Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal • Hacker News Board

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#241

Post by jcranmer » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:19 PM UTC

da_big_ghey wrote: post #147

Spooky23 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even smartphone demand slows down. And that's a device with daily utility with a 2-5 year life. Seriously, I'm coming at this from a perspective of a country boy who went shooting 3-4 times a month as a teen, and earned a bounty for shooting pigeons on a farm. How much more demand can be filled for more guns the mostly sit around and gather dust? It's a market driven by ignorance and fear -- folks are treating these…

Population continues to grow, and there are many Americans who don't own guns who represent a big market. Many have purchased their first in the past year. And yes, lots of people like collecting a shooting a wide variety of guns. Most of then do it for reasons other than or in addition to prepping. The new firearms market is not going to die; the idea that it will is fudd nonsense.

Gun ownership in the US has gone down over the past ~30-40 years, but the number of guns per capita has gone up, which indicates that fewer people are buying guns but that those who do are buying more guns than they used to.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#242

Post by leesalminen » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:23 PM UTC

HideousKojima wrote: post #238

sofixa wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And how is that working out? Last time i checked, the US was leading in violent crime, death and suicide by guns, mass shootings, etc. among developed nations, by a lot .

Why does it matter if someone is murdered by a gun vs. cut into cubes by a cartel or brained with a hammer or anything else? If you don't limit it to murders and suicides by guns , your claim is flatly untrue. Japan's suicide rate is greater than the US's murders and suicides combined. Russia has far more murders despite having fairly restrictive gun laws. In any case, the US is inherently more violent and criminal t…

Don’t forget about acid attacks which from what I understand are far more prevalent in the UK than the US.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#243

Post by Bakary » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:25 PM UTC

nickthemagicman wrote: post #28

ed_blackburn wrote: post #5

Doesn't seem like a lot of money. Shame somebody didn't buy it and shutter it. Less guns in the world is better for everyone.

We've all grown so comfortable in modern America that we forget that default state of human nature is subjugation and repression and has been for thousands of years. Modern America is a historical anomaly. The powerful aren't peaceful by choice. It's the SECOND amendment in the constitution for a reason.

The number of prisoners per capita in the US is indeed an impressive anomaly

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#244

Post by whomst » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:29 PM UTC

yaacov wrote: post #239

pjkundert wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a large overlap between any serious engineering discipline and firearms enthusiasts. The engineering and physics involved in building/tuning guns and shooting accurately is very interesting. Furthermore, the "renegade" spirit required to reject the status-quo and push the envelope in science and engineering attracts quite a few of the same types of people. Finally, the idea of "banning" guns -- which every b…

> Finally, the idea of "banning" guns -- which every basically qualified engineer or physicist should be capable to building from readily available materials and tools -- makes them even more interesting. If for no other reason than to illuminate preposterous and insulting nature of the idea. By this logic, almost nothing should be banned, do you endorse that position?

Something to note is that most physical things that are banned are one-time-use (drugs, organs, etc), whereas the shelf life and resale value of the gun are much longer. Also the classification of "gun" is much wider than classifications of most other illegal things

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#245

Post by CydeWeys » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:30 PM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #110

rayiner wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Monthly gun sales have about tripled since 2000, and we had a lot of guns even back then: https://www.google.com/search?q=gun+sales+per+year&client=sa... As to regulatory changes: support for a handgun ban is the lowest its been since Gallup started tracking the statistic in 1959: https://news.gallup.com/poll/150341/record-low-favor-handgun... . It's just 26% today, versus 60% in 1959. Unlike with tobacco, there's no…

Even smartphone demand slows down. And that's a device with daily utility with a 2-5 year life. Seriously, I'm coming at this from a perspective of a country boy who went shooting 3-4 times a month as a teen, and earned a bounty for shooting pigeons on a farm. How much more demand can be filled for more guns the mostly sit around and gather dust? It's a market driven by ignorance and fear -- folks are treating these…

> Even smartphone demand slows down. And that's a device with daily utility with a 2-5 year life.

How many people do you know who collect smartphones? Also, waaaaaay more smartphones are sold per year in the US than guns (it's roughly two orders of magnitude difference), so if that represents some kind of ceiling, then it's a very high one that guns are nowhere near.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#246

Post by wing-_-nuts » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:33 PM UTC

nickthemagicman wrote: post #234

wing-_-nuts wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your honesty is refreshing, and psychopathic.

