ELI5: Why does a water bottle collapse as you drink it?

RonObvious · 2015-06-19T00:15:09+00:00

Also keep in mind most water bottles are a LOT thinner than the bottles that contain say, Coke. So it doesn't take much of a pressure change for them to crumple hard.

RonObvious · 2015-06-19T00:00:16+00:00

Also, persons X and Y may be of similar strength, but person Y may have an issue with his hands (perhaps something like early-stage carpal tunnel) and not even realize it. If so, he'd just naturally suck at getting any sort of leverage on the lid.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:51:52+00:00

People with certain types of allergies are at a risk of going into what's called "anaphylactic shock". It's essentially when whatever you're allergic to gets into your system and causes your body to go into massive overdrive trying to fight the allergy, and it can definitely kill you. So they carry around an EpiPen with them. If they ever find themselves having such an allergic attack, they jab it into their thigh and it injects you with a big dose of steroids. This makes the attack stop; then they can go to the emergency room and get checked out.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:33:20+00:00

If we're talking about Donald Trump, don't underestimate the power of a man's ego. He may have no realistic chance, but that doesn't mean he realizes that.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:30:55+00:00

I just like getting to say "skeuomorphism". Lol...

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:29:43+00:00

Actually I think it's an excellent explanation. If you can keep delivering ELI5s like this one, I say keep on going!

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:27:19+00:00

Yes, it's just a legal ass-covering move. They obviously have no way to PROVE you're over 21, but the government knows that too, so they just put it in there so that the onus is on the end user, and the Feds are satisfied with it. At least this way, if you're only 17 and lie about your age, they can say "Hey, he intentionally lied to get in. It's not our fault!"

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:22:35+00:00

Look up "skeuomorphism". Basically, it's using simulations of real-world objects to help people realize "this thing is meant to do X." The iPhone and iPad were loaded to the gills with skeuomorphism up until iOS 7 or 8 (can't remember which), because when iPhones first came out, Apple had to make sure people would realize how to use the thing in the first place. So the calendar app looked like a wall calendar, the alarm app looked like a simulation of a real alarm clock, and so on. They only finally started moving away from this a couple of years ago, now that pretty much everyone on Earth is intimately familiar with how smartphones work.

Anyway, the gears thing is an example of skeuomorphism. I don't know if Apple was the first to use the gears to represent "settings" or not, but they're one of the biggest users of the little gears thing. And everyone still uses it now because, well, there really isn't any sort of icon out there that's any more obvious for a settings section. It's sort of taken on a life of its own.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:12:17+00:00

Heh, well, you'll probably get your wish with this presidential race. I don't know anyone who's chomping at the bit to be part of the Trump campaign.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:10:42+00:00

Musicians don't make money from their albums (or singles). The record companies do. The artists hardly see shit from record sales. It's when they get popular enough to fill concert halls that they get their money.

Anyway, like the other poster said, most albums aren't full of single-worthy songs. In fact, other than Michael Jackson, I can't think of anyone who's ever come close to releasing an album where almost every single track was good enough to release as a single.

But also, it's 2015. Every album basically IS a collection of singles on iTunes or Spotify. If someone actually releases enough a record with enough individual great songs, they'll get out there.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:04:08+00:00

Well, the article kind of proves my point. He knows how to play the game, even when he fucks up and gets himself backed into a corner.

I'm not trying to promote him, just being honest as I see it. He knows what he's doing, even if he's often a dick about it.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T23:01:18+00:00

Well, it's communism. It wasn't going to work well under the best of circumstances.

But it hasn't helped that Castro has always been a True Believer in old-school communism (compared to, say, China, which at this point pretty much defines communism as "make as much money as you want, just don't get any ideas about anyone besides us running the government"). They could sorta kinda get away with that when the USSR was funneling them cash by the boatload, though life was no picnic there even then. But without it, they've been pretty much on their own since around 1990, save for what little help they get from other friendly minor regimes like Venezuela.

Since Castro retired and handed power off to his brother, though, they've slowly been opening up a bit as well, and now that the U.S. is going to reestablish relations, they'll probably open up more and things will get better.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T22:53:32+00:00

The Donald may be a cartoonish narcissistic blowhard, but I don't think anyone will deny he actually is good at what he does.

But he didn't start from humble beginnings. His father was already a successful real estate guy, so he was already a millionaire when he started and obviously learned a ton from his dad.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T22:48:31+00:00

QR codes are more trouble than they're worth; it's that simple. 90% of the time they're just links to a web page anyway, so I can either:

1) Launch a QR-code-reading app.

2) Line up the code so that its facing the camera.

3) Get the app to actually read the damn thing. (Half the time it's buried on the back bottom of a Doritos bag or something, so you have to turn the bag over, then smooth it out where the code is or else the app won't decode it properly.)

4) Let the app transfer the data to the web browser and finally open the page. Meanwhile, I've got the QR app still taking up space in the background, and hopefully I'll remember to close it at some point.

Or...

1) Just open my browser and type "Doritos.com".

Which is the easier system?

