INFO-VAX Sat, 04 Oct 2008 Volume 2008 : Issue 536 Contents: Re: Elvis is dead - get over it! Re: mounting USB Sandisk Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street RE: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 04 Oct 2008 10:11:22 GMT From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= Subject: Re: Elvis is dead - get over it! Message-ID: JF Mezei wrote: > What if you have an important remaining customer who has stated that > they require GTK and some other middleware ? Does this have anything with reality to do ? Or was it just something dreamed up ? I support VMS systems at two pretty large companies, and I've never seen that need. Of course Richard is correct in that VMS is dead and has been dead on the desktop for the last 10 years at least. Trying to get (back?) to the desktop *now* is totaly wasted. > Porting a browser is the > perfect project to not only port that middleware to VMS, but also to > test it by compiling a browser with it before you hand it over to the > customer. That might be correct in a way, but why not do it on some usable software ? > Just because YOU don't see a need for that software doesn't mean that > there isn't a business need for it. There just isn't, no matter what Righard or anyone else says. > Funny, HP has the proprietary port of Apache for VMS, there is the OSU > web server as well as WASD. I believe that even IBM has some web serving > middleware available on VMS. And web serving is now an important part > of a server since it is used a lot to distribute information to clients > from the server. A web/http *server* is a logical part of any "server" platform today. Bot not a browsers which this was all about... ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2008 11:12:24 +0000 (UTC) From: helbig@astro.multiCLOTHESvax.de (Phillip Helbig---remove CLOTHES to reply) Subject: Re: mounting USB Sandisk Message-ID: > >>>>> [...] Even in the PC world for USB 2.0 disks I see things peaking > >>>>> at 15 or so Mbytes a second. > >>>> That's consistant with my own observations (Win2k SP4, WinXP SP2) -- for > >>>> USB hard disks as well as card readers. > >>> I didn't know any OS supported card readers anymore---much less at 15 > >>> Mb/s. Let's see, that would be about 25 million cards per second! :-) I got it wrong by a factor of 1000; it's 25 thousand cards per second. Still pretty fast, though! :-) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 04 Oct 2008 09:50:23 GMT From: =?ISO-8859-1?Q?Jan-Erik_S=F6derholm?= Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Message-ID: Richard B. Gilbert wrote: > AEF wrote: >> But while describing all the bad things that >> homeowners did she adds the following parenthetical remark: "Those who >> were lied to by bookers about the reset rates on adjustable-rate >> mortgages and other elements of their loans are in a different >> category." > > Those people appear, to me, to have failed to read and understand what > they agreed to. It does not matter, legally, what they were told. Well, at least in Sweden, it does matter *a lot* what your bankman actual *told* you ! There has been quite a few cases where peoples has got their right against some bank that had talked them into some business. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2008 02:54:47 -0700 (PDT) From: johnwallace4@yahoo.co.uk Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Message-ID: On Oct 3, 10:05 pm, "Dan Allen" wrote: > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Richard B. Gilbert [mailto:rgilber...@comcast.net] > > Sent: Friday, October 03, 2008 11:42 AM > > To: Info-...@Mvb.Saic.Com > > Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street > > > AEF wrote: > > > On Oct 3, 5:30 am, "David Weatherall" > > wrote: > > >> Neil Rieck wrote: > > > >> > > > >>> For the longest time, people in the financial sector claimed they > > >>> are smart while the rest of us are dumb. (Try getting an official > > >>> explanation of "derivatives" without the usual insider lingo and > > >>> you'll see what I mean). So it turns out that these > > people are not > > >>> as smart as they claim, which is not the same as criminal > > (lthough > > >>> we do have crimes involving criminal damage to society or > > its citizens). > > >>> Some people say this mess was created (in part) by the > > synoptic view > > >>> of Alan Greenspan who was repeatedly warned about the sub-prime > > >>> bubble in 2002. But Greenspan knew better... > > >http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09192008/profile.html(besure to > > >>> watch the video) Other people say this mess was caused > > (in part) by > > >>> people clinging to their ideologies rather than meeting in the > > >>> middle after a diplomatic dialog followed by debate. > > >>>http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/09262008/watch.html(besure to > > >>> watch the video) If this crisis brings the Western-world > > together in > > >>> a dialog about why we are running stock markets like > > casinos, then > > INNOCENT?? I doubt it very much! When you buy a house and > > mortgage it, you are supposed to know that you must make > > monthly payments of X dollars per month for Y years. You are > > supposed to have an income sufficient to make those payments > > as well as feed your family, pay taxes, health care, etc, > > etc. The customary penalty for failure to pay is to lose the > > house! The agreement you sign says all this and, by signing > > your name, you agree to it. > > > Nothing guarantees the resale value of your new home! The > > selling price will depend on the condition of the property, > > the current