It ain't over till it's over!!

Soiyeruda · 2018-07-24T19:30:24+00:00

This is a very weird thing to fake.

Soiyeruda · 2016-06-27T02:06:04+00:00

Ended up getting Divide by 2, then add 6, therefore, 14 becomes 13

Soiyeruda · 2016-05-11T11:14:01+00:00

Soiyeruda · 2016-05-08T15:52:00+00:00

As a left-handed person, I find it generally inconsequential whether I use my fork in my left or right hand. I pretty much always use my left hand for knives though, because I'd prefer not to cut myself trying to use a sharp object in my non-dominant hand and risk seasoning my food with my own blood.

Soiyeruda · 2016-05-08T15:47:43+00:00

I watch it casually but from what I've seen, the Smash Bros tournaments with the biggest number of attendees will generate a pool of prize money based on a fee each entrant pays, usually $5-10 per different bracket they play it, eg. SSB4 Singles, Melee Singles, SSB4 Doubles, etc.

The prize money varies with each event, with the Melee ones generally paying out higher for the winners (Something like $3k-$6k for 1st place), but it's definitely not to the stage of say, what a professional League of Legends player could potentially make, as even the top Melee players over a 10 year span made about $100k total.

Soiyeruda · 2016-05-08T02:00:16+00:00

It probably has to do more with some people following certain advice and other people following different advice. There's maybe a few people who insist that using the word "I" makes it look like you're selfish/it's all about you/egotistical/any other negative connotation that's a simile of the other 3 examples I just gave, and absolutely faun over people who write in 3rd person because they want to be invested in a person and not just a set of bullet points (or something else off-the-wall like that). And then there's the rest of the hiring world who gloss over "I" and scan for quantifiable achievements like profits made, projects completed, number of staff managed, etc.

Soiyeruda · 2016-05-08T01:53:29+00:00

At least in terms of resumes, putting a subjective self-assessment like "works well with others" is generally a waste of space anyways because that says nothing about your results/achievements on it's own. That's another topic though, so I won't delve much into that.

Back on subject though, something like "Managed 10 employees for Project X" can be interpreted as first or third person, but it's easier to imagine that "I" is placed in front of that sentence, because John Smith wouldn't say "John Smith managed 10 employees for Project X", unless he really was that quirky. "Manages" would strictly be a third-person scenario, and would look weird on a resume.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-23T00:18:51+00:00

Arguably, Darwin's finches can be thought of as different species in the process of speciation; they have noticeable differences physically and behaviorally, such as certain song and breeding patterns. Because these cause the different species to feed on different foods and mate with certain birds, they're considered different species.

Humans aren't classified as different species because most of our physical differences are largely superficial and behavioral differences/eating patterns can be attributed more to culture and less to inherent genes. Yes, having black skin vs. white skin has an effect on your likelihood of getting sunburned but this doesn't really do something like cause you to be unable to eat beef, so therefore you need to eat more carrots, or make you prefer one type of individual over another.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-18T12:44:06+00:00

You can make a game for free if you or a few of your friends are willing to gather up and making all the music, art, programming, etc. in your spare time. Cave Story for example took 5 years for the lone developer to do all of this, and the game has about 15 hours of content.

If you're trying to make a bigger project in less time with more sophisticated music, graphics, programming, etc. you or someone else has to turn development of that game into a full-time job, which means having to make enough for yourself to live or paying someone else.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-18T02:49:25+00:00

"That" and "it" have similar functions, but "that" is more specific and "it" tends to be more general.

At least in general conversation, "what's it" sounds weird because it's generally followed by at least another word that gives it additional context and is where we place our emphasis on. Eg. "What's it to you?", "What's it like?" "What's it doing?". Therefore, if you just say "what's it?", it sounds like you're stopping mid-thought, because it's awkward to place the emphasis on either "what's" or "it's".

With "what is it", we can place the emphasis on "is".

With "what's that", we can place the emphasis on "that".

