Category: technology

If you had bought Apple stock instead of a PS3…

ps4logo

You’d have made a hell of a lot of money.

Sony announced their next console, the Playstation 4 today. They didn’t unveil the actual machine or give its cost. But, it got the internet buzzing with hype, argument, and discussion.

But, unlike every other time a next generation console has been announced the news left me unphased. On twitter I attributed this to growing up. Some people took offense to that. I didn’t mean it in the sense that video games are for kids but more that I’m growing out of them perhaps.

After being told about the announcement and reading some articles I still couldn’t care much about it. Instead I found myself thinking about what I could have done with the money I earned instead of buying a new console. Or what I could have done with the money I have used to buy consoles in the past.

And so a thought experiment was born! The Playstation 3 came out on November 11, 2006 in two version. A 20 gig rig that retailed for $499 and a 60 gig version that sold for $599. On that same date a single share of Apple’s stock was selling for $83.12.

With the money you would have spent on the 20 gig version you could have bought six shares of Apple stock (we’ll round down and say 7 stocks if you sprang for the 60 gig version.) Seven years go by. Today, I can go on ebay and buy a 20 gig original PS3 for between $40-$70. Sixty gig versions go for around $100. A deprecation in value of  84 to 92 percent?!

As of the writing of this posts Apple’s stock was selling for $448.85 per share. So, your six apple stocks would be worth $2693.10 for an increase in value of 540 percent! Quite the deal!

Of course in 2006 I wasn’t married or working full time or contemplating buying a house. Still, if I had bought the stocks then I could have made money and bought a PS3 now and still come out ahead. Just think about that this fall when you rush out to buy the new one…

*this is all of the cuff maths so if I made a mistake I apologize. Regardless, the stock purchase would have done you a lot better than the PS3 one.

Green Up your Clean

Isn't it insane that there is a STANDARD for such pictures?
If you google images of cleaning supplies you’ll note that MY picture conforms nicely to the standard.

Cleaning it’s a Sisyphean task. As soon as you’re done you’ve got to do it again. Just another front of Humanity’s endless war against entropy. But you don’t have to help entropy along by using harsh chemicals that muck up our waterways, damage our skin, and do harm to our fellow travelers (critters and such.)

So, here are some “friendly” alternatives to the more common cleaning agents!

Comet: Used to “disinfect and clean tough stains” Comet usually finds duty in the bathroom where it’s used to clean tubs and toilets. The primary ingredient is dichloroisocyanuric acid that reacts to water and becomes hypochlorous acid, a chemical similar to bleach. Instead of using Comet you can use Bon Ami’s powder cleanser it is biodegradable, non-toxic, and hypoallergenic.

Pledge: Used to clean and dust. Pledge is mostly propane, butane, and lighter fluid mixed in water. Instead of covering your wood products in propellants and fuels every week try using Earth Friendly Product’s furniture polisher with olive and orange oil.

Formula 409: Used as a general/all purpose cleaner. Formula 409 contains 2-butoxyethanol a carcinogen and ethylene oxide a highly toxic material. Instead of using Formula 409 try Seventh Generation’s Free & Clear all purpose cleaner. Free & Clear contains only plant derivatives and baking soda.

Windex: Used to clean glass surfaces Windex is mostly water with small amounts of ethylene glycol (antifreeze) and rubbing alcohol. Give Citra-Clear a try it contains natural plant ingredients suspended in ethanol (booze.)

There you have it some good alternatives to the chemical rich, petroleum derived cleaners we usually use. If you make the switch let me know what you thought of any of these products. Or, if you use something else share it in the comments below!

Going Digital: Books

Maybe a fifth of the books I removed from my library...

D and I are moving in the fall to the San Diego area; she got a job doing science stuff at the University of California there. The move is still a few months away but the two of us have started looking around at all of our stuff and asking ourselves, “Do I want to cart this across the state?” For a surprisingly large amount of things the answer is, “no, I don’t.” This is especially true for books now that I have a kindle. As I looked over my bookshelves I noticed that a great deal of the books on the shelves were over 100 years old and they were now in the public domain. With the kindle (or my computer) I can have access to those books without having them take up all this physical space. I did this over a decade ago with my music collection and had been putting it off with books because I love them so and the technology just wasn’t there yet, that isn’t the case anymore. So, I started sorting…

I know what you’re saying! Getting rid of books is a crime. I used to think so to, but what I really love about a book is not the binding, or the paper, or the ink though with some books those are very nice things. What I love about a book is that it allows me to experience another person’s thoughts and ideas. That is what makes books amazing and for their time they were the most efficient and effective way to spread ideas. That isn’t the case anymore though.

Another pile of books that I no longer need to have around physically

For every book that I knew I wanted to keep I checked Amazon’s Kindle store and Project Gutenberg; if a free copy existed I downloaded it and set the book aside. For every book that I wanted to keep but there wasn’t a free version available on-line I looked for a $0.99 version. If there was one I purchased it. I splurged a few times and spent $1.99 or $2.99 for a digital collection that would replace multiple physical books. After I had downloaded all the books I was going to I went back to the stack of books and started entering them into Amazon’s Trade-in store to see if Amazon was interested in buying a copy from me. Every book Amazon wanted went into a box to ship to them, every book they didn’t went into another stack. At the end of that process I had one 40 pd box of books to send to Amazon and another stack to put up on Freecycle.

All these classics now take up less than 5 megabytes on my hard drive

Amazon offered me $78.81 for all those books. I spent $12.93 picking up digital editions. That’s a net gain of $65.88!

 

EDIT: I made a second pass through my library and found more books that are available digitally, so I repeated the process and sent off another box to Amazon! This time they’re giving me $27.42

Having so few physical books means I can cover my walls with art instead of bookshelves

In the last week I’ve eliminated two entire bookshelves worth of books! The now empty bookshelves have gone up on Craigslist.

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