In the Google Navy 129
theodp writes "Having already assembled a private Air Force, Google's top execs now seem to be turning their attention to building a personal Navy. At last count, CEO Eric Schmidt's wife had assembled a stable of three classic racing boats — the Swan 80 Selene, the 46-foot W-class Equus and the Alerion Mischief. Perhaps not to be outdone, the press is reporting that Google founder Larry Page just snapped up a $45 million superyacht called Senses from New Zealand businessman Sir Douglas Myers, who referred to the ostentatious-yet-awesome yacht as his 'adventure boat.' As Google likes to say, 'just the latest steps in Google's commitment to a clean and green energy future.' So, do Google execs eat their own carbon footprint calculator dogfood?" All I know is if Larry wants to go fishing, I'll bring bait — or he can come here and fish on Zen's pontoon boat. It only leaked once, the engine usually starts right up, and while there's no helipad, I'd love to watch someone try.
Not a Navy (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not really a Navy unless it's got guns, or a least archers or spear-throwers or something.
Re:Not a Navy (Score:4, Funny)
Well, if either of them bring their laptops on board I'm sure they have some electronic warfare capabilities.
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Re:Not a Navy (Score:5, Informative)
It's not really a Navy unless it's got guns, or a least archers or spear-throwers or something.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchant_Navy [wikipedia.org]
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Ummm...? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Ummm...? (Score:5, Funny)
Hello, this is the news at 10. In headlines tonight: an enormously large object squashes a rich person.
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Just saying.
Re:Ummm...? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes. But... But But... But.... These are Google Execs! You see, when a rich executive does something that is frowned upon, they bring shame to their company. But when a company does something that is frowned upon, no one blames the exec. It's a completely unilateral relationship where there is absolutely no personal responsibility when an organization does something wrong, but it is ENTIRELY the organization to blame if the executive officers decide to do something like this.
Are you getting it yet? The entire corporation that is Google isn't living up to its standards because 2 individuals don't!
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But when a company does something that is frowned upon, no one blames the exec
Are you joking? The hate that much of Slashdot had (and continues to has) on for Bill Gates verges on irrational lunacy....
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If only I had mod points...
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FWIW, supposedly Mark Zuckerberg commutes in a relatively humble Acura TSX. http://time.com/poy [time.com]
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FWIW, supposedly Mark Zuckerberg commutes in a relatively humble Acura TSX. http://time.com/poy [time.com]
That's because he's trying to retain some privacy and anonymity.
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There's a little secret to the economy. Even though rich people make huge profits and take large salaries if most of it goes into investments it doesn't matter much. When the money is invested somewhere it's adding value to the world. It isn't going to feed the hungry, but it is going to increase efficiency, build businesses or enable people to live a decent life. After it is done doing that it can be reinvested to do it again and again pretty much forever.
When that money is taken out and blown it on somet
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Enormously rich person buys large object, news at 10?
Better pictures and video here:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055689/ [imdb.com]
and here:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057751/ [imdb.com]
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I have two words for Larry Page: luxury submarine.
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I have two words for Larry Page: luxury submarine.
How about "hollowed-out volcano"?
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As far as I know, he can't buy a hollowed out volcano; I certainly haven't heard of one for sale. A luxury submarine, on the other hand, can be purchased on the open market (albeit for a price that mere mortals like you and I can't afford), and I think it would be obscenely cool to own one.
Thank you /. for sticking that song... (Score:1)
Re:Thank you /. for sticking that song... (Score:5, Funny)
In the Google navy
Yes, you can yacht the seven seas
In the Google navy
Yes, you can put your search at ease
In the Google navy
Come on now, people, they're going green
In the Google navy, in the Google navy
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Have you seen the front page of Slashdot lately?
and while there's no helipad (Score:2)
Sea View, Harbour View? (Score:5, Interesting)
I predict they will cruise around the world taking photos of every harbour, ship and shoreline.
I also predict they will get into trouble for doing that.
All of the world's marine traffic [marinetraffic.com] in real-time is already on Google... (ok, its basically just overlayed AIS data, but still its effing cool ! just try to find an application that is cooler! or is it wetter?)
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All of the world's marine traffic [marinetraffic.com] in real-time is already on Google... (ok, its basically just overlayed AIS data, but still its effing cool ! just try to find an application that is cooler! or is it wetter?)
Doesn't that make it a bit easy for pirates?
You realize Schmidt's wife's boats are sailboats? (Score:5, Insightful)
Carbon footprint of racing sailboat is pretty much 0, at least while it's actually racing. I'll grant you that construction and the diesel auxiliary contributes to greenhouse gas emissions, and especially if they're having it moved around on a container ship so it's ready to go in exotic locations, and then flying in to sail on it, they're pretty much at the head of the line in terms of their individual contribution to future generations' climate-related misery. But overall, I think sailboats should be way down your list if you're making a catalog of climate-hostile consumption.
