The fiber biz has been placed in Alphabet now, as opposed to Google. They state that they’re running it as a profitable business. (Which does not preclude grants. Dunno.)
Tho I love Austin, with its extreme traffic and trendiness and expensiveness, don’t much wanna live there.
But Google/Alphabet has announced that San Antonio will be getting fiber. When you combine that with the weather, the food!!!, the quality of life, being on the edge of the Hill Country, the cost of living, and the cost of rural land within a 2 hour drive, that sounds pretty tempting.
@f00l I don’t really care for Austin. It’s pretty country but people seem very trendy and image-conscious there. I haven’t spent a lot of time in San Antonio but I like it best of the cities in that part of the world. Pretty country, the people feel more real, I love the old houses in the central area. I’ve always said it’s what El Paso would be like if we had money and water.
The Austin of my childhood and my twenties was a smallish, gorgeous, weird, unassuming city with few hassles, amazing food, full of normal people and hippies and ex-students and professors and lobbyists and legislators and journalists all mixing happily. Anything went. But no traffic and still a tiny place. You could get anywhere by walking or biking. Parking never a prob. Everyone wanted never to leave.
And now it’s a sort of monstrosity. Got too big and self-conscious and rich for its own good. I love it. In small doses.
If I were choosing a largish city in Texas to live in, with no family or other personal considerations or other location constraints, San Antonio wins easily.
DFW (well, Dallas, Carrollton, Plano, and Frisco anyway) and Houston are too self-consciously striving and too obsessed with growth and image. And traffic sux. And El Paso is lovely but so damned far away from everything except Juarez.
San Antonio is just a great place with history and beauty and astonishing food and culture.
@f00l Used to spend a lot more time in SA & Austin back in the day (15yr ago). Not able to account for differential changes since then (I will still blame you), I would still choose to live in Austin for 1 primary reason: the live music is unsurpassed.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Understand. And Austin food and culture are great.
But Austin traffic …, now way worse than anything in DFW or Houston and all the time everywhere bad. If you are driving down the jams start at either Temple or Georgetown depending. Traffic is so bad that a lot of people are stuck in their neighborhoods because it’s such as hassle to go somewhere.
And housing there costs like they think it’s California. No relation to real estate riding in DFW or Houston. And other costs, such ad restaurants charges, have escalated with the housing.
If you had a well-paying job you like there, and could afford decent housing close in, maybe it would be a great place to live. Students aren’t moving off campus like they used to. Much harder to afford a student apt if your parents aren’t in the top 5%.
San Antonio - or perhaps East Austin or San Marcos or something - might offer generally far better life quality.
Well, this one is my next door neighbor. Really. Less than a quarter mile from my house. And it didn’t explode. Close, but no sheBANG, so to speak. And all of us living around it are perfectly normal. PERFECTLY NORMAL, I tell you!
@f00l The standard number, in my case. But my Dad’s brother married my Mother’s aunt, so their children were my Dad’s nieces and nephews, my Mother’s first cousins, and my first cousins. (Anyone who doesn’t have at least one oddity like that in the family tree can’t claim to be a native.)
People always want to meet the ones they see on TV in person, so seeing someone in person is better, right? So why do friends who get interviewed for 20 seconds for the news get so excited by being on TV? “Did you see me on TV? Did you?” “Um, but I see you in person every day, so why would I need to see you on TV?” “But I was ON TV !”
Getting to be on TV is for some reason a little like getting to meet the President or getting to win a fancy trip to Hawaii.
Every day isn’t anyone’s special moment. You gotta respect those special moments. The people who receive special moments sometimes think you outta worship theirs.
@f00l Around here it seems you see a house on fire, you run home gather a bag of old clothes, call the tv station to meet you at the fire, then call the fire dept.
@f00l My money would be on overpopulation. But then, having the knowledge and means to control population, but not doing it, probably falls under the “stupidity” heading.
@rockblossom Along those lines, why aren’t vision and dental considered medical expenses? Especially considering heart disease is the #1 killer and periodontal disease includes bacteria which can spread to the heart.
@cranky1950 And because we still have our heads up our asses about preventive versus acute care costs. The insurance agencies ought to be all over preventive care, it saves them a fortune over acute care, but they are still thinking backwards.
