skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I'm not going to enter this deep, deep rabbithole- but I'd just like to point out that your post rests on the assumption that military leads to the betterment of the species/individual humans.
Show HN: We just redesigned the SlideShare homepage
>>Your morality and ethics are your own.

No. Only morality is defined by the individual. Ethics are defined by groups and societies.

http://www.diffen.com/difference/Ethics_vs_Morals
> Its written into our Code of Ethics in Canada that all Engineers are to put the public good above that of our own personal gain or that of our employer.

That's great. Which part of "protecting the motherland against terrorists" would not satisfy that code? I'd bet that the vast majority of the (necessarily quite competent) engineers that built the NSA infrastructure believed (and possibly still do) that that is what they're doing. It would surprise me severely if a majority of them was making a trade-off between "family eats" and "the right thing to do".

We're not talking about people that plausibly do not have alternative employment available. These are highly competent engineers and they could go work for any number of companies with decidedly less evil businesses if they felt their ethics were being compromised.
> It's all very well new languages coming along and solving the trivial stuff (setting up message queues, isolating memory) but very few of them do anything to solve the real problems.

I think that Rust makes a lot of effort to move things in the right direction. In Rust you can share memory, but unless you are in the unsafe sublanguage (which is clearly marked) the type system restricts you to one of: (1) copying messages; (2) transferring ownership of a message so that the original thread cannot race on it; (3) sharing immutable memory only; (4) taking a lock before accessing mutable data. We've seen huge engineering benefits from this: making parts of Servo thread-safe has been simply a matter of running the compiler repeatedly and letting the error messages tell us where to insert the locks; when it compiles we know the data races are gone. (You can still deadlock though.)
Resurrecting Bose QuietComfort 15
So what if these NSA engineers really thought they were helping people and doing good? What if they personally decided they were willing to deal with the certain privacy sacrifices they were making because from what they knew, working in very secret high level intelligence(seeing and knowing a lot more than we do), the threat to peoples lives and safety were worth what they are doing. Then in that case this whole article would be considered bunk. Ethics like morals are relative.
Ethics are not necessarily your own, and can take the form of an enforceable code in a number of professional organizations.

Some sources define ethics as being a set of normative values common to a group of people, and morals as being subset of the individual's normative values.
But those are exactly the customers who won't believe you anyway???

I'm not saying that these customers don't have justification for their paranoia... just saying that there is an extremely high probability that Brazil, or Indonesia, or Statoil are planning to phase out use of American software over time in any case. In fact, it's so plainly evident that surely American tech companies should already be factoring it into their strategic planning???

Why not try to create some new customers? Or do something that doesn't rely on foreign organizations to trust, or use your software?

I don't know what that would look like... but that's why they get paid the big bucks.
The law should protect your online communication
Fwd from an email from Take Action with Google (https://www.google.com/takeaction/) - so I am not Derek Slater.

Join tens of thousands of Americans who agree that the stuff you store online deserves the same legal protections as the stuff you keep in your home.

More than 36,000 people have signed the "We the People" petition demanding that the White House update the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) to reflect the way people use the Internet now, not the way we used it back in the 1980s when the law was written.

The White House is only obligated to respond once the petition has reached 100,000 signatures, so today is the day to speak up and let the White House know.

Take two minutes to sign the petition and tell the government to get a warrant. Add your name now:

http://takeaction.withgoogle.com/white-house-petition

To sign the petition, you'll create an account, click a link in the confirmation email, and then click once more to sign that petition. It's just a few clicks to help protect the Fourth Amendment, but they're clicks that will demand a response from the White House.

More soon,

Derek Slater
Google Inc.
Think of it as an involuntary social network!
The answer to your question most likely is: Because that's how they wanted to make it.
You don't see yourself as evil, so no one should call you evil?

Hitler had a lot of self confidence
Do you allow closed source entries? Rewriting an algorithm implemented in someone else's code to avoid copyright infringement is trivial not to mention inevitable given the performance requirement differences between a contest and a production site.
var allHackersHaveSamePoliticalBeliefs=FALSE;

while (! allHackersHaveSamePoliticalBeliefs) {

// Should randomize topics NSA, Snowden, Wikileaks, US Govt, US Military

postPoliticalStoryToHackerNews();

sleep(1_DAY);

}
Chromium's --no-remote is pretty busted these days, in my experience. Basic browsing sorta works, but little else does.
It was just an example.
My point is, by relaying all entrance control to an email, you are giving it master password access. The only thing you are doing is relaying the security issues to wherever that email is hosted; most of the times, a free and third party service over which you have no control.
No, it is not more secure to keep your car, home and security box keys together.

You are not increasing security, whatsoever. You are setting all the security in an email service, which we already know are not the most secure services at this moment.

May be, such login can be applied inside a company's network, where you have control over the security of the servers, certificates, network encryption, etc.