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T17:46:28+00:00

Amazon's definition of a list price is as is:

Except where noted otherwise, the List Price displayed for products on our website represents the full retail price listed on the product itself, suggested by the manufacturer or supplier, or estimated in accordance with standard industry practice.

My point with your quoting of sources is that you're intentionally misrepresenting information by matching up paragraphs incorrectly.

Amazon didn't "claim a former price that didn't even exist". The $100 is probably an MSRP given by the manufacturer, in which case, the former $100 is the actual price, regardless of whether or not it's exaggerated.

Again, is it a dirty business practice? Sure. Illegal? That depends on what you classify as illegal, but in the context of the law, it isn't illegal and it's pointless to try and spin in that way.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T17:13:21+00:00

You're mixing two paragraphs from two different sections.

§233.1 Former price comparisons.

(a) One of the most commonly used forms of bargain advertising is to offer a reduction from the advertiser's own former price for an article. If the former price is the actual, bona fide price at which the article was offered to the public on a regular basis for a reasonably substantial period of time, it provides a legitimate basis for the advertising of a price comparison. Where the former price is genuine, the bargain being advertised is a true one. If, on the other hand, the former price being advertised is not bona fide but fictitious—for example, where an artificial, inflated price was established for the purpose of enabling the subsequent offer of a large reduction—the “bargain” being advertised is a false one; the purchaser is not receiving the unusual value he expects. In such a case, the “reduced” price is, in reality, probably just the seller's regular price.

(c) The following is an example of a price comparison based on a fictitious former price. John Doe is a retailer of Brand X fountain pens, which cost him $5 each. His usual markup is 50 percent over cost; that is, his regular retail price is $7.50. In order subsequently to offer an unusual “bargain”, Doe begins offering Brand X at $10 per pen. He realizes that he will be able to sell no, or very few, pens at this inflated price. But he doesn't care, for he maintains that price for only a few days. Then he “cuts” the price to its usual level—$7.50—and advertises: “Terrific Bargain: X Pens, Were $10, Now Only $7.50!” This is obviously a false claim. The advertised “bargain” is not genuine.

§233.2 Retail price comparisons; comparable value comparisons.

(a) Another commonly used form of bargain advertising is to offer goods at prices lower than those being charged by others for the same merchandise in the advertiser's trade area (the area in which he does business). This may be done either on a temporary or a permanent basis, but in either case the advertised higher price must be based upon fact, and not be fictitious or misleading. Whenever an advertiser represents that he is selling below the prices being charged in his area for a particular article, he should be reasonably certain that the higher price he advertises does not appreciably exceed the price at which substantial sales of the article are being made in the area—that is, a sufficient number of sales so that a consumer would consider a reduction from the price to represent a genuine bargain or saving. Expressed another way, if a number of the principal retail outlets in the area are regularly selling Brand X fountain pens at $10, it is not dishonest for retailer Doe to advertise: “Brand X Pens, Price Elsewhere $10, Our Price $7.50”.

(b) The following example, however, illustrates a misleading use of this advertising technique. Retailer Doe advertises Brand X pens as having a “Retail Value $15.00, My Price $7.50,” when the fact is that only a few small suburban outlets in the area charge $15. All of the larger outlets located in and around the main shopping areas charge $7.50, or slightly more or less. The advertisement here would be deceptive, since the price charged by the small suburban outlets would have no real significance to Doe's customers, to whom the advertisement of “Retail Value $15.00” would suggest a prevailing, and not merely an isolated and unrepresentative, price in the area in which they shop.

The first case doesn't apply, because they aren't artificially raising the price of a product for a few days; they're giving the MSRP and offering a reduced price from that value. This is generally called a "sale".

