Here's an article about efficiency, fault tolerance, and fraud . It's about how Hilton hotels overbook rooms and excuse it as "like an airline." So not only do we have airlines that don't really sell reliable transport, we now have hotels that don't really sell reliable lodging, which means that airlines are spreading bad business practices like a winter cold. Gee thanks, assholes. >_< When a business purports to sell something, and customers buy it on good faith, and the company doesn't deliver not due to unforeseen accident but due to company policy, that isn't responsible business. It's fraud. It's bait-and-switch. Those things are typically illegal, but here the law chooses to ignore the abuse because the people doing it are important and have money. That's a problem. Often it's just a nuisance, but sometimes it is life-wrecking. Worse, it undermines a functional society -- betrayal is expectancy violation. Why would people keep buying things if they aren't sure they'll actually get what they already paid for? If the company won't even promise not to wreck their plans for its own self-aggrandizement because it's too incompetent to calculate usage effectively and understand fault tolerance? Efficiency and fault tolerance are opposites. Efficiency tries to use every last bit. Fault tolerance always keeps a reserve in case of surges, failures, or other challenges. America runs on efficiency. Because of this, things routinely run out, break down, or otherwise fail because people couldn't be arsed to account for a margin of error. It creates a crisis-to-crisis lifestyle that serves nobody well. Fault tolerance is absolutely critical to safety and sanity. It's what prevents an elevator from breaking when one too many people squeezes in, because you know they're going to do that. It's what prevents a magazine from being late just because some contributors were late; the submission deadline is always before the drop deadline. Without it, well, that's a key reason why airlines are failing . Cry me a river, bitches. You suck. You deserve to fail. Hopefully these shitty companies will be replaced by something more competent. If you are responsible for anything whatsoever, make sure you include fault tolerance. Most discussions deal in computers or health care. Anything critical should have a surge plan to handle peak demand or shortages due to failure. At an event, schedule some "firebreaks" -- little spans when nothing is meant to happen, so if one thing runs late, they don't ALL run late like a line of dominoes falling. Reorder supplies before you run all the way out. Aim to turn things in before they are due. You might not always succeed, but you will do a lot better than if you ran everything down to the line and constantly had to scramble to make up for unforeseen problems. Fault tolerance is the foundation of reliability, customer service, and peace of mind. Don't be a dick -- don't be an airline. And when you're dealing with dicks? Use your folding vote and shop elsewhere if possible. If not, and you get screwed, use word of mouth to stab them in the reputation until you feel better. It can cost them a lot . \o/