market, the availability of credit, the property > > taxes that must be paid, the condition of neighboring > > property, etc, etc. To say that the resale value will > > fluctuate can be one of those major understatements. . . . > > > The current "crisis" appears to be the result of poor > > judgment on the part of just about everyone involved. People > > seem to have purchased homes and taken mortgages at the limit > > of, or somewhat beyond, their ability to pay. Loan officers > > appear to have given insufficient weight to the borrower's > > present and future ability to pay the interest and principal! > > They also appear to have ignored the possible changes in the > > market value of the property securing the loan! > > > "Not a good thing!" is a statement I think we can all agree with. > > That is indeed "not a good thing". I'm not investment maven but from what I've > been able to understand about this whole mess they are just the pawns in a > botched gambit by the real players. That gambit opens with an investment market > that purchased those bad loans along with a lot of very sound ones and pacakaged > then into an equity based security and marketed it to the investment community. > These securities were resold, repacakaged, anf further diluted in the process. > This process was repeated numerous times over and over and the result was a huge > pile of mortgage backed securities (MBS's) that were carrying AAA ratings and a > big load of risk. The investment community and banking industry was getting > "rich" on the flow and they were happy to leverage it to the hilt - risk? - what > risk? - damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. It's hard to truly fault the home > buyers who are being aggresively courted with offers of incredibly sweet deals. > Or the small banks offering the deals when they knew they could resell the debt > and make an instant risk free profit. The housing market was a gold mine and the > big money players couldn't pour the cash in fast enough. > > Then the "impossible" happened and the hammer dropped on the housing market - > home prices started to fall, mortgage defaults started to rise (really only > about 6%) and the cash calls started coming in to the big investment banks > holding all those MBS's. And as they began to sell off those MBS's at bargain > prices to meet their cash calls they were forced to devalue the ones they still > held. And that devaluation produced a wave of new cash calls leading to a self > perpetuating downward price spiral that poisoned the market place and left a lot > of really big investment banks with really big piles of mortgage backed paper > that they couldn't liquidate for pennies on the dollar. They had walked way out > on a very tiny limb and their only hope of avoiding a very big fall was to find > some big time investor with enough hard cash to buy up their devalued paper at > or near it's "rated" value and infuse them with some real liquidity. For good or > bad we just signed the check this afternoon. If all we have to eat is a 5-6% > default loss on the $700B I'll consider it a success. I'm not so sure we'll be > that lucky. "home buyers who are being aggresively courted with offers of incredibly sweet deals" Did the US fall for the "endowment mortgage" big lie in the same way the UK did? The banks and (former) building societies (= US S+L?) started offering *big* "low cost" (their words) mortgages, not the classic "repayment" mortgage, but a loan and a *separate* investment package (the "endowment") which was supposedly going to be paid for by the "mortgage" repayments, yet supposedly going to involve much lower repayments than a classic repayment mortgage. There were two things the banks and building societies kept very very very very quiet: firstly, there was no *guarantee* that the investment would ever pay off the loan, and indeed a few years ago the chickens started coming home to roost for many people, the loans were approaching maturity and the investment was *nowhere near* repaying the mortgage. The second thing was that the banks and BSs were getting huge up-front financial incentives to sell the "investment" packages associated with these mortgages (simple arithmetic says the cost of this payment needs to be added to the loan sooner or later). I once had the dubious pleasure of listening to one side of a conversation between a respected colleague who had been about to take out an endowment mortage, and his intended mortgage provider. I'd just pointed out to him the risk implicit in the lack of guarantee (it might pay it off, it might not, it is important the customer is aware of this in order to make an *informed* decision). Summary of conversation: repeat until bored: begin colleague: I have a simple question. Is the investment guaranteed to pay off the loan at the end of the term? bank: wiggle, squirm, do not use the word "guarantee" and definitely do not say "no guarantee" end // bored now colleague: Thank you for lying to me, my loan is going elsewhere. You just lost your commission on this endowment. Have a nice day. (paraphrased) Sadly, experiences like this with the "financial services" sector are far from unique. On another occasion, my financial adviser at the time offered me a ten year "insurance" policy of some flavour I forget (critical illness?). They were honest enough to state up front how much commission the company would make - three years of the ten years payment went to pay for the up-front payment to the sales agent (in this case, actually to their employers), which struck me as excessive (but actually it's fairly typical), so I asked if we could split the commission 50:50. Given the choice between making no sale and no commission, or a sale at a slightly lower price to me with a lot less commission for her employers, her management chose "no sale". And I'd better not start on the way "buy to let" and "interest only" mortgages have been widely mis-sold... but the entirely predictable effects are already there for all to see. If a lot more people knew a lot more about what they were being sold, and in particular about the up front incentives and the well-hidden long term risks, the "financial services" sector might look rather different than the current "house of cards" we clearly have in the UK and the USA. