skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
I doubt very much anyone is going to be bullish on Greece. They lent Greece money on the condition they stop deficit spending and guess what, Greece didn't do it.
My interpretation is that this referendum effectively forces the ball into the EU's court. The Greek public rejected the last deal, if they don't get a better one then it will be the EU pushing the Greeks out of the euro and not the choice of the Greek government to leave.
The real problem is that banks lent to Greece without doing their due diligence evaluating risk. Instead the bankers collected their fat fees for making the loans. Usually when banks make bad loans they have to write them off but when in 2010 the Troika (Euro Community, IMF, ECB) took over the Greek debt they paid 100% instead of insisting on the banks taking a "haircut" of say 50%. In truth some of the smaller members of the IMF did ask that they banks take a hit but the larger members turned that down.

The problems with the Greek economy that lenders are complaining about now, about the lowest tax collection rate in Europe, the "overly generous" retirement plans all existed before banks made the loans and fixing these problems should have been made a condition of making the loans in the first place.

It will be impossible for Greece to pay off the debt and now instead of the bank management (and the shareholders who appointed them) taking the hit for their incompetence in making the loans the taxpayers will take the hit.

The German and other taxpayers should not have a problem with Greece, but rather that Merkel and other governments decided to pay off the banks 100% instead of insisting that they take a large "haircut."

Ideally, the banks should have been made to take a "haircut" on the loans and the shareholders should have fired the management. Instead Merkel and other leaders let the banks off the hook putting the burden on the taxpayers. Now the taxpayers should fire Merkel and the leadership of other countries that OK'd the 100% payout to the banks in the next elections.
I understand your position, and the Greeks are truly in a hole that they have dug themselves, but do you think that this latest package would have helped them?

It seems to me, as an outsider, that the political problems and ESPECIALLY the tax collection problems need to be addressed for any permanent change. Perhaps rather than austerity measures, the EU should have targeted the Greek public directly and tied the bailout funds to the citizens willingness to fund their own government.
You seem pretty bitter to me. And there's a reason the first question here has been downvoted, because it's off-topic.
i hope the priority of Any new interest will be to change the name. Several times now i've thought, "what the heck was that Reddit competitor called?"
From the IMF report: http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2012/02/06/opinion/02061...
You don't speak for the people of Europe. The Eurozone deals will never help Greece recover...I just assume you didn't read the proposals. Anyway it's amazing that still some German naively believes that the problem is the "spending" of money.
The fact that you are convinced that Germany acted in Greece's best interest is what sets us apart.

Your money went mainly to your Banks, via Greece.

Concluding, I'd rather go back to the Drachma and blow the Euro project than die starving becuase it suits your country's political class.

ps. Even if Greece doesn't put the last nail on the coffin of the EU-project, I'm 100% sure that the UK will.
I don't see Europe as so economically fragile. If it were a nation, the EU would be the wealthiest in the history of the world (with the possibly exception of the U.S.; I'm too lazy to look it up).

This is hardly a novel or outlandish situation. The nature of bankruptcy is that creditors get a haircut; many nations have had their debts reduced (including Germany). The nature of civilization is that those with resources help those without.

> would they not want their own debt forgiveness?

It's theoretically possible, but the same could be said of any bankruptcy (my neighbor had his/her debts forgiven; do I want to go bankrupt too?) or for any program that benefits one region/state/industry more than another, yet these programs persist.

Also, maybe the EU or Eurozone does need a program to help all struggling states.
> Employee access to sensitive internal applications (like document and image management) gated through Citrix-like environments, so you have to remote terminal in to get to the browser that actually talks to the application.

That may be a realistic proposal, but I'm skeptical that it's the best answer, maybe because 100% of my Citrix experiences have been awful. Wouldn't "ensure internal app adhere to all other points, rewriting them if necessary" be a better answer for "given infinite money" question?
Exactly. Austerity was not what the Greeks needed. They received chemo therapy for a flu. Guided investment advice was all they needed. Not forced budget cuts which caused severe harm to their economy and pretty soon the global economy.

Edit: spelling
How could that be possible? If foreign countries interfere with local tax collection then its a much bigger breach of sovereignity. The Eurozone is not a federal country. The lenders thus set monetary targets.
Show HN: Turn your AWS S3 bucket into an image gallery
It's not a matter of quality of life, its a matter of a sustainable debt. Increasing dramatically the taxation is killing the private sector which is the one that produced profits.
I do not like history stories on HN. They invariably lead to me going on an hour long Wikipedia safari.
programming is a blue collar job, no degree required. Try climbing the ladder in a technical company (not a startup). You won't have the skills and understanding to assume the responsibilities of higher positions.
It's been this way for a long time. Programming can be taught at a vo-tech.
Apparently the deficit is more like 3% (depending on whether you believe Greece's own stats, or the EU's.