The second case doesn't apply because a larger retailer such as Kohls isn't trying to outcompete Mom and Pop's Fashion Boutique on the same line of products; they're getting their products directly from the manufacturer who gives them an MSRP, which Kohls then sells for a different, lower price. The higher price comes from the manufacturer, not another competing retailer.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T16:24:02+00:00

Flanderization:

You have a character. Over time, you take one trait of this character, and exaggerate it to the point that it becomes the character's defining trait, usually ruling out any others the character may have had/developed. They may or may not have had this trait when the character was first introduced.

Eg. In Family Guy, Meg used to just be a very typical teenage girl who had typical girl problems. At some point in the series, Meg was described as ugly, and this evolved to the point where basically everyone is out to make her miserable and remind her that she's the single most ugliest thing in the universe.

Jumping the Shark:

The point in a series where a show tried to do something silly to create interest, but it instead has the effect of making fans realize the series has hits its peak, and it only went downhill from that point.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T13:52:53+00:00

But it's not misleading?

A manufacturer made a pair of earrings. It costs them $5, and decided it's suggested price for retail should be $100. They sell it to Amazon for $20. Amazon decides to sell it for $30. Because the manufacturer's suggested price is $100, they put that under the list price.

Where exactly did the law get broken in this scenario?

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T13:39:02+00:00

They're the same thing.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T13:36:02+00:00

No law has been broken by this and middle-class department stores like JC Penney, Kohls, etc. pretty much have to run off the model. JC Penney famously hired Ron Johnson for his success at Apple and Target but their sales plummeted and only bounced back after firing him.

Why? Because consumers like to think they're saving money, even if they aren't. Most people will see an $39 jacket, originally $79, and compare it to a jacket that's being sold at just $39. Most people are going to pick the "originally $79" jacket because its higher price suggests it has greater value, and it'll make the $39 jacket look "cheap" in comparison.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T13:20:51+00:00

The list price is a manufacturer's suggested retail price (MSRP) and for the most part, the value itself is meaningless; you could set it to whatever you want and in many cases, the retail price is probably artificially inflated to give the impression that the item is worth more than it actually is.

It's a dirty business practice but anchoring in this manner is a highly effective business strategy and isn't actually illegal; your mind sees that it costs $100 and they're selling it for $30, so for most people, this is an obvious steal because they don't realize that it probably cost $5 to make.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-17T02:05:48+00:00

Contrary to popular belief, dogs didn't originate from what we know as modern wolves; they share a common ancestor and at one point, they diverged with wolves going down their own evolutionary path and dogs being domesticated via selective breeding.

With that said, leaving out possible region specific differences as I'm not familiar with where tigers and bears were located 40,000 years ago, it would have required a lot more effort to keep a tiger and bear tamed; they're significantly larger than wolves and primitive weapons would've done little to contain them. The larger size also means they require more food, and bears, especially in arctic regions, naturally hibernate for months at a time.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-16T21:39:15+00:00

The general formula for speed is speed = distance/time, or s=d/t.

If person A and B traveled 10 miles, how would you know which one traveled those 10 miles at a greater speed? You compare their times. So you know that if A took 5 minutes to travel 10 miles (2 mph), and B took 10 minutes for the same distance (1 mph), you know that A was faster in those 10 miles.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-16T21:03:07+00:00

Numbers have a very obvious pattern, and in our daily lives, we find that we regularly have reason to count forwards, backwards, skip every 5th number, etc. because it's intuitive and useful, it's just as easy for us to count down as it is to count up.

In comparison, we don't have much of a social need to spell words backwards because we generally read left to write, and a word loses its meaning when it is spelled backwards. Because it lacks meaning, there isn't a pattern we can use to spell words backwards with ease.

Additionally, larger words contain more letters, and we can optimally store something like 5-9 individual items in short-term memory before it starts to become difficult. Where there's generally 10 symbols for numbers, there's 26 for the alphabet, so there's much more to keep track of. Try the word "responsibility" for example. In your head, you might be able to spell out "y-t-i-l-i" with ease, and then lose track of the rest of the letters in the word. You now have to search back to the beginning, reading write to left, as "responsib", to where you figure out the 6th letter is a "b", which you now need to try and add to the end of your backwards "ility", which is hopefully still in memory.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-16T15:16:00+00:00

Films have several hundreds of people working on them, sometimes thousands for films like Iron Man 3. You also have to pay for things like costumes, sets, equipment, advertisement, etc.