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 4 Oct 2008 07:10:41 -0400 From: "Dan Allen" Subject: RE: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Message-ID: <066501c92611$d7331b00$1f3a0681@sdct.nist.gov> > -----Original Message----- > From: johnwallace4@yahoo.co.uk [mailto:johnwallace4@yahoo.co.uk] > Sent: Saturday, October 04, 2008 5:55 AM > To: Info-VAX@Mvb.Saic.Com > Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street > > On Oct 3, 10:05 pm, "Dan Allen" wrote: > > > -----Original Message----- > "home buyers who are being aggresively courted with offers of > incredibly sweet deals" > > Did the US fall for the "endowment mortgage" big lie in the > same way the UK did? > No. The current mortgage mess is centered around "traditional" home mortgages. The "sweetness" I spoke of was things like excessive loan to value (as high as 125%), no down payments, Adjustable Rate Mortgages (ARM's), mortgage loans 3X+ borower's income, etc. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 04 Oct 2008 07:19:59 -0400 From: "Richard B. Gilbert" Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Message-ID: Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote: > Richard B. Gilbert wrote: > >> AEF wrote: > >>> But while describing all the bad things that >>> homeowners did she adds the following parenthetical remark: "Those who >>> were lied to by bookers about the reset rates on adjustable-rate >>> mortgages and other elements of their loans are in a different >>> category." >> >> Those people appear, to me, to have failed to read and understand what >> they agreed to. It does not matter, legally, what they were told. > > Well, at least in Sweden, it does matter *a lot* what your > bankman actual *told* you ! There has been quite a few cases > where peoples has got their right against some bank that > had talked them into some business. > In the U.S. a verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it's written on! Honest men generally do as they have promised but if matters get to court, it's the written agreement that counts, not what the parties agreed to verbally. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 04 Oct 2008 11:38:42 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Message-ID: <00A8097C.B0283AED@SendSpamHere.ORG> In article <69778933-a759-438b-afa5-830b03352752@25g2000hsx.googlegroups.com>, AEF writes: > >I'd be amazed, even thrilled, if anyone actually wanted to publish If you have an email address, I'd explain it to you. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM ... pejorative statements of opinion are entitled to constitutional protection no matter how extreme, vituperous, or vigorously expressed they may be. (NJSC) Copr. 2008 Brian Schenkenberger. Publication of _this_ usenet article outside of usenet _must_ include its contents in its entirety including this copyright notice, disclaimer and quotations. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 04 Oct 2008 11:50:35 GMT From: VAXman- @SendSpamHere.ORG Subject: Re: OT: USA the fleecing of USA banks by Wall Street Message-ID: <00A8097E.58F52525@SendSpamHere.ORG> In article , "Richard B. Gilbert" writes: >Jan-Erik Söderholm wrote: >> Richard B. Gilbert wrote: >> >>> AEF wrote: >> >>>> But while describing all the bad things that >>>> homeowners did she adds the following parenthetical remark: "Those who >>>> were lied to by bookers about the reset rates on adjustable-rate >>>> mortgages and other elements of their loans are in a different >>>> category." >>> >>> Those people appear, to me, to have failed to read and understand what >>> they agreed to. It does not matter, legally, what they were told. >> >> Well, at least in Sweden, it does matter *a lot* what your >> bankman actual *told* you ! There has been quite a few cases >> where peoples has got their right against some bank that >> had talked them into some business. >> > >In the U.S. a verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it's written on! >Honest men generally do as they have promised but if matters get to >court, it's the written agreement that counts, not what the parties >agreed to verbally. ...and produce any piece of paper, no matter how dubious its veracity, and the courts will entertain it, especially if the plaintiff is the source of its production! US courts need to cease playing the plaintiff favoritism gambit and yielding to the financial fianchetto of the opening movers! It makes for a difficult game to win. -- VAXman- A Bored Certified VMS Kernel Mode Hacker VAXman(at)TMESIS(dot)COM ... pejorative statements of opinion are entitled to constitutional protection no matter how extreme, vituperous, or vigorously expressed they may be. (NJSC) Copr. 2008 Brian Schenkenberger. Publication of _this_ usenet article outside of usenet _must_ include its contents in its entirety including this copyright notice, disclaimer and quotations. ------------------------------ End of INFO-VAX 2008.536 ************************