Forgiving debt by definition doesn't change the primary surplus, right? The primary surplus is the budget before taking interest payments into account.

And that's the whole premise of not bailing Greece out on Greek terms, right? That bailing them out doesn't accomplish anything if they're still on a course to rack up more debts due to unsustainable fiscal policy.
Right. This is more of advice to anyone else that submitting security vulnerabilities to a company who didn't ask for it is an extremely risky decision to make.
One thing's for sure, without countries to bail them out, without banks to lend them more money - the greeks will have no other choice but to increase their tax income and decrease their spending.
Austerity as some might call it.
Also, digital is so efficient it accumulates far faster than older mediums. I find it a very telling pattern. Things are easy and so they get out of control.

When I was a kid, a photo album had something like 50 tiny fading photos, and it covered 5 years or so. Each one was a very high density of memories. Now we have thousands of them. Curious.
What "harder stance" would you suggest we take??? We don't exactly view mass surveillance with approval (note how that first vote in the House didn't break along any obvious lines), and I'll attest that, when not legally required, many companies in the guns and ammo business are dreadfully bad at keeping long term records....

The "swamping" concept I was referring to was something of a thought experiment, e.g. imagine an out of science fiction effective speech broadcast to enough people that it doesn't matter that the police know "the people" are coming right now.

As for your general point, people who think about this sort of thing often focus on the old techniques like cells, one time pads, etc., subverting those listening in, etc. etc. Plus I'd add, just how effective do you really think governments are, especially against "non-crazy" people. That's the real danger I see, that "middle class" or thereabouts people like me get upset enough to take up arms, instead of the usual suspects like the Weather Underground. Note our "revolutionary" Founding Fathers, especially apropos this day after the anniversary of Declaration of Independence.

And there's a relatively new "leaderless resistance" concept where individuals not in close communications nonetheless take effective action. Again, see how "effective" for some value of effective Christoper Dorner, working alone, was. One man, or a small group, can be dreadfully effective nowadays.
What does this mean for startups/tech industry? I assume not very much as long as it is limited to Greece, but more so if it spreads to Portugal, Spain, Italy, right?
I'll say yes. For example, sometimes we have to run electrical current through someone's chest to correct an arrhythmia. Depending on the urgency, we will give a medication such as midazolam. Ideally you want the sedation to have taken effect, but you don't always have the time to wait for that before your hand is forced and you have to cardiovert. The amnestic properties will help reduce some of the traumatic memories.
Pixel Hop – Android Game
They did and it has destroyed their economy. That's the whole problem.
I wonder how this is supposed to work, given that zerofund seems to be registered in the US (based off their WHOIS records)
Really interesting that this is presenting the vote as Greece taking control of its own future. In fact I think that the people voting no believe that they will be rescued as the result of the vote.

I do not think that they are correct.
Yep, nationalism is on the rise and it's a bit ugly. As a US citizen living in Europe for over 10 years now, I wish that people would just get along. There is a deep lack of faith and trust between people. And, furthermore, that the economies would get much closer together so ordering something from one EU country and having it delivered to another wasn't such a damn pain.
"Europe exemplifies a situation unfavourable to a common currency. It is composed of separate nations, speaking different languages, with different customs, and having citizens feeling far greater loyalty and attachment to their own country than to a common market or to the idea of Europe."

Milton Friedman, The Times, November 19, 1997

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optimum_currency_area
It seems excessive to replace the interpreter just to add some fault tolerance
I read this book "The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World" and based on that I would say your left hemisphere were active when right one was suppressed for some time. I can't recommend this book highly enough - it's very comprehensive and it give you an opportunity to look at the world from a different perspective
Our game is finally ready, and has been published! You are a pixel among billions, and your goal is to get to the top by going past the many obstacles that come at you.

We aimed for simplicity and good design, and we're very pleased with what came out of our vision! Please let us know what you think :)
Valid, literal XML in C++ with Blasien
A public sector can be enormous without damaging the economy. In Scandinavian countries it's about 50% and used to be higher. The problem is that the Greek government is both bad and weak. The Greek public sector's purpose is not really to provide utility to the populace, but to buy votes from the unions. It's very hard to pay for because it does not enrichen the private sector nearly as much as it should. And because the Greek oligarchs own the media (and many parliamentarians) so taxing the rich is absurdly hard.

Greece is not just insolvent, it's also practically a failed state.
Thanks for the sharing, very intersting and well explained
After 5 years of "rescuing" that did lead the country into ruins, no wonder!

It is a widespread knowledge (at least the US has it), that forceful saving in a crisis, will deepen the crisis.

