Ron Bailey explodes it.
Only Seven Shopping Days Left
Volvo Virgin Galactic Mailing List
is not for sale. Volvo doesn’t rent lists or send out third party solicitations. 135,000 people who registered for a spaceflight giveaway after Super Bowl 2005 I have to contact the hard way about my site, Space-Shot.com.
Organ Sale Ethics is Cultural
In The Ethicist column in the New York Times Magazine last month, Randy Cohen talked about organ transplant sales being unethical:
For a system of acquiring organs to be ethical, it must be equitable, which is not the case when one economic class is exploited (and put at significant medical risk) for the benefit of another. And exploitation it is when the seller is not making a truly voluntary decision but responding to financial desperation.
Is it unethical to hire a maid who is financially desperate? If I had trouble getting a job out of college, I would be financially desperate, but I would be very grateful for the opportunity to sell my labor.
Organs are different than jobs. But the difference is not financial desperation.
D’oh!!
I must be getting senile.
I almost always take a red eye back to Florida from LA, so I’ve been going merrily along for the past few days thinking I had a flight tonight. Well, when I logged on this morning to see if I could improve my seat, I discovered that my reservation was cancelled. Why? Because I was supposed to leave this morning.
No credit for the ticket. The only way to get back without buying a one-way is to go standby. So I’m off to LAX, with hope in my heart for a seat on a plane to Dallas, and then hoping I won’t get stuck in Dallas because there’s nothing available to Fort Lauderdale (the flight I missed was a non-stop that would have had me in about three this afternoon).
Probably no blogging for the rest of the day, unless there’s wireless in a terminal.
D’oh!!
I must be getting senile.
I almost always take a red eye back to Florida from LA, so I’ve been going merrily along for the past few days thinking I had a flight tonight. Well, when I logged on this morning to see if I could improve my seat, I discovered that my reservation was cancelled. Why? Because I was supposed to leave this morning.
No credit for the ticket. The only way to get back without buying a one-way is to go standby. So I’m off to LAX, with hope in my heart for a seat on a plane to Dallas, and then hoping I won’t get stuck in Dallas because there’s nothing available to Fort Lauderdale (the flight I missed was a non-stop that would have had me in about three this afternoon).
Probably no blogging for the rest of the day, unless there’s wireless in a terminal.
D’oh!!
I must be getting senile.
I almost always take a red eye back to Florida from LA, so I’ve been going merrily along for the past few days thinking I had a flight tonight. Well, when I logged on this morning to see if I could improve my seat, I discovered that my reservation was cancelled. Why? Because I was supposed to leave this morning.
No credit for the ticket. The only way to get back without buying a one-way is to go standby. So I’m off to LAX, with hope in my heart for a seat on a plane to Dallas, and then hoping I won’t get stuck in Dallas because there’s nothing available to Fort Lauderdale (the flight I missed was a non-stop that would have had me in about three this afternoon).
Probably no blogging for the rest of the day, unless there’s wireless in a terminal.
Where to Turn for Hard News
From BBC World Service, “Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has confessed to having had an affair with one of his secretaries. BBC British Affairs correspondent reports”
this story. A red letter day for affairs when they get their own correspondent.
A Classic Of The Genre
…of space economics fallacies, the topic of my panel discussion at Space Access on Friday night:
…did you ever think about what is involved in presenting anything to the general public? When is the last time you purchased, studied, or otherwise became interested in a subject that was not in some way advertised to you? I would say, “never”. The time, and sometimes dollar, investments are heavy, but necessary if there is anything worthwhile to say. Getting information out to people costs a lot, but the return will, hopefully, be worth it. How? In terms of public support for the program, backed up with funding to make it possible. This, in turn, provides jobs for engineers, scientists, and, well, you. They, subsequently, provide jobs and income for car salesmen, lawyers, doctors, service providers, restaurant owners, teachers, website owners, and all who get pieces of the income spent by the space workers.
Yes, it’s all about job creation. Who cares if anything useful is accomplished, or wealth created?
This (flawed) argument would apply to any government program–there’s nothing unique about NASA with regard to it. I beat this one to a pulp a few years ago, but people still fall prey to it.
Microsoft in Video Ad Acquisition
Microsoft plans to buy Massive Inc. for $300 million +/- $100 million. They do ad placements in video games. More in the Wall Street Journal. In-game ads are expected to triple from $56 million last year to $160 million this year and be $700 million by 2010.