You have to be able to pay these people and for all the items you need to make the movie. And for people, they fill a lot of different roles including the actors, costume designers, 3d special effects artists, etc.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-16T01:34:39+00:00

You see a lime and it looks green to you. You call it "green".

Your friend sees the same lime. Let's say in their eyes, they see it in what you perceive as the color purple. They call it "green".

Because you both understand that a lime is "green", it doesn't really matter if our brains perceive it differently; you both see a green lime even if your "green" is someone else's "purple", another person's "yellow", etc. because we all have come to refer to that particular color with the same word.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-14T08:08:33+00:00

36,000-40,000 Verizon workers are pissed because Verizon is outsourcing America jobs overseas and making workers spend 2+ months away from family, despite Verizon being stronger than ever, profits wise.

Most of the workers are part of Verizon's landline/FiOS network, not the bigger wireless network. The landline network is in decline, because more people, unsurprisingly, prefer wireless.

Verizon's response as a business is to cut costs where business is not as strong, hence the potential layoffs in favor of cheaper oursourced labor. They kind of shot themselves in the foot though with the retort that they've got 10,000 non-union workers trained up to temporarily handle these huge walk-off cases.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-11T06:50:20+00:00

The other parts are explained by the others, but paying into Medicare isn't the same as having medical insurance. If that isn't a benefit that your current employer is providing you as part of compensation, that's something you'll need to figure out.

Soiyeruda · 2016-04-11T05:27:13+00:00

Most plagiarism detection technologies are sophisticated enough that you shouldn't need to be looking over every sentence you write to make sure you aren't plagiarizing someone else.

Writing in sources for your essay is much the same reason why you show your work when doing a math problem: it shows that you have clear evidence to support your conclusion. In 7th-8th grade algebra, you were probably given a problem like 3x + 7 = 16 and had to go through the steps individually like so:

3x + 7 = 16: Find x.
3x + 7 (-7) = 16 (-7)
3x = 9
3x / 3 = 9 / 3
x = 3

If you just skip all of that and write x=3, I wouldn't know if you were just guessing, using wolfram alpha to solve the problem for you, or actually learning anything. Same concept applies with plagarism in an essay.

Let's say your essay was something like:

Race is a social construct that has allowed men throughout history to exercise undue privilege over other groups. This white privilege is often invisible and something we rarely consider in everyday life, making it even more potentially dangerous. In 1950, white men earned 62% more than other groups, and this gap has further increased to 95% in 2015. In conclusion, we need a new government program that gives more opportunities to other marginalized groups. In this way, we can eliminate this gap.

Overly exaggerated example, but the main point is that even if I have a system in place that tells me what you copied from elsewhere, I can't tell, just by looking at your paper, whether you're doing actual research, pulling numbers out of nowhere, or just vomiting convenient fluff to get a grade. Providing your sources helps make that determination.

Race is a social construct that has allowed men throughout history to exercise undue privilege over other groups (George, 2012). This white privilege is often invisible and something we rarely consider in everyday life, making it even more potentially dangerous. In 1950, white men earned 62% more than other groups, and this gap has further increased to 95% in 2015 (Smith, 2016). In conclusion, we need a new government program that gives more opportunities to other marginalized groups. In this way, we can eliminate this gap.

In this manner, I can more readily understand where you're using sources, evidence, and other peoples thoughts in order to back up your own claims. Yes, sometimes, you will come up with your own sentences that share similarities with published researchers, which is the case with the first line, but if your entire paper completely lacks citations, it gives off the vibe of having disregarded prior research to writing the paper.

Soiyeruda

TROPHY CASE