Now if you think about it from a social engineering perspective. It is much easier to get access to a single email account than to every account you own. And about persistence of access... There's this thing called email forwarder. If I get access to your email, I would create a forwarder for all the email you receive to one I control; chances are you won't notice it in a long time.
If any of the Google people are in here, I would consider adding a feature that delays access to your new archive by 48 hours.

As great as export features are, I imagine it's the thing hackers who compromise an account will go straight for.
Is there more description of the data anywhere? Like what does having an "f_number_of_pets" of 7.5 mean?
Slow cookers and mason jars are an extremely economical way in both time and money for poor people to eat well. Armed with a 6-9 quart cast iron slow cooker and maybe 2-3 evenings a week with minimal attention after mis-en-place, you can eat very well, very cheaply. Plus, the food you prepare reheats very well and stores well in mason jars in the fridge or freezer.

You can go well beyond a slow cooker in time and money with a one time purchase of a solid pressure cooker. I have a 21-qt All American that I can produce tasty brown and black bean based meals at less than the cost of the Mac-n-Cheese. I'd cook about 15 quarts of beans in one evening, freeze 12 and eat the other 3 over the next few days.

If you were to ban ready-to-eat foods high in sugar and hydrogenated fats, you'd force people to learn about these alternatives. The benefit of banning is that it eliminates the path of least resistance where people remain ignorant of alternatives.

If people still want sweet foods and other things that are bad for them, they can still have them, but they have to do some work by cooking those sweet things themselves.
Yeah, but Bitcoin's price is not based purely on logic. It is also based on emotion.
That guy is brain dead. He is embarassing to watch or listen to anymore, unfortunately.
Let's take this further with a thought I always like to spend time musing on from time to time:

If we discover alient life within our galaxy, and years pass and we become friendly. What if another galaxy attacks ours, and we fight them.

Galaxy vs. Galaxy.

One side wins, the other falls in line and is absorbed in their ways. The we form one huge 'quadrant' in space.

Another quadrant attacks us ad infinity.

When does the tribal, us vs. they end? -Does- it end?
Here is the simplest solution I found to taking a backup of your gmail. The only glitch is that the mirror account will of course be a perfect image only if you set up the forwarding from day one :-(

I had to use gmvault (gmvault.org/) to make a copy of my gmail; it was quite doable.

Pasted from http://www.webmonkey.com/2008/11/simple_solutions_to_help_yo...

"Create some backup accounts — This one is so obvious I’m always surprised to hear that not everyone does it. Gmail is free and lets you have an unlimited number accounts… so open a second one. Mine is just my usual account with .bak appended to the username. Once that’s set up, login to your primary account and either enable forwarding for all messages (Settings >> Forwarding and POP/IMAP) or create filters to only forward the messages you really care about. Then just send those messages on to the backup account.

I use my main Gmail account to manage five e-mail addresses, so I used the filters method and only back up a couple of them (the others are already backed up on the original domain’s mail server). I also have the forwarding set up to pass messages along to a Yahoo Mail account, an account on my own server and even a good old Hotmail account (or Windows Live Mail as it’s known these days).

This setup is like a good investment portfolio, think of it as e-mail diversification — your’re hedging your bets by spreading your mail around to several servers. If something goes wrong on one account, just login to another.
I don’t login to the other accounts much, so they aren’t as carefully filtered, organized and de-spammed as my main Gmail account, but at least my mail is there"
For some people its simply an over indulgence problem. You could easily counter by saying why don't people just throw up after eating problem solved. Yet in my experience quick fixes often have other consequences that may not be immediately known. I don't believe you can simulate complex bio mechanical processes like muscle tearing but you may be able to allow you body to be more efficient when you do these things.
China forbids banks from Bitcoin trading
Foursquare 7.0 Brings Scannable Design, Expands Recommendations To All Users
There's always checkvist.com
Introducing GlassFart: the world's first fart app for Google Glass.
Can neuroscience help us understand financial bubbles?
Bullshit; it would be like pretending that tires shouldn't have been created because someday those could be used on war jeeps.

It's not possible to predict the uses of one's work and therefor is impossible to comprehend its ethical implications. And if you add capitalism to the equation it means that someone else is going to create the technology even if you don't just if there is a direct -or even indirect- profit from it regardless of ethics.

So the "problem" is not a burden on individuals of certain professions (e.g. engineers) but on basic social structures.
There are roughly two sorts of people to consider here. The people who agree that the project they are working on is unethical (or would agree if they stopped to think about it), and the people who honestly believe that their work is ethical.

Obviously when we tell engineers to consider the ethical implications of the project that they are working on, we are talking to the first group (particularly the parenthesized subgroup). The people who believe their work is unethical won't stop working on it just because we disagree, but that should not discourage us from encouraging people to grow a spine and not work on projects that they have ethical objections to.

