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Show HN: put a text nyan cat in your emacs - joeheyming https://github.com/joeheyming/ascii_nyan ====== joeheyming yo dawg, I herd you like nyan cat, so I put a nyan cat in your emacs so you can nyan while you program ~~~ joeheyming or prank a co-worker, thats the real intent :-)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: Create a WordPress Plugin from Any Embed Code - bosdev http://InstantWordpressPlugin.com ====== afslas Amazing and elegant. Gets the job done.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: What accounting appz do you use? - marcamillion Small business, future web app company...what do you guys use to track all accounting? ====== rlpb All I do is maintain a general ledger. Everything else I need falls out of this data. I use gnucash. ------ apowell Quickbooks. Best feature: my accountant knows it. ------ jjudge xero.com	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: My HN November App (Quotiac) is finished. Better late than never? - beeeph Back in October, the "HN Make November Launch an App Month" discussion was started and it sounded like a great opportunity, so I joined the Facebook group and decided to build my take on an iOS version of the classic Quotefalls puzzle game, thinking I would learn a ton and it would be a great way to get my feet wet with making, marketing, and managing my own software. A week before the group presentation (end of Nov.), I took my project off the project list because I was nowhere near finished. One of the many great things I’ve learned in all this is how easy it is to justify all the feature creep that bloated the design for my original MVP. Every time I decided to include a new, major chunk of functionality in the first version of my app, I convinced myself that it had to be in there otherwise it would make the wrong first impression and people would never give it another try. I still think that’s partially true, but only now that the first version is finished and in the wild am I’m realizing the incredible value of early feedback. It’s still early, but my early metrics show people aren’t really playing it and, if it turns that people don’t find the game as fun as I do (or at all), then sticking with the original, lean design for the MVP would have at least allowed me to recognize that early on and stop there rather than spend another three months tacking on all the single player and multiplayer functionality.<p>But I’m obviously still seeking feedback and I would love to hear what you all think, since HN is what got me started down this road. Specifically, I’d like your feedback on the tutorial. Does it explain how to play the game? Is it a roadblock? Are there any other aspects of the game that need to be explained better? And most importantly, is the game any fun? Brutal honestly is happily accepted!<p>The game is called Quotiac and it’s available for free on the App Store. I even added a puzzle pack for the HN community, it’s called “The Hack Pack” and I think you’ll all enjoy puzzle #9 especially (http://quotiac.com/images/puzzle9.png).<p>Here’s a link to the app, http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/quotiac/id400583719?mt=8<p>Thanks gang, I hope you like it. ====== kfullert Just installed it, played the tutorial and first couple of levels and it's a great game, certainly one I'd consider paying for - good idea and great execution of it. ~~~ beeeph Thanks, kfullert! Question, when you played through the tutorial, were you able to go straight through or did you find yourself clicking the "back" button at all?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Why do firemen not earn as much as movie stars? - known http://forbesindia.com/blog/business-strategy/put-need-before-greed-flamboyance-can-wait/ ====== tosseraccount Why do diamonds cost more than water?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Hedge Fund Boss Retires at 37. Thanks "Idiot Traders" - DanielBMarkham http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/oct/18/banking-useconomy ====== markbao That's pretty much one of the permutations that success can be. You get enough money, you say fuck you to the industry, and you do what you couldn't when you were working hard: enjoy life. Of course, that's not always the best way. The best way (in my opinion) is to make a lot of meaning WHILE enjoying doing so, WHILE amassing wealth. ~~~ andyking I agree. It's really easy to say "throw away your Blackberry and enjoy life" when you don't have to earn another penny as long as you live. The rest of us just make the best of whatever situation we find ourselves in. ------ wheels From yesterday: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=335815> ~~~ DanielBMarkham Sorry about the dupe. Missed it yesterday and it looks like it's re-sourced here. You'd think we'd have some kind of spiffy dupe-detection code here, huh? ~~~ wheels If you submit the same link twice it catches it, but there's no logic to try to detect the same story reported in different locations. ~~~ DanielBMarkham Some link sites (like DZone) will go out and load the page in question once the link is submitted. I know DZone makes a neat little thumbnail of the site, but seems like you could also do some basic text analysis while you're at it. Not sure it's worth it, though. I don't think the dupe ratio here is that high. ~~~ eru Hacker news uses crowdsourcing. ------ mvid I want to be this man.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Volkswagen C++ - gpderetta https://github.com/elnormous/volkswagencpp ====== waynecochran So on the first reported issue is someone trying to push code that is segfaulting? This is evil.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Is It Time for the US to Drag Jobs Out of Silicon Valley and into the Heartland? - teklaperry https://spectrum.ieee.org/view-from-the-valley/at-work/innovation/is-it-time-for-the-us-government-to-drag-tech-jobs-out-of-silicon-valley-and-into-the-heartland ====== alex_young Silicon Valley is a place where you have lots of smart people because the smart people all go there because that's where the other smart people are. You can get them in a room and they can figure out amazing things. It's kind of like Los Alamos for nuclear physics. Sure, you can put a team together elsewhere, but it's never going to be quite the same because those happenstance conversations won't have the right people in them. Let's say for a minute that you could break this thing up into dispirate groups. What's the advantage? You'll be splitting up the best team ever created and hoping they somehow reconstitute. Sounds dangerous to me. ~~~ munificent _> What's the advantage?_ More affordability for the people in those groups, and thus less separation of tech people from members of other sectors and socio-economic levels. It's good to have _enough_ people concentrated in one region to form great teams and give people options and mobility. But, beyond that, it starts becoming a negative to tech people and non-tech people. SF and Seattle are _insanely_ expensive. Most of my friends here in Seattle are in tech, and over the past few years, I've watched most of my non-tech friends get priced out and be forced to leave the area. I don't think it's good for individuals or humanity as a whole for people to spend all of their time in a bubble surrounded only by people like themselves. ------ kindatrue Some long time Silicon Valley residents would be thrilled with this - like the Cupertino planning commissioner who opposes building more housing for Apple employees because those engineers will turn high schoolers into prostitutes. [https://twitter.com/HousingValley/status/1154781703262498816](https://twitter.com/HousingValley/status/1154781703262498816) You can't make this stuff up. ~~~ C1sc0cat Wow just Wow where some of these apple engineers be "coloured gentlemen" ------ vmchale I'm curious how discrimination economics affects the relative lack of investment in some of these areas. Particularly for transgender people and immigrants (a larger group). If immigrants/engineers are getting murdered in hate crimes in your city, why should the whole country pay to subsidize the fact that your city is an unpleasant place to work and live? ------ kevin_thibedeau There is a pay problem. In the heartland there are lots of employers that think $75K is too much for a senior engineer. My junior engineer starting salary was $55K in 2000 which would be _more_ after inflation adjustment than what many will offer. Lower cost of living doesn't make up for being short changed. ~~~ yesimahuman Salaries in “the heartland” have gone up quite a bit in recent years. Have seen this first hand as a startup hiring locally in a smaller college town in this region. I think remote work has had a big impact on forcing local companies to be competitive. It’s a net positive ------ satya71 We do have a "boomlet"-ing tech scene in St Louis, MO and metro areas in the surrounding states. The thing that crimps the growth is access to risk capital. Companies here had to list with a bay area address, just to get a look from the VCs. What the govt can do is fill the role of VCs and make good returns in pure financial terms as well. Missouri has a small fund that's been very successful, but the new GOP governor cut funding as soon as he got in. ~~~ Apocryphon Silicon Valley is risk adverse and unwilling to invest in firms outside of its own geographical and cultural bubble. So perhaps that's what the article should have mentioned, one angle that could involve government funding. ------ Apocryphon It doesn't seem like anyone has actually RTFA. The Brookings contenders for the next Silicon Valley aren't random farming towns in the Great Plains. If you look at the chart at the bottom they include Madison, Minneapolis, Albany, Portland, Nashville, Detroit, Pittsburgh, Columbus, Charlotte. A lot of these cities are already up and coming to the point of rapidly escalating rents. ~~~ alexhutcheson Their criteria unintentionally selected for metros with a restricted housing supply, by including "only those that saw population or real GDP growth slower than the nation as a whole". That can indicate a slow-growing economy, but can also indicate that you're not building enough new housing for population to grow at or above the national rate. Portland and Nashville are obvious examples here - nobody who has been there recently believes that they are struggling, but they've been adding population slowly because they're not building enough housing to meet demand. ~~~ Apocryphon You're not wrong, but my overall point is that it seems like a lot of people in this thread are arguing against the prospect of moving to intolerant backwater villages, whereas most of the ones that Brookings listed are already hot secondary destinations. And many of them aren't even located in the Midwest! Guess IEEE was referring to basically everywhere not on the coast when they say "the Heartland". ------ rb808 Its relevant that the US DoD contracts helped build Silicon Valley in the first place. It makes sense for the government to encourage firms to other regions. [https://steveblank.com/secret- history/](https://steveblank.com/secret-history/) ------ rolltiide The crux of this argument is that federal funding should be involved, which is what got Silicon Valley started so it can have some merit. Silicon Valley's culture is hard to replicate, and by culture its just the consolidation of venture capital firms and the aspirations of liquid wealthy people who want to play angel investor themselves. Would newly wealthy tech aficionados in the midwest really stay in opioid land with its extremes of temperatures, or would they just get the condo in south beach Miami and disappear? Having one local Warren Buffett means only insurance and real estate plays get funded, as an example. Having only a couple Warren Buffetts means you get some people that "only invest in what they know" and aren't willing to learn anything. You really need a market of venture capital, run by people that got rich there. So pumping an area with federal funding is a much better step than just slapping a "Silicon" label on the nearest geographic formation. ~~~ jrs95 I live in Ohio, and I would stay here. I’d rather contribute to my community than abandon it. ~~~ rolltiide The only reason this article is trying to get the federal government is involved is because more economic outliers say that then actually do ------ brenden2 PG's essay from 2007 seems relevant: [http://www.paulgraham.com/startuphubs.