New Microsoft Ad Campaign Targets Mac Prices

[polaris20]

Just teasing.

I always wondered why Americans who produce 25% of the world's CO2 are the least concerned of all when it comes to the environment, driving giant Humvees that get 1 MPG when everyone else is frantically trying to change their ways.

Then it hit me: Of course, it must be all those rapture-humping Christians. If they truly believe that the world will go under any day, it makes sense that they don't give jack about the environment since they think it'll only be around for 10 more days or so, not 10 million years...

Again, just teasing.

Not me sir! I drive a Scion/Toyota Xb and get 30mpg, to go along with my "environmentally friendly" MBP

And as an IT guy, I'm a huge advocate of virtualization in the data center. Consolidating 12-15 pizza boxes into one has got to be better for the environment, as it saves a lot of juice.

 

[Anuba]

Not me sir! I drive a Scion/Toyota Xb and get 30mpg, to go along with my "environmentally friendly" MBP

Good going!

I used to drive an Audi A2 which was way ahead of its time (it was introduced in 1999 long before global warming became a mantra). It only had 75 bhp and an 1.4L engine but ran like a rocket thanks to the aluminium unibody, it weighed what small cars used to weigh in the 70's (under 1000 kg) but still had all the modern safety bells & whistles and gave 45 mpg. It was like some Narnia closet, small on the outside but on the inside, four basketball players could stretch their legs, thanks to the back seat floor being several inches lower. More like a nano-van than a hatchback. The car was a huge flop, though, and they discontinued it in 2005. A year later people were suddenly lining up around the block for a supercompact that gave 40+ mpg, and Audi did the facepalm.

 

[KnightWRX]

In the end, 1 MPG cars are better for the environnement than 45 MPG cars. Huh what why ?

The faster we go through petrol reserves and the more the price climbs, the more people will look for alternatives that are non-polluting.

 

[tubbymac]

Just 2 more posts and this thread will beat out the Steve Job's Firewire thread and become the most replied news thread in all of MacRumors. GO GO GO!

 

[SkeffMBP]

Just 2 more posts and this thread will beat out the Steve Job's Firewire thread and become the most replied news thread in all of MacRumors. GO GO GO!

ONE MORE!!

 

[yossim]

Well, at least you don't live in the EU where the politicians have gone completely bonkers and plan to ban plasma TVs and regular lightbulbs (only LCD TVs and low-energy bulbs will be legal), and the tax makes up around 70% of the gas price (=U.S. price per gallon times 2).

wow! and I thought we had it bad here...

 

[yossim]

It seems like we're kind of getting off the subject. don't you think?

 

[Anuba]

In the end, 1 MPG cars are better for the environnement than 45 MPG cars. Huh what why ?

The faster we go through petrol reserves and the more the price climbs, the more people will look for alternatives that are non-polluting.

So then they will blow the entire oil reserve in a year, generating unprecentended pollution and 50 years worth of CO2, and then they'll turn to ethanol, all rain forests will be cut down and a tomato will cost $600. Great idea!

It seems like we're kind of getting off the subject. don't you think?

No doubt we're going OT but the Mac/PC arguments have been exhausted, the ad has been debated to death and the thread has become a subcommunity all of its own.

Oh and "-hh", the Dell Precisions w/ Nehalem are out today and for once I gotta hand it to Apple. Dell has apparently mistaken the Nehalems for Picasso paintings.

 

[NoSmokingBandit]

I love how this thread has nothing to do with the commercial any more

In the end, 1 MPG cars are better for the environnement than 45 MPG cars. Huh what why ?

The faster we go through petrol reserves and the more the price climbs, the more people will look for alternatives that are non-polluting.

This is true, but we need to keep enough oil to ween the population off slowly. Its not like everyone can go out and buy a hydrogen car if the started making them today.

I may be getting may hands on a diesel chevette soon and if i dont screw it up i plan on making it run on used veggie oil. Then im going to rig up a filtration system in my garage and convince local fast food shops to give me their waste oil from the fryers. If all goes well it will be epic.

 

[Jpoon]

In the end, 1 MPG cars are better for the environnement than 45 MPG cars. Huh what why ?

The faster we go through petrol reserves and the more the price climbs, the more people will look for alternatives that are non-polluting.

That doesn't mean it's right...

So, since Tuberculosis is developing more and more completely resistant strains, we should just let it kill off the people that are currently affected, as well as the communities that surround them?

It's the same thing. Less overpopulation, the disease dies out *kills all the many infected hosts*, and we move to solve the problem faster than we would have if it only killed some people every year. . .

