but AM radio is still mostly mono because the free market failed to choose a standard. So yeah, that's why we need the FCC. If the free market could choose between PAL and NTSC, would color TV ever taken off?* *Note: PAL and NTSC are actually ways of encoding colors. They've just become a shorthand for all the other differences that exist in television signals, like 25 FPS versus 30. But Brazil, for example, uses PAL, but their TVs run at 60 hz. If you watched a Brazilian broadcast on your TV, it would just be in black and white. Cemetry Gator fucked around with this message at 21:31 on Oct 18, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 21:29
|
|
|
Cemetry Gator posted:So yeah, that's why we need the FCC. If the free market could choose between PAL and NTSC, would color TV ever taken off?* That's like saying you need the FCC to choose between Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. A stereo AM standard was never needed because it's going to be inherently inferior to FM stereo no matter what.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 22:01
|
|
|
Also there's an AM Stereo standard that works really well and more and more stations are deploying it. It's the AM section of the hybrid-digital radio spec. You can get FM Stereo quality sound out of AM and near CD-quality stereo plus multiple channels ala tv subchannels on FM, not to mention a mode where you get surround digital sound on FM. We're close to having most radio stations in the country support it, and in large metro areas almost all radio stations use it. Incidentally, that's because the FCC declared it would be the sole digital terrestrial radio broadcasting standard.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 22:13
|
|
|
Kiwi Ghost Chips posted:That's like saying you need the FCC to choose between Blu-Ray or HD-DVD. A stereo AM standard was never needed because it's going to be inherently inferior to FM stereo no matter what. I can't tell if you're being serious or being facetious. It's not really an accurate analogy though. In the case of a format war like Blu-ray and HD-DVD, there's nothing physically stopping someone from producing a film on both formats, like Warner Brothers did. However, with a broadcast format war, there is something physically preventing you from broadcasting in multiple formats - the fact that you can only broadcast one signal per radio station. Also, you need to look at history and what was going on. AM Stereo took off in other parts of the world, so it's not impossible to imagine that it might have taken off in America. And in the 1980s, when the initial AM Stereo push was still going on, there were still AM radio stations playing music. In New York, WNBC (now WFAN) had music programming up until they switched over to a sports station in 1988. In 1987, WHN was still a country station on the New York radio dial. These were formats that could have benefited from broadcasting in AM stereo, since by the 1980s, almost all music was produced in stereo. In Chicago, WLS had music until 1989 - long after the FCC had decided to let the market figure out AM stereo. Also, even if it's going to be inferior to FM Stereo, it's still a radio station, and it is very difficult, if not almost impossible, for you to get a new license today without buying an existing one. And generally speaking, AM radio stations have a farther reach than FM stations. And stereo can be better than mono for a lot of things. So, if you had a radio station, why wouldn't you want to have the best sounding radio station that you can have? Of course, by 1993, when the FCC finally determined the AM radio standard, there was just no big push. There are a lot of reasons why AM Stereo never took off in America, but when the FCC decided to let the market figure it out and have competition, none of them won because people were confused by the four different systems, and didn't know which radio to buy. It's an example of how the free market doesn't always work. Cemetry Gator fucked around with this message at 23:03 on Oct 18, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 22:55
|
|
|
Your statist propaganda won't work on us, obviously in ancap libertopia all of the radio broadcasters would just willingly form an FCC-like organization and agree to be subject to its rules, because free market, and you can't prove that this wouldn't happen therefore Ron Paul 2016 end the fed
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 23:46
|
|
|
QuarkJets posted:Your statist propaganda won't work on us, obviously in ancap libertopia all of the radio broadcasters would just willingly form an FCC-like organization and agree to be subject to its rules, because free market, and you can't prove that this wouldn't happen therefore Ron Paul 2016 end the fed gently caress you. I'm just going to buy as many transmitters as I can, hook them up to my coal burning power plant ran by children, gaining an education in the school of running a coal power plant, and broadcast my glorious statist propaganda with as much power as I can on AM and FM frequencies, in glorious statist approved monophonic sound.
|
|
#
?