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/startuphubs.html) ------ cgy1 I feel like these places outside of Silicon Valley would run into many of the same problems if a bunch of high paying tech jobs were dropped into these places, such as steep increases in housing prices (although still cheaper than the SF Bay Area) and resistance of current residents to change/new housing. You take a look at places receiving an influx of new well-paid residents, like Boise, and you can see that these problems are also cropping up there. ------ jrs95 The “eligibility index” here is kind of a bullshit number. R&D per capita doesn’t make sense as a measurement to begin with, and even if it did it doesn’t account of population density and the artificial nature of the borders of some of these places. Some cities have more or less of their suburbs within their borders, which is going to drastically affect those R&D per capita numbers. Overall though I think the concept is very good. ------ auiya Smart company leaders are already doing this by hiring remote worker teams. They don't need to "drag" anyone. FAANG are woefully behind the curve in this regard and would rather waste money building office empires in big cities. Nobody wants to relocate their entire life across the country away from family/friends just for some BS tech job that could just as easily be done from home. ~~~ kamarg The "office empires" make perfect sense at the size of FAANGs. When you need to hire that many people every year, many of them who have never worked in "the real world" before, how do you do the best to ensure they all have access to knowledge, resources, support, and oversight? Not everyone is good at self directed work from home. That doesn't mean they can't be an outstanding employee. Hiring is expensive and if you can avoid having major churn in employees you'll save quite a bit of money. On top of that, being a major employer in a city gives your company sizable clout when it comes to lobbying the local government. Don't like the new tax plan? It will probably work out in your favor to let the city know that it would really hurt hiring and salaries at the biggest employer in the city. Heck if it hurts enough, you might even have to move to that nearby competitor city who is offering all those sweet tax breaks. You don't want to but it's the only responsible thing to do for all of your employees. It would be a shame to see a bunch of those employees leave the city and cause housing prices to drop for all the rest of the citizens. What's that? You're reconsidering that tax bill? I knew you'd make the right choice for your constituents. ------ ldoughty The government shouldn't invest billions in proping up existing or new cities.. it should spend time reversing ISP regional monopolies and giving citizens choice on internet access. The barrier to entry of a high tech job sector is primarily internet connectivity. You can't run a web server out of your house if your ISP doesn't allow it.. or if the top speed is 3Mbps. Sure, you could push stuff to a third party, but that increases development costs (in dollars and knowledge). And if you're doing a lot of data pushes, a 256Kb upload speed will be painful if you're pushing a 90MB container up to the cloud. IT people flock to areas that have internet. It was a requirement both times I moved that there's >25Mbps high-cap wired internet. I would NEVER move to a place with less. I would be eager to move to a place that offers gigabit fiber that I could run a server behind (I mostly do cloud work, but I do enjoy having some at-home services). ~~~ varikin You do realize we have internet in the rest of the country, right? I get over 150 Mbps regularly at my house with Comcast. Upload is around 3Mbps. But I could change to Comcast business to get symetric at my house. Or I could colocate in any number of DCs in my area. Or I could move to another neighborhood and get USI Fiber[1] for about $100/mo. I don't because I don't want to move from the current neighborhood I am in. Internet access may suck in many places, but not everywhere. Don't assume that you need to be in SF to get good internet. Most metropolitian areas in the US have good internet. [1] [https://usinternet.com/fiber/coverage- map/](https://usinternet.com/fiber/coverage-map/) ~~~ Lammy This happens even within the Bay Area. After going from Comcast Business cable to Sonic gigabit fiber in San Francisco I can never go back. It’s like going from an HDD to an SSD for the first time. They both technically do the same thing, people argue online if the speed difference really matters, but it’s the _latency_ difference that makes it so amazing. I get 2ms pings now. It makes the network mentally invisible in a way that’s hard to describe without experiencing. ~~~ varikin Don't get me wrong, I would love fiber. USI has been laying down fiber across Minneapolis at a very fast rate over the last 10 years. I think almost half the city is covered now. But I really like my neighborhood and I don't want to move. I am sure USI will get to me eventually, but it will take time and my road will be expensive due to being on a hill above the street level. ~~~ Lammy Absolutely, and that’s why good access shouldn’t be so concentrated. My comparison to San Francisco was in the sense that it’s difficult to find good and equitable and affordable residential access in the country’s tech capital much less across the vast rural areas inland. ------ alexhutcheson The criteria the Brookings paper used to determine eligibility doesn't make sense. Specifically this bit: "Looking next at the remaining top 20 metro areas with the most innovation sector jobs, only those that saw population or real GDP growth slower than the nation as a whole since 2010 are considered eligible to become designated growth centers. By dint of that, cities such as Raleigh, N.C., Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, Austin are set aside because they are already self- sustaining superstars. They are safe bets for any new tech graduate looking for a job or any tech firm looking at add a few hundred jobs somewhere. Allowing these places to be eligible would simply reinforce existing spatial imbalances." This decision disqualifies growing Sun Belt metros including Austin, Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta from inclusion, _specifically because they are already growing_. The result is a list that is biased towards metros in the northeast and midwest, which are shrinking for a variety of reasons, not strictly due to job opportunities. This has two problems: 1\. It sets the program up for failure: Targeting shrinking metros means that the policy intervention needs to offset existing decline before it can demonstrate any positive growth. This is not easy! There are lots of public programs already targeting these metro areas (particularly state-level programs), and they are still shrinking. 2\. It makes it very unlikely that the program would develop a new "superstar" tech city comparable to NYC, because you've already excluded the most probable candidates. Adding some regional balance for fairness and (valid) political concerns is a good idea, but a program that proposes to subsidize growth in Chicago and Minneapolis while excluding Atlanta, Dallas, and Raleigh-Durham seems neither fair nor sensible. ------ hamhand Keep piling big budget infrastructure like subways into existing cities seems like a dead end, you push the living cost ever higher, concentrating workers ever more into city centers, congestion, then more big budget infrastructure, this is just a vicious cycle. If electric vehicles are the future, young people shouldn't be afraid to creat their own new cities with scattered companies and minimum infrastructure investment, you only need roads and charging stations. Cheap land make for cheap houses and low living cost, in fact, isn't this what their fathers did to achieve the American dream life young people nowadays so pine for? This seem to be the only way the American dream can still be realized. ~~~ blt Cars require too much land area per person. Two dedicated parking spaces is only scratching the surface. There's gas stations, repair shops, dealers, and of course the actual roads. By the time you carve out enough space for these, sprawl is necessary, and horrible traffic is unavoidable. Personal cars are a failed experiment and a total aberration from historically successful modes of human development. ------ martianfeeder Many great comments on this thread but I, a sikh immigrant who wears a turban, would rather leave the US than live anywhere except for the valley or NYC. Comments on this thread address everything from internet speed to "gov intervention is bad" but fail to miss a very important point - US tech workforce has a lot of immigrants and cities outside the list mentioned in the article are actively hostile to immigrants. It would be very difficult to build tech hubs without making them friendlier towards an immigrant workforce. I spent 6 days in Houston visiting a friend, here's what I remember from the trip: \- Random airport check in a private room (check) \- Called random names more times in 6 days than in my entire life (check) \- Stared down actively in every bar I went to (check) Imagine being on an evening out, people staring at you trying to figure out "what" you are and knowing that they may be carrying a gun on them. Silicon valley (and NYC) is a place where its okay to be whoever you are, and that is something government intervention can't inject no matter how hard they try. I hope my comment doesn't come off as offensive, just trying to provide an important perspective which I believe the article misses. ~~~ rayiner This is an important issue, though I’d like to present the opposite experience. Only a small fraction of the country lives in New York or SF, but the US is among the top countries in the world for inclusive attitudes: [https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/...](https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2018-06/the- inclusiveness-of-nationalities-ipsos-global-advisor.pdf). For inclusiveness of naturalized citizens, it’s #1 by a large margin. (This is based on surveys asking people like whether they would consider a naturalized citizen a "real American" or "real German" or whatever. For that question, 76% of Americans answered "yes" versus 13% answering "no." In Italy, it was 41% "yes" to 36% "no." Incidentally, also do pretty well on LGBT inclusiveness, having a higher net “yes” score than Spain, Italy, Germany, or the U.K.—which together comprise more than half the EU.) That’s consistent with my experience as a Bangladeshi immigrant. I grew up in a DC suburb in the early 1990s, before that area became diverse. A few remarks aside, I’ve always felt welcome, including in rural parts of Virginia, Illinois, Georgia, etc. I was on a plane to Dallas a few months ago. My seat mate was delicately trying to figure out my ethnicity. I explained I was Bangladeshi, and he didn’t know what that was. Then we had a very good conversation about how had really gotten into Indian food, and had put together a tandoor. Speaking for myself, I’d rather live in Houston or Kansas City or Pittsburgh than anywhere in the coasts. Also, where would I go, besides back to Bangladesh? You think the Berlin tech scene is more welcoming than the Salt Lake City tech scene? Maybe people will not say anything uncomfortable or offensive. But a Bangladeshi immigrant can become American, and people will recognize that as substantive and not merely a euphemism. But he’ll never become German, or Japanese, or French. The United States elected a son of an immigrant President. Not just New York and California, but Wisconsin and Michigan and Iowa. That’s never happened in Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Spain, or Italy, or any EU country that I’m aware of. I don’t say this to diminish anyone’s experience. But I think to the extent that people on the coasts are wondering what the rest of America is like, they get a balanced picture. ~~~ Apocryphon And even in the conservative South, you see Desis getting elected to governor. > That’s never happened in Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Spain, or > Italy, or any EU country that I’m aware of. Ireland. ~~~ selimthegrim Bobby Jindal never identified that way nor did Haley. ~~~ rayiner I agree that neither identify as "desi" but it's worth unpacking that a bit. Both are the children of immigrants. (Jindal's mother was pregnant with him in India before coming to the U.S. Both had two wedding ceremonies (Catholic and Hindu for Jindal, Sikh and Methodist for Hailey.) Both have discussed their parents' immigrant background publicly. Obviously, neither presents as white. In fact, they have a very common and very American immigration story. Even as children of first-generation immigrants living in the south, it was so easy for them to assimilate that they grew up identifying as "American" more than "Indian-American." This is the story of _many_ children of immigrants. My dad, for example, hates the labels of "hyphenated American." So my brother and I grew up identifying as just "American." But this isn't possible most places.[1] Its not just about how you identify yourself, but how other people identify you. In most countries, society forces immigrants to identify with the country they left or their ethnicity. There are only a handful of countries that are so welcoming that the children of immigrants can _choose_ to identify with nothing other than their new homeland. [1] Ironically, as I've gotten older, I've started to identify as Asian more than before. But I'd chalk that up to the balkanization of American culture and the drift away from what I can easily reconcile with my Asian immigrant values. ~~~ selimthegrim Yes, Jindal likes to call it his mother’s “preexisting condition” To some extent I have as well, but I think in my case it is more to stick it to Pakistanis who think I don’t have any rights on the first part of the hyphen ------ vonnik A lot of Silicon Valley tech companies are actively trying to hire remote engineers all over the US and the world. Market forces are doing the job better than a government initiative could. ------ thorwasdfasdf This is literally the best idea idea I've seen in print all year long: "They argue that the federal government should create eight to 10 regional “growth centers” in the U.S. heartland." New cities, we desperately need. The entire housing fiasco is caused by an imbalance between the number of jobs and the amount of housing. all the jobs are, ironically, in places that really don't want to grow. so the logical thing to do, is to move those jobs to new places that do want to grow. This could really ignite the economy in a way that's not zero sum (like most other solutions). There's so much free wealth out there for the taking (land that's not being used for any productive capacity ~ you could literally create wealth out of thin air). ~~~ 1over137 New cities we desperately don't need. There are plenty of small cities than can be grown instead of destroying more wild nature, which we are fast running out of. ~~~ thorwasdfasdf You know those hen farm houses where hens are squeezed together by the 1000s into a tiny area with poop all over the place. Some people think that's not nice to do to a chicken. I think it's not nice to do that to human beings. And yet that's exactly what we're doing to the people in SF, Poop included. If you don't create new cities, the people still need to end up somewhere. You can move jobs to smaller cities or create new ones, whatever. the point is, you need to move jobs to areas that want to grow. Have you seen the new neighborhoods that are being built in places like CA? Every single tree gets chopped down, ever last one. That's because developers are forced to build with density because the cost of land is so high. if you want to prevent the slaughtering of trees, you'll need specifically create minimum distance regs or reduce the # of trees that can be cut down legally. at the current rate, there's no nature for anyone to enjoy in the neighborhoods that are currently being built. ~~~ fluxic Show me the chicken that's unhappy in a $750/mo 750sqft apartment? The only reason that doesn't exist in CA