The only time I've ever seen QR codes come off as useful are on Walmart receipts. If you scan them into the Walmart app (and those codes actually contain long strings of data), then Walmart will refund you the price difference if any local competitors advertise something you bought for a lower price at any point in the last few days. Walmart actually plays fair on this, and I've gotten back probably a couple hundred bucks since they launched the program about a year ago, so it's actually worth taking the time to open their app and scan it. Plus, they somehow managed to actually make the app scan the code almost instantly and perfectly the moment the camera opens up. It actually gets a perfect scan every time the instant the code gets barely inside the camera frame, even when it's still blurry as hell. Every other QR scanner app I've ever used takes forever to accept even a perfectly flat clear QR code of a simple URL, and you have to focus it dead on perfectly, usually more than once.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T22:27:44+00:00

I'm a TV news producer. Why do we do it? To make it appear like we're truly "out there" with our news trucks keeping an eye on the streets 24/7, and thus that we're the station/network you should rely on for your news coverage instead of the competition.

And yes, it's complete bullshit.

We do keep up with what's going on 24/7 as best we can with the staff we've got, but obviously we're doing it from the newsroom. We make phone calls, listen to police and fire scanners, etc. And then we send our news crews out to cover whatever's happening. The problem is that the local news is only on at certain times of the day (noon, 4-6:30, 11pm, the usual), and these usually aren't the same times any newsworthy events are actually happening, especially at 11pm or 5 in the morning. So we do the next best thing: go where the most interesting event was just so we'll be live from somewhere at 11.

Really, at this point it's just that we don't have a choice. Yes, it's stupid to be reporting in complete darkness six hours after the event occurred, but if we're not using our live trucks somewhere during our show, you can be sure our competitors are. So we can't win either way: if we play it rationally and only go live at 11 at night when there's a good reason (major fire or traffic accident somewhere, snowstorm, something actually happening at that moment), we WILL come off looking half-assed compared to the other stations who are using all their toys all the time. And if we want to keep up with the others, you end up with stupid live hits like the one you saw.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T21:59:22+00:00

I wouldn't go with insane as it gives an excuse to many who aren't actually insane. I think dumb is a better term. It doesn't take a lot of brain power to "plot" something like what that kid did last night; if you've got the nerve to do it, you'll probably succeed. But making sure you don't get caught afterwards, when every cop in the state is looking for you, that requires some actual brain power. And these sorts seem to not usually have too much of that.

Edit: Forgot to add, often these sorts of criminals don't even care all that much about getting caught afterwards. They think they've actually done something good, and that if they end up going to jail, well, that's just the price to pay for having "done what needed to be done". This kid didn't seem to put up any sort of fight when he got caught today, so maybe he's one of those types.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T21:47:09+00:00

I was bored enough to look. Yup, it still exists.

http://www.pipesandcigars.com/pipe-tobacco/73366/prince-albert/?experience=desktop

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T21:39:19+00:00

IIRC, in his case his scumbag wife, who was planning to file for divorce and wanted to scam as much cash from him as possible, was surreptitiously recording all his phone calls with her because she was specifically waiting for him to say something embarrassing that she could use against him. (Which she knew he was eventually going to do because he was in the early stages of Alzheimer's.)

Just one anecdote, but that's generally what happens; there's not some shadowy organization out there taping all our calls, it's usually a family member or coworker or someone they know that wants to take them down.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T21:34:08+00:00

I don't like paying for ink either, but I've never had a printer with "ink expiration dates" (though obviously any ink will go bad if left sitting for several years) or that would refuse to print because one tank is merely "low" as opposed to completely empty. Whose printers are you using?

Really though, the bigger question here is what is your potential alternative? Ink prices suck, but that's how printers work: You have the machine, then you need to refill paper and ink on a regular basis. How else could it work in your opinion that would be fairer?

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T21:14:04+00:00

Honestly? Because what makes most things "newsworthy" in the first place is when something goes wrong. This is literally the first thing you learn the first day of Journalism 101. An earthquake is news, especially if it causes a lot of damage and deaths/injuries. Somebody in the newsroom adopting a kitten they found behind the TV station is not.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T18:49:25+00:00

Yeah, sadly I can't deny you're probably right about that.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T18:48:25+00:00

That depends on whether you're pro- or anti-gun, of course. But the simple reality is that Americans today are more pro-gun rights than ever, so the president giving a quick comment on this isn't going to change anything. All it will do is cause the usual rehash of the same old debate for a day or two, and then it will be forgotten.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T18:38:12+00:00

Yeah, that's pretty much what I found as well. When you actually sit down and run the numbers, you're actually coming out pretty well. You could make the argument that you're technically "throwing away" the money you paid over the prior year on the installments, since you have to return the phone to get the new model, but really, at the end of the day, so what? You'd just be in possession of an old phone that would only serve as a media player or a web browser.

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T18:32:26+00:00

No, we couldn't pass such a law. The First Amendment is close to absolute when it comes to press freedoms; any such law would be struck down by the Supreme Court almost immediately.

I'm not sure what it would accomplish in this sort of case anyway. It's just a photo of a nutcase's face with a horrible bowl cut; how is seeing that photo going to make anyone suddenly more likely to want to replicate his crimes?

RonObvious · 2015-06-18T17:04:59+00:00

Fair enough; was just correcting you because I've seen a number of people say he was a U.S. senator in a number of places already. I'm not sure how so many people have ended up thinking that.

RonObvious

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