A well written article, and it fantastically ties modern software development to energy activism. I agree on all accounts. Frankly though, by pinpointing Ruby on Rails, you take focus away from the core content. You shouldn't need, for example, the ending statement:
"And yes, this is deliberately provocative link-bait for my overly-zealous RoR-fanatic friends. Which doesn’t make it any less true."
If I were to rewrite it, I would focus on the underlying argument, and then follow up with the seemingly boundless examples of wasteful computing. That being said, an obscure topic like this probably demands feet being held to the fire, and the act of calling out one amongst many will hopefully lead to further conversation. Can't wait for followup articles.
Jeff Ward
· 1 year ago
Oh no you dih-ehnt :)
Doug Ransom
· 1 year ago
It is true to make computers do more operations has increased energy use - though speed and energy use are two things the industry is always working on. We can see examples of improvement, like the fact you can run an IPod for hours -- how much energy can that take? -- and flash memory competing with magnetic storage for larger and larger applications.
Fortunately, you live in a heating climate 6 months of the year, so your computers at home are only wasting energy 6 months of the year. At a data center, well they are always cooling.
There are some interesting economics to think through: - you use wasteful rails to produce something of value - that is a huge social benefit. People pay you money to make their lives better. Maybe you would never be profitable if you spend 45 times development cost to build your product in C . Or even started. - you will always be looking for ways to be more profitable. If your product on rails is so profitable that computer cycles become a major expense for your solution, you are going to find a way to make it cheaper. By rewriting it, by moving to a data center with cheaper operating costs (because they have less cooling costs, or a cheaper energy source). If operating more hardware is the most profitable approach, it is the best approach for the environment and the economy. The good news is you just need to focus on profits to maximize social benefits.
As far as foreign workers being exposed to hazards, I think it is the role of their foreign governments and not pressure (or thinly-disguised trade barriers)from US or Canada to protect their workers. I have no doubt as China's economy evolves and improves their environmental regulations, or enforcement of existing regulations will improve. China's government will attempt to do the best for China. Though I would like to see them adopt a constitution protecting Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of (insert corollary of liberty here).
Going through an industrialization/pollution/cleanup cycle seems to be the way modern economies emerge. China is moving through these phases more rapidly than we did.
Jeremy Dunck
· 1 year ago
You can argue for efficiency to reduce supply-chain inefficiencies, but it's more effective in manufacturing due to its scale and different deployment (i.e. not every driver is a mechanic).
I hear ecologically-aware people argue that the Green Revolution was a bad thing-- it's certain we'll have hard times ahead unless we find some alternate tech post haste-- but I'd argue that maybe the other billion people are also useful.
As far as energy consumption, I place my near-term bet on SSD, and mid-term bets on memristors. Long-term, we'll need to be off petro. If you're arguing that entropy in general, is bad, I agree, but we can't change it-- we can only channel the flow towards eventual heat death.
I don't know how much of our e-waste is due to cheap-driven e-lust hardware turnover and how much is actual at-scale failure and replacement. That'd be interesting to see. If our only at-scale solution is to stop using computers, well, that's a tough call.
Chad
· 10 months ago
Amen to that! I still believe we can end up with expressive languages _and_ a high computation to watt ratio. Maybe someday I'll end up working on that.
Joel Franusic
· 10 months ago
Speaking of old computers, I just got rid of a bunch. In the process of finding recyclers, I ran across this outfit http://www.crc.org/ - they seem pretty cool?
DeLonghi Pinguino
· 9 months ago
this is such great information. thanks for the insight.
Alien talk
· 6 months ago
NO NO NO NO NOOOOOOOOOOO. Its NOT global warming..its..imaginary..
All Comments
"And yes, this is deliberately provocative link-bait for my overly-zealous RoR-fanatic friends. Which doesn’t make it any less true."
If I were to rewrite it, I would focus on the underlying argument, and then follow up with the seemingly boundless examples of wasteful computing. That being said, an obscure topic like this probably demands feet being held to the fire, and the act of calling out one amongst many will hopefully lead to further conversation. Can't wait for followup articles.
Fortunately, you live in a heating climate 6 months of the year, so your computers at home are only wasting energy 6 months of the year. At a data center, well they are always cooling.
There are some interesting economics to think through:
- you use wasteful rails to produce something of value - that is a huge social benefit. People pay you money to make their lives better. Maybe you would never be profitable if you spend 45 times development cost to build your product in C . Or even started.
- you will always be looking for ways to be more profitable. If your product on rails is so profitable that computer cycles become a major expense for your solution, you are going to find a way to make it cheaper. By rewriting it, by moving to a data center with cheaper operating costs (because they have less cooling costs, or a cheaper energy source). If operating more hardware is the most profitable approach, it is the best approach for the environment and the economy. The good news is you just need to focus on profits to maximize social benefits.
As far as foreign workers being exposed to hazards, I think it is the role of their foreign governments and not pressure (or thinly-disguised trade barriers)from US or Canada to protect their workers. I have no doubt as China's economy evolves and improves their environmental regulations, or enforcement of existing regulations will improve. China's government will attempt to do the best for China. Though I would like to see them adopt a constitution protecting Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of (insert corollary of liberty here).
Going through an industrialization/pollution/cleanup cycle seems to be the way modern economies emerge. China is moving through these phases more rapidly than we did.
I hear ecologically-aware people argue that the Green Revolution was a bad thing-- it's certain we'll have hard times ahead unless we find some alternate tech post haste-- but I'd argue that maybe the other billion people are also useful.
As far as energy consumption, I place my near-term bet on SSD, and mid-term bets on memristors. Long-term, we'll need to be off petro. If you're arguing that entropy in general, is bad, I agree, but we can't change it-- we can only channel the flow towards eventual heat death.
I don't know how much of our e-waste is due to cheap-driven e-lust hardware turnover and how much is actual at-scale failure and replacement. That'd be interesting to see. If our only at-scale solution is to stop using computers, well, that's a tough call.