is because of NIMBYs and their ridiculous zoning policies. ~~~ maxsilver > Show me the chicken that's unhappy in a $750/mo 750sqft apartment? There's a lot of chickens unhappy about $1600/month 200sqft apartments. (a real example from SF - [https://www.smartcitiesdive.com/ex/sustainablecitiescollecti...](https://www.smartcitiesdive.com/ex/sustainablecitiescollective/micro- apartments-making-160-square-feet-livable-san-francisco/1038601/) ) Because that's the dystopian nightmare in SF, and to move jobs out of silicon valley to elsewhere, would be to export that same dystopia to more places. We already see this in _Michigan_ of all places. You can make a SF salary and pay $1600/month for a micro-apartment. Or you can take a 50% pay cut, to pay $800/month for ~200sqft micro-apartment. They are equally ridiculous and equally unaffordable, once you account for the currency/wage differences, despite the fact that we have no zoning restrictions in this town. We obviously need more housing, and need to build more housing, but housing is inherently pollution-heavy. You can not build your way into affordability alone, because the act of new construction inherently _generates_ more unaffordability. It alone can never solve it. > The only reason (cheap apartments) doesn't exist in CA is because of NIMBYs > and their ridiculous zoning policies. No, that's only a tiny part. Zoning is a small reason, but not the primary one. The biggest reason CA apartments are expensive, is the financial pollution generated by the companies there. If you built a brand new city in an empty cornfield somewhere, with no laws or zoning of any kind, it would be somewhat cheaper than San Francisco, but every single apartment would still cost ~$1100-$1600/month. Because _most_ of that price is due to the financial pollution from the companies, not the zoning. ~~~ baddox > You can make a SF salary and pay $1600/month for a micro-apartment. Or you > can take a 50% pay cut, to pay $800/month for ~200sqft micro-apartment. They > are equally ridiculous and equally unaffordable, once you account for the > currency/wage differences, despite the fact that we have no zoning > restrictions in this town. They’re not equal. You almost certainly end up with significantly more disposable income in SF. ~~~ maxsilver Agreed. And that kind of makes the whole situation worse. ------ nullbull Is it time for the government to drag financial sector jobs out of New York? Is it time for the US to drag credit card companies out of Delaware, or agribusiness out of the heartland and toward the coasts? No. It isn't. Funny the regionally exclusive monopolies that we seem to have tolerated for literally decades and the ones we suddenly, for some reason, don't. Or maybe it isn't funny at all. Maybe it's a totally predictable outcome of a system that is highly tolerant of calcified, politically-connected regional monopolies. A system that is intolerant of disruptive, politically-indifferent or unestablished regional monopolies. In other words, this isn't about economic efficiency or anti-trust law. It's about political sour grapes first. Everything else second. ~~~ anm89 This gets at the heart of this. This isn't t part of some consistent political philosophy or legal framework. This is policy based on angry people wanting to get revenge on a specific topic. Unfortunately I think the tide is moving in the direction of this being an acceptable way to govern and while people may get individual things they want out of it I think the end result is a net loss for everyone. ------ blackflame The Government has no business in picking and choosing which cities to promote. The free market will take care of that. The government should instead focus on why everyone is leaving the heartland because it's not just because of the beach. ------ mumblemumble I'd directly benefit from this, but still, I'm inclined to say no. For starters, when it comes to this sort of thing, the government is inevitably running toward where the ball just was instead of where it's going to be. That's just the nature of the game - legislation is (or at least should be) a slow process. Second, these kinds of interventions inevitably result in rent-seeking behavior. I don't want the kinds of games that agricorps played with the dairy subsidy being related to how far you are from Eau Claire, WI getting imported into the tech industry. And finally, capitalism: If it's really most economically efficient for tech to hyper-concentrate in silicon valley, then fighting that will probably produce a whole lot of deadweight loss. If it isn't, then market forces will guide the situation toward a natural resolution. (Perhaps only after the eventual dissipation of the reality distortion field being fueled by a certain generation of techies' determination to heat their own backyards by burning the money that fell into their laps during previous tech bubble. But still.) ~~~ vharuck I'd also benefit from this, but I'm for the idea so may be biased. >And finally, capitalism: If it's really most economically efficient for tech to hyper-concentrate in silicon valley, then fighting that will probably produce a whole lot of deadweight loss. If it isn't, then market forces will guide the situation toward a natural resolution. Capitalism trends toward more efficient usage of resources. But it doesn't care about humans and their quality of life. It works with that (people spend resources on their healthcare for themselves and their families), but it's perfectly "efficient" for some people to stay impoverished. The government is a great entity to cover this gap. And Brookings' proposal isn't so bad: fixed 10-year duration, cities chosen by RFP instead of by politicians, and funds focusing on R&D instead of "make money now" projects. Most R&D moves as slowly as the government, so it's not a bad target. ------ excalibur No. We don't need government intervention to bring tech jobs to the large cities listed, they already have them. I could have my pick of jobs if I were willing to relocate or commute to one. It's a singular failure of Silicon Valley that so many tech jobs still need to be done in person. All physical infrastructure is going to need a contingent of warm bodies onsite (or at least on-call locally), but there's no reason in 2020 that the vast majority of tech positions can't be remote. ~~~ lettergram My team regularly designs systems on white boards, we discuss, refer to the board as we write docs, and implement. I’ve attempted the same thing remote. Unfortunately, there is nothing more creative / better than having those in person sessions. I hope one day VR can replace this, but today there just isn’t anything there. I should note, we are an internal research and consulting group inside a large corporation. So it is specialized, arguably most full-stack jobs can be done remote. My personal suggestion is to build teams in cities (5 people per team). These teams can be setup in a small office and maybe you get 3-4 teams per office. That’s how my group is currently setup and it works fairly well. The only issue is ensuring facilities are decent and backfilling team members because it can be a challenge to backfill and often attrition snowballs ~~~ aantix For remote collaboration, have you tried something like the Meeting Owl to bridge that gap? [https://www.owllabs.com/meeting- owl](https://www.owllabs.com/meeting-owl) ~~~ lettergram I haven’t but we have done a camera on a whiteboard. It just doesn’t work super well. I think a lot of it has to do with just being stuck in a room together without distractions from personal stuff. ------ mc32 I think companies will be incentivized to do this for two reasons. Cost and echo chamber. If they geodiversify they lower costs and the workforce is less of an echo chamber. ------ cvaidya1986 Yes. ------ purplezooey We seem to be incapable of challenging entrenched city councils and fixing our housing problem, so we may deserve it. ------ duxup I think it would be a good policy to incentivize it. I often tell my anecdotal story about working for a valley company who was 'forced' to hire some midwesterners and there was a serious bias towards valley hires for jobs that really could be done elsewhere. TL;DR Valley company thought tech support HAD to be in the valley / required some high spec resumes ... it very much did not. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21746219](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21746219) I do wonder if those POVs towards the existing tech centers would make any government incentives irrelevant. ------ fortran77 Amazon wanted to open an office in New York--not exactly the heartland, but it does spread out the jobs a bit. But there was resistance and they cancelled the plan. How can you "drag jobs" out? Government ordered migrations of people? Massive subsidies? ~~~ jorts Amazon is opening a new office in NY by 2021, just without the huge tax breaks that they were originally pushing for. The tax breaks were the main reason that folks like AOC were pushing back against them opening a new headquarters in NY. ~~~ corporateslave5 1500 people versus 25k. A huge loss for nyc. Also lost tax revenue for nyc and the state. ~~~ poulsbohemian If Amazon believes it is in their best interest to be in NYC, then they will eventually grow to that 25K number regardless. There's a long track record across the country of companies demanding concessions in promise of jobs, only to have the jobs never materialize. In many cases, companies are going to do what they want, so there isn't any real incentive for governments to play along.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: My friend's project to simulate an entire C. Elegans - SlyShy http://nemaload.davidad.org/ ====== apl While interesting (especially from a funding perspective!), most of these approaches aren't quite as ground-breaking as one might think. Neuroscientists in academia _are_ doing most of these things. For optogenetics, see Deisseroth's work; for in vivo Ca2+ imaging in nematodes, refer to the work of Bargmann as well as the various Witesides collaborations involving microfluidics; pan-neuronal in vivo imaging is currently being pioneered by Engert at Harvard and a couple of Janelia Farm labs. These are massive efforts, and involve horrendous heaps of diligent busywork. This makes me the boring naysayer, but please don't be distracted by the startup-like appearance and the peculiar financing situation. It's possible but unlikely that the major obstacle here is simply the combination of available techniques! Honestly, what I'm most curious about are his thoughts on model-driven interrogation of an in vivo system -- biologists, and even computational neuroscientists, are a bit too hesitant when it comes to letting computers find and test hypotheses. In the age of highly advanced genetic techniques (e.g., binary expression systems in Drosophila or zebrafish) and 2-photon imaging, the process of actually evaluating hypotheses has become a bit old- fashioned... ~~~ Hitchhiker David's start is at 14 and not post 20 as most grad students. At minimum, he will end up making something like Mathematica like Wolfram and at max, he will change the world. The Big and Little Oh of this story are both extreme events. ~~~ lmm That's an awfully high "minimum". I knew several "geniuses" at that age (might even qualify myself, though admittedly I was only three years ahead of par at that age); most of them have gone on to fairly normal (though by no means unsuccessful) careers, and a couple burned out quite spectacularly. I don't think putting that weight of expectation on is helpful. ~~~ Hitchhiker In deed, you remind me of Solon's warning. Perhaps the better way to put it is he's attacking one heck of a problem - and with the right detachment to both industry and academia - so the minimum is based more on the quality of problems than the individual ( as unique as that is in this particular case ). But yes, being an entrepreneur is an added layer, as you've to learn to arrange people to attain a larger goal than just research. And he shows signs of that even on the jobs page while avoiding the broken method of interviewing that is oft practiced, he's almost defining a boundary for relatively high signal from the applicants. His fluid approach is reminiscent of the caper that the Google guys pulled at Stanford.. and as it turns out, I think he also got funded by Larry. ------ adventureloop I love the internship application page <http://nemaload.davidad.org/jobs>. The author does expect any candidate to be perfect before meeting, but sets out a small set of criteria for any potential candidate to research. Probably in the process of researching any of these topics a potential intern would gain a good understanding of the upcoming internship. Sometimes I wish job interviews were laid out like this. ------ netvarun Sounds really interesting. You could try to secure additional funding for this project via Microryza (<http://www.microryza.com/>), which is a kickstarter for scientific research. ~~~ irollboozers Side note, I used to do work with CAD systems for simulating/building gene circuits. I can't wait until we move from open tools (Tinkercell, Biobricks, Genome Compiler, etc) to fully-modeled open platforms for organisms. Imagine having the latest build for E.Coli or C.Elegans, or a package manager to organize them, at your fingertips so that you can hack away at new designs. It makes you wonder, with so many people independently studying and creating observed and simulated data, are there centralized places to aggregate and share these? ~~~ kanzure How is "Genome Compiler" an open tool? I hate those guys, it's not even an actual compiler. or open. If they wanted to do something useful, then yeah I would shoot for that package management concept. ~~~ irollboozers Hmm - it seems those guys are not what I remembered/thought they were. I think they were somehow tied to the open bio standards project which is what I was thinking of. ~~~ kanzure Oh definitely, they pump out lots of confusing/wrong marketing all the time. I can see how they would get into that sort of list. Edit: you have a phd in pirate science? ------ dylangs1030 This isn't directly related, but he enrolled in an MIT graduate program at the age of _14_? That's incredible. I would love to see how this project progresses. It has fascinating implications for artificial intelligence and singularity. ~~~ sweettea ...and was fired from it. ~~~ DaniFong This is not actually true. ------ songgao The about page [1] is very interesting. "3. Providing a foundation for uploading research .... If it can be done for a worm, the next steps are to attempt a zebrafish, then a fruit fly, then a honeybee, then a mouse, then a dog, then a macaque monkey, then a chimpanzee, and, ultimately, a human. " -- that really fascinate me. Isn't that awesome? But ... "the philosophical assumptions fail, and human immortality through uploading is fundamentally impossible". Could anybody explain this a little bit? [1] <http://nemaload.davidad.org/about> ~~~ ars The jump from honeybee to mouse is enormous - much larger than any of the other jumps except chimpanzee to human. Maybe try lizard in between them. ~~~ davidad_ I'm tempted to point out that reptiles are so distinct from either mammals or insects that they wouldn't be a natural stepping stone. But some of my esteemed colleagues advocate jumping from _zebrafish_ to mouse, and I just realized they're probably thinking along similar lines: why try to figure out insects along the way from fish to mammals? Personally, though, I'm limiting my scope to the worm (at least for now!). The particular path which is best to take beyond that is much less clear. ------ soccerniru Interesting .. although a similar project already exists (<http://www.openworm.org/>), and is, from a cursory glance, much more developed. ~~~ hcarvalhoalves Doesn't seem to be same thing. OpenWorm is computer simulation, while the OP plans to build a model based on observing an actual living individual [1]. [1] <http://nemaload.davidad.org/about> ~~~ davidad_ That's about right. My end product is also a computer simulation, as far as that goes, but I'm taking an obsessively data-driven approach, motivated by the advent of new technologies for single-neuron measurement and perturbation in living, behaving animals. Meanwhile, OpenWorm is taking a bottom-up approach, driven by physics and other first principles. We'll meet in the middle eventually. ~~~ kanzure yo david, long time no talk.. did you ever get a chance to make use of this data set? ftp://anonymous@ftp.mrc- lmb.cam.ac.uk/pub/tjucikas/wormdatabase/results-12-06-08/Laura%20Grundy It's a few thousand hours of videos of the worms under different stimulation conditions for observing/identifying common behaviors. We miss you in IRC. ~~~ bntlyb The videos and statistics, as well as a description of the setup used for the recordings can be found here: <http://wormbehavior.mrc-lmb.cam.ac.uk/> ------ codeulike So its not just 'simulate', its more like 'virtualise'. They want to examine neurons in a real worm in real time and then model that. You know all those sci-fi books where people upload their minds into software? This worm is going to get there first. Hope they give it somewhere nice to virtually live. ------ vitno Oooh Exciting stuff! I've been following openworm off and on for a while now. The projects should be extremely complementary. I hope they communicate. (This projects is going to collect a totally new dataset) ~~~ davidad_ Yes, I know Stephen Larson and some of the other OpenWorm guys. In fact, I'm even a member of their organization on GitHub <[https://github.com/openworm?tab=members>](https://github.com/openworm?tab=members>). Once both projects are a bit more developed, I expect ample opportunities for substantive cooperation; but for now, I'm focusing on data collection challenges, while they're focusing on simulations, visualizations, and data management. ------ feniv I like the "optional" hands-on challenges he listed for applicants in the jobs page. It may end up filtering out some talented candidates (not wanting to put in this much effort for one application), but it will certainly call out to the tinkerers and hobbyists who would do those tasks for fun anyway. ~~~ ProblemFactory The challenges are great because it's not just another meaningless programming test. Instead it's "week 1" of the internship, where you learn the background necessary to start work on the project. And even if you don't get the position, all those tasks are useful for a grad student in neuroscience or bioinformatics. ------ Hitchhiker This has been out for a while. Would be interesting to see the next steps. ~~~ davidad_ Yeah, I haven't updated the site in a while. (This really wasn't the _best_ time for a Hacker News blitz. I was just telling my friend that Nemaload _hadn't_ been on HN yet, as far as I knew, and he simply decided to fix that pronto.) But there have been plenty of developments since November (when I think I last updated the site). I have access to a few candidate strains for pan-neuronal calcium imaging (though the genetic engineering is still an ongoing optimization process) and have collected a couple of large datasets, one on a light-sheet microscope and one on a light-field microscope. Much of the data is useless, and we're still working on the algorithms to extract signals from it, as well as the infrastructure for opening it up for distribution. But there will certainly be more publicly visible activity soon (June at the latest). ~~~ rmrfrmrf $ !! > <http://nemaload.davidad.org/news> ~~~ davidad_ OK, I can't argue with that. <https://nemaload.davidad.org/news/2013-developments> ~~~ davidad_ Oops, didn't mean to link to the HTTPS-restricted area. <[http://nemaload.davidad.org/news/2013-developments>](http://nemaload.davidad.org/news/2013-developments>), but it's basically just what I wrote above, as suggested (-:	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: Best Ad Netowrks? - nickFaraday Hi HN,<p>I'm currently in the process of evaluating Ad Networks to provide revenue for my site. There are so many out there some free, some pay, some new, some old. I'm not even sure where to start!<p>Any fellow HN readers have any suggestions?<p>My Ideal network would have:<p>1. Base level of add track / performance metrics.<p>2. Geo Specific Ad targeting abilities.<p>3. Ability to sign up my own Advertisers.<p>4. Sales Force help. (Sales people to help sell space)<p>5. Flex banner size (Ability to post different sizes of ads)<p>Is there a service out there like this?<p>Thanks ====== nickFaraday Found this link for anyone interested. It gives a pretty good summary of some of the networks: [http://howtosplitanatom.com/news/21-great-advertising- networ...](http://howtosplitanatom.com/news/21-great-advertising-networks-for- publishers/)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Selenium with Headless Chrome on Travis CI - amihaiemil http://www.amihaiemil.com/2017/07/14/selenium-headless-chrome-travis.html ====== based2 Headless Java notes from yesterday: [https://www.blazemeter.com/blog/headless-execution- selenium-...](https://www.blazemeter.com/blog/headless-execution-selenium- tests-jenkins) [https://stackoverflow.com/questions/494442/fake-x11-display](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/494442/fake-x11-display) [http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/articles/javase/headless-1...](http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/articles/javase/headless-136834.html) [https://stackoverflow.com/questions/32862344/what-is-the- dif...](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/32862344/what-is-the-difference- between-openjdk-7-jre-headless-and-openjdk-7-jrejdk) [https://github.com/nimmis/docker- java/tree/master/openjdk-8-...](https://github.com/nimmis/docker- java/tree/master/openjdk-8-jre-headless) ------ logn In some contexts it might be easier to use my project [https://github.com/machinepublishers/jbrowserdriver](https://github.com/machinepublishers/jbrowserdriver) which requires Java/JavaFX (no external browser bin). Chrome Headless is a godsend though. ~~~ amihaiemil Interesting project :D ------ payne92 For my project, I just drove headless chrome w/ the debug API (remote debugging protocol) directly from Python--it was very straightforward. Headless chrome makes much of these existing frameworks redundant, IMHO. Unless you have a suite of existing test cases in some framework, I'd consider just driving Chrome directly and skipping the overhead and external dependencies. ~~~ nathancahill Isn't the goal of Selenium/WebDriver to allow for some level of standardization in interacting with different headless browsers? If you're only interested in ever testing in Chrome, great. But headless Firefox is in the release pipeline (I think it's being tested in Nightly?). ------ casimiro It workds pretty well, except for the download functionality.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: Mailbrew Mobile (Sneak Peek) - linuz90 http://mailbrew.com/mobile ====== Lightbody A couple thoughts: 1) I was bummed I couldn't actually _try_ Mailbrew Mobile yet :( 2) That said, I hadn't heard of Mailbrew before and I _love_ the idea behind it. I visit 4-5 sites as part of my morning and nightly routine, but I also find myself getting sucked into them as a method of procrastination (like right now haha). I hope this can help!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Cache Control Immutable – A Year Later - cpeterso https://discuss.httparchive.org/t/cache-control-immutable-a-year-later/1195 ====== brlewis I'll probably be excited about this directive for a long time. I'm still excited about stale-if-error and stale-while-revalidate though it's taking a long time for support to go all the way out to the browser. ------ MaxBarraclough Neat. I'm reminded of the way GWT uses quirky file names to enable them to treat files as immutable and 'cacheable forever'. If you update your GWT page/app, then (with just one small exception to get things off the ground, as far as I can see) you get new files, enabling good caching. [https://support.google.com/code/answer/77858?hl=en](https://support.google.com/code/answer/77858?hl=en)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Patent infringement claim re: “Creating Shazam in Java” blogpost (2010) - danso http://www.royvanrijn.com/blog/2010/07/patent-infringement/ ====== Smerity It terrifies me that even disclosing that you are attempting to understand a patent implies you intend to infringe upon it. It's as close to a thoughtcrime as possible without peeking into our heads. Worst of all, this is only happening thanks to our modern age of information sharing[1], which helps encourage innovation. Even if this topic covered was complex enough such that a patent was warranted, this is still disturbing as this accusation of patent infringement aims to directly halt the understanding of any of the innovations at play. Patents are an exclusive right granted in exchange for detailed public disclosure of the invention - to promote understanding and innovation is their purpose! This wasn't angled towards mass production, just simply understanding and spreading knowledge - a fundamentally important concept in our knowledged based field. [1]: Quote: "Also, as I'm sure you are aware, your blogpost may be viewed internationally. As a result, you may contribute to someone infringing our patents in any part of the world." ~~~ kabdib This is the double bind. You can't go looking because you're penalized. Yet the PTO and patent community refers to patents as "teachings". I continually heard that. "This patent 456 teaches that yadda yadda bing-bap- boom" and your very soul (well, professional career) is pillar-of-salt material if you even go look. And yet, none of the _really hard_ stuff seems to be patented. Or I could just be bitter. Or both :-) "Let's see if someone's got prior art on (super whiz-bang technology)." Click, page, click . . . "Wait, no--" "Oh crap, I just read someone's hash table patent. Pass me another mind-wipe pill, would you?" "Sigh. I'll have them hire another lawyer downstairs." Which is what it's really about these days. Ka-ching, baby. ------ Htsthbjig Even those that promote patenting algorithms should agree that patents purpose is opening the details of a machine or process in exchange for a monopoly. That was the purpose of original patent's plans, that everybody could replicate your machine or process with the information provided. When you want a monopoly and also ban publishing the details of the algorithm or working examples, something wrong is happening. It has gone too far, with people recommending other people NOT to read patents, because it will be bad for them on court. ~~~ kabdib The reason that companies tell employees not to read patents is that knowingly infringing a patent is triple damages (as opposed to just accidentally reimplementing something). I've read a bunch of software patents, with attorneys helping me out with language and advice, but this was under the guise of "How can we do a product like X, but not infringe on the related patents?" The patents in question were very broad, nearly without exception either ridiculously obvious or adoption of techniques that I found in textbooks and papers from conferences. It was almost like the company producing product X had bribed the PTO, it was that bad. I believe that nearly every piece of software exceeding a few hundred lines of code infringes on someone's bullshit software or business methods patent. And of course, you can't go reading all the patents, so every software project is pre-screwed. Shipping software these days is a matter of ignoring the issue, crossing your fingers and hoping that a patent troll doesn't come knocking. ~~~ Twirrim The PTO largely doesn't seem to care or do any research beyond the bare basics. As far as I can tell they're not really incentivised to do so either. They collect a whole heap of fees for getting and maintaining a patent ([http://www.uspto.gov/learning-and-resources/fees-and- payment...](http://www.uspto.gov/learning-and-resources/fees-and- payment/uspto-fee-schedule)), and even claim a fee for revisiting a patent, but so far as I've been able to find, it doesn't cost them anything to actually invalidate one. It ought to cost them all the money they've taken so far, and then some on top, to provide them with more of an incentive to make sure the patent is correct. ------ rayiner Trolling hobbyists is indefensible, but it's simplistic to say that this is an obvious patent on "matching music using a hashing function." The patent in question is: 6,990,453. It describes doing a frequency domain analysis of the audio signal to obtain a set of landmarks, and using characterizations of those landmarks to obtain