For people in the second group, we can work with alternative techniques. One possibility is socially ostracizing and blacklisting people who continue to work on unethical projects. (As discussed at some length on HN three or so weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6714585)
when you say "keep it legal" it sounds like you only mean, "so I don't get arrested". That is, you would not work on something very ethical, but illegal (like some system of assisting in the production of medical marijuana in a state where it's illegal) but you would work on something unethical but legal (NSA spying).

So really, saying anything legal is not saying much - essentially ethics don't come into question.

I know for a fact that I'm very uncomfortable working on something that I find to be obviously unethical. Though NSA stuff, I'd not work on that just because I'd hate keeping everything I do a secret.
Compromising one email account is easier than compromising several credentials.
Except you are missing something, this hasn't even begun yet.

The three major OSes are controlled by Apple, Microsoft, and Google. Linux and relatives are great but haven't gained real traction outside of Android.

Apple wants to sell hardware so creates a tight software ecosystem. Microsoft wants to sell software so focuses making their OS valuable enough to justify the cost. Google wants to sell ads so gives away their OS.

Android is open source because Google doesn't have anything to lose by doing it. No more no less.
Still not a proper analogy. Nigerian scammers are scammers. They are committing fraud. Slate is an ad-supported publisher, which in most places is still considered an honorable trade.
Hmm, first thing I thought was, there goes Backupify's business model: https://www.backupify.com/

Also, holy crap, it's great to see MBOX going strong after 20 odd years.
Internet’s new big threat? Hackers secretly redirecting web traffic
They know it's wrong (by societies/normal people's) standards, but it doesn't violate their own.

Tou keep saying that, but it doesn't mean what you think it means.
As a google apps admin for my work I backup the entire domain's emails - there are a bunch of companies offering this as a service these days.

As a personal google mail user I use offlineimap to synchronise with a local maildir for both redundancy and reading my emails.
Currency and barter transactions are very different things. Currency transactions are based on credit, barter transactions are based on trading commodities without any intermediary.
Software Defined Networking, Intel and the Cloud
The PS4 uses OpenGL (4.4?).

The PS3 used a proprietary API based on OpenGL 1.0.
Odds of alien life: Very high. Odds of it affecting us in the foreseeable future: Very low.

It's an interesting question, and one that I would love to see research funding for. But it's also unlikely to lead to any direct practical results for a while, although offshoots of technology designed to answer it might end up being handy.
You don't transmit and wait, you just keep talking* - we've essentially been doing this since radio broadcasts began, but we haven't heard/recognized a response yet...

*I thought this was a NASA quote, but I probably got it from a science fiction story somewhere?
Asking to sign an NDA is a sure sign that the entreprenuer is not serious about their business
> The article hints at Homejoy's plans to apply their underlying technology to services beyond cleaning.

That's easier said than done. More often than not, when young, fast-growing companies try to enter new markets quickly in this fashion, it doesn't have the intended outcome.

> It's easy to look at what Homejoy is currently doing, extrapolate to the point where they dominate that specific market, and say, well, this would be worth $X. But I imagine the vision that HJ has sold investors on is one well beyond the relatively narrow market in which they currently operate.

It's even easier to look at what markets Homejoy could apply its technology to, extrapolate to the point where they dominate most if not all of those markets, and say, well, this would be worth $x. Even though this is not at all likely.
Fortunately, it's also hard to get that stuff into your system.

Elemental mercury is usually quite harmless if touched or swallowed.
It is so thick and slippery that it usually falls off your
skin or out of your stomach without being absorbed.¹

¹ http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002476.htm
By betting against the fools.
Little known fact: The Constitution-free zone that extends 100 miles inside the border extends 1000 miles outside the border.
I just love antirez blog. He's such a talented developer with passion and patience to explain implementation details. Every time you read one of their posts you are sure to learn something new.
Uh. FTFA:

> Prices on BTC China, the country's biggest Bitcoin trading platform -- which had stood at more than 7,000 yuan (around $1,100) each -- plunged by more than a third to an intra-day low of 4,523.12 yuan.

A 33% reduction in value is a dive. It may be constrained to the yuan, to China, to the particular exchange or just the crazy fluctuations of bitcoin, but it is still a dive no matter how you slice it.
I'm going to play devil's advocate here.

Assuming that an engineer is aware of the eventual applications for his or her work and is ethically mature enough to recognize that some of those applications are evil, destructive, or violate the rights of others, it doesn't necessarily follow that this engineer should refuse to do the work. For one, just recognizing that a technology has harmful applications--even only harmful applications--and refusing to build it doesn't mean that the technology will not come about anyway. If you find the applications harmful and refuse to work on it, others may--and likely will--step in and build it instead. So there is a game theory issue that the article ignores. If many people can profit (financially, professionally, learning) from building technology that eventually becomes harmful, then a sufficient number of those people need to refuse to work on the technology in order for it to not be developed. But decreasing the scarcity of labor will increase the value of it, and thus the rewards for developing this harmful technology will be increased, which creates a more powerful incentive for engineers to "defect" (in the prisoner's dilemma sense) and work on the harmful tech.