Some people value principles higher than human life and that is noble not psychopathic. Millions of men died for their principles so you could sit here, and call having principles psychopathic. Are the millions of men who purposefully sacrificed their own lives for this idea we call liberty psychopaths? Modern Liberty is an anomaly in human history where the rule has been repression and subjugation for millenia. Peop…

Flag away, it's a free country. I don't think it's a personal attack to call a sentiment psychopathic that values one's unfettered freedoms to be more valuable than human life.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#247

Post by CydeWeys » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:36 PM UTC

floren wrote: post #2

CZ makes damn fine guns, so this seems like one of the better outcomes--better than being bought by a maker of crap who wishes to apply a veneer of respectability through the Colt name.

It really is a damning indictment of how badly Colt has been mismanaged over the past few decades, what with firearms sales in the US at all-time highs starting with the Obama administration. They have unbelievable brand value, probably #1 in the world, but they failed so spectacularly to capitalize on it that they went bankrupt 5 years ago.

There's a lesson here that's universally applicable well beyond gun manufacturers: You can't rest on your laurels and attempt to coast on brand value, even #1 brand value. You still always have to be competing.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#248

Post by TedDoesntTalk » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:43 PM UTC

pjkundert wrote: post #162

lutoma wrote: post #102

Honest question: How is this relevant to Hacker News? As a non-American i was rather bewildered to find this here. Is there a serious overlap between gun enthusiasts and the IT community in the US?

There is a large overlap between any serious engineering discipline and firearms enthusiasts. The engineering and physics involved in building/tuning guns and shooting accurately is very interesting. Furthermore, the "renegade" spirit required to reject the status-quo and push the envelope in science and engineering attracts quite a few of the same types of people. Finally, the idea of "banning" guns -- which every b…

Software engineer here. I am also a gunsmith with a wide variety of tooling. Not interested in hunting in the slightest and only use handguns.

I am glad this article was posted. Thank you.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#249

Post by megameter » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:43 PM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #110

rayiner wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Monthly gun sales have about tripled since 2000, and we had a lot of guns even back then: https://www.google.com/search?q=gun+sales+per+year&client=sa... As to regulatory changes: support for a handgun ban is the lowest its been since Gallup started tracking the statistic in 1959: https://news.gallup.com/poll/150341/record-low-favor-handgun... . It's just 26% today, versus 60% in 1959. Unlike with tobacco, there's no…

Even smartphone demand slows down. And that's a device with daily utility with a 2-5 year life. Seriously, I'm coming at this from a perspective of a country boy who went shooting 3-4 times a month as a teen, and earned a bounty for shooting pigeons on a farm. How much more demand can be filled for more guns the mostly sit around and gather dust? It's a market driven by ignorance and fear -- folks are treating these…

Although I find firearms a bit scary in practice, I've been around enough gun nuts to get where they're coming from, and also been around to hear voices from different countries with different rules...and I agree that there is a "gun pollution" problem here that deserves a different framing from the form that has been around in the US my whole life.

If you have two guns, it's simple to keep them maintained, cleared and secured when not in use. If you have 250 guns, you are extremely likely to lose track of them. And when you lose track, accidents happen. That's nothing to do with crime or responsibility or freedoms or the design of the gun - it's there in the statistics that country by country, there are more accidential gun deaths when there are more guns, and bringing our market to saturation is not serving anyone.

Re: Czech gunmaker CZG buys Colt in cash and stock deal

#250

Post by soneil » Fri, Feb 12, 2021, 9:53 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #224

gambiting wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>There is a large overlap between any serious engineering discipline and firearms enthusiasts. Again, surely you mean in the US ? All engineers I have ever worked with or met are almost the exact opposite of this. IMHO ;-)

Some European countries have more guns than you’d think. Iirc it’s estimated that some countries like Switzerland have more guns per capita than some US states (New Jersey is usually the lowest per capita). The difference is in gun culture. Very few Europeans identify with guns as much as Americans occasionally do.

I believe gun ownership in Switzerland is very closely tied to compulsory military service. It's very much an outlier as statistics go - issuing every adult male a rifle isn't so much a gun culture as a military strategy.

(Czechia does has a strong civilian ownership, however)