the fingerprints, and using the fingerprints to match songs: [http://www.google.com/patents/US6990453](http://www.google.com/patents/US6990453). That's why Shazam can recognize recorded and transcoded music. Simple hashing would not do that. In fact, the article in question is actually based on a different article, which is based on a paper published by one of the Shazam authors: [http://www.ee.columbia.edu/~dpwe/papers/Wang03-shazam.pdf](http://www.ee.columbia.edu/~dpwe/papers/Wang03-shazam.pdf). IMO, the outrage here is the tone-deaf PR of the CTO. ~~~ themartorana While technically awesome, it's still math. It cuts so closely to being able to patent proofs or mathematical expressions (it's kind of hard to argue that's not exactly what it is) and I hope one day the judicial system understands software well enough to invalidate software patents. It's technically amazing. Shaman still amazes me with its speed and accuracy. But in the end, it's simple (advanced) numerical analysis. I'd much rather their implementation be held close to the vest as a trade secret, where stealing source code is illegal, but if I produce similar functionality on my own via my own work and time investment, I don't need to fear that someone has government sponsored exclusivity on that pattern of mathematical analysis. ~~~ throwawaykf05 _> ... it's still math..._ This is a very prevalent misconception around here, so I will address it again. Saying "software is mathematics" is about as correct as saying "machines are physics". (Note that you cannot patent laws of physics either.) ------ placebo I'm always surprised by the confusion of well meaning, intelligent, creative but obviously naive hobbyists trying to understand the justice or logic when they are threatened by lawyers backed by organisations with lots of money. Here's a wakeup call: Justice has nothing to do with any of this, and the only logic behind it is the golden rule, i.e that those who have the gold make the rules. This is nothing new. Satisfying greed of the powerful by invoking terror on the less powerful is a very common occurrence throughout human history. The only things that change in different times and places are the implementations of this rule. Sorry to be so cynical about this, and I'd be delighted if you prove me wrong. It's ironic how patents today exist to mostly serve the exact opposite of their original intent. ------ jrockway I don't think you can patent the description of the algorithm. Doesn't the patent itself contain the description of the algorithm? This just sounds like pure bullying from third-rate "lawyers". ------ hhjj Interesting letter showing lawyers think matching music thanks to an hashing function is not obvious (else why would they try to bully someone to remove that information from www). ~~~ teddyh Lawyers actually “think” nothing. Or rather, what they write and what they argue is what they are paid to write and argue. It has no actual connection to what they actually think - they might not even have actually personally considered the issue, and may never do so. However, what they write is in many ways _meant_ to be taken seriously and reacted to, just like troll posts. Therefore, take care not to be trolled by lawyers. ------ masterzoozoo A quick search on github.com ([https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=shazam](https://github.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=shazam)) lists a lot of implementation related to it. Bad that they are running behind a single guy. May be their implementation is exactly same as what is posted on the blog. ------ voltagex_ Why hasn't AcoustID been targeted? [0] [0]: [https://acoustid.org/](https://acoustid.org/) ------ phaed Streisand effect in 3, 2, 1...	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
16% of web vulnerabilities are still XSS - bensedat https://www.tinfoilsecurity.com/blog/100-000-security-vulnerabilities-and-counting ====== tptacek I assume they're not tracking CSRF, since CSRF tends to be much more common than XSS. ~~~ borski We actually were, for a while, but are working through some bugs in that particular module for the last couple of weeks. However, it still didn't show up as often as XSS in our testing, actually. ------ compumike Big variance in vulnerability seriousness across that spectrum... but if you've found 100K+ vulns and 2.5% are SQL injection, that's a lot of big holes! ~~~ borski Yup! Some of those are less serious than others, though all are a beachhead you don't want available to an attacker. And SQLi, I agree, is among the worst. ------ bluetooth How did you test for YAML injection? From my past experiences with Ruby (hardly any) YAML injection is difficult to test from a blackbox perspective as you need an understanding of the source code in order to be able to craft the appropriate serialized YAML object to yield code execution. ~~~ borski Couple of methods. For one thing, we test for status codes returned for particularly crafted YAML/XML parameters. Aside from that, we also carefully craft a YAML injection using a timing attack and test blind, that way. ------ sebcat Title is wrong. Instead of saying that 16% of web vulns are XSS, it should say that 16% of the findings reported by this particular product/service are XSS. Web vulnerability scanners can diff a lot in their results. Crawling algos/site coverage, finding and using different input vectors, specific testing methods &c are all very different across various products. Sectoolmarket is a good resource with results from WIVET (crawl tests more or less) and WAVSEP (detecting vulnerabilities). Even so, those benchmarks only cover a very small portion of possible web application attack vectors. And let's not forget the problem of crawling "The Deep Web" i.e., stateful web applications. TL;DR: title is wrong. ------ sdevlin 16% of web vulnerabilities _found by a scanner_ are still XSS. ~~~ borski Not sure what the implication is here - yes, 16% of the vulnerabilities found by our scanner, of just over 100k now, are XSS. Are you implying XSS is less widespread? In my appsec experience, it's possibly even more widespread, if anything...	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Take a pic of your creditcard and get a call from the fraud hotline in 30 mins - jakobjs https://translate.google.is/translate?sl=is&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=is&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dv.is%2Fskrytid%2F2017%2F10%2F9%2Fdagur-tok-mynd-af-debetkortinu-sinu-stuttu-sidar-var-hringt-i-hann-fra-valitor%2F&edit-text= ====== jakobjs The translation is a bit wierd but it's not totally Google's fault. "Map" in Icelandic also means "Card". And his name, Dagur, means Day. But yeah, this guy takes a picture of his creditcard at 11:16 (a debit card but they all come with cc numbers as well now), because the numbers were so smudged that they were about to dissapear. Then at 11:36, exactly 30 minutes later the local VISA company (Valitor.is) calls him. It is the emergency fraud hotline and informs him that someone in Indonesia is trying to use his card. He used an iPhone and said the photo just went to his "Camera roll" and probably uploaded to his iCloud backup. His card was immediately closed. ------ navjack27 I'm confused, how did someone get into his iCloud? Or was there a MiTM?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Scientists pull living microbes, possibly 100M years old, from beneath the sea - walterbell https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/07/scientists-pull-living-microbes-100-million-years-beneath-sea ====== sradman The paper _Aerobic microbial life persists in oxic marine sediment as old as 101.5 million years_ [1]: > Our results suggest that microbial communities widely distributed in > organic-poor abyssal sediment consist mainly of aerobes that retain their > metabolic potential under extremely low-energy conditions for up to 101.5 > Ma. > Dominant bacterial groups included Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, > Firmicutes, Alphaproteobacteria, Betaproteobacteria, Gammaproteobacteria, > and Deltaproteobacteria (Fig. 3b, c) with a minor fraction of Chloroflexi > (0– 2.6%). It seems that it is the conditions that extends life since such a diverse community of aerobes was "reanimated". [1] [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17330-1](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17330-1) ------ est31 I've heard that there is a hard limit of about 1 million years to recover ancient DNA because of deterioration processes [1]. Wouldn't their DNA have deteriorated by now? Or is it being constantly repaired? [1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_DNA](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_DNA) ~~~ Knufen You can 'reverse engineer' DNA. Though the DNA strand itself deteriorates rather quickly given the time scales. The peptide bond are extremely robust and can be used to recreate the original DNA string or at least some semblance of it. ~~~ gus_massa Some parts of the DNA are not transcribed, for example the "Promoters" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promoter_(genetics)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promoter_$genetics$) They are important so some proteins are build only when the they are needed. For a more concrete example, see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac_operon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lac_operon) ------ rajekas Makes me think that panspermia isn't so outlandish. 100 million years will get you from star system to star system with plenty of time to spare. ~~~ waheoo Has work been done on figuring out how long it would take to develop DNA/RNAthrough evolution? I.e. has the earth been around long enough? ~~~ ericbarrett The fossil record indicates life on Earth appeared no later than about 800,000,000 years after it first formed, and possibly much sooner. While there’s no real evidence for panspermia, it is a fun topic to read about. I recall one hypothesis is that DNA (or RNA) based life evolved shortly after the Big Bang (500,000 years?) when the universe was a balmy lumpy-gas bath of 0-100C. If this were true, it would follow that life is as pervasive as the cosmic background radiation and we should expect to find it in every crevice. Mind-bending. ~~~ ardy42 > I recall one hypothesis is that DNA (or RNA) based life evolved shortly > after the Big Bang (500,000 years?) when the universe was a balmy lumpy-gas > bath of 0-100C. If this were true, it would follow that life is as pervasive > as the cosmic background radiation and we should expect to find it in every > crevice. Mind-bending. That's pretty unbelievable, since at that time stars hadn't formed to create heavier elements, so the elements available were hydrogen, helium, and a little bit of lithium. DNA is mostly carbon and nitrogen. ------ cerealbad Anyone with a passing interest in this or adjacent fields should check out the Deep Carbon Observatory website. [https://deepcarbon.net/worlds-oldest-groundwater-supports- li...](https://deepcarbon.net/worlds-oldest-groundwater-supports-life-through- water-rock-chemistry) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfate- reducing_microorganism...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulfate- reducing_microorganisms) ------ rbartelme It's a big logical leap to the conclusion that this will "doom us all". It's even sillier to be afraid of sediment core incubation experiments with destructive sampling techniques. Don't you think? ~~~ zipwitch SF author and marine biologist Peter Watts has a trilogy on a very similar premise, where an early "fork" of life (that is actually _more_ efficient than our entire tree of life) got stuck down in the ocean depths at the dawn of time, until we accidentally bring it up. [https://rifters.com/real/shorts.htm](https://rifters.com/real/shorts.htm) ------ freedomben Related: I recently read "The Story of Earth" by Robert Hazen and it's a fascinating read. Highly recommend. The author also has a few Great Courses courses. "The Origin and Evolution of Earth" is a companion to the book (it covers much of the same material) but the two together left me with significant retention of the material. It's fascinating to go out hiking now with my kids and be able to entertain and educate them with facts about the rocks and formations we are hiking on :-) ------ dumbfoundded I wonder if there's any depth we've searched where we haven't found life. It looks like life is everywhere we look. Is there anywhere on Earth there isn't some microbe living? ~~~ Someone Reading [https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2017/04/deepest- life...](https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2017/04/deepest-life-earth- mariana-trench-astrobiology-science/), scientists think temperatures above 250F (120 °C) aren’t compatible with life as we know it (carbon-based, using water), and, because of that, there isn’t life below 6 miles down. Reading [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanopyrus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanopyrus), about a microbe that “can survive and reproduce at 122 °C”, that limit may be based on observation, rather than first principles. Regardless, I would take it with a grain of salt. ~~~ close04 Some archaea species like Geogemma barosii [0] can survive and reproduce at temperatures above 121 °C (the temperature used in many autoclaves for example). [0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strain_121](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strain_121) ~~~ dumbfoundded That's pretty awesome that the only limitations of life on Earth appear to be pressure and temperature. ------ ncmncm Maybe now the bacteria revived from 40Mya amber are believable. ------ imvetri Isn't this a repost ? I remember reading similar article last year ------ 42droids It’s 2020. What can go wrong? ~~~ vz8 Remember the Mayan calendar brouhaha over 2012? They just forgot to carry the 1. And here we are. ~~~ felipemnoa Would have made a great movie. "The Mayans were off by 8 years" ~~~ nkrisc I'm sure the Mayan's original paper they submitted for peer review had the appropriate margins or error detailed, it was just lost once the newspapers picked it up. ~~~ felipemnoa Great point! ------ tomcam They don’t look a day over 61 million ~~~ Igelau Does my pseudopod look fat to you? How about now? ~~~ tomcam Dear, you always look wonderful to me. ------ benmcnelly Do you want zombies, this is how you get zombies... /kidding of course(mostly)! ~~~ walterbell But, but .. we did that in 1997-2005 for Spanish flu and nothing (?) happened. [https://www.nature.com/articles/437794a](https://www.nature.com/articles/437794a) _> It is thought to have killed 50 million people, and yet scientists have brought it back to life … Working out how it arose and why it was so deadly could help experts to spot the next pandemic strain and to design appropriate drugs and vaccines in time, they say. But others have raised concerns that the dangers of resurrecting the virus are just too great. One biosecurity expert told Nature that the risk that the recreated strain might escape is so high, it is almost a certainty._ Grave digging: [https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic- resources/reconstruction-19...](https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic- resources/reconstruction-1918-virus.html)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Cortex: API platform for machine learning engineers - ChefboyOG https://github.com/cortexlabs/cortex/tree/v0.18.0 ====== ishcheklein Interesting, what are the benefits of using this vs Sagemaker? ~~~ calebkaiser Maintainer here. There are a bunch of feature-level differences between Cortex and SageMaker (spot instance support on Cortex is one that comes up a lot), but the real core differences are: 1\. Cortex is for ML engineering, SageMaker is for data science. Cortex is designed specifically for the needs of production-scale ML applications. Deploying a model as an API with Cortex will be familiar to anyone who has used Serverless or Beanstalk before--you write your API in a Python script (Cortex provides a Predictor class for this), you configure your deployment with a YAML file, and you deploy with the Cortex CLI. You can see a GIF of a deployment on the repo: [https://github.com/cortexlabs/cortex](https://github.com/cortexlabs/cortex) In order to deploy the API, Cortex automates all the necessary cloud infrastructure. It spins up a k8s cluster, containerizes/deploys your API, configures autoscaling, implements a load balancer, streams logs, tracks predictions, handles rolling updates, implements different deployment strategies, cleans up, etc. Because Cortex is just focused on serving models, not the data science/model training side, it can do all of the above automatically in ways that are familiar to software engineers (e.g. YAML/a CLI instead of notebooks/a Python SDK). This solves a lot of production challenges with ML, particularly around reliable deployment processes and collaboration. Additionally, decoupling serving from training allows Cortex to be agnostic as to how you develop your model. You can use SageMaker, download a pre-trained model, whatever you like, so long as it can generate predictions. 2\. Cortex is free and open source. The obvious benefit here is cost--you don't pay the ~40% premium for EC2 instances that SageMaker charges. Additionally, we believe that there are fundamental benefits to open source infrastructure, in terms of transparency and control.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
I just lost 1,400 BTC - agirgelen https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/issues/5072#issuecomment-683356052 ====== nemothekid As far as I can understand 1\. The user had 1,400 BTC in an old wallet using this software 2\. An old version of the software was vulnerable to phishing 3\. The user attempted to use the software, and was phished 4\. Massive payday for the scammers Really unfortunate - and goes to show with software you manage yourself you need to be diligent about making sure it's updated. For all the shit coinbase gets, it's difficult to lose your coins in this manner. ~~~ brianwawok Also, I think it's just the reason that crypto-currency will fail. If you trick me into an ACH transfer of 16 million, there will a) Trigger some random human based audits at my bank before the money can leave (likely involve some phone calls) b) Have actual recourse, like court orders to hold the funds at the other bank c) Take some amount of time to happen, to allow for A & B It's not perfect, and it has bugs.. but I would never store actual money of value in crypto anything. ~~~ swyx unless a bank wouldnt serve you, like for sizable parts of the economy. ~~~ eanzenberg Sizable, like 2%? ~~~ eanzenberg I looked it up. 6% of Americans don’t have a bank account. Doesn’t say whether they could go ahead and get one, or they choose not to. Sizable? ~~~ soco Correct me please if I'm wrong, but I'd say most of those folks not served by a bank wouldn't have the skills to manage bitcoins either. ------ ztratar Many folks shit on the modern financial system, with its centralization and Government-coupling, but things like this are actually trackable and reversible in that ecosystem. The safeguards have evolved over centuries. I am curious when crypto will get there. Maybe 10 years or so? ~~~ rabidrat It is impossible by design. Adding that 'feature' takes away the core principle of decentralized currency. Allowing government to reverse transactions will also allow them to seize assets. Then it is just a regular currency (for better and worse). ~~~ Scoundreller Didn’t ethereum fork to rollback a hack they didn’t like? ~~~ nyghtly Do you mean this? [https://www.bitdegree.org/tutorials/ethereum-vs-ethereum- cla...](https://www.bitdegree.org/tutorials/ethereum-vs-ethereum-classic/) ~~~ Scoundreller This one: [https://www.coindesk.com/ethereum-executes-blockchain- hard-f...](https://www.coindesk.com/ethereum-executes-blockchain-hard-fork- return-dao-investor-funds) ------ Canada I can't believe someone would even allow a system with that balance to even connect to the internet. It's like filling a car with gold bars, driving it around town, and hoping nothing bad happens. He could have created another wallet, preferably a multisig, created the transaction with the software wallet offline, copied the signed transaction off and broadcast it from another system. What he did was reckless. Some people are going cry that Bitcoin is unsafe because of this. It's not. You must handle large amounts of cash or gold or other valuables with care. ~~~ herpderperator Bitcoin is all online. The analogy doesn't work: your gold bars are being driven around town all day and night in public view, already. In this case, it's just the fact that the access was granted at the application level when the user logged into their wallet, which is like giving someone keys to your car by mistake. ~~~ jkepler No. One can store keys offline. That's what hardware wallets do. ~~~ herpderperator In order to do anything with Bitcoin, which appears to be what the author wanted, you would have to be connected to the Internet. Keys being stored in hardware wallet sure, but the gold bars are still in public view. Hardware wallets aren't without their flaws. With an application-level vulneravility in a hardware wallet, you are still screwed. Here is just one example: [https://www.ledger.com/improving-the-ecosystem-disclosure- of...](https://www.ledger.com/improving-the-ecosystem-disclosure-of-the- trezor-recovery-phrase-extraction-vulnerability) ~~~ vmception You can sign transactions offline and hand deliver the file if you felt so inclined. Signed transactions cant be modified. Someone needs to make sure nodes see it that transaction and add it to the database, eventually. This user experience has not been refined, but is very possible. A system with fewer nodes, like if the internet was attacked and not available, would still work for this currency. ~~~ natcombs > You can sign transactions offline and hand deliver the file if you felt so > inclined. How big is that signature/file? Can it be encoded in a QR code or something simpler to bridge the airgap? ~~~ Canada The specific transaction this post refers to was 1813 bytes. It had 12 inputs that had to be signed for making it larger than average. For $10M I'd be willing to manually type out the 3626 hex digits, or if feeling lazy splurge on a $10 USB stick. Only 3 inputs account for almost all of the balance, so really it could have been moved for under 1000 bytes, which I happily write longhand on paper with a quill in triplicate before I'd even consider exposing the secret key to the internet. ------ addcninblue This looks like the relevant transaction: [https://www.blockchain.com/btc/tx/ef600c380a239d9b929c6c964d...](https://www.blockchain.com/btc/tx/ef600c380a239d9b929c6c964deaf7060e309750950a516cee65576232b0c53c) ------ Xcelerate If I had that much in an old wallet, no way would I touch that myself or allow it anywhere near the internet. I would hire a team of experts and get the transaction over to my bank insured. ~~~ herpderperator Do any big banks offer a BTC account? ------ vmception Its kind of crazy that the phishing attack people are still operating those servers for all these years! But since they pay for themselves no reason to turn them off. The knowledge gulf is so wide in cryptocurrency that schemes are resurrectable every bull market Like, some people will use this to reinforce their juvenile binary argument about why “crypto bad”, and then they enter next bull market after someone they respect shows them something they didn't consider. But then they are still a decade late in knowledge while chasing every new shiny thing. If people want to learn its there, permissionless, lucrative. ------ willemlabu Here [1] is the explanation: I had 1,400 BTC in a wallet that I had not accessed since 2017. I foolishly installed the old version of the electrum wallet. My coins propagated. I attempted to transfer about 1 BTC however was unable to proceed. A pop-up displayed stating I was required to update my security prior to being able to transfer funds. I installed the update which immediately triggered the transfer of my entire balance to a scammers address. [1] [https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/issues/5072#issuecommen...](https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/issues/5072#issuecomment-683374289) ------ pkrefta With big money comes big responsibility. Storing $16M should be taken very seriously and probably most people have no clue about that. ~~~ bpodgursky I think the point is that you can store $16M in a bank and take need to take no precautions against casual theft (and often can recover the money via person-to-person interactions, if theft does occur). ~~~ thebean11 I completely disagree, only the first $250k is insured. I would never store $16M cash in a bank. You aren't protected against the bank becoming insolvent. ~~~ smabie Okay... where would you store 16m? ~~~ tootie In an investment account with a reputable brokerage. ~~~ herpderperator What's the difference between that and a bank? ~~~ tialaramex Well the fun part is that the way it's different is that there would be a bank account with your money in it, that the brokerage isn't allowed to touch. So, you're protected from the brokerage going bankrupt - your money is still yours if that happens. But it's still in a bank account, so if the bank goes under you're screwed. See my other comment in this thread though... ~~~ herpderperator SIPC isn't unlimited, though: The Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC) was created to protect against the loss of customer assets at brokerage firms. SIPC offers protection of up to $500,000, including a $250,000 limit for cash, if a brokerage firm fails, and covers most types of securities, such as stocks, bonds, and mutual funds. [0] [0] [https://www.schwab.com/public/file/P-3042070/Asset_Protectio...](https://www.schwab.com/public/file/P-3042070/Asset_Protection_Brochure_MKT45080-09.pdf) ------ notRobot Stuff like this is why you shouldn't use a lightweight wallet and should use the official wallet, or at least host a full node. Read more here: Full nodes: [https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Full_node](https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Full_node) Lightweight nodes: [https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Lightweight_node](https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Lightweight_node) ~~~ qwertox What about an hardware wallet like Ledger? ~~~ notRobot I would simply recommend hosting a full node and using the latest release of the official Bitcoin Core wallet. Hardware wallets are relatively new and uncommon, so not much is known about their security risks. That said, there are no glaring, obvious issues and you _could_ use one if you want. Read: [https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Hardware_wallet#Security_risks](https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Hardware_wallet#Security_risks) As always, do not take advice from strangers on the internet about storing your crypto without doing extensive research on your own. The Bitcoin wiki is a great starting point: [https://en.bitcoin.it/](https://en.bitcoin.it/) ~~~ mianos The popular Trezor wallet has a hardware vulnerability, where, if you physically have the hardware it can be exploited. Hardware wallets are a vast improvement but not without issues. Large scale fraud, where the money goes missing is much more common so far. ------ kutorio I'm not an expert in BTC storage, but as far as I understand such an attack could have been prevented if the owner invested in a hardware wallet for $100-200. As the final step in a transaction would be to sign it on your ledger/trezor device, and would be much harder to phish. ~~~ AgentME This was my first thought too. Hardware wallets show transactions on their own screen so the amount and destination address can be confirmed on-device before the device signs the transaction, which seems like a great tool to avoid this kind of issue. Anyone that owns more cryptocurrency than a hardware wallet costs really needs to have a hardware wallet. ------ btilly Reading these threads I always have to wonder. Is the report of being scammed a scammer trying to make extra money on a sale? How would anyone know? ~~~ GaryNumanVevo Bitcoin being a public ledger, it's fairly easy to see if 1,400 BTC was moved recently: [https://www.blockchain.com/btc/tx/ef600c380a239d9b929c6c964d...](https://www.blockchain.com/btc/tx/ef600c380a239d9b929c6c964deaf7060e309750950a516cee65576232b0c53c) I mean they definitely could have seen that transaction and