skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
What a really amazing turn-around from a few months ago. AirBnB was lauded as one of the few unicorns that were actually profitable and doing a good job justifying their valuation. With that said, they were a bad faith actor in many cities and caused rents to go up significantly [1], so I'm not sad they're taking it on the chin.

[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/garybarker/2020/02/21/the-airbn...
I've just gotten the paperwork for our disaster loan. The COVID loans do not have a personal guarantee. That was one of the items on the first relief bill that specified this program on March 6.
> The last time we saw labor contraction like this was during the Great Depression, when millions starved and the economy took years to recover. What are people supposed to do when there are no jobs for them and they can’t leave the house?

What do you think they did in the Great Depression? WW2? They didn’t sit there and wait for the government to bail them out. They saved for a rainy day. The US govt borrowed money from the citizens to fight WW2. But thanks to QE infinity, the government has disincentivized and fucked over savers as well. Big surprise, anytime the government gets involved they fuck it up.
Nextdoor is essentially a nationwide service for people to share coyote sightings in their neighborhood. No matter where they are, people won't shut up about them.
Wow. Thanks. I never even thought of moving to Shenzhen, but that's a smart idea. I wonder whether I have any 1st- or 2nd-degree contacts over there who could help me get set up.
I can only gather you don't know many gig workers. The ones I've talked to aren't doing it for fun. They're desperate.
AirBnb uses a lot of dark patterns. The price you see on the UI can be 50% lower, because cleaning fees and other taxes add up very fast. You can't even compare two listing and get an Apple to Apple comparison.

Their customer support is hopeless, I've lost money on two stays where I wouldn't get a refund because the listing was inaccurate (smelly and bad hygeine).

They have to learn from Amazon. I know Amazon has terrible practices for it's workers but as a customer, I can't think of any online company that comes as close to their customer obsession. I can buy anything with prime label, its delivered quickly and I can return it if I am not happy for any reason.

This is what I want from AirBnB. A very generous refund policy, and transparency in its listing + pricing.
Sure, you're not wrong about this, however, given the situation with COVID-19, we don't really want people to be out there working. We want them working from home if they can or not working at all. If that's the case, the government has to kick in to support those people. We're making a public health decision that adversely affects the economy but not making this decision is likely worse than the where we're at and where we're headed.

Perhaps this will be a lesson to us as a people, a nation, and all companies who operate to not take such a narrow view.
Instacart Workers to Strike over Company’s Covid-19 Response
> Now there’s no reason to look for another job, if your rent is guaranteed and the government checks come in every month for four months on top of unemployment.

That is actually an ideal outcome, because that would slow down the disease transmission significantly.
This is a dumb take. All these people were working and wanted to keep working until coronavirus lockdowns took their jobs. I’m sure most of them want to find new jobs but good luck because almost no one is hiring in this environment.
Will investors also do the right thing and not subsidize these types of startups?
Brisk: A proof of concept scripting library for Swift
Especially because a lot of those major American companies have spent the past decade loading up on debt and buying back their shares at historically high prices.
Abbott ID NOW: 5 minute point-of-care test for Covid-19
Sadly (or not sadly depending on your perspective), most people today will use a remote host via Google Drive or DropBox (or even email) and not have this problem.
Scott Gottlieb says this is a game changer. Here some facts I found interesting:

* It works on isothermal amplification [1] rather than temperature-cycling PCR, so it's much faster.

* It detects the viral RNA directly, so it should be detecting pretty much the same thing as existing PCR-based tests, just much faster.

* It's the same platform as a flu test. Obviously the Covid-19 version was done in a rush, so it might not be quite as good, but the sensitivity and specificity rates for influenza are amazing: sensitivity above 95% and specificity near 100%. If the numbers for Covid-19 are close, I can see why Gottlieb is calling it a game changer.

I really have to be impressed by our collective technical ingenuity, both the scientists figuring this stuff out in near real-time, equipment manufacturers such as Abbott who can do this, and of course the front-line health providers.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loop-mediated_isothermal_ampli...

[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31558351
* I’m practically never so productive that I’m counting seconds for an app to open.