As a German, I know that Germany got a dept-cut after the second World war, that the German nation could rise from misery. We should have allowed the Greek the same luxury.

Instead, the governments cared only for the banks.
Except that major spending cuts during a downturn are harmful, which is what Greece has been in pretty much since austerity. Greece has problems, I admit, but austerity during a downturn only makes that worse. Party comes along and says it wants to do invest in the economy because, clearly, austerity isn't working and we won't give them a chance.

There are reports from the IMF and many other leading figures that now say austerity has had more of a negative impact than once thought. Greece has been cutting its spending or else it wouldn't have been given more money, as per the terms of the bail out. The effects of those cuts have been mediocre and, in fairness, harmful.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/feb/26/imf-inequali...
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jun/15/focus-on-low...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/10/12/i...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/04/18/a...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22223190
http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2013-04-18/faq-reinhart...
I am very pro Euro. But I don't like the fact that a single country in Europe feels that 18 other countries have to pay their debt.

These bailouts in the past were signed from the greece government in the best interest of its people. A lot of people make it seem that we (non-greece european) somewhat forced theses agreements onto greece. In fact these bailouts where were unpopular in Germany, because it cost us a lot of our money, we could have spent on infrastructure, education, etc.

Therefore I would love Greece to give up the Euro currency and leave the European Union, so that these other 18 countries don't feel any obligation anymore to transfer more money to greece.

I believe that Europe will be stronger that way. Because a vision of a truly united European Union can only be reached if all countries play by the same rules and abide to their agreements.
Autopsy: Why Microsoft's ad business withered
Do you have something more concrete than sweeping assertions and the claim that people you disagree with are ignorant? Because at least two of your examples are totally wrong.

Mexico's revolution was in large part about wealth and land reform [1]; Zapata's famous battle cry was "tierra y libertad", land and freedom. Many of the reforms persists, albeit in weakened form, even today. China's revolution is known as the Chinese Communist Revolution [2] for a reason. The spike in conspicuous inequality is so new in China that the newly rich quite literally need instruction on how to display their wealth [3].

I do think a revolution is unlikely to happen in the US any time soon, but that's because we've got some tradition of taking care of people well enough that they're mostly not desperate enough to start a shooting war with the cops. E.g., during the 2008 crash, we spent zillions of dollars propping up the economy until things got better. We also have enough issues with race that we may see a race war before a class war. But it's a mistake to think it can't happen here. If we're ever dumb enough to pursue an austerity program like the one being inflicted upon Greece, where the interests of a small number of bankers are being hugely privileged over the great bulk of a nation, I would not be shocked at all to see something like Occupy Wall Street crossed with the Cliven Bundy crew.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Revolution

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Communist_Revolution

[3] http://www.gq.com/story/chinas-richest
Can you talk about the use of such meds in ITUs?

As I understand it there's an increased risk of PTSD if people are chemically restrained, which is why some ITUs (but not in England) use physical restraints when needed.

This is a different use case from surgery, where these meds are useful.
A grexit will strengthen the euro substantially. The key economy is Italy , which is doing pretty stable. After grexit, Greece doesnt stand to win much, in particular its entrepreneurial class will just leave the country.

This kind of schadenfreude against EU/EZ/Germany is very common in greece this week. In a few months, nobody will want to admit they voted for "no".
Years of primary surpluses are clear evidence that Greece is capable of funding its own ongoing spending. This year is an aberration due to the crisis. If the debt were forgiven, I don't think Greece would need outside funds in 2016. Greece isn't asking for forgiveness though—they're asking for restructuring.

Greek fiscal policy is not unsustainable. Much of it is unwise, but still affordable.
If the ECB keeps the current regime for another 2 to 3 weeks, then Greece might be "forced" to go back to the Drachma and devalue. At that point you don't need to increase tax incomes but you might have a series of other problems (control devaluations, impose capital control for an undetermined period, etc.) - but in the long run, might be positive (According, to Krugman, Stiglitz, S. Keen, etc.)
I can confirm the surf in Lisbon is awesome and a massive variety of beaches near the city. Not sure of the tech scene though. Ireland has awesome surf if you don't mind the cold.

Bristol, Oxford, Cardiff and Swansea in the UK are all in good positions to get to the coast. 2/3 hrs and lest than 1 hr respectively and decent chance of work.