just acted like it was their stolen money. ------ iJohnDoe Serious question. Not trolling. Would it have been possible to exchange that much BTC for US dollars? Ignoring taxes for a few seconds. Would it have actually been possible to get real fiat money for the 1,400 BTC? I’ve always heard of complete incompetence trying to get an account set up on any exchange. Getting verified, etc. ~~~ noxer If he acquired them legal of course he can sell them an get fiat withdrawn to his bank, assuming hes not in a place where bitcoin is illegal. Doing this all at once without informing your bank will probably instantly freeze the funds and trigger some kind of investigation. That doesn't mean you eventually get access to it. Also there are exchanges withdraw limits so its not on your bank account in 1-2 working days. If you want to sell all at once and withdraw you would have to register on different exchanges to circumvent daily limits and do the KCY which that can take days to get verified. ------ phedboi Why would someone holding 1400 BTC use a software wallet instead of an offline hardware wallet? SMH ~~~ spurgu Yeah this is what blows my mind. I would be paranoid if I had 14 BTC, let alone 1400. When I had (as much as) 19 BTC some while ago I stored them on a Trezor, with the seed on a paper (three copies in different places) in a form that no one would realize it actually was a seed. ~~~ herpderperator Be careful... sometimes we end up making things so complicated that we forget how it works. Think why comments are so crucial after looking at your own code from a year ago and having no clue what you meant. :-) ------ gota I've said this time and time again: 'be your own bank' is a terrible design error, not a feature, for 99.99% of users. This guy is most likely somewhat technically literate, and this happened to him. ~~~ rjkennedy98 There is no mandate in Bitcoin to 'be your own bank' \- its just an option. It is a feature and a very good one for people who are afraid of government intrusion into how they use their money. If you don't care about this "feature" you can turn it off by putting your crypto in Coinbase or other exchanges where it will be insured. ~~~ nyghtly > Satoshi Nakamoto stated in his white paper that: "The root problem with > conventional currencies is all the trust that's required to make it work. > The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history > of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust." [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitcoin) It's clear that the purpose of Bitcoin is to replace existing banking institutions by providing a trust-less alternative. This means that using an exchange to store Bitcoin is essentially useless. If your purpose is to protect your money by handing it over to a trusted institution, then you're better off putting it into a bank that's FDIC insured. Of course, the real reason that people store their Bitcoin on Coinbase is so that they can easily profit from speculation by exchanging their coin for USD. ~~~ fluffything Bitcoin does not provide a trust-less alternative, at best, it requires you to trust yourself. The internet is full of people that have lost their wallets due to hardware failures and no backups, scams, phishing, ... ------ simonblack If you can't hold it in your hot little hand, it does not exist. This also applies to your money and other valuables held by third parties such as Banks or Trusts, or wealth stored as numbers in a computer. _Unless you hold and control it personally, it 's not yours at all._ While it's definitely convenient in good times for your wealth storage to be in the hands of others, you're completely dependent on the goodwill of those others. In bad or difficult times, you're not going to keep that wealth for very long. ~~~ EForEndeavour Pointing out that you don't technically own the money in your conventional bank's chequing account is a mere distraction from the fact that in the real world, it's easier to permanently lose access to your cryptocurrency than it is to permanently lose access to your bank account. ------ echopom This is fascinating. Honestly , while I found BlockChain & Immutable Ledger disruptive technology , I have zero trust in cryptos. The amount of scam in this industry is just obscene, unlike banking , there is no such thing as insurance for your wallet or legal recourse to get back your assets, your pretty much on your own and I'm fairly convinced he won't get back his 1.5M$ Bitcoin . I feel bad for him , but there is very little surprise playing with unregulated stuff. ~~~ vmception There is a lot more scamming in those legal recourse systems, they have the benefit of not being masqueraded as international news every time! The user experience where you personally still have your money might be something you like. Also it was $16m bitcoin ------ ur-whale Reading this, I feel compelled to repost this old but still largely relevant blogpost: [http://trilema.com/2013/the-story-of-pointless-and- witless/](http://trilema.com/2013/the-story-of-pointless-and-witless/) ------ kobasa It's not crypto-currencies and it's not crypto currencies. It's simply cryptocurrencies. At least learn to spell the word correctly before giving your absolutely ignorant opinion on it. ------ CameronBanga Given that the first post in tracker mentions "0,09", I think the comment here may actually be using a Euro standard decimal notation. So the author may have lost 1.4 BTC, or ~16k. Still a loss, but not 16m. ~~~ spurgu Nope: [https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/bc1qcygs9dl4pqw6atc4y...](https://www.blockchain.com/btc/address/bc1qcygs9dl4pqw6atc4yqudrzd76p3r9cp6xp2kny) Address mentioned here: [https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/issues/5072#issuecommen...](https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/issues/5072#issuecomment-683356120) ------ asdz That's why getting a hardware wallet is important!!! The guy have 17 million USD and don't even bother to heighten up the security. ------ xwdv Fools and their bitcoin are easily parted. Perhaps this man has lost his only chance at possessing millions. What an expensive lesson. ------ rtx This is why we need, order > Community > Society > Government > Banks We are at the community stage with crypto. ~~~ gchamonlive This structure is just one form of security implementation and not flawless at that, and I would dare say biased towards the richer parties. Scams, in and outside of banks happen really frequently, so turning to traditional structures of control just because new ones failed at some point is defeatist. We can have nice things, but they need time to evolve properly. ~~~ rtx Don't disagree, always happy to see the alternative. Another one that we had earlier in India was Rta (natural order) > Rna (debt on non conformist) > Karma > Gods. But as we understood the world better, this one went out of fashion ------ reportgunner This story is kinda like: "I got pickpocketed once and lost all my cash. This means that cash is inherently unsafe and should not be used by anyone ever." ~~~ knorker No, more like "I got pickpocketed of all my life savings, therefore maybe I shouldn't walk around with my life savings in my back pocket". ------ illgenr The negative comments on HN about crypto give me confidence RE: it's eventual success in dethroning fiat currency. ------ ncmncm And somebody gained 1400 BTC. ------ krapp Caveat fucking emptor.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
The Problem with Prediction Markets - bjterry http://blog.statricks.com/the-problem-with-prediction-markets.html ====== jefreier The fact that a terrorism futures market was even proposed seems ridiculous to me. If even 2 seconds of thought went into that, you would see the gaping holes in that idea.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Writing Resilient Components in React - iraldir https://overreacted.io/writing-resilient-components/ ====== jessaustin 'draw_down you are hellbanned. To see this, just open this page in an "incognito" tab. In reviewing your comment history, I can't see anything to justify a hellban...	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: Domain dynamics? - thomasreggi Should the home page of a domain be a portfolio or should it be a blog? I have a really short and sweet domain (reggi.com) and I don't know what to do with it. Should I use subdomains like this? http://portfolio.site.com/ and http://blog.site.com/ . Should I use root folders like this? http://site.com/portfolio/ and http://site.com/blog/ . Examples would be nice!!<p>Is the best way to do this with multiple wordpress installs or is there a better way? ====== jacquesm Indeed, examples would be nice!! What's the domain ? Since you already have it you don't need to be shy about it. If you do an 'Ask HN' it helps if you provide enough information to actually answer the question ;) ~~~ thomasreggi It's my name reggi.com ~~~ jacquesm Cool, ok in that case I'd go for the blog, it immediately ties your blog content to your person and that's more or less a natural match. I can't easily figure out an association where 'reggi' can be made in to a stand-alone item either. On top of that a blog can be moved to a section of a product site later, so you don't actually lose much if you decide to change tack later on. To prepare for that you could do: <http://reggi.com/blog/> And redirect the homepage there for the time being. If you change your mind later on all you do is drop the redirect and provide a link to /blog/ . Hope that helps!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
I don’t use Semantic Web technologies anymore, though they still influence me - mdlincoln http://www.lespetitescases.net/why-I-dont-use-semantic-web-technologies-anymore-even-if-they-still-influence-me ====== zcw100 I could write a book on what's wrong with the semantic web. One of the worst isn't even technical, it's the community. There are some great people in the community but there are also a large number of extremely toxic people that drive people away. If the technology ever takes off it's going to be because some outside community cherry-picks the good parts and tells those people to f-off. That's already starting to happen and you'll hear no end of bitching from people in the semantic web community about how they're reinventing what they've already done years ago. Guess what? You're right. You're so toxic that it's worth redoing everything if it means they don't have to deal with the toxic attitudes. ~~~ markhollis I'm curious what those toxic attitudes are. Surely the "we already invented it and you're reinventing it" can't be the only case. I'm also curious if it's in an academia or in industry. ~~~ wrnr My take on the attitude in academia: Here we describe a set of algorithms that can solve a class of problems that previous algorithms can't. In the 60' someone published a solution to a problem we have improved upon with the novel innovation of called "hyperlinks". The technical, social and economical shortcomings of our solution are invalid because it is decentralised and therefor morally superior to the current offerings, used the world over, of industry practitioners who are only doing it for the money. More funding is needed for further research. ~~~ nl In general the decentralised fetishism isn't something that is big in academia (as in the academia that publishes paper). There's lots of issues in academia and even more with the semantic web, but fetishism of decentralisation isn't it. ------ JimmyRuska Semantic web tech solves a common problem. You have a database where you want to have some shared schema among many groups, and you want a way to infer facts based on first order logic. You want to be able to query multiple sources and reason about facts when taking into account multiple sources. Whether you use semantic web tech or not that's still a common problem that doesn't always have a good plug and play solution. There's still a lot of places using jsonld format for metadata and cataloging information. You can google cooking recipes and get ratings, cook time; search for movies and see how high rated the movie is and who made it with a synopsis of the plot, all of these are product metadata powered by rdfs or jsonld metadata, a relic of the semantic web. It would be incorrect to say semantic web is dead. Any AI that can effectively use wikidata as a fact table would be jeopardy grade. There's still new tools coming out like RDFox that apply first order logic at multicore speed across huge datasets for reasoning. There is work being done to make it horizontally scalable. I think people will just go on an endless loop of getting the same pain points and creating new tools using the trending tech of the day, but even in this day and age, sometimes something like prolog or picat is what you need. ~~~ zozbot234 > you want a way to infer facts based on first order logic Isn't that computationally infeasible? Semantic web standards are based on description logics, i.e. multi-modal logics chosen specifically for computational expediency. Also, I wouldn't describe JSON-LD as a "relic" of anything. It's a fairly recent standard in the grand scheme of things, and many interesting projects these days implicitly rely on it. ~~~ aggerdom So not an expert in this area, would love if someone corrects me. My understanding is generally FOL is infeasible. Propositional logic even can be computationaly difficult [1]. My understanding is that most of the semantic web stuff is done using a description logic of some flavor. These will be named based on the properties of the logic. The important thing is that they are generally decidable, and you can use something like MALET or some other solver to infer things from your database or ontology.