Oct 18, 2014 23:57
|
|
|
Cemetry Gator posted:gently caress you. I'm just going to buy as many transmitters as I can, hook them up to my Children are a renewable resource, it's in your rational self-interest to use a fuel source that is limitless
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 00:09
|
|
|
Cemetry Gator posted:the fact that you can only broadcast one signal per radio station. Ah yes, a fact that isn't true. There are thousands of radio stations in America today doing just such a thing. And that's not even counting other global radio stations where what you would call a single radio station actively broadcasts across multiple different frequency ranges, let alone broadcasting modes. Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 00:38 on Oct 19, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 00:35
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:Ah yes, a fact that isn't true. There are thousands of radio stations in America today doing just such a thing. You're kind of being pedantic here over a minor point of semantics. It comes from the fact that radio station can refer to both a single point on a dial as well as the organization where the signal is originating from. Since, in many cases, they are one and the same, I didn't think to word things more specifically. On a single frequency, only one signal can go out. If you want to broadcast in multiple formats on the same frequency, you would need to doing multiplexing. Given that this conversation is in regards to analog means of broadcasting AM stereo, and not digital means, the point I'm making still remains. In order for me to broadcast in multiple AM Stereo formats, I would need multiple frequencies to broadcast on.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 01:20
|
|
|
Cemetry Gator posted:gently caress you. I'm just going to buy as many transmitters as I can, hook them up to my coal burning power plant ran by children, gaining an education in the school of running a coal power plant, and broadcast my glorious statist propaganda with as much power as I can on AM and FM frequencies, in glorious statist approved monophonic sound. Don't teach the forced labor to read you retard. Do you have any idea how many problems that can cause!?!?!?!?
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 01:50
|
|
|
Cemetry Gator posted:You're kind of being pedantic here over a minor point of semantics. It comes from the fact that radio station can refer to both a single point on a dial as well as the organization where the signal is originating from. Since, in many cases, they are one and the same, I didn't think to word things more specifically. If you want to argue based on 1950s radio tech sure, but most people would agree your arguments should work with digital technology. Also no, some methods of AM stereo in analog could allow for multiple to be broadcast at once, if you were willing to make slight sacrifices in fidelity.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 02:44
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:If you want to argue based on 1950s radio tech sure, but most people would agree your arguments should work with digital technology. Are you seriously trying to argue that I'm wrong about a situation that occurred in the 1980s because modern technology from 30 years in the future may have solved that problem? The systems that were available for AM stereo broadcasting were all incompatible with each other, which meant that broadcasters had to pick one system. Without a standard, radios that supported AM Stereo either only supported one system, which may have been incompatible with the station you listened to, or supported multiple systems. This led to confusion in the market, which led to apathy because nobody adopted it. The market created confusion. Combined with AM radio stations moving away from broadcasting music, it lead to the end of AM Stereo as a viable broadcast format in America, at least, until recently with HD Radio. http://books.google.com/books?id=ZO...patible&f=false Here's an article from 1985 in Popular Mechanics. As you see, the four systems are incompatible. http://www.nytimes.com/1987/12/31/arts/few-am-stations-switch-to-stereo-broadcasting.html Here's an article written in 1987 about the transition. Once again, they mention that the two systems that were still available were incompatible with each other. You're insisting that I'm wrong about something you don't know what you're talking about. I honestly don't think you do, because you tried to tell me I was wrong about something that happened in the 80s because modern technology took care of that problem. That's like saying that the Continental Army in the Revolutionary War had airplanes because they're available today, but you'll concede that if I want to argue based on what was available in the 1700s, then you might concede with me.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 05:46
|
|
|
There were multiple attempts at AM stereo from the 50s up to the 80s. Some of them had the possibility to run both at once. And it would also have been possible to intentionally design a dual standard. Your assertion that since no one did it it is impossible is just flat out wrong. Quite simply people attempting to do it generally designed systems that functioned as a sole method, but this was in no way required by the medium.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 17:33
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:There were multiple attempts at AM stereo from the 50s up to the 80s. Some of them had the possibility to run both at once. And it would also have been possible to intentionally design a dual standard. Your assertion that since no one did it it is impossible is just flat out wrong. This slap fight about Amplitude Modulation radio is almost worse than an caps magical thinking. Its indiscernable from star trek technolgy chat word replaced. I'll post my summary of the whole of telecommunications in libertopia shortly so we can pick that apart over mead served in the skulls of statists instead.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 17:41
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:Your assertion that since no one did it it is impossible is just flat out wrong. This was not his/her assertion hth
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 17:50
|
|
|
RuanGacho posted:This slap fight about Amplitude Modulation radio is almost worse than an caps magical thinking. Its indiscernable from star trek technolgy chat word replaced. Mead would just fall out of the eye sockets.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 17:56
|
|
|
Who What Now posted:Mead would just fall out of the eye sockets. If you do not know how to modify a skull into a drinking gourd you have no place in Valhalla DRO Actually now that I think about it, if I dislike the current leadership behind Valhalla DRO but am ok with raiding and pillaging in general would anyone join me in making a 99 Tngri DRO?