Still, I realize this is slashdot. Let the poorly-informed outrage fly!
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Generally speaking, the only kinds of racing that have anything approaching a 'green' fotprint are the kinds of racing that leave footprints.
Auto racing can't claim a green footprint. Even solar racing has a manufacturing footprint that is noticeable.
Boats? Powerboats of course just crave fuels. Sail? Except perhaps for some small classes, they rely on exotic materials. Smaller classes are starting to give in to this a little bit.
Planes? hehe... Gliders? Carbon-fiber.
Even bicycles use such exotics that
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Making a carbon fiber epoxy composite uses a bunch of energy etc. I imagine that's what he referred to.
You're not keeping carbon from being CO2, net.
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Not to mention the noxious chemicals in the epoxies, manufacturing the carbon-fiber to start with, etc.
And the manure from horse racing has its usefulness. More than the discarded carbon-fiber components from the sailboat, which at best lay inert in a landfill, and at worst leach interesting stuff into the aquifers below when the landfill inevitably fails.
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I think sailboats should be way down your list if you're making a catalog of climate-hostile consumption.
Why?
http://galenfrysinger.name/eh61/harbor02.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b1/Monterey_CA_harbor_p1070194.jpg
http://www.pictureninja.com/pages/new-zealand/north-island/auckland-harbor-sailboats.jpg
http://www.harborsailboats.com/images/mainpage.jpg
http://www.gdanmitchell.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/SouthBeachHarborMornFogSF20090701.jpg
http://reve.ed.shizuoka.ac.jp/photos/Honolulu02.jpg
http://thetriton.com/directory/userlogo/21736-5724_b.jpg
http://www.boatharborslocator.com/ca%20marin%
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I was going to make the same exact point.
As these are proper ocean cruiser boats you are not going to move them by container ship. 24m worth off composite hull is something you move by water with a hired crew, not by ship. Sailing such boats from A to B so that the person with excess pocket money can use it where they want it is a pretty good job if you can have it by the way. I would not mind being a sailing crew on one of those :)
So the only greenhouse emissions are from the leerjet flying you to the sail
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you can easily move very large ships from ocean to ocean via a piggyback ship.
in fact, there are ships designed for this very purpose, and moving a large sailing yacht is one of their main customers.
these specialized ships take on ballast and essentially purposefully flood their own decks and then the large sailing/motor yachts are driven over the deck, pilings are set to support them, and the ship pumps out the ballast to raise itself above the waterline.
why?
because its a lot cheaper to pay for one large t
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The world is full of liberals/socialists/workers/puritans/humanists who live by their beliefs. You usually don't hear them in the media because they're too busy living off a worker's wage, possibly playing a part in a local union, looking after people in the family and community, etc. to have the money to make their voice sufficiently loud.
Unfortunately, like the undergrad banner-waving protester who says "capitalists r evil hypocrites look at Bush/Hitler!", we have childlike Randroids with the idential "li
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The world is full of conservatives/religious people/workers/puritans/humanists who live by their beliefs. You usually don't hear them in the media because they're too busy living off a worker's wage, possibly playing a part in a local union, looking after people in the family and community or church, etc. to have the money to make their voice sufficiently loud.
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Yes, quite.
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Joe Biden's mansion? You might want to check your facts on that one.
In the Navy... (Score:2)
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terrible Google Wave pun
sorry, all that came up when I googled that was this [tvtropes.org]
actually, I'm joking. the actual GIS results for that phrase were even more off the wall
(luxury) floating data center idea (Score:1)
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That explains the recent push at google to recruit "linux sysadmins who look good in a bikini"...
Lowest. Job-applicants. Ever.
Oww my English (Score:5, Funny)
do Google execs eat their own carbon footprint calculator dogfood?
All those words... but together they.... the letters, the letters...
So it's come to this. After all those centuries, English, this is what you've become. Face down in the left gutter wearing Comic Sans with an empty carton of Strunk and White. Googling your own blogfeed indeed.
I just hope you're happy.
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You gotta problem with four nouns jammed together in a sentence, huh? You must not be German. They cram 'em into one WORD.
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Danke schoen for the example.
No, Americans don't like to eat *dogfood.
That is point of the saying: "you make/sell this stuff but you don't want to eat it (or have it apply to) yourself".
*We certainly do spend a lot on dogfood though.