* VS Code is just as quick to use as Xcode, actually more responsive in many actions, demonstrating effectively that it’s the algorithm which must change for a serious speed up

* MBP batteries are laughable in the first place and they’re basically portable desktops that need to stay plugged in all the time

* The rest of the OS hasn’t behaved consistently with itself the whole time I’ve been using it, just like every other OS I’ve used for the past 25 years; consistency was a pipe dream
right, why save when you can buy back your stock.
These workers would be dependent contractors in Germany or Canada, I think. Defining that in-between category in the US would allow for some useful compromises. Especially because full employee comes with so much baggage here, e.g. health insurance.

https://www.wolfbaldwin.com/articles/small-business-articles...
The author completely forgot to include the thirty year war, it was instrumental in completely breaking Habsburg hegemony "almost" overnight on the historical scale, and opened way for historical shift of power to Western Europe from Central, and Eastern Europe.
A small amount in most areas, yeah.

Frankly I'm surprised they have spot capacity at all, given how much other providers are struggling to work at all.
Not very widespread. You may not have a very long view on history. Take a look at my username (I'm "English" by the way). Just in case I need to spell it out: Gerdes ~= German.

Those two wars had very different reasons despite Germany being a participant in both of them. Russia (famous for not being Anglo) was a major player in those wars as well and we should not overlook Japan etc as well.
Do you have any proof of "grocery stores already have strong unions"? Genuinely wondering how you've concluded this.
Ask HN: What's your Covid19 layoff story? any predictions?
I wanted to see how others in tech are affected by this. I am assuming if your company is in tech not much has changed,is it accurate? How about those of you who are employed outside of the technology sector in technical roles? How badly has your or your colleagues employment been affected?

I also wanted to hear about any job market related speculations for technical roles during and after this crisis so I can best advise colleagues. I am being optimistic in hoping I won't need that advise.

Cheers.
Necessary Tricks for High Quality Neural Style Transfer
Funds are collected by GoFundMe through a partnership and the policies for claiming belong to GFM.
This is a good point. I agree.
I see how email creates a barrier. Thanks for the tip. I'll post it ASAP. In the meantime, I'll send email to the address in your profile.
As I paged-down to start reading, I got four words in ("Mindlessly checking social networks") before four social network badges animated in from the left. Seems a little ironic.

Regardless, it was a good read. Your idea about dumbphone+SIM-less smartphone is something I've not heard before and might try.
I totally agree that first responders need to get them first. This virus will not go away. We need to plan towards the future until we get a vaccine or there's enough herd immunity that it's no longer a threat.

See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22708139
http://www.ufcw.org/grocery/

It's a strong grocers union, but does not cover Instacart and other gig workers.
> Careful individually planned offboarding to help them transition.

This doesn't work when you need to make large changes to an org.

I've seen first hand how different styles of this work.

When it's done 'carefully and individually', and keeps happening over days (because that's what it takes) - everyone else in the company starts wondering if they're impacted, and it becomes this slow-moving horror show. Another person gets tapped on the shoulder, called into a room and let go. Meanwhile the business expects things to continue as normal, but it doesn't and even normal meetings become a source of anxiety.

While it's never pleasant to be told you're being let go - at least if you can do it in larger groups and get it over and done with as soon as possible you reduce the level of anxiety and uncertainty.

Not to say that a pre-recorded video, voice mail or text message is the way to go, but still.
Could it be that nobody in their right mind would take a leadership position at this trainwreck of a company (when they can probably find a much better one), so the only ones left are the cowards?
Doordash has a message now saying they will leave it at your door. Their workers are saying others should learn from their response.
ah, i’m reminded of an old comedy classic
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=bVBYaTwMtmY
Yet you're advocating to arrange things for everyone according to your principles which can also, demonstrably, cost lives. I'm advocating that individuals make choices for themselves about when to work together to solve a crisis, or when to avoid one another, or when to collaborate with their government, or when to oppose it.

Totalitarian regimes start with the people being stripped of their freedoms. In every case throughout history, they have stripped people of their rights to speech and defense.

> I am very much averse to the sacrifice of some life in defense of others' principle.

Then advocate for a better healthcare system and government accountability. They don't need to have the system to track people in order to provide healthcare, restrict foreign travel, or issue public guidance on how to handle the situation.

Besides, most people would happily volunteer the information, assuming it was on their terms and reasonably secure. But it never is.

> lives saved figure of merit

I agree, it should be. But you're not counting the lives lost or destroyed by the choice you favor. The "compromise" isn't to give up rights, it's to improve healthcare and preparation for situations like this.

Evil regimes killed 100+ Million people in around a 100 year period. Not allowing governments the power to do that level of evil saves more lives than the coronavirus could ever take.
Months-long? Let's not kid ourselves: years-long.