(You give up some expressivity for decidability) Not sure how much stuff is going on with that these days. Played with a petrology ontology in protegé some back in college, but haven't followed the space. I remember OWL being important, but can't remember why at the moment. [1] For example if you try to figure out if a formula is satisfiable. You can for sure do this using truth tables. The catch is that you're looking at 2^n complexity where n is the number of propositions in your formula. ------ hos234 I am still a fan of Googles OpenRefine tool. It's reconciliation feature that helps disambiguate Named Entities etc based on wikidata is really powerful - [https://github.com/OpenRefine/OpenRefine/wiki/Reconciliation](https://github.com/OpenRefine/OpenRefine/wiki/Reconciliation) You can hook in your own reconciliation end point which we do at work to expand internal knowledge graphs. ~~~ nl Note that OpenRefine isn't really kept up to date. The basic capabilities work ok, but lots of the additional capabilities have atrophied away. ------ ansible I had a lot of interest in the semantic web when I first started learning about it. However, the efforts I've seen seem to be missing some critical factors for longer-term success. I think we've got a lot of work to do with regards to knowledge representation in general. One of the big things for me is that the context for any fact is critical for it to be true or not. You can have a fact like "Tim Cook is the CEO of Apple", represented in a graph like you would expect. However, that is only true _today_. Ten years ago it was Steve Jobs. Without explicit context encoded in the information graph, this web of data isn't as useful as it could be. Context is important for reasoning in all kinds of situations. "What if Steve Ballmer was CEO of Apple?", is a hypothetical context, where it may be useful to do reasoning about. The context of "Who is the most distinguished captain of the Enterprise?" could be about the real world US Navy, or a fictional Star Trek universe (of which there are multiple). ~~~ mdlincoln context-dependent, or "reified" assertions are a pain point for sure. I come from the perspective of cultural heritage data, where context is king. Which expert made this attribution for this painting? Who owned it _when_? According to which archival document? etc. Almost all the engineering problems cited in the original post are still basically there, but graphical models are still the least painful way of doing this, particularly when trying to share data between institutions. Example: [https://linked.art/model/assertion/](https://linked.art/model/assertion/) ~~~ zozbot234 The OP mentions property graphs as a way around this problem. They can be seen as natural extensions of "RDF quads" which in turn are based on common RDF triples (Subject / Property / Object) ------ sawaruna Shoutouts to the 11 other people on HN still working with rdf and similar in 2020. ------ at_a_remove At an old job, I knew some very idealistic folks who kept pushing semantic web business. "Let's do that everywhere!" As an exercise, I would have them open a browser, visit various sites, and then look at the source. "Go on, check to see if it validates," I would say with an anticipatory grin. Whether hand- crafted HTML or generated by any number of frameworks, many sites can barely manage to close their tags, asking for semantic references is a "just won't happen in practice" thing. I have also seen a great deal of consultant money, programmer time, sys-admin sweat, and the like focused on these toweringly-designed, completely-unused triple stores, layer upon layer of hot technologies (ever-moving, construction on the tower never ceased) fused together to create a resource-intense monstrosity that, at the end of the day, barely got used. But hey, let's look at that jazz semantic web example one more time. The most painful part is that I understand the urge to build a gleaming repository for information, where the cool URIs never change; SPARQLing pinnacles, ready to broadcast the Library of Alexandria, glimmer; and the serene manifold of abstract information lies RESTful ... but I have come to understand that the web of today is an endlessly bulldozed mudscape where Someone Very Important has to have _that_ URL top-level _yesterday_ (never mind that they will forget about it tomorrow), of shoddy materials and wildly varying workmanship, and where nobody is listening to your eager endpoints because the commercials are just too loud. I too once labored for information architecture, to have the correct thing in the obvious place, with accurate links and current knowledge, to provide visitors with the knowledge they desired ... but PR preempted all of it to push yet more nice photographs in yet another place: the Web as a technology for distributing images that would once live on glossy pamphlets. The vision is lovely, but we who have always lived in the castle have walked alone. ~~~ riffraff I would argue the problem is not the broken tags, but the business disadvantage to exposing semantic data. Remember when microformats were all the rage, and you could get hReview or hRecipe or XFN data everywhere? Then every host in turn realized that actually, it's _better_ if people can't scrape your site, and it's even better if they can't even see it and it's behind a login wall. ~~~ acdha “better” is too strong: in many cases, structured data is not a problem (and if it is, people will scrape it anyway), but there's simply no business case for spending time on it. Most of the semweb stack had a horrible developer experience — bad documentation, tools, validators, etc. — and rarely had tangible benefit from spending time slogging through it. The semantic data which has actually been implemented on a wide scale happened because someone could go to their boss and say “Spending time on x will mean better Google ranking” or “Facebook will use their new sharing display for our pages”, and it was orders of magnitude simpler to implement so the time and risk were far more palatable. ------ mark_l_watson These a fair criticisms of the semantic web. One thing the author misses (does not touch on at all) is domain specific RDF resources for biology, medicine, etc. schema.org and WikiData are great resources and for large companies, using these as a foundation for their own internal Knowledge Graphs can make sense. This expense is (maybe?) too large for small and medium size companies, they would not get enough benefit for the cost. I worked with Google’s Knowledge Graph as a contractor, and I am still a believer in the technology but I also respect other people’s well founded scepticism. ------ AndrewStephens I have some low-level hate for the Semantic Web. I run a small personal blog that I maintain using a relatively simple static site generator that I created that turns markdown files into clean(ish) html. A couple of months ago I got interested in adding semantic information to my posts so I modified the generator to add some of the common semantic tags. It was an annoying job, since the semantic information pollutes the structure of the html. Can anyone tell me what the semantic web does for me as a small-time publisher? Is it for search engines? Does it really matter that a book review (for instance, I have a few) is tagged properly? ~~~ lazyjones > _Can anyone tell me what the semantic web does for me as a small-time > publisher? Is it for search engines?_ Yes, in practice it is mostly for bigger fish in the pond to easily identify and steal your content as needed. For example, Google was using reviews from small competitors' sites in Google Shopping. ~~~ abathur I think this is one of the big issues. The semantic information does make it easier for end users to find what they're looking for, but it also made denial of traffic possible. In a lot of cases, the information was there to get eyeballs--so this is undesirable. I guess if you don't really care about the eyeballs it can be "useful" for the big fish to pay most of the cost of serving the fraction of your server response that the end user was looking for... ~~~ TeMPOraL So the root problem is actually that people care about the eyeballs. Nothing good comes from such incentive. ~~~ abathur Maybe. Not sure what I think about that framing. FWIW, I was picking "eyeballs" as something wider than just ad revenue. I think ads are the big share, but I'm sure there are people/orgs who want eyeballs for other reasons like ego/status, promote their company/brand/service/products, etc. In some sense I think your framing is accurate, but I don't know about whether we'd be better off (have an informational ecosystem that is more net- positive?) without status chasers. Some share of them are inevitably gaming the system and diluting the ecosystem; others probably add net value in pursuit of eyeballs? ~~~ TeMPOraL In context of semantic web, pursuit of the eyeballs is a problem because it makes the people owning/creating the data also want to be delivering that data directly to the users, and be the only ones allowing to do so. Semantic web works for the opposite goal - to allow the data to be automatically transmitted, processed and understood by software, and only perhaps eventually delivered in some form to end user. As for building more net-positive information ecosystems, going for the eyeballs instead of actually caring to deliver good information isn't necessarily bad _per se_ , just suboptimal. It's better for an eyeball-chasing site to publish some information, if otherwise that information wouldn't be published at all. But it's the eyeballs being your primary revenue source that will make you work hard to make the data as useless as possible outside your own publication - which leads to a very unhealthy information ecosystem. ------ contravariant With the recent widespread interest in Category theory I still think it's a damn shame that RDF wasn't designed to treat relationships as stand-alone entities. Perhaps property graphs work better in that regard, although it's a bit weird how properties aren't themselves relationships, but perhaps that's a necessary concession to keep things efficient. ------ tannhaeuser I wouldn't call semweb dead; it just has found its niche(s) and is even stabilizing and gaining in those areas. I actually landed a gig for graph DBs, SPARQL, etc. in lab informatics for bio/chem. Earlier this year I attended a keynote held by Wikimedia Deutschland's Franziska Heine pushing for large publicly available RDF data sets, etc. ------ abathur I'm really interested in semantic authoring (not really structuring data with semantics--but marking semantics within running text), though I guess I'm disinterested in the semantic web. I agree with a lot of the problems noted in other posts, and would add two other problems from the authoring side: 1\. Identifying and employing sound semantics requires a level of thought and clarity that I don't think most people are habituated to working at. It raises the bar somewhat on who can be contributing (either they have to understand and take care with the semantics, or you need a separate person to handle them?) 2\. I may be missing some good tools, but I haven't been able to find a good low-friction semantic authoring experience. Even if you are mentally prepared to write with explicit semantics, it still adds a lot of friction to the writing process (or requires subsequent semantic-edit passes). ------ buboard modern NLP makes the semantic web completely obsolete. if anything, you need less markup because it's confusing and more often than not, just wrong. ~~~ drongoking This is too extreme. If, like Google, you have a flock of Ph.D.s who you can put onto an NLP problem to extract semantics from text, then semantic markup becomes less valuable. Not all of us are in that situation. And I don't think parsing text is the only application of the semantic web. Having hugs databases full of knowledge is interesting in itself. As for semantic markup being confusing and usually wrong, I don't know where you get that. ~~~ buboard Yeah, but i think there is a difference between standardized markup data formats describing e.g. proteins, and generic text with annotations. The latter are redundant ------ liminal I really want to like semantic web technologies, but every time I try to get into them I'm stymied: * A zillion standards that all reference each other * Two zillion incomplete and incompatible implementations of those specifications * No sense of direction within it all (what's the easy path?) * Multiple rebrandings of the same ideas (Semantic Web, Linked Data, Solid...) ~~~ zozbot234 "Solid" is just SOcial LInked Data anyway. I like LD as it seems clearer in intent than the "semantic web" label. ~~~ Vinnl Yeah, in that sense Solid is a subset of Linked Data: linking personal data. ------ austincheney When writing data structures that are not for describing or defining services I still can't help but think in triples. I also can't help but think of each data facet as though it were something described with meta-data would provide sufficient context that it would make sense if it were read out loud to a stranger. ------ tylerjwilk00 Or responsive web design techniques apparently. ~~~ StuffedParrot It reads fine for me on mobile.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: A simple Prolog Interpreter written in a few lines of Python 3 - photon_lines https://github.com/photonlines/Python-Prolog-Interpreter ====== westurner Cool tests! PyDatalog does Datalog (which is ~Prolog, but similar and very capable) logic programming with SQLAlchemy (and database indexes) and apparently NoSQL support. [https://sites.google.com/site/pydatalog/](https://sites.google.com/site/pydatalog/) Datalog: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datalog](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datalog) ... TBH, IDK about logic programming and bad facts. Resilience to incorrect and incredible information is - I suppose - a desirable feature of any learning system that reevaluates its learnings as additional and contradictory information makes its way into the datastores. ~~~ photon_lines Thanks for the feedback :) I'll definitely check out Datalog - I didn't realize they had logic programming integrated with SQLAlchemy, so it definitely sounds interesting! ------ tluyben2 Nicely done! I have been trying to implement actual usable (as in, they can be used as a scripting language for instance to build anything) languages in as few lines as I can (without making them unreadable). Ofcourse that's more as a challenge than anything serious, but it is fun. A minimal implementation I define as being something that can parse the language, interpret it and has FFI to add whatever else you may need. So far I got down to around 50 lines in C# [0]. 0\. [https://gist.github.com/tluyben/16ee2645c4c8aed813005d51488d...](https://gist.github.com/tluyben/16ee2645c4c8aed813005d51488d5c6a) ~~~ photon_lines Thank you :) If you want real power for implementing things in as few lines as possible, F# is definitely worth taking a look at as well