Halo 3 is causing major productivity drops now that it has been released. From the article:
It's not just the tech guys who might be in short supply this week. Farther back in the GameStop line, Brian, a government economic analyst, was wondering about the wisdom of Microsoft spending more $10 million to promote Halo 3.
"All these people were going to buy the game anyway," he said. "I have no idea how they're going to get $10 million more in revenue. I have to hope that their marketing people know something I don't."
Apparently the fact that Halo 3 has now reached the status of the biggest entertainment event in history, went right over Brian's head. $170,000,000 in sales on the first day that the game was out for sale. Over 3.5M people preordered the game. Call me crazy, but I think Microsoft recouped that $10,000,000 in marketing costs within the first day of people going into the buy the game when they hadn't preordered a copy of it. Add to that, that part of the reason the game had so much hype was the fact that Microsoft paid $10,000,000 to put advertisements everywhere from on TV to in movie theatres. Yeah, really dumb move on Microsoft's part.
A federal judge read the constitution and discovered that the USA PATRIOT Act has more unconstitutional provisions. Huh. Apparently the U.S. Constitution says that the police have to have probable cause before they search and seize. Who would have guessed?...
NRG is about to start construction on additional nuclear reactors at one of its sites in Texas. It's going to cost a lot of money, to the tune of about six billion dollars to add those new capabilities and it will take several years to get operational, but it's another small step toward not having to rely on fossil fuels. Of course, the environmentalists are already up in arms over this, but what else is new? A more misanthropic lot never existed.
Of course, the environmentalists are already up in arms over this
Naturally. The eco-nuts won't be satisfied until we're all living in the trees eating bugs and honey.
About the reactor, they are not about to start construction; they are applying for a permit. This process can take years to complete before any real construction can begin. The whole ordeal, from initial application through construction and startup, can take around twenty years or more. You can thank the federal government for this.
I think it only takes Japan about four years to do everything from initial application to startup.
Triton,
That is because we don't want to rush into anything, especially when using new and essentially untested technologies, like at a nuclear power plant. It isn't like this has been around for a few decades like the water wheel or butter knife (both of which can be extremely dangerous!)