I fail to see how that's a logical statement. We should just skip the more fuel efficient engines and find the damn alternative, or in the case of TB, stop making money off of the cure for the curable TB and work more on the currently non-curable TB.

 

[yossim]

.

 

[yossim]

I love how this thread has nothing to do with the commercial any more


This is true, but we need to keep enough oil to ween the population off slowly. Its not like everyone can go out and buy a hydrogen car if the started making them today.

I may be getting may hands on a diesel chevette soon and if i dont screw it up i plan on making it run on used veggie oil. Then im going to rig up a filtration system in my garage and convince local fast food shops to give me their waste oil from the fryers. If all goes well it will be epic.

ya, and then the irs will nail you for not paying gas tax...

 

[Jpoon]

It's funny how one reacts when they're on the other side of the game.

 

[Anuba]

I've heard that one volcano blast puts more pollution into the air than all the cars in history.

They need to get off the obsession with personal vehicles altogether because they're not the main culprits by a long shot. For example, I live in Sweden and we generate 0.2% of the world's CO2. Cars are responsible for 12.5% of these 0.2%, i.e. 0.00025% of the world's CO2. Even if all Swedes stopped driving for good, it would delay any impending disaster by, what, 15 minutes?

Furthermore, 30% of all CO2 emissions associated with a car during its lifespan are generated during manufacturing. If the governments force everyone to buy new, more fuel efficient cars at the same time, the manufacturing alone would generate a CO2 boom that's much larger than if we simply kept driving our current cars until they break down.

 

[Jpoon]

They need to get off the obsession with personal vehicles altogether because they're not the main culprits by a long shot. For example, I live in Sweden and we generate 0.2% of the world's CO2. Cars are responsible for 12.5% of these 0.2%, i.e. 0.00025% of the world's CO2. Even if all Swedes stopped driving for good, it would delay any impending disaster by, what, 15 minutes?

Furthermore, 30% of all CO2 emissions from a car during its lifespan are generated during manufacturing. If the governments force everyone to buy new, more fuel efficient cars at the same time, the manufacturing alone would generate a CO2 boom that's much larger than if we simply kept driving our current cars until they break down.

That's an extremely interesting thought there. If this is a true statement, then we're just prolonging the inevitable hehe.

 

[Anuba]

That's an extremely interesting thought there. If this is a true statement, then we're just prolonging the inevitable hehe.

It is a true statement (it takes lots of energy to manufacture cars), and the 30% figure is probably for "normal" cars. For a fuel efficient hybrid it might be more than 30% given that it will emit less CO2 than a normal car once it's out of the factory.

 

[KnightWRX]

So then they will blow the entire oil reserve in a year, generating unprecentended pollution and 50 years worth of CO2, and then they'll turn to ethanol, all rain forests will be cut down and a tomato will cost $600. Great idea!

CO2 isn't a problem. Guess what plants and trees live off of ? CO and unburnt carbon is the actual problem. And coal plants in the US are a much bigger source of pollution than cars, so the faster they run out of coal the better too.

And Ethanol isn't a solution and people are starting to realise it. It is much less efficient than petrol as far as energy production goes.

I was actually thinking of electric cars, powered by cleanly produced electricity (wind power, solar power, hydro power). If decision makers aren't blind and petrol runs out, we won't go to another polluting product like petrol next time.

 

[Anuba]

I was actually thinking of electric cars, powered by cleanly produced electricity (wind power, solar power, hydro power). If decision makers aren't blind and petrol runs out, we won't go to another polluting product like petrol next time.

That would be great of course, but the technology is still only in its infancy and if we ran out of petrol today people would follow the path of least resistance and turn to something true & tested which would be ethanol.

IMO they should drop the whole ethanol idea today, steer everyone over on green diesel cars that are much more energy efficient than gasoline cars, and then gradually move over from diesel via diesel hybrids to electric cars. If everyone went diesel today we'd get a few decades more out of the oil, leaving ample room for the development of alternatives.

 

[KnightWRX]

That would be great of course, but the technology is still only in its infancy and if we ran out of petrol today people would follow the path of least resistance and turn to something true & tested which would be ethanol.

The electric car is much better than you think. A lot of companies (including our own electric research center) have produced prototypes which can be mass produced that are fully electric with good autonomy and decent speeds.

If automakers hadn't bought out and shelved products left and right all these years, the electric car would be a reality today. The electric prototype I'm talking about (the wheel based engine) was bought out by a French car automaker and pretty much killed 10 years ago. The prototype car was a Dodge Intrepid, not some spacial age car with no room.

 

[polaris20]

Good going!