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 18:02
|
|
|
DarklyDreaming posted:If you do not know how to modify a skull into a drinking gourd you have no place in Valhalla DRO Just kill the current leadership and take their place.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 18:08
|
|
|
Do not concern yourself over fighting honorable opponents, for the day will come when we all feast together and fight on the same side at Ragnarok!
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 18:16
|
|
|
VitalSigns posted:This was not his/her assertion hth It was their assertion that doing so is impossible. It isn't. It's in fact rather easy if you actually want to do it. In multiple ways and forms even.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 18:26
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:It was their assertion that doing so is impossible. It isn't. It's in fact rather easy if you actually want to do it. In multiple ways and forms even. Pretty sure the assertion is that AM would have been more popular if the government had set a standard and that private industry refused to do so, not that making AM technology adequate for a popular broadcast system would be impossible. You are quibbling about details that are completely beside the point.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 18:48
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:It was their assertion that doing so is impossible. It isn't. It's in fact rather easy if you actually want to do it. In multiple ways and forms even. That really isn't his argument, stop it fishmech
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 19:02
|
|
|
paragon1 posted:Pretty sure the assertion is that AM would have been more popular if the government had set a standard and that private industry refused to do so, not that making AM technology adequate for a popular broadcast system would be impossible. You are quibbling about details that are completely beside the point. If that was his assertion it is insane. AM was wildly popular from the mid 1920s to the mid 1970s, despite FM radio existing since the late 1930s and FM Stereo existing since 1961. It took til the late 70s for FM listenership to exceed AM listenership. AM stereo never really had a chance to recapture its old role as primary music broadcast - the FM bandplans and the methods of FM broadcast simply allow far greater quality in analog format than AM could ever hope to match (let alone the even greater improvements available with digital technology). This wouldn't have been solved by having a standard AM Stereo plan implemented and available in receivers either. And even so, AM remains more popular in certain areas, typically rural, where the ability to be heard over greater ranges is more important than high quality. You'll find contemporary music stations on the AM band in those areas, unlike urban areas. For those of you who don't understand radio, which seems to be a lot, here's what the kind of distance advantages are that you can get for full power AM versus full power FM: AM daytime and night time on a clear channel full power AM station:   FM all-day on a full power FM station: 
Nintendo Kid fucked around with this message at 19:23 on Oct 19, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 19:12
|
|
|
Telecommunications are the Greatest Achievement of Statists Everywhere We have had people arguing for the demolishing of government for time immemorial but often as they call for such things they take for granted the fact that all they enjoy for comforts is implausible if not impossible to accomplish without a form of government. For this reason and more I assert that government IS society and vice versa, the structure and nature of this arrangement can be a multitude of different things but for humanity, government itself is a quality of our species and to imply that we can somehow exist without it is childish at best and sociopathic at worst. Technology as we know it is largely a result of the past 100 years, through industrialization, development of scientific theory and structural enhancement of society. Our technology which allows us to communicate is especially premised on an implicit understanding of a common good, so much such that people whom would deconstruct society rarely, if ever account for how their best laid plans would be impossible under such a political structure. Here I will outline the ways that telecommunications technology specifically is reliant on central government derived authority that has no apparently plausible "free market" solution. The Electromagnetic Spectrum The Wireless Solutions It is often thought that in an anarchic-capitalist or another form of less regulated society that wireless solutions could be used to circumvent some of the issues of property rights. The problem is the electromagnetic spectrum is a finite resource. quote:The electromagnetic (EM) spectrum is the range of all types of EM radiation. Radiation is energy that travels and spreads out as it goes – the visible light that comes from a lamp in your house and the radio waves that come from a radio station are two types of electromagnetic radiation. The other types of EM radiation that make up the electromagnetic spectrum are microwaves, infrared light, ultraviolet light, X-rays and gamma-rays. Today EM signals are so ubiquitous in society that