I don’t understand the question. Breeder reactors were never a threat. The same people terrified of breeder reactors were the people who prevented us responsibly disposing of nuclear waste and moving to MSR. Is this a joke?
@unksol Breeder reactor was a bad choice of names. Take something that’s scary to a lot of people, then put the word “breeder” in front of it, which suggests the potential for uncontrolled replication.
@cranky1950 So obviously even more evil than Cruella DeVille. She wanted to murder Dalmation puppies, which are unbearably precious, but still not as cute as flopsy eared Beagle puppies.
Newer, more immediate threats.
How come Google fiber is so expensive and they’re putting in slums first?
@cranky1950
Interesting notes available through Wikipedia on Fiber.
@cranky1950
Google is so rich they don’t budget.
@f00l Sounds like my wife
@cranky1950 You’re cranky.
@cranky1950 I know nothing about this but it sounds like they may have gotten grants to defray the cost.
@moondrake
The fiber biz has been placed in Alphabet now, as opposed to Google. They state that they’re running it as a profitable business. (Which does not preclude grants. Dunno.)
Tho I love Austin, with its extreme traffic and trendiness and expensiveness, don’t much wanna live there.
But Google/Alphabet has announced that San Antonio will be getting fiber. When you combine that with the weather, the food!!!, the quality of life, being on the edge of the Hill Country, the cost of living, and the cost of rural land within a 2 hour drive, that sounds pretty tempting.
@f00l I don’t really care for Austin. It’s pretty country but people seem very trendy and image-conscious there. I haven’t spent a lot of time in San Antonio but I like it best of the cities in that part of the world. Pretty country, the people feel more real, I love the old houses in the central area. I’ve always said it’s what El Paso would be like if we had money and water.
@moondrake
The Austin of my childhood and my twenties was a smallish, gorgeous, weird, unassuming city with few hassles, amazing food, full of normal people and hippies and ex-students and professors and lobbyists and legislators and journalists all mixing happily. Anything went. But no traffic and still a tiny place. You could get anywhere by walking or biking. Parking never a prob. Everyone wanted never to leave.
And now it’s a sort of monstrosity. Got too big and self-conscious and rich for its own good. I love it. In small doses.
If I were choosing a largish city in Texas to live in, with no family or other personal considerations or other location constraints, San Antonio wins easily.
DFW (well, Dallas, Carrollton, Plano, and Frisco anyway) and Houston are too self-consciously striving and too obsessed with growth and image. And traffic sux. And El Paso is lovely but so damned far away from everything except Juarez.
San Antonio is just a great place with history and beauty and astonishing food and culture.
@f00l Used to spend a lot more time in SA & Austin back in the day (15yr ago). Not able to account for differential changes since then (I will still blame you), I would still choose to live in Austin for 1 primary reason: the live music is unsurpassed.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@cranky1950 $50 a month for 100mbps connection with no usage limits is expensive?
@compunaut
Understand. And Austin food and culture are great.
But Austin traffic …, now way worse than anything in DFW or Houston and all the time everywhere bad. If you are driving down the jams start at either Temple or Georgetown depending. Traffic is so bad that a lot of people are stuck in their neighborhoods because it’s such as hassle to go somewhere.
And housing there costs like they think it’s California. No relation to real estate riding in DFW or Houston. And other costs, such ad restaurants charges, have escalated with the housing.
If you had a well-paying job you like there, and could afford decent housing close in, maybe it would be a great place to live. Students aren’t moving off campus like they used to. Much harder to afford a student apt if your parents aren’t in the top 5%.
San Antonio - or perhaps East Austin or San Marcos or something - might offer generally far better life quality.
@thismyusername The page I saw originally, the cheapest rate was $110.
because the african swallow isn’t a migratory bird?
@Yoda_Daenerys
Spoken like a breeder.
You’re cranky.
Because particle accelerators are going to create a black hole and swallow the breeder reactors.
@parodymandotcom This could be so much fun on the right forum.
How come the bigger the company the shittier the network?
@cranky1950
/image “we don’t care. We don’t have to.”