If you have a chance of remote work consider Morocco!
Great stuff .. looking forward to seeing it running in HTML5.
It is staggering how brainwashed you are. Please try to form your opinion elsewhere than from the mainstream media.
I think your last sentence is absolutely right. The author works on a team whose responsibility is to make programming easier for everyone in the world. That's a luxury most startups don't have.
I once lost a memory for couple hours - I was fully aware that I don't remember anything
Of course Germany didn't do this because they love charity. But it is meant to be mutually beneficial: German banks get their money, Greece can stay in the Euro and can get further loans. It's not great for Greece, but the alternatives aren't much better.
They have ~25% unemployment - over 50% for youth... it seems like they already did plenty of that.
It's like everybody all of the sudden will come to the conclusion that paying their mortgages is somehow a humiliating and oppressive endeavor.
Nobody is really familiar with what the "oppressive" terms really are, but everybody feels like the Greeks are totally undeserving of paying their debts.
How does everybody feel like to have their subway fares reduced to $0, the way the Greeks had them for the past decades? I think it is just fair that New Yorkers travel at the expense of the NY State, otherwise it is totally oppressive! /sarcasm

Lots of projections in all these opinions. But for somebody that actually had to go through austerity measures, I am not happy to see others asking for a handout, with the only justification being "just because, Greek history".

EDIT: and if you downvote, at least be New Yorker enough, and justify your action. Otherwise, I would say that you just want a handout.
The IMF released a report last week stating that in addition to substantial debt relief the Greeks need an additional bailout of EUR60 billion.

Both Varoufakis and Tsipras tweeted their agreement with the report. It seems pretty clear that Greece won't make it without another big bailout package.
> Alan Stern, the mission's P.I., dispelled rumors that contact had been lost on the USF forum

Not sure what you mean? He was responding to the (supposed) rumor that contact had "been lost again or was never regained".

That Deep Space Network Now page is great. Thanks for sharing.
send us a message at https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/firebase-talk if you have any problems.

The websocket API is the main selling point of Firebase, but I guess you were not actively looking to use Firebase in a product, rather, it was a necessity from HN API. Good luck! Don't hesitate to contact us.
> Greece is not just insolvent, it's also practically a failed state.

Syria, Iraq - those are failed states. Greece just managed to organise a democratic referendum peacefully and efficiently - within a week. A failed state looks different to me.
The transfers to greece of the last few years were to a large extent a way of transferring private debt of german and french banks to the general EU populace.

This is just not the case. Only about 1/3 of the bailout money went this way (and certainly not to the "general EU populace", only to some european tax payers). The remaining 2/3 went to Greek consumption in some form or other. It is estimated that 1/3 of the bailout money went to off-shore accounts.

Moreover, taking on Greek debt is a massive gift to Greece, for this money no longer needs to be paid back, hence is a gift.
First, we're all just "parroting back what someone else told us", unless one of us is secretly an economist specializing in the public sector of Greece.

That said: it's really not that vague. Go to the OECD stats site. Go to "Social Expenditure", isolate "old age" retirement benefits (which in Greece start at 61), go to the column on the table with the most recent full data, sort that column, note where Greece falls on it, note where Sweden falls on it, and note where the US falls on it.

Now, in another tab maybe, go to Public Sector/Taxation, to comparative tables for tax revenue, and do "total tax revenue per capita". Make the same comparisons. You will note that the US actually gets quite a bit more money per citizen than Greece does. My intuition was the same, which is why I chose Alabama for the comparison, not the US as a whole; Alabama is one of the least-taxed states in the union.

It is true that the intuition to make this comparison came from someone else (in my case: Matt Yglesias, though lord knows where he got the idea to make the comparison). What is also true is that the assertion is verifiable.
Can we identify any laborer anywhere whose lot in life was improved by St. Steve's miraculous revenue growth?
Making economic decision that cut growth chances in the near/mid future doesn't help to lower the GDP/debt ratio, and that's why the recent reforms asked by the EU failed in improving Greek economic status.
You omitted the part where Greece repeatedly lied about the fact that it wasn't meeting its obligations.

And now our TV's are showing images of Greeks celebrating that they've told us to f-off with our euros. That's going to kill any kind of sympathy they still had when what's left of the Greek economy is going to crash hard over the next few weeks and months.

This is game over. Any compromise that was still possible is now dead, even if EU leaders would be willing to compromise, they can no longer sell this to their own people.
Can you cite some sources for the years of primary surplus? I'm looking for them, and the stats I'm seeing all suggest years of severe deficits.
A Greek friend once told me that, in Greece, "only idiots pay 100% of the taxes they owe". His perception of his fellow Greeks' attitude towards taxes wasn't wrong. In Greece, tax evasion is endemic.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_evasion_and_corruption_in_...

It's hard to be surprised by the financial troubles of a government that is so utterly feckless when it comes to collecting taxes that members of it's own finance ministry are suspected of hiding their funds abroad. It is also hard to have sympathy for Greeks, most of whom apparently view tax evasion as a virtue.

Now that they've burned Germany and the EU, where is Greece going to get the money it can't collect from it's own citizens?