# Recent updates to gwern.net (2013-2014)

> Previous: [2011](/lw/8kv/recent_updates_to_gwernnet/), [2012-2013](/lw/h0b/recent_updates_to_gwernnet_20122013/)

“It cannot be gotten for gold, neither shall silver be weighed for the price thereof. / It cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx, nor the sapphire. / The gold and the crystal cannot equal it: and the exchange of it shall not be for vessels of fine gold. / No mention shall be made of coral, or of pearls: for the price of wisdom is above rubies.”

Another 477 days are past, so what have I been up to? In roughly topical & chronological order, here are some major [additions to `gwern.net`](http://www.gwern.net/Changelog):

Statistics:

*   [Google Alerts](http://www.gwern.net/Google%20Alerts): analysis of all my emails from Google Alerts to see whether/when they started to be less useful.
*   [Google shutdowns](http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns): compiled dataset of past & present Google products for a [survival analysis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survival_analysis) attempting to investigate common claims about why Google abandons things & predict which would be shutdown in the next 5 years. So far the model’s predictions are doing well.
*   applied survival analysis to [modeling _Methods of Rationality_ reviews on FF.net](http://www.gwern.net/hpmor#survival-analysis)
*   reproduced a [paper analyzing Bitcoin exchange shutdown](http://www.gwern.net/Silk%20Road#bitcoin-exchange-risk) or theft risk.
*   [Public release of the Mnemosyne spaced repetition dataset](https://groups.google.com/d/msg/mnemosyne-proj-users/tPHlkTFVX_4/oF61BF44iQkJ) (18GB of 121.2m flashcard reviews, collected ~2004-2014)
*   [nootropics survey analysis](http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/02/16/nootropics-survey-results-and-analysis/#comment-41413)
*   [power simulation](http://www.gwern.net/AB%20testing#covariate-impact-on-power) of the penalty from omitting important covariates in logistic regression
*   did some spaced repetition research using [the Mnemosyne logs](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/mnemosyne-proj-users/8yZz9BbqKl4/BxAIjo_2WscJ): found weekly & time of day effects on memory performance - with a clear circadian rhythm; while my results aren’t conclusive, my analysis of 48m flashcard reviews from the public database finds that the best time for recalling your flashcards seem to be noon. (I haven’t looked at time correlates with _next_ review, though.)

QS:

*   DNB meta-analysis expanded with a dozen or so studies & a new covariate (whether payment reduces gains: [it doesn’t](http://www.gwern.net/DNB%20meta-analysis#paymentextrinsic-motivation))
*   compiled a small meta-analysis of [creatine’s effect on intelligence](http://www.gwern.net/Creatine)
*   updated my [analysis of SDr’s sleep data](http://www.gwern.net/Zeo#sdr-lucid-dreaming-exploratory-data-analysis)
*   [2013 Lewis meditation quasi-experiment](http://www.gwern.net/Lewis%20meditation): A Quantified Selfer and a few other guys did some meditation while doing an arithmetic game; turned out to be a perfect application for multilevel modeling
*   Modafinil: [price table update](http://www.gwern.net/Modafinil#modafinil-table)
*   [Sleep and lunar phases](http://www.gwern.net/Lunar%20sleep): A recent paper claimed that there’s a phase-of-the-moon effect on circadian rhythms; since I have so much sleep data on myself, I thought I’d see if there’s any effect…
*   [analyzed a self-experiment](http://www.gwern.net/LLLT) about [low level laser therapy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_level_laser_therapy) improving reaction time
*   [Treadmill/spaced repetition experiment](http://www.gwern.net/Treadmill#treadmill-effect-on-spaced-repetition-performance-randomized-experiment) (likely interference)
*   an [LSD microdosing](http://www.gwern.net/LSD%20microdosing) self-experiment (while there was a lot of criticism, I still regard as worthwhile and setting a new benchmark for any future research in that area.)
*   finished [caffeine-pill wakeup pilot trial](http://www.gwern.net/Zeo#morning-caffeine-pills), began full-scale blinded self-experiment

Black-markets:

*   an analysis of whether a particular vendor on Silk Road is a federal mole ([probably not](http://www.gwern.net/Silk%20Road#a-mole), but some have claimed he was the source of the bad fake IDs Ross Ulbricht ordered)
*   transcribed [_Drugs 2.0_: “Your Crack’s in the Post”](http://www.gwern.net/docs/sr/2013-power) (book chapter)
*   betting all and sundry that BlackMarket Reloaded & Sheep Marketplace will be [busted or shut down within a year](http://www.reddit.com/r/SilkRoad/comments/1pko9y/the_bet_bmr_and_sheep_to_die_in_a_year/) (no takers; my 1-year predictions were correct, but my 6-month predictions drastically underestimated the risk)
*   preliminary black market [survival analysis](http://www.gwern.net/Silk%20Road#survival-analysis), done for the bet
*   compiled a table of all known [black-markets with lifetimes](http://www.gwern.net/Black-market%20survival) (intended for a larger survival analysis)
*   [estimating DPR’s net fortune](http://www.gwern.net/Silk%20Road#estimating-dprs-fortune-minus-expenses-exchange-rate) based on the FBI numbers
*   doxed the owner of Sheep Marketplace (see http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=9spTATw6 & https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/182368464/2013-11-03-sheepmarketplace-doxxing.maff )
*   BBC Radio 5 & NHK interviews
*   2 [Mike Power interviews](http://www.gwern.net/Silk%20Road#mike-power-questions)
*   I have begun systematically spidering all operational black-markets, and [wrote a bit on how my complacency](http://www.gwern.net/Mistakes#centralized-black-markets) about free-market mechanisms lead to no serious archiving early on

