Deep Throat had at least a 600x multiple (a budget of $47,000 and a box office somewhere between 30 million and 50 million). Blair witch had over a 1000x multiple, with the same 200k budget as mad Max and a box office around 200 million. Paranormal Activity also seems to be close to the 1000x mark.
Sure, but let's not fool ourselves. It isn't exactly a cost center for Apple to run the service nor would it be to scale up usage to include Android users. The cost would be a rounding error to Apple.
From a business perspective, I'm much more sympathetic to arguments that iMessage is a perk Apple wants to keep as incentive for more users to switch to Apple's ecosystem and, likely more important, lack of cross-platform interoperability raises the cost for existing Apple users to transition to Android.
Another way to look at it is that there would always be a fixed cost to operating any global messaging network that would probably be at least a million dollars a year. Piggybacking on Apple's already-built network and focusing only on marginal cost sidesteps the reality that standing up a service that big from scratch is very expensive. Even if iMessage were a decentralized network like email that allows federation, Beeper Mini would be on the hook for a much bigger bill.
Airbnb was open plan (it still is, I’m just not there anymore). They also have an amazing Food team who would occasionally, randomly, bake treats for us (this is relevant, I promise).
There was no sales bell, but there was an outage gong. Any time we had an outage affecting the “Book It” flow and revenue stopped flowing that gong rang out. Hearing the gong meant engineers would abruptly leave meetings or lunch to come help fix the issue.
As we scaled and hit the limits of various systems we had periods where the gong rang out semi-regularly (a few times per month). These were hard times for engineers.
Soon, engineering started to push back on Product requests, took the time to re-architect and build better systems, and calm was achieved. Months went by without hearing the gong ring out, then years passed. People joined the company and got promoted, never having heard it ring. Until one day in 2018.
I was working near a pod of project managers, and I hear the gong. Like Pavlov’s dog, it triggers an immediate wave of anxiety in me: something is very wrong. But my blissfully unaware PM colleagues have no idea, it’s the first time they’ve ever heard the gong.
One lady looks up from her laptop and asks: “oooh, did the Food team make cookies?”
That seems like the correct incentive, no? If the shorts believe a company is (e.g.) poisoning 100,000 people in a large suburb, shouldn't they profit massively if the government agrees and seizes it?
I got access to Waymo recently and it is astoundingly good, it has replaced Uber for me (in SF).
I suspect it will be some time before we can get insurance policys for privately owned autonomous vehicles. If Google own the car and wrote the AI software then there’s only one party who is ultimately responsible should a collision occour. This is more complicated if you privately own an autonomous vehicle which is in an accident. Does the AI share culpability with the owner? How will insurance claims work?
Tesla requires users “maintain control and responsibility for your vehicle” while autopilot is on, and it feels like that is a CYA hedge should autopilot fail (“see, we told them to stay in control”).
> I suspect it will be some time before we can get insurance policys for privately owned autonomous vehicles. If Google own the car and wrote the AI software then there’s only one party who is ultimately responsible should a collision occour. This is more complicated if you privately own an autonomous vehicle which is in an accident. Does the AI share culpability with the owner? How will insurance claims work?
I understand it will require a bit of a legal rethink, but I don't give a shit. The industry will just have to figure this one out. And in the end it's the insurance company that's financially responsible anyway, whether it's a human driver or computer in control.
But the legal issues are really the least thing that should hold this back. Don't forget it will actually make roads a lot safer by no longer having people in a hurry run red lights or cut off other drivers. And it will be good for the environment as well, as autonomous vehicles will be able to coordinate together on optimal speeds in busy conditions, alleviating the need for stop & go traffic jams.
Legal stuff is really meant to serve society, not hold it back.
This is exactly the same thing used in cash vaults in businesses. The idea is that the robbery doesn't even happen in the first place when criminals work out there is no way you can coerce people in to giving up the goods.
> Even though Mr. Whistler was perfectly aware that his mother was a hideous old bat who looked like she had a cactus lodged up her backside he stuck wither her and even took the time to paint this amazing picture of her.
It has one of the biggest Budget to Box office multiples I know of: ~120x ($7k -> $841k)