What's next, Slashdot Cribs? (Score:2)
Inquiring minds want to know (Score:5, Insightful)
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It does and I guess that is Taco's problem. Even after all these years he still has some of the reactions from the days when Slashdot was being run on an Alpha salvaged from a skip and put under the desk in his dorm room.
Time to let go dude.
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It does if you like Jack Lemmon http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053291/ [imdb.com]
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Does owning a $45 million yacht significantly increase your probability of getting laid?
Well it doesn't have much practical point, does it?
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How's that "Don't be evil" working out? (Score:2)
How's that "Don't be evil" working out?
Carbon-neutral? Nope.
Excessively reckless and wasteful? Yep.
The top AOL execs were never this ostentatious.
Well, we did buy Time Warner. They were bigger than your yacht and stable of Cigarette boats.
That's not a boat (Score:2)
THIS is a boat. [apolloduck.us]
If I had Larry Page's stupid amount of money, I'd get a real ship. Plus, you can make money with it if the GOOG stock tanks.
Or just load it up with 1400 hot chicks and sail around the world.
And of course, there's always THIS boat [maritimesales.com]
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Well, if they all sink ... (Score:4, Funny)
... we'll get Google Davie Jones' Locker View, real soon ...
Net Google Carbon effect (Score:2)
But what about Good Google? How much carbon is saved each year, for example, by their handy maps? (Now if I could only get my wife to stop printing them out and just write the directions on a piece of waste paper) How much does Google reduce carbon by efficiently locating points of interest -- and someday -- helping you get your car to the nearest electrical outlet. Sniping at rich people's yachts is I guess a family tradition but the real problem with carbon hypocracy stories is they really don't take in t
Google Sea Org? (Score:2)
This is news? (Score:1)
Someone with money bought a boat. News at 11.
I mean come on ... who the fraq cares?
What happened to google? (Score:1)
I seem to remember an old? 60-minutes piece on the culture of Google where execs drove normal cars to work and shopping sprees to shave off excess millions were universally frowned upon.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/12/30/60minutes/main664063.shtml [cbsnews.com]
Meh (Score:1)
Any idiot can buy yachts and planes. You're not a truly awesome geek millionaire until you have a self-sufficient private island.
Phoenix 1000!!! (Score:2)
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No one will ever buy that. But it is interesting.
Why, because $45m for a surface ship is like buying a car but $78m for a submarine is just crazy?
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If you're going to buy a boat... (Score:2)
...then you should get a badass boat like this one [smugmug.com], a 190 tons displacement, 37 meter costal patrol boat purchased by an early Internet pioneer from the Royal Navy.
Google Green? (Score:2)
The only way for Google to ever be green in reality is to cease their business. Let's get real.
Carbon footprints (Score:2)
Zen's pontoon boat (Score:2)
Sounds like an adventure boat to me.
dumb (Score:1)
your final sentence (Score:1)
Ask the guy who got his face shot off by Dick Cheney.
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I'm a Republican that met Dick Cheney in the Las Vegas airport bathroom, he didn't tap his foot or shoot me in the face with a quail gun.
I do own guns, and I'm more than happy to get my news from alternative sources and accept alternative views. Hell I lived on a Kibbutz for a year and support tax hikes on the wealthy. I also voted for the Democrat for the Governor of Alaska in '10 (he ran on more of a drilling and pipeline platform) and wrote in Murlowski in the race against the Tea Bagger.
The only thing I
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Laughing at someone is not a sign of fear.
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So, why are leftists so AFRAID of Sarah Palin, anyway?
Speaking as a non-American I'm not sure you have any leftists in your country, but that aside, what people in the rest of the world are afraid of is that the most powerful county on earth could even conceive of electing someone as patently thick as Palin.
Then again, you've got previous with George W Bush, Reagan and so on. At least in the UK our evil politicians like Thatcher don't have learning difficulties.
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Obama is no fucking leftist. He is just GWB round 2.
I expected it, both parties are rightist and after the same stuff, no surprise to me at all.
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You can't even understand the difference between being overly passionate and dangerous rhetoric. GP was abrasive, but not violent. No mention of a "second amendment solution", no mention of "reload", no.. well you get the idea...
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basically, i dont have to oblige with anyone's shitty sarcasm. if one wants to say something, s/he should directly say it.
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the guy, talked as if he was mad. i have read it, taking it as he pictured himself, that is, as mad.
i dont have any obligation to see deeper meanings or connotations or references or hidden implications in any random schmock's post on the internet.
by the way, i havent made any claim. it was you who pulled me making a claim out of your ass. you can put it back there, if you wish.
tho, i want to thank you for providing me with the opportunity to voice my opinion about this v
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Now, I know your UID is close to a million, but almost as many people have joined after you as before, so someone really should have said this to you before now:
Don't feed the trolls!
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