Bitcoin:

*   [Wei Dai/Satoshi Nakamoto emails](http://www.gwern.net/docs/2008-nakamoto)
*   [McCaleb email interview on MtGox](http://www.gwern.net/docs/2014-mccaleb)
*   short essay on [Zerocoin prospects](http://www.gwern.net/Prediction%20markets#zerocoin)
*   bets: update on [bet with qwertyoruiop](http://www.gwern.net/Prediction%20markets#personal-bets) btc<$50 - conceded defeat, learned a lesson about panicking, and paid up; altogether admirable
*   wrote up [an essay](http://www.gwern.net/Blackmail) on:
    *   3 attempts to blackmail/extort/scam
    *   [a fanfiction about Satoshi Nakamoto](http://www.gwern.net/Blackmail#fanfiction) sent to me by an anonymous user, which was too good to simply delete
    *   [Evolution’s attempted blackmail](http://www.gwern.net/Blackmail#march) of me to find out who was criticizing them on Reddit

Tech:

*   [Spatial locality for better file compression](http://www.gwern.net/Archiving%20URLs#sort---key-compression-trick)
*   [Epigrams on technology](http://www.gwern.net/Notes#technology-epigrams)
*   Haskell Summer of Code: [2013 review](http://www.gwern.net/Haskell%20Summer%20of%20Code#section-7)

Literature/fiction

*   [Scholz’s _Radiance_](http://www.gwern.net/docs/2002-radiance): transcribed, annotated, commentary, copy of original novella & diff with corresponding material in the final novel, and Benford essay [“Old Legends”](http://www.gwern.net/docs/2002-radiance#old-legends) on his physics career, SF & science, the “Star Wars” program, Edward Teller, etc; tracked down and scanned a copy of [“The _Astounding_ Investigation: The Manhattan Project’s Confrontation with Science Fiction”](http://www.gwern.net/docs/1984-berger.pdf)
*   [Book reviews](http://www.gwern.net/Book%20reviews): for the LW media threads, I began writing book reviews on [GoodReads](http://www.goodreads.com/user/show/11004626-gwern), but why let them keep my reviews? So I wrote a Haskell program to parse my GoodReads ratings & reviews into Pandoc Markdown and make my own backup.
*   [Sand](http://www.gwern.net/Sand), on:
    
    *   forgotten cleaning methods in literature; and
    *   the forgotten science behind [early SF’s “great pain of space”](http://www.gwern.net/Sand#scanners-live-in-vain-as-realistic-sf)
*   compiled & expanded [anthology of my poems](http://www.gwern.net/fiction/Poems)
    

Misc:

*   wrote a [short essay defending](http://www.gwern.net/The%20Narrowing%20Circle#the-fukuyama-thesis) Francis Fukuyama’s end of history thesis
*   [Cicadas for dinner](http://www.gwern.net/Notes#cicadas): I caught some cicadas during the most recent Maryland emergence; I review the spaghetti dinner I made with them
*   [compiled my tea reviews](http://www.gwern.net/Tea)
*   I [researched an old family friend in his 90s](http://www.gwern.net/Notes#arthur-moulton) who has never been willing to talk about his government work during the Cold War & found some stuff using released Census records; he has since passed away.

Site:

*   I began [A/B testing my site design](http://www.gwern.net/AB%20testing) to try to improve readability:
    
    *   no difference between 4 fonts
    *   no difference between lineheights
    *   no difference between the null hypothesis & the null hypothesis
    *   a pure black/white foreground/background performed better than mixes of off-colors
    *   font size 100-120%: default of 100% was best
    *   blockquote formatting: Readability-style bad, zebra-stripes good
    *   header capitalization: best result was to upcase title & all section headers
    *   tested font size & number size & table of contents background: status quo of all was best
    *   [BeeLine Reader](http://www.beelinereader.com/): no color variant performed better than no-highlighting
*   [anonymous feedback analysis](http://www.gwern.net/About#anonymous-feedback) (feedback turned out to be useful)
*   deleted Flattr, trying out [Gittip](https://www.gittip.com/gwern/) for donations; Gittip turns out to work much better
*   I began [a newsletter/mailing-list](http://eepurl.com/Kc155); the back-issues are online:
    
    *   [December 2013](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2013/12)
    *   [January 2014](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2014/01)
    *   [February 2014](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2014/02)
    *   [March 2014](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2014/03)
    *   [April 2014](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2014/04)
    *   [May 2014](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2014/05)
    *   [June 2014](http://www.gwern.net/newsletter/2014/06)