Liberty

I did no such thing. I just didn't understand what you were talking about for a while, and then when I thought I did, I explained why I don't think there's any reason why Apple would ever become an internet service provider or a wireless carrier, and I explained how I thought they could make an Apple TV. If you see negative in that, you are projecting.

Customers will pay for it, just like they do now with cable. It's not like Apple will pay and give people free access. Except instead of having only the choice of subscribing to super-expensive bundles with lots of stuff they don't want, Apple could offer them a more a-la-carte way to subscribe to content (ie. I just want Disney, HBO, CBS, AMC, and Netflix). And content owners will sell to Apple because they know that over-the-top streaming is the way of the future and will be a major source of revenue for them. Many already have deals to be on Apple TV. Telcos will recoup some of their cable losses by charging more proportionally for bandwidth. This is what John Malone has been describing for a while. Apple isn't planning to make money primarily by selling other people's content, though they'll probably take a cut. They make most of their money on hardware and their own services. iTunes sells tons of music, TV series, and movies, but it's primarily a way to make iPhones and iPads and Macs sell better and be more useful.

My tone is not negative, it is puzzled, because I don't understand what you mean. If you think it is negative, you are projecting. I described two things I thought could be done, and then you had 3 messages obviously replying to me ("they could do it, but.."), including 1 quoting me, saying basically the same thing that doesn't really have anything to do with what I said, or even with any realistic expectation of what Apple would do, hence my puzzlement.

Well, that's not what I'm saying at all, so why are you replying to me with that? Apple would sell something that you plug into your internet router and it would get content over the internet (like Netflix right now). Why would they compete against ISPs? That makes not sense at all.

I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. Data product? Spectrum? Facilities? Internet access that Apple is reselling? What are you talking about? The point is: People want to sit on their couch and have a good experience watching content or playing games. Apple could potentially offer a better experience than what is currently on offer, and people would pay for the hardware and services that can do that.

What do you think iTunes and the App Store are? Mostly reselling other people's content and taking a cut. But these are valuable because they sell the hardware on which Apple makes a lot of money. Same thing there. They don't need to own the content, they just need access to it (that's what the telcos do too). But if they wanted to go nuts, they could set a billion aside and buy up original series like Netflix has done with House of Cards and Orange is the New Black so they have some exclusive stuff. It's sofa money for them. Customers aren't happy with bundling. They pay a lot for all kinds of stuff they don't want (especially sports). Apple can come in and say: "Only pay for the content you want."

I guess I missed that comment. I don't think it makes any sense either. IMO, there are two main ways they could go: 1) Make an actual TV set that has a great interface, great hardware, and is basically a computer that allows you to do all kinds of things including stream over-the-top content from content owners like Disney, FOX, etc. 2) Make a new version of the current Apple TV (don't make the actual screen -- people's problem right now is not with the screen but with the interface, how content is bundled, etc) that does more than it currently does (ie. act as a gaming console, has local storage and more CPU/GPU power, integrates better with iPhones and iPads and Macs, etc), with access to ever more content as Apple strikes new deal with content owners. Despite many people who think they'll make a TV, I think #2 is much more likely, especially since TV tech is changing fast and it's much easier to just upgrade your Apple TV box once in a while and keep the TV than change the whole TV panel too just because you want the latest version. Apple TV has been growing right under everyone's nose the past few years.. At some point it can reach a state where it is good enough to disrupt the industry because it does so many things better than the competition (better way to watch content than cable, better gaming platform than current consoles, better way to view your content on your TV than other boxes, etc).

iOS 7 seems like a solid update for people with disabilities

Good news. I doubt we'll see much price movement before the end of the year because any move up will be matched by selling pressure from tax loss selling, but what matters is that there's now a substantial new source of cash coming in. Q4 should (finally) start to look better, and we might get an update on the future of LSQ during Q3 CC. Maybe that'll also trigger some common stock buyback if they feel more secure. We'll see.

Data facilities? I don't understand what you mean, care to elaborate?

If you check the Liberty Media discussion, that's what John Malone has been saying for a while when he's talking about debundling and charging more proportionally for bandwidth.

What you need is agreement with the content cos (Disney, HBO, AMC, etc), not the cable cos. Apple TV already has deals with some of them.

Samsung seems to have been caught cheating on benchmarks http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2013/10/galaxy-note-3s-benchmarking-adjustments-inflate-scores-by-up-to-20/ Update: Also, I think we've just seen the beginning of gaming on Apple platforms. Stuff like this if well implemented can help http://www.macrumors.com/2013/10/01/image-of-potential-logitech-mfi-controller-leaked/ But i still think there's a good chance that a future Apple TV will be more powerful (especially GPU) and be compatible with gaming controllers - ideally a standard one designed by Apple - entering the console market (if someone can do a better job than microsoft and sony, it's Apple) on top of all the other things the APple TV can do.

Your biggest mistake made you +64%? Not too shabby...

Thanks. Expected savings of 4.6m/year at LSQ if they can go forward with this. I know they also mentioned that using nat gas at Thurso was a possibility and could reduce costs there (and probably much easier to do than get gas in a CNG or LNG form up to LSQ... savings might proportionally be higher since probably no need to build CNG/LNG hardware).

Thanks for the notes, hellsten! :)

The problem is when the owners are the one buying out everyone else.. Right, I think my brain skipped that last part about holding ratio... Not sure how to mitigate management lowballing you, except maybe to look at historical undervaluation; has it been very cheap in the past? If they didn't pull the trigger then, it might be an indication that they won't in the future and prefer staying public, though certainly not a guarantee...

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/09/gta-vs-stock-trading-platform.html :P

The first thing that comes to mind is how much skin management has in the game. If they don't own much stock, acquirers can dangle shiny things in front of them to convince them to support a sale. If they own a ton of stock, suddenly a lowball offer doesn't seem so attractive anymore... I'm no expert by any means, but this is what I would look at first.

Good to see that they did install it on Sept. 16 after all and just didn't announce it until now because of the 100-hour test issues (though what's most important is that the cogen operates well, and 94 + 71 hours is a pretty good indication that it does, if they had to stop for issues unrelated to it, as they say. I just hope the unrelated issues are normal ramping up tweaks and not more serious problems). The LSQ stuff is not surprising since they are not on the original timeline anymore. If the do go forward with LSQ, it would certainly be nice if they could increase the cogen contract to 42 megawatts (a 23.5% increase). The logistics cost-cutting and efficiency tweaks were mentioned on the last CC. Good to hear they're making progress. "Inventories at the FSC Mill may also increase as a result of the uncertainty caused by MOFCOM's investigation resulting in Chinese buyers suspending purchase orders for dissolving pulp." This is a bit more worrying. You never know what can happen with political decisions... But as previously discussed, if the Chinese are rational about it, they won't hurt their much larger textile industry to help their smaller DP industry. This should be especially true if, as some have said, the Chinese were confused between specialty DP pricing and commodity DP pricing... I'm a bit puzzled at the lack of market reaction to these news, but oh well, what matters is they're getting operations ever closer to the point where Thurso is fully ramped up with a fully contributing cogen.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-09-30/apple-overtakes-coca-cola-as-most-valuable-brand-study-finds.html

Thanks for the recommendation. The hardcover is incredibly cheap on amazon.com (but not .ca) for some reason.

Thanks, that was a good read. Reminds me of Pirates of Silicon Valley, which dramatizes that pariod: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0168122/

Gio, I'm not sure that anything Brooklyn Investor wrote goes against what you're saying. Are you speaking in general, or about something specific in that piece?

Ballmer saying goodbye to Microsoft employees.