@cranky1950
Ernestine assists General Motors
Lots of Ernestine
Joan Rivers interviews Ernestine
Well, this one is my next door neighbor. Really. Less than a quarter mile from my house. And it didn’t explode. Close, but no sheBANG, so to speak. And all of us living around it are perfectly normal. PERFECTLY NORMAL, I tell you!
@rockblossom
I can’t tell that you’re a mutant from here.
/giphy mutant
@rockblossom Sure but then again you’re talking Arkansas normal, Walmart normal.
@cranky1950 Well, a lot of the kids around here have extra fingers and toes, but I’m pretty sure that’s from the inbreeding, not the radiation.
@rockblossom Or both? Look what happened to the Oak Ridge Boys.
@rockblossom
How many brother-uncle-dads and sister-niece-grandmothers do you have?
@f00l None that I know of but a lot of the kids in my extended family seem to resemble my father.
@f00l The standard number, in my case. But my Dad’s brother married my Mother’s aunt, so their children were my Dad’s nieces and nephews, my Mother’s first cousins, and my first cousins. (Anyone who doesn’t have at least one oddity like that in the family tree can’t claim to be a native.)
People always want to meet the ones they see on TV in person, so seeing someone in person is better, right? So why do friends who get interviewed for 20 seconds for the news get so excited by being on TV? “Did you see me on TV? Did you?” “Um, but I see you in person every day, so why would I need to see you on TV?” “But I was ON TV !”
@rockblossom
Getting to be on TV is for some reason a little like getting to meet the President or getting to win a fancy trip to Hawaii.
Every day isn’t anyone’s special moment. You gotta respect those special moments. The people who receive special moments sometimes think you outta worship theirs.
@f00l Around here it seems you see a house on fire, you run home gather a bag of old clothes, call the tv station to meet you at the fire, then call the fire dept.
@cranky1950
Gotta love the South.
@rockblossom
/youtube
Some of us need a reason to get up in the morning.
Complacency is going to be the thing that destroys the human race.
@SSteve
I’d vote for all the 7 sins plus a few more including stupidity.
@f00l My money would be on overpopulation. But then, having the knowledge and means to control population, but not doing it, probably falls under the “stupidity” heading.
@rockblossom I go with Glorified Stupidity it seems to be spreading through the world.
@cranky1950 http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x41k6q4
@SSteve I should do something about that but I’m gonna watch football instead.
@rockblossom yeah, I call the World Population Clock the Doomsday Clock.
http://www.theworldcounts.com/counters/shocking_environmental_facts_and_statistics/world_population_clock_live
How come: Medicare, for people over 65, does not cover any of the cost for eyeglasses or hearing aids, but it DOES cover prenatal care?
@rockblossom
Because benefits that are strictly theoretical are cheaper than benefits people might need and use?
@rockblossom Along those lines, why aren’t vision and dental considered medical expenses? Especially considering heart disease is the #1 killer and periodontal disease includes bacteria which can spread to the heart.
@moondrake Because they cost money and are benifits that people will use.
@cranky1950 And because we still have our heads up our asses about preventive versus acute care costs. The insurance agencies ought to be all over preventive care, it saves them a fortune over acute care, but they are still thinking backwards.
Because if they were going to do it, it would have happened in the shitty year ~2016~
@mfladd
Saw a headline saying that if we thought 2016 was bad, 2017 will be even worse.
Refused to read the article, so I’m not sure in what way they were talking about.
I don’t understand the question. Breeder reactors were never a threat. The same people terrified of breeder reactors were the people who prevented us responsibly disposing of nuclear waste and moving to MSR. Is this a joke?
@unksol Donald Trump just go elected prez and youre asking if breeder reactors devoring the universe are a joke?
@unksol Breeder reactor was a bad choice of names. Take something that’s scary to a lot of people, then put the word “breeder” in front of it, which suggests the potential for uncontrolled replication.
@moondrake But even StarTrek had one mucking about. You’re looking at something that could use beagle puppies for fuel.
@cranky1950 So obviously even more evil than Cruella DeVille. She wanted to murder Dalmation puppies, which are unbearably precious, but still not as cute as flopsy eared Beagle puppies.
