But there’s no such thing as ‘free’!
FTA (from Reddit): There is no 'free' lemonade
This column is a true story -- every word of it. And I think it very appropriate to consider around the Fourth of July, Independence Day spirit.
Last week, I was in a car with my brother and his fiancee, driving through their upscale neighborhood on a hot summer day. At the corner, we all noticed three little girls sitting at a homemade lemonade stand.
[My brother asked how much, and the kids said they're free.]
His fiancee smiled and commented, "Isn't that cute. They have the spirit of giving."
That really set me off, as my regular readers can imagine.
"No!" I exclaimed from the back seat. "That's not the spirit of giving. You can only really give when you give something you own. They're giving away their parents' things -- the lemonade, cups, candy. It's not theirs to give."
I pushed the button to roll down the window and stuck my head out to set them straight.
"You must charge something for the lemonade," I explained. "That's the whole point of a lemonade stand. You figure out your costs -- how much the lemonade costs, and the cups -- and then you charge a little more than what it costs you, so you can make money. Then you can buy more stuff, and make more lemonade, and sell it and make more money."
...
No wonder America is getting it all wrong when it comes to government, and taxes, and policy. We all act as if the "lemonade" or benefits we're "giving away" is free.
And so the voters demand more -- more subsidies for mortgages, more bailouts, more loan modification and longer periods of unemployment benefits.
They're all very nice. But these things aren't free.
The government only gets the money to pay these benefits by raising taxes, meaning taxpayers pay for the "free lemonade." Or by printing money -- which is essentially a tax on savings, since printing more money devalues the wealth we hold in dollars.
If we can't teach our kids the basics of running a lemonade stand, how can we ever teach Congress the basics of economics?
Um, wtf? As Reddit titles it, "Sweet little girls give away free lemonade. Conservative columnist decides they represent everything that's wrong with America."
Firefox is free. Google services are free. Linux is free.
What really "sets me off" is people drawing conclusions too quickly.
Skype and its fair use
I got into an interesting discussion with a guy in my team. What makes the ability to correctly capture and identify Skype traffic so valuable? Why are we wasting time and effort on finding out how Skype routes traffic under different type of network scenarios? Skype Inc. can easily change the behavior in the next version, and we need to retest and check if their packets fall within our parameters.
He says Skype and among other applications, will eventually be bundled together as a filter list, and customers would subscribe to get the latest definitions - kinda like antivirus software.
Who would have such an invested interest in categorizing Skype traffic? ISP, he says. He explains:
Skype is a P2P technology: other than having a centralized login server, everything else is handled by peers. Every computer running Skype is a node, and if the computer and network qualifies, it can be a supernode. Because Skype doesn't run on a centralized server, Skype Inc. doesn't pay ISPs for the leased lines it uses to connect calls - the clients do. Compared to Vonage, calling cards, and other VoIP services that use centralized servers, Skype is pocketing a much larger amount of profits, and ISPs wants a share of that.
This is where my opinion differs from my teammate. Why should Skype share their profits with the ISPs? That's their competitive advantage. In addition, if ISPs start blocking Skype traffic until Skype Inc. pays for the leased lines, wouldn't that become a net-neutrality issue and a violation of antitrust laws?
I do not want to live in a world like this.
Catching up on some thoughts about California
It's been almost two weeks since my arrival at California, and I've seen so much. The weather is wonderful here everyday, and makes me think people are are too spoiled. They say, "This is the worst weather" when a little rain drizzled for half an hour. I tell them, "You should go to Texas".
On the other note, I went to Berkeley last weekend - the campus itself isn't all that bad, but the living quarters and shops around it? Let's just say now I know why my Berkeley friend is jealous of Stanford.
We went to a town theater to watch Prince of Persia. The theater itself is worth noting; it's a completely different experience than your typical AMC or Cinemark theater complex. It's in an alley; it only has two movie showings; the staff are dressed up in armor or dress (to go along with the Prince of Persia theme); and the theater walls are embellished in an archaic style. Also, a break from the large, corporate theaters was the prize drawing prior to the showing. They gave out wrist compasses, free movie tickets, leather-bound notebook, two DVDs, and free posters. I was lucky enough to be drawn for one of the prizes. What is it? Brokeback Mountain, because Jake Gyllenhaal is in both movies.. My friend and I looked at each other, and he said, "We are NOT watching that movie together".
hehe, yeah. No we're not.
I forgot my camera, so I didn't take pictures. Next time.