There are also objectively good benefits to doing work that is eventually harmful. If you have a family, you can feed and clothe them. You can learn skills and that will help with non-harmful work in the future, and you will meet people who may help you do non-harmful work later. Being intimately familiar with this technology, you will be able to warn others of the dangers of it. Whether these objective goods outweigh the potential bads of a technology is difficult to determine during its development. And where the balance is difficult to determine, engineers, being practical and conservative by nature, will tend to side with the tangible benefits they can get today over the intangible costs that others may incur in the future.

I agree with the article's point that engineers need to develop a broader societal focus[1] and be mindful of the potential uses, especially the unintended ones, of their work. The problem is that awareness alone isn't going to accomplish much because a world full of aware engineers doesn't change the existing incentives.

[1] A good book on this topic is "The Civilized Engineer" by Samuel Florman: http://www.amazon.com/Civilized-Engineer-Samuel-C-Florman/dp...
Yes, this is true, especially in the past (up to the iPhone 4/ iPad era). Obviously hardware dependent features aren't there (eg siri when new, iOS7 camera, M7, etc) either.

Still, I have zero issues with iOS 7 on my iPad 2 and my parents are happy on their 4S.
MongoDB startup hired by Aadhaar (UIDAI)... and the CIA?
Former soldier here: veteran of the first Gulf War. Was on the ground in Saudi, and during the push into Iraq when the ground war started.

Pretty sure I didn't engage in any baby-killing, but thanks for furthering the stereotype.

Edit: I specifically said "baby-killing" because this is the kind of slander thrown at my father's generation when they returned from Vietnam. Not all soldiers are killers, and to imply that they are is offensive. It's sad that I have to point this out.
Mbox, eh? Can anyone confirm that they've implemented this properly, particularly when it comes to escaping lines in message bodies that start with "From "? Failure to properly escape such lines was an infamous bug with Mail.app's mbox exporter[1].

[1] http://web.archive.org/web/20070329131522/http://diveintomar...
Relax, CIA is not snooping into Aadhaar via MongoDB
thanks - I'm usually updating this list every 2-3 months, when I have long weekend or something like...
Since 1925, in a voluntary ritual near the end of a Canadian engineering degree, almost-graduates swear an oath and, upon doing so, are given a small card and a ring.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritual_of_the_Calling_of_an_Eng...

I swore my oath more than 25 years ago and I still have the card in my wallet and the iron ring on the smallest finger of my working hand. A couple times a year, I pull out the card and read it.

The oath reads:

"
I [worldvoyageur], in the presence of these my betters and my equals in my Calling, bind myself upon my Honour and Cold Iron, that, to the best of my knowledge and power, I will not henceforth suffer or pass, or be privy to the passing of, Bad Workmanship or Faulty Material in aught that concerns my works before mankind as an Engineer, or in my dealings with my own Soul before my Maker.

MY TIME I will not refuse; my Thought I will not grudge; my Care I will not deny towards the honour, use, stability and perfection of any works to which I may be called to set my hand.

MY FAIR WAGES for that work I will openly take. My Reputation in my Calling I will honourably guard; but I will in no way go about to compass or wrest judgement or gratification from any one with whom I may deal. And Further, I will early and warily strive my uttermost against professional jealousy or the belittling of my working colleagues in any field of their labour.

FOR MY ASSURED FAILURES and derelictions, I ask pardon beforehand of my betters and my equals in my Calling here assembled; praying that in the hour of my temptations, weakness and weariness, the memory of this my Obligation and of the company before whom it was entered into, may return to aid, comfort and restrain.
"
The way I see it, conflict usually comes from means of profit, and limited resources. The universe is pretty damn big, and chances are once we're advanced enough to do space travel, there aren't going to be many resources in one place but not the other.
Maybe make that clear? Maybe have a link to the iPhone app? Something better than a ca. 1999 "get a real browser" message.
"... it is impossible for bitcoin to be a currency."

It is already functioning as one -- just not a very effective or useful one. So, please be more articulate if you actually want to have a debate.

But thanks for diverting the the discussion by maligning my character.

Looking through your comment history, it's pretty clear that you have a strong aversion to Bitcoin. As someone so blindly opposed to it -- you probably have an ulterior motive too. At least I was forthcoming about mine -> I'm a Bitcoin fanboy and am building a business around it -- which is more than most speculators can claim.

So, what's yours? Because otherwise, you're kind of in need of digging yourself out of troll status. :)