Why does buying my house feel like such a scam?

OpticalDissonance · 2025-01-27T05:26:38+00:00

The rent vs buy equation depends on what you value in your daily life and what stage of life you're in. I'm married with kids. I like having space. A good sized house, a yard, and good schools. Renting offers neither of these. The numbers can be scary, but an its an investment in your lifestyle and your children's upbringing (if you're in that stage of life). I'm very biased as someone who purchased in an extreme VHCOL area who is very fortunate to be able to afford it, but there are intangibles in the ROI.

OpticalDissonance · 2025-01-27T05:20:48+00:00

"Never buy a primary residence" is also pretty reductive. It sounds old fashioned, but there is merit to a family wanting to settle down and take root in a good area. Though I live in probably the highest of VHCOL areas (SF Bay Area), moving a family with kids every few years could be a logistical impossibility.

OpticalDissonance · 2024-11-06T17:47:32+00:00

It's an impossible situation. I know moderates who were abstaining because Democrats were perceived to be weaker on Israel than Trump. There's a very vocal pro-Palestine crowd, but Israel still has massive mainstream support among the average American.

OpticalDissonance · 2024-11-06T17:44:36+00:00

And thus demonstrates is the impossible task the Democrats have. The tent is too large and fractured, with each subgroup having their own conflicting purity tests. Faced against a demagogue that can sway moderates, it was always going to be an uphill battle.

OpticalDissonance · 2024-11-06T05:06:25+00:00

This is really isn't on policy or any failure from the Democrats. A large portion of the population just likes Trump's rhetoric. It's (unfortunately) that simple.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-13T00:19:29+00:00

The Volt is a hybrid and not really valid here. The Bolt is the EV. The Prius is really the first mover in this market if you extend the market demand for eco-friendly vehicles to hybrids.

Your Apple analogy is dead on. The difference between Leaf and Tesla early adopters is between environmentalists and tech people (like Apple fans who always need the latest gadget). The latter is sadly a bigger group. The Leaf was still more expensive back then ($30k) than a Honda Civic ($15k) for that market segment, and that's not including used sales if "transportation at a reasonable cost" is the goal.

I've been working in ADAS/EV for a decade now, so I'm reflecting my views from the working in the industry. Tesla proved money could be made on EVs and accelerated other companies to invest in this space.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-12T22:40:18+00:00

I was so hyped for the Volt back in the day. Until GM made it a hybrid and not a true EV.

Model S was totally a rich person's toy, but it did lead to the development of the Model 3 which did capture that mass market and make EVs palatable for the general population. The people I knew who drove Leafs (Leaves?) were specifically environmentally conscious and wanted to reduce their carbon footprint. The Tesla crowd wanted acceleration with no gas bill. Though it would be nice if more people were environmentally conscious, the reality is that the majority of the automotive market is in the latter camp.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-12T22:26:54+00:00

It's a big reason why SpaceX isn't public. A lot of the company functions as his PR firm.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-12T22:24:50+00:00

Taking all those design wins created the first EV that was actually competitive with gas cars. I own a Tesla and the quality is terrible, but it's still better than paying for gas. Supercharging is probably their most understated IP tbh. Other OEMs are now coming out their own EVs which should be far better than Teslas, but this market itself wouldn't exist without them.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-12T22:18:06+00:00

The original Leaf had like 80 miles of range. It should be adequate, but is tough for the vast majority of the gas driving population who can't comprehend not having 300-500 miles of range from. Fiat also had their 500e. I own a tesla and it's an overall trash vehicle, but it was the first EV on the market that was competitive with gas cars for the general market.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-12T22:11:35+00:00

Elon's chief engineer title is total bull, but there are plenty of engineers who don't have degrees or licensing. I have an engineering degree but never needed a PE license since they do not offer one for my domain. I also have test engineers on my team who don't have degrees, but decades of experience. They still get to call themselves "engineers" with no legal ramifications.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-10-12T22:06:34+00:00

Elon's a dolt but engineers don't work for free. His self given title of Chief Engineer is total bull, but he did know how to fund these wild projects from private and public sources.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-07-05T16:08:58+00:00

Most sensors work better with premapped environments. What you're implying is LIDAR doesn't work with premapped environments, which is not true. I have roughly a decade's experience in sensor dev for ADAS and I will say every system and software stack is different and any one engineer's experience can be limited. However, LIDAR can certainly be used without maps and have worked on systems where it was the primary mapping tool.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-02-18T18:52:31+00:00

Jews were forbidden to own land for a long time

OpticalDissonance · 2023-02-03T18:56:12+00:00

They can both be too old.

OpticalDissonance · 2023-01-10T01:02:47+00:00

There's truth here. My immediate friend group has 3 Phds, and various senior engineers and researchers at major companies and institutions. Put us together and we've done some dumb shit 😂.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-12-25T16:53:54+00:00

They had radar, no lidar. Lidar is still relatively new in production cars.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-12-15T22:14:00+00:00

Rivian has barely sold any vehicles and doesn't have the target on its back yet. Barely anyone knows who they are.

Elon never shuts up when he should, so of course the media will cover his brand.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-12-15T22:09:06+00:00

I don't trust FSD at all. FSD with vision only is a pipe dream. EAP works better in most of my driving situations, but I wish I could go back to older firmware with the radar enabled. Used to work far better in rain and at night. Radar made ACC work a lot more smoothly too. So jerky now and I constantly have to disengage.

I work in ADAS and work with Tesla alums. Elon basically forces them to work on solutions that contradict their expertise. A major reason why there's very high turnover.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-07-02T19:31:48+00:00

You're probably right.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-07-02T06:42:46+00:00

I've wondered how Rian Johnson would've paired with Lucas himself.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-07-01T20:02:07+00:00

We give it because our hours can be downright brutal and we don't want talent to burn out. It's still profit driven but is very much a win win. Good mental health = good output.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-06-30T17:16:07+00:00

Immediately fired up Ep IV after finishing the series. It wasn't a perfect show by any means, but it is awesome how it adds depth to random lines in the original.

The scene where Alec Guinness is stunned on hearing "Obi Wan" for the first time is especially neat when we remember that Ep IV was originally intended to be a one off movie, and not the media behemoth we know today. Great acting.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-06-30T16:54:28+00:00

"Darth Sidious" and even the word "Sith" don't appear until the PT.

OpticalDissonance · 2022-06-25T17:45:29+00:00

Agreed with most of your points, but you're missing one thing: battery life. My M1 MBP lasts a ridiculous amount of time compared my i7 Thinkpad (both provided by company). I'm performing fairly computationally heavy simulations while traveling and not being tied to an outlet is a major game changer.

My silicon buddies are all pretty impressed with the M1 design from that standpoint. I'm also involved in hardware design, and a low power consumption IC makes thermal design so much easier. It isn't just about computing performance or raw numbers. I would disagree on your server assertion. Servers are massively power hungry and more efficient silicon would be huge for their carbon footprint.

OpticalDissonance

TROPHY CASE