But the screw is so simple and cheap--most cost less than a penny apiece to make--that it has been easier to design around its deficiencies than to come up with a better model.
In many cases this low-quality content is produced by so-called content-farms that produce it on the cheap.
With modern hardware so cheap, Intel-based servers that dish out applications and data have proliferated like rabbits.
Although he confesses to being a "coding novice, " Langevin taught himself how to use Arduino -- a very cheap and increasingly popular microcontroller -- so that he could get his prosthetic hand to move.
That meant pirates could buy cheap boxes and so-called smart cards that were being subsidized by the company, hack into the system and get free service.
But institutional investors, especially those that like to invest in what they consider cheap stocks (so-called value investors), have had to follow their lead or dramatically underperform their rivals.
If students facing large debts decide that a so-so course at a so-so university isn't so attractive after all, there may be summer sales, with places going cheap in clearing, or perhaps early-bird discounts for students who make a particular institution their first choice.
It could, of course, be burned in the US to make power - but shale gas is so cheap that it's not worthwhile.
One of the reasons Internet use has grown so rapidly is because it is cheap - and it is cheap mainly because, in most cities around the world, there is no per-minute charge for calls to local Internet service providers.
Besides, greens often claim that the American economy is so energy-inefficient that it is littered with cheap carbon savings.
For credit-worthy borrowers, loans are so cheap that they are almost free.
FORBES: Economic Forecast Update, 2013-2014: Light-to-moderate Growth
This was made clear in a speech last week by the prime minister, who talked about building on the Treasury's use of so-called "credit easing" to channel cheap finance to housing projects, businesses and infrastructure.
Where once the West relied on China's lack of environmental enforcement to tamp down rare-earth prices and implicitly subsidize high-tech goods, in the future the nature of the subsidy will change so that China's cheap(er) labor will subsidize Western mid-tech goods.
Thirty years ago, as I started my so-called career, not a single person told me that computers and technology would get so cheap that they would practically end up being given away in boxes of Cheerios.
So color digital printing won't be cheap--5 to 10 cents per page versus a fraction of a penny for offset.
Adjust the reserve to a more typical level--and thereby move the tangible book down by a like amount--and Citi doesn't look so cheap.
They may also be instrumental in the next generation of almost-invisible computational devices, ones so small and cheap they could be woven into your clothes.
Opposition to the treaty has come especially from European carmakers who have argued the agreement benefits South Korea by allowing Korean manufacturers to reclaim duties paid on cheap imports from neighbouring countries - so-called duty drawback.
BBC: EU-South Korea trade deal backed by European Parliament
The real trick to getting cheap fares is to travel during the so-called shoulder season, according to Anne Banas, executive editor of SmarterTravel.com.
Renewable energy remains too expensive, too land-hungry, too unreliable and too small-scale to take up much slack, so cheap coal and newly abundant natural gas will do the job.
Applied Materials (nasdaq: AMAT - news - people ), are working to improve another thin-film technology that is extremely cheap but so inefficient it can't yet match First Solar in cost per kwh.
We said we were building children's self-esteem so they could be successful, but it never occurred to us that giving kids what psychologists call "cheap self-esteem" could do more harm than good by making our kids think they're 10-feet tall and bulletproof when they're neither.
Also, until recently, China lacked a reliable and cheap method of shipping packages, so the e-commerce industry has invested in developing one.
After its first four attempts at malls, which were a disaster, Mr Allen now thinks Seiyu has learnt the tricks of the trade, offering super-cheap leases to the crowd-pulling stores so that money-earning small retailers will want to open up too.
The benefits of importing semi-skilled needleworkers are less so, particularly since they are not cheap.
So, Silicon Valley dwellers, with the cheap land and wide-open spaces of a generation ago long gone you tell us: why stick around?
Also pushing down the value of used cars are price cuts on new cars, typically taking the form of so-called "incentives"--that is, rebates or cheap financing.
Gas has become so cheap that it can be substituted for coal as an electricity-generating fuel.
So cheap have the big, established brokers become that online start-ups such as Kiwoom.com, which opened last month, are struggling to win customers, despite its offer of free trading until the end of June.
Suddenly, in the middle of all this, the Farrellys cut to a gruesome close-up of the actual mutilation, which is so unexpected and so cheap, I couldn't decide how I felt about it as a joke.
CNN: Review: 'There's Something About Mary,' and it's disgusting
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