Little Big Tomatoes

Basically, It’s Over

March 4th, 2010

A parable about how one nation came to financial ruin. By Charles Munger.

In the early 1700s, Europeans discovered in the Pacific Ocean a large, unpopulated island with a temperate climate, rich in all nature’s bounty except coal, oil, and natural gas. Reflecting its lack of civilization, they named this island "Basicland."

The Europeans rapidly repopulated Basicland, creating a new nation. They installed a system of government like that of the early United States. There was much encouragement of trade, and no internal tariff or other impediment to such trade. Property rights were greatly respected and strongly enforced. The banking system was simple. It adapted to a national ethos that sought to provide a sound currency, efficient trade, and ample loans for credit-worthy businesses while strongly discouraging loans to the incompetent or for ordinary daily purchases.

Moreover, almost no debt was used to purchase or carry securities or other investments, including real estate and tangible personal property. The one exception was the widespread presence of secured, high-down-payment, fully amortizing, fixed-rate loans on sound houses, other real estate, vehicles, and appliances, to be used by industrious persons who lived within their means. Speculation in Basicland’s security and commodity markets was always rigorously discouraged and remained small. There was no trading in options on securities or in derivatives other than "plain vanilla" commodity contracts cleared through responsible exchanges under laws that greatly limited use of financial leverage.

Article on what happened to the US in the recent times by Charles T. Munger, the vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway.

Read the original article from Slate or discuss the article on BasicallyMoney.com:

What investment strategy would you deduce from the latest article from Charles Munger?

Popularity: 3% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in Ideas

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Warren Buffett & Bill Gates – Keeping America Great

November 18th, 2009

CNBC TRANSCRIPT: Warren Buffett & Bill Gates – Keeping America Great

Popularity: 7% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in Ideas

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Team Hoyt

May 27th, 2009

We are beings capable of limitless love towards each other.

Popularity: 20% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in Ideas, Personal

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The crisis of credit visualized

February 22nd, 2009

A very good visualized explanation of the credit crisis. From CrisisOfCredit.com

Part 1.

Part 2.

Popularity: 24% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in General, Ideas

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Some ideas for modules for Shuriken

January 13th, 2009

I am putting out a list of modules, that I am planning to implement for Shuriken, the launcher. If you have a good idea that would make a good module, please either leave a comment or write me an email and I will put it on my list:

iTunes module.
This module would let the user to issue commands that would allow them to control the player, the following actions would be implemented:

Play/Pause
Next Song
Previous Song
Volume Down
Volume Up

Windows Media Player and/or Zune module.
This module could do exactly the same as the iTunes one would be. It would allow the user to control the player with the same commands. Stopping and starting songs and moving back and forward between them.

Date and Time module.
This module would let the user to bring up the current date and time on the computer as its default action and it would also act as a world clock making really easy to get the time and date in any city in the world.

Google Calc module.
This module would allow the user to enter queries against the Google Calculator from Shuriken. The results would be displayed by the app somehow, so no need to open up a browser window.

What other kind of modules would make sense?

Popularity: 26% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in Ideas, Shuriken

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Some very nice icon tutorials

January 11th, 2009

I am trying to learn how to make some vector art stuff and icons on my own. I am always on the look for nice tutorials. The icons I like the most are stylized illustrations of different things that we use everyday such as a compass or pencil. I though I would list my favorites:

Design a Detailed Compass Icon in Photoshop

Design a Detailed Compass Icon in Photoshop

Very nice compass icon done in Photoshop. I like it, because of the metal part and the reflections on the compass glass and body and the attention to details.

Another drawing tutorial for icon lovers in which we’ll be illustrating a metallic compass. We’ll be controlling shadow and reflection to add realism to the illustration. As with any icon design, it’s a combination of the overall design and subtle details that gives quality results.

Create a Custom Mac OSX Style Ring Binder Address Book Icon

Mac OS like address book, again lot of attention to the details.

Today I’ll show you how to create an Address Book replacement icon for Mac OSX. When you are a beginner, it’s better to start with designing replacement icons to get some practice. Let’s get started with personalizing the icons in our workspaces.

Design a Shiny Photorealistic Apple Remote

Design a Shiny Photorealistic Apple Remote

Apple has so many beautiful products. Their product designs consistently attain a sought-after status, which distinguishes them as an innovative company. In this tutorial, I’ll teach you how to make a shiny new apple remote.

Some extra string comes here and so the layout will be much better …..

Create a Shiny Lock Icon Design

Create a Shiny Lock Icon Design

The gloss and reflection is very nicely done on this lock icon.

A popular icon that you can find on the internet is the lock icon. It is widely used to identify secure Web pages.

It often indicates password fields for secure files. Wherever you wish to place a lock icon, this tutorial will show you how to create an attractive one for you to use.

How to Create a Super Shiny Pencil Icon

How to Create a Super Shiny Pencil Icon

This is another cool looking icon, my only complaint with this is that the top part of the pencil does not look like an actual eraser, but I guess this can be fixed by changing the color and removing the reflection.

The Pencil is one of the visual metaphors most used to express creativity. In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to draw a pencil icon. We’ll have a look at gradients, selection tools, and basic transform operations. Let’s have some fun with this.

How to Make a Bangin’ Woofer Embedded in Wood

How to Make a Bangin’ Woofer Embedded in Wood

In this tutorial, we’ll illustrate a woofer and make a simple wood texture for the background. We’ll place the speaker so that it appears to be inside the wood texture. Also, we’ll create screws that appear to hold it in place. Put some good music on and lets get working!

Illustrating a Cool Glass of Beer

In this tutorial, we’re going to draw a beer glass with some beer in it. We’ll create the shiny curly glass with reflection, put some beer in it, add some bubbles, and finally we’ll make the shadow and the reflections. Meanwhile, I hope you’ll have some fun and learn some cool techniques too.

I try to collect more of these tutorials in the future and post them as I have them. If you know some, please share with me….

Popularity: 23% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in Design, Ideas, Tutorials

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Digitally assisted billiards

December 23rd, 2008

This is a very cool idea, where the computer gives you hint what are the possible collision path on the billiard table. They published the source code too.

[via Hackaday]

Popularity: 16% [?]

Posted by gyurisc Filed in Fun, Ideas

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Little Big Tomatoes

Basically, It’s Over

March 4th, 2010

Warren Buffett & Bill Gates – Keeping America Great

November 18th, 2009

Team Hoyt

May 27th, 2009

The crisis of credit visualized

February 22nd, 2009

Some ideas for modules for Shuriken

January 13th, 2009

Some very nice icon tutorials

January 11th, 2009

Digitally assisted billiards

December 23rd, 2008

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