Wade, thanks for the really thought provoking article. You have deftly articulated the love-hate relationships in Apple products & management style that both excite and annoy. I too think it notable that Mr. Steve Jobs himself unveiled the building plans to the city council – and that its form and future will continue to fuel discussions about loving/hating Apple. They have earned respect for their vision and execution, whether one agrees with them or not.I wish they would have first paid some dividend on shares or bought back some stock prior to spending money on the new HQ. Atleast it would have moved the stock price up rather than stagnating for past 8 months.

Deere said it has signed an agreement with the Russian government and local authorities to invest approximately $80 million in a central operations center which includes a distribution, replacement parts and training facility in the Kaluga region, 38 miles southwest of Moscow.

“We believe this is one of the largest single investment projects of a non-Russian farm and forestry equipment manufacturer in Russia,” said Robert W. Lane, Deere & Company chairman and chief executive officer. “Our strategic investment reflects Deere’s confidence in the Russian and other Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) markets. It also recognizes the commitment of our dedicated Russian employees and the support of the Russian government and local authorities.”

In its initial stage, the new 98-acre facility in the Kaluga region will accommodate a 322,000-square-foot replacement parts distribution center, a training facility for dealer personnel, including a product demonstration site, and a whole goods distribution facility.

“The site will leave room for further expansion potential as our business in Russia continues to grow,” said Mark von Pentz, president of Deere’s Agriculture Division for Europe, Africa and South America. “This new center, which will be operational in 2010, marks a growing commitment to this important region. As an interim step for further investments, it also contains a provision for local assembly and manufacturing at a later stage.”
* MFWD TRACTOR Available Oct.2008 . 1000 PTO

* P.S. 4 SCV

* Rear Tire 480 80 X46

* 380 85 34
John Deere has a long history of agricultural and forestry equipment sales to Russia. In the late 1920s, the company sold a significant number of plows and its famous Waterloo Boy tractors in Russia. The forestry markets have been served in Russia for over 30 years

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Over the years I have on again–off again participated in this NG I have developed an affection for the ‘regulars’ (you know who you are), their idiosyncratic behavior, and often time thoughtful and knowledgeable responses…and have also come to appreciate the ‘irregulars’ and their sometime unorthodox views–kind of a ‘mean’ cross section of less well known scientific community, I thought.

So some time ago, I started a novel made up of you guys, and/or your ideas and NG personas. I have put together a draft excerpt (200 pages from the 800 +/- page book) that will give y’all a ‘ look see’. Of course it is fiction, therefore, I may not have interpreted all of the theories,
whatever, 100%, but I have, am, thoroughly enjoying the process of ‘unravelling’ physics and some of the people who have made it happen here.

Solar Hot Water
Most solar water heating systems for buildings have two main parts: a solar collector and a storage tank. The most common collector is called a flat-plate collector. Mounted on the roof, it consists of a thin, flat, rectangular box with a transparent cover that faces the sun. Small tubes run through the box and carry the fluid – either water or other fluid, such as an antifreeze solution – to be heated. The tubes are attached to an absorber plate, which is painted black to absorb the heat. As heat builds up in the collector, it heats the fluid passing through the tubes.
Swimming pool systems are simpler. The pool’s filter pump is used to pump the water through a solar collector, which is usually made of black plastic or rubber. And of course, the pool stores the hot water.Many power plants today use fossil fuels as a heat source to boil water. The steam from the boiling water rotates a large turbine, which activates a generator that produces electricity. However, a new generation of power plants, with concentrating solar power systems, uses the sun as a heat source. There are three main types of concentrating solar power systems: parabolic-trough, dish/engine, and power tower.

Parabolic-trough systems concentrate the sun’s energy through long rectangular, curved (U-shaped) mirrors. The mirrors are tilted toward the sun, focusing sunlight on a pipe that runs down the center of the trough. This heats the oil flowing through the pipe. The hot oil then is used to boil water in a conventional steam generator to produce electricity.