A modern example of this is lambda-the-ultimate.org, which has so many threads that have been running for years without any clear purpose that it's almost impossible to find a thread that hasn't.

Of course, that could be a matter of scale; with less posts to keep track of, I guess it would be easier to continue things eternally.
Puppet lays off less than 10% of its workforce
Abbott's press release: https://www.abbott.com/corpnewsroom/product-and-innovation/d...

The test/product: https://www.alere.com/en/home/product-details/id-now-covid-1...

> The ID NOW™ COVID-19 assay is now available for use on the ID NOW platform under U.S. Food and Drug Administration Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). The ID NOW™ COVID-19 rapid test delivers high-quality molecular positive results in as little as 5 minutes, targeting the coronavirus (COVID-19) RdRp Gene.
What potential problems could this cause?
There are a wide variety of ways to test this, yet no significant link has been found. I see this hypothesis come up a lot on HN. It’s a favorite around here.

Consider this: HN generally attracts the intelligent type of personality. What scares that type of personality most? Losing the gift of intelligence. What is the most common thing that can take that away? Dementia. How do you make yourself feel safer about such an unpredictable thing as dementia? Convince yourself that it’s caused by something that can easily be controlled with modern medicine - microbes. It’s not so scary anymore, is it?
^ this is a strong argument for a 100% estate tax, as well as for exceptionally high capital gains taxes.

After all, people with inherited wealth or unearned income will have no incentive to work otherwise. A such, we MUST strip them of their assets so that they may become productive parts of society.
Does anyone know if there was anything in the stimulus bill for health insurance for people on unemployment?
This helps, but it seems vanishingly unlikely that both spouses will always be able to find good jobs in the same neighborhood for as long as their kids are in school.
Lyft is referring drivers to jobs at Amazon after ridership decline
Passenger pigeons, bison, wolves, etc.

Here is an interesting map of the historic and current grizzly bear ranges.

https://www.usgs.gov/media/images/historical-and-current-gri...

It is truly amazing how nearly completely we wiped the continent of wildlife. Many of our teams are named after the animals we wiped out. Florida Panthers, Jacksonville Jaguars, California Golden Bears, Michigan Wolverines, etc.

> Whales as far as the eye could see all day long.

The near extermination of whales along our shores changed geopolitics. One of the reasons why commodore perry "visited" japan was to open japanese ports to our whalers.
Perhaps, but it will also clear out potentially strong companies that still require substantial investment to get to market simply because they're early in their lifecycle.

You can tell a well made building vs a poorly made building by what's still standing after an earthquake. But no building is built to withstand an atomic blast.
Airbnb would be every bit as successful with a Craigslist or Amazon interface, while saving millions in front-end salaries.
Isn't a stock buyback exactly the same as paying a dividend, but taxed at a lower rate? I don't see why these companies are being demonized, the government should just let them go bankrupt and let the public buy their assets for pennies on the dollar.
I remember seeing a Security Analyst for the DC I worked for take down 6 racks worth of Cisco Catalyst 12000 series router hardware once.

They had a HSRP interface set up at the .1 address, and the security analyst set his laptop up with the same static .1 IP address and plugged it in. Instant outage.
Awesome. Hadn’t been aware the forums could be that granularly useful. Thank you!
Sure but the fun part about these insanely well funded moonshot startups that lose money on every transaction is that all these shutdowns improve their gross margins and cashflow positions.
D3 Graph Theory – Interactive Graph Theory Tutorials
I thought the idea was that you were allowed to make money by furthering humanity?

I've spent a lot of time on my app and I still had to pay people to help do the app.
The cases and deaths counts aren't informative enough to really say anything useful about what's going on. When a "case" is reported, we don't when the symptoms started occurring, or even when the original sample was collected. So you can't really draw any conclusions from this "consumer grade" information. You'd have to study it properly, and look a sample of individual case progressions.

I think the CFR stat is especially misleading, and we shouldn't be trying to compare it. For instance, if a country simply has a longer lag between testing and reporting the tests, the CFR will look higher. CFR will also look lower if the growth rate is high.

I made a little hypothetical to illustrate this.

Imagine a disease where your skin turns bright green on day 8 and you drop dead on day 30, without fail for all infections. It's growing 25% a day. What's the "CFR" at day 100?

In this hypothetical, all infections are symptomatic, all symptomatic cases are detected, and all symptomatic cases are fatal. But people don't drop dead immediately -- it takes 22 days, and at 25% a day the number of cases grows 135x in that period.