it is unquestionably taken for granted, all the technology we currently use is licensed out or specified for specific use by a specific authority, the Federal Communications Commission. While it is theoretically possible to make technology that would use parts of the radio section of the electromagnetic spectrum, and indeed some do exist, like infrared, they generally are challenged by the limitations of physics in ways that would lead to less desirable outcomes. Generally speaking, EM that is not sight restricted or radio are things that more directly affect atoms, and thus people. You COULD make a high powered microwave transmission system but there is a reason why radar systems have procedures to make sure no one is in line of sight of those transmissions, technicians could literally be cooked, lower power implementations don't have the range to be plausibly used for communication over significant distances. So this brings us back to radio, which is the sweet spot for range, safety and versatility. Why can't it work in libertopia? Well the basic premise of a government-less society is a lack of central authorities to regulate things, so if we accept that conceit then the EM spectrum basically falls into unusable chaos, here is why: If you've ever wondered why some cell phone carriers seem to do better in your area is doesn't actually have a lot to do with how many towers they have put up, there was a time when this was the main constraining factor but for the most successful companies they have largely built out their infrastructure to support the Radio Frequency they have leased from the FCC. I don't want to dive too much into the details of physics here (hence my lack of external links for now) but basically in the US the top two carriers, Verizon and AT&T have a preferable part of the spectrum for cellular communication, this means to get a similar effective range, the other two major carriers, T-mobile and Sprint need to have more towers more densely packed together because their signals don't penetrate objects as well or as far as the spectrum that Verizon and AT&T currently have access to. By now some of you may be already getting ahead of me here and nodding sagely as what this would lead to. Libertarians would inevitably conclude that this is unfair market competition and that the government is choosing winners and losers! Well, not quite. You see the problem is that the spectrum has some really good, ideal spots and some less ideal spots, which means whomever controls the ideal spectrum can do the most with it, the most cost efficiently. In libertopia we have a new DRO situation to control the airwaves themselves, because any form of compact radio technology needs to be limited in scope or you're going right back to 1980's size cell phones in order to be able to connect to SOME of the radio spectrum. This is a similar reason why you've been able to find mp3 players with FM receivers to pick up some tunes an alternate way, there's a very limited selection of radio it needs to be able to pick up with relatively low space cost. The moment you want to transmit you need more complex radios, with better antennas, and the miniaturization we've been afforded has only been possible because of the limited scope of spectrum. If we had to target a more complex part of the spectrum we could never get radio components that were small enough or cheap enough to function as well as they do. This is without getting into the market oddities of cell phone subsidization and such in the US market. In the end this means that at best, you'd have DRO's trying to obliterate each other to control the best parts of the spectrum, using aggression because any miserable person who decides they don't like your use of the spectrum can just jam it all up with their own equipment. It's only currently through the force and authority of the FCC that the wireless spectrum doesn't turn into an entire shitstorm of nothing working, completely avoiding talk of the FCC making sure that consumer goods don't produce RF disrupting radiation. Socialist/Statist Alternative Universe: Nationalize the entire RF spectrum, make the wireless spectrum a stream of internet connectivity, allow everyone including content and service providers to connect free of charge and regulate only safety and traffic management. The Internet, Backbones, Telephones and Dirty Secrets of Infrastructure How Anything Communicating Requires the Abdication of Property Rights "Okay! Forget it! I'll just build my own private network!" you might be thinking. Here's the thing though, the infrastructure and backbone that the entire internet functions on is built on implicit agreements of every government from the HOA up to the Federal level that you don't have the right to block telecommunications infrastructure from being installed in your neighborhood or reasonably through your property. The problems with infrastructure are a little more straight forward, and more political ironically than the problems with wireless technology. Simply put, if property rights are the only thing that matter to you, as many libertarians, an caps and conservatives are wont to imply, you generally destroy the ability to have things for the common good because everyone deserves their fair cut of any property infringement made against them. I will illustrate the difficulty this posits for libertarian