I used to drive an Audi A2 which was way ahead of its time (it was introduced in 1999 long before global warming became a mantra). It only had 75 bhp and an 1.4L engine but ran like a rocket thanks to the aluminium unibody, it weighed what small cars used to weigh in the 70's (under 1000 kg) but still had all the modern safety bells & whistles and gave 45 mpg. It was like some Narnia closet, small on the outside but on the inside, four basketball players could stretch their legs, thanks to the back seat floor being several inches lower. More like a nano-van than a hatchback. The car was a huge flop, though, and they discontinued it in 2005. A year later people were suddenly lining up around the block for a supercompact that gave 40+ mpg, and Audi did the facepalm.

Sweet car! I was actually giggling a little bit with the car analogies when the hatchback thing came up. I actually love hatchbacks, the GTI/Rabbit/A3 in particular, and was 10 minutes away from buying a used 2008 GTI. The thing that killed it is the shady exhaust job the previous owner did, as well as the fact that it was the 2-door, not the 4-door (family needs).

 

[-hh]

Fair enough.


"Spin"? Do you really need proof that Americans don't like hatchbacks?

I agree, but that's not the point: the point is that Audi was "denying consumer choice" by not even offering to sell the product: the same thing that you criticize Apple for doing.

You defend Audi, effectively saying: "...but they wouldn't make a profit on it".

We can go on with our analysis of the automotive industry, but my point is that you then don't provide the same detail to understand the viability of Apple's business plans: you simply condemn them without ever proving that your assumptions & claims are correct (and by extension, that Apple is wrong).

I'm sure that there were some Americans who wanted the A2 or the A3, although at least they could've gone to another country (maybe even Canada?) to buy one.

Sorry - not a viable option with US DoT regulations.

Each brand has a tailor made lineup for each market. Where do I go to get the xMac? Russia? Brazil? That's right, Apple doesn't adapt to any local markets. It's their way or the highway.

And ditto for the Porsche pickup truck. It doesn't fit their business plan.

...Those sales wouldn't even have recouped the marketing costs. Compare that to the >50% of Apple's potential customer base who would buy the proverbial "xMac" in a split second.

The loud yammerings of the 0.01% of Mac enthusiasts on this website do not constitute adequate research to build a viable, defendable business case.

If nothing else, you're neglecting another one of those Undergrad Economics 102 elements, called "price elasticity".


But I will offer you this, free and clear: if I'm wrong and Apple releases an xMac within the next year and as a clear result, Apple's marketshare increases by the 50% that you claim that it will ...we'll call 'immediate' to be 6 months... I'll fly over to Sweden and take you & your girlfriend out for a nice dinner in Stockholm (or closer to home for you; your choice), all at my own expense.

Or if you prefer, I'll burn some of my FF miles to fly you to NYC and you can take me out to the best Swedish restaurant you can find in town.


-hh

 

[Trajectory]

So I guess all the car analogies have led to this thread now being about cars?

 

[polaris20]

That would be great of course, but the technology is still only in its infancy and if we ran out of petrol today people would follow the path of least resistance and turn to something true & tested which would be ethanol.

IMO they should drop the whole ethanol idea today, steer everyone over on green diesel cars that are much more energy efficient than gasoline cars, and then gradually move over from diesel via diesel hybrids to electric cars. If everyone went diesel today we'd get a few decades more out of the oil, leaving ample room for the development of alternatives.

Ethanol is definitely a dead end.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the new lithium ion tech that charges in like 30-60 seconds (MIT) and the new ultra capacitor stuff. Either way some cool potential.

 

[cjm3113]

Ethanol is definitely a dead end.

It'll be interesting to see what happens with the new lithium ion tech that charges in like 30-60 seconds (MIT) and the new ultra capacitor stuff. Either way some cool potential.

Electric cars have no future. The energy potential is much too low compared to liquid fuel.

 

[iMpathetic]

My thoughts on this thread(shorthand):

-- The computer Lauren bought is a lump of excrement.
-- Apple's prices are outrageous.
-- If you think otherwise, you either live under a rock or have vast sums of money at your disposal.
-- This is why I'm so glad the OS X x86 project exists.
-- Hac users aren't cool enough for either group. In fact, they're basically rounding up Jobs and Gates and b*tch slapping both of them AT THE SAME TIME.

But, yeah, I don't like the self-righteous kumbaya crowd or their eco-friendly green movement.

I like the being green part, but not the BS-spewing industry that has grown from it.

I like a lot of the kumbaya crowd, actually.... just not the self-righteous one.

That Audi A2 is awesome.