So even though this fictional disease is 100% fatal, the "case fatality ratio" will stay under 1% all the way through the growth phase.

In summary: those stats aren't really evidence that Germany's outbreak is progressing any differently from anyone else's. The information is much too vague to say one way or another. Instead the baseline assumption is, Germany has the same virus as everywhere else, and is applying the same treatments. So for any individual patients, the outlooks will be the same here as anywhere else that still has ICU beds and ventilators available.
Once at a meeting to discuss the patent application the presenter mentioned how Jeff Bezos patented "one click buy" - i.e. Buying something with a single click. I asked why we didn't patent "2-n click buy" to prevent any competitors from selling anything.

Everyone laughed but I meant it seriously. I still don't get how "1 click buy" is a thing you can patent but you can't patent "2 click buy". The patent process is incredibly stupid and arbitrary as far as I can tell - at least when it comes to software.
Makes perfect sense when interest rates are near zero. Borrowing is practically free and saving earns you next to nothing.
Guess (or find a leaked meeting ID) and you can talk / show things pseudo-anonymously to a bunch of kindergartners today.
Or just observe them and find out aout them. That has some potential problems.
> I said that due to recent policy decisions, the government has incentivized workers not to work.

On some level, isn't that almost the goal? If the coronavirus hits us at full speed, the estimates I've seen suggest that the loss of life would remove tens of trillions of dollars of future economic capacity. (And also, you know, kill people.)

Until we figure out how to keep this under control (like Singapore) or slow it enough to provide adequate medical care for the infected, the goal is to get people to stay home.

So it almost makes sense to incentivise people not to work. The last thing we want right now is everybody out and mingling.

But we have to use this time well. We need to increase medical capacity, research treatments, build ventilators, run serological tests for antibodies, build contact tracing infrastructure, care for patients, make masks and PPE, and a hundred other things.
I have heard that many companies are multi cloud as a result of acquisitions, resulting in a dependency on both clouds.
It's nonsensical to assert that someone has a choice when they need income.

The actual cost of living (food, utilities, and home maintenance) is quite low compared to the amount that just gets funneled upwards as rent. This rent treadmill has been created by decades of artificially low interest rates, an explicit government policy.

Sadly most of this surplus doesn't even go to Scrooge Mcducks swimming in vaults of wealth, but rather gets wasted in a distributed fashion on fake office jobs.
Of course you can! Email us at hn@ycombinator.com. As I explained above, that would have been much better. The answer to your question was as simple as https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22708065, but when people bring questions like this up in the threads I feel obliged to write an explanation from first principles.
Complaints about saving are the most absurd thing ever.

Rich people were getting free money by doing nothing and taking no risk. Now they're getting less free money by doing nothing and taking no risk.

It's crazy that you want to enact policies which would very literally kill thousands of people just because you want rich people (who don't need more money) to get more free unearned money.

In a truly free market wealthy people would have to pay vault, security, and insurance fees to maintain a riskless balance.
> Pipes exercise backpressure on the writer - if the pipe is full the writer is blocked. Actor systems mostly use seemingly unbounded queues. The sender will not get blocked.

Erlang does suspend (block) processes that send to ports or nodes when the buffers for that get full; but not when sending to local processes. There used to be an optional reduction count punishment for senders when sending to messages with larger mailboxes, but it seems that may have been removed. I don't think it would be too hard to add a feature where sending to a local mailbox over a specified size caused the sender to be suspended, but tracking it might be a little difficult.
Contributed Firefox a little bit two years ago. Here is the file I contributed: [1]

You will immediately see a lot of NS_ (or ns) prefixed names in the source code. Without knowing about Firefox's history I thought like that Firefox has history with Apple (NeXTSTEP). But no, NS_ are the legacy from Netscape.

It was fun to get to know its history from the source code when I was contributing it :)

[1]: https://dxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/dom/media/Med...
They typically do one swab of the nasopharynx (upper back of the throat, up above the soft palate). You might have the virus elsewhere but not there.

Saw reports that bronchoalveolar lavage (introducing and then suctioning out fluid from a branch of the lung) is better at picking up virus if it's present -- but it's much more time consuming, more invasive, and much less pleasant for the patient than sticking a swab up your nose. Not something you're going to do in a parking lot in a drive through testing center for someone only showing mild symptoms.

There are always compromises.
It should be opt-in, if you don't opt-in,mandatory quara tine for you. And this should not be something they can renew after the crisis like the US Patriot act.
Getting the ducks in line for a sale?