society by following a regional network connection from it's central office to an end user. It is technically feasible, but as you will see, so cost prohibitive that the internet as we know it would not be possible, it is taken for granted, much like free speech in the Western European world largely is. Starting at the highest node in a major city (are there still major cities in libertopia? Just asking) We have what is basically the nexus of internet connectivity for the region from here, one of the local ISPs buys a connectivity agreement with, but they need it to go somewhere so they have fiber installations run from that building to their regional office 3 blocks away. Along the way there are two co-ops who own the road right of way, plus 10 private property owners who need to be individually compensated for their property infringement to have telecommunications equipment on their property, this could be little as a handhold so the fiber can take a 45 degree turn and not completely lose signal or just passing through because property rights!  Next we go from the regional center to the outlying areas, probably one or two of these for each area of greater population, the average distance that this would have to travel is somewhere between 10-40 miles, between each of these nodes, which along the way will require hitting periodic hardware installations to keep the signal from degrading. Try tracing your communications from your home to your ISP's website, it's going to be fairly inside their network, as they have a vested interest in getting you there fast. You will probably find a minimum of 4 hops before get to the aforementioned regional nexus, this is just the hops you can see. It's important to note that this is a decent measure because even if you never leave your ISP's network they are connected in that area because that nexus connects to EVERYTHING else in the area. In my case this is approximately 40 miles away as the crow flies and arrives in about 30 milliseconds. This to be gentle, would not be possible in libertopia. Why not? Because telecommunications nodes currently use generous Right of Way the problem is that it's pretty clear under current governments and laws who has the ability to waive and enforce right of way. Even a freedom to roam would help but not solve the issue. There is probably about 100,000 people between my location and the central node as I've described here, this is ignoring that more likely, due to the lack of centralization of the government structures for stability centralization, the internet wouldn't be built at all because it would cost too much to build infrastructure for less centralized populations, especially when there's 100,000 people to negotiate the free flow of traffic through. Honestly there's a lot more detail that one could go into with how ridiculous even old copper phone lines would be in libertopia but I'm getting exhausted thinking about it. This should be at least a decent overview for now. Socialist/Statist Alternative Universe: Make the last mile of connectivity to homes a utility, not usage based so popular and useful services don't have financial disincentive against expansion My final culminating point: Ancaps/libertarians should never post on the internet ever or they're hypocrites and leeches on a system they don't want any part of. RuanGacho fucked around with this message at 20:32 on Oct 19, 2014 |
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 20:29
|
|
|
Nintendo Kid posted:If that was his assertion it is insane. AM was wildly popular from the mid 1920s to the mid 1970s, despite FM radio existing since the late 1930s and FM Stereo existing since 1961. It took til the late 70s for FM listenership to exceed AM listenership. Good God  Let it go, no one cares about the old man talkie box, and I say this as an NPR listener.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 20:29
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 15, 2024 03:18 |
|
|
RuanGacho posted:Good God Oh I am soooo sorry I brought facts into a discussion instead of letting people flail around with faulty arguments. If you don't like dealing with mean old facts I hear mises.org will help you out.  RuanGacho posted:If you've ever wondered why some cell phone carriers seem to do better in your area is doesn't actually have a lot to do with how many towers they have put up, there was a time when this was the main constraining factor but for the most successful companies they have largely built out their infrastructure to support the Radio Frequency they have leased from the FCC. I don't want to dive too much into the details of physics here (hence my lack of external links for now) but basically in the US the top two carriers, Verizon and AT&T have a preferable part of the spectrum for cellular communication, this means to get a similar effective range, the other two major carriers, T-mobile and Sprint need to have more towers more densely packed together because their signals don't penetrate objects as well or as far as the spectrum that Verizon and AT&T currently have access to. Sidebar: this is precisely why Sprint has long-standing voice and low speed data roaming agreements on Verizon and why T-Mobile had varying amounts of roaming for voice and slow data on AT&T befor ethey were granted further access as part of that one deal.
|
|
#
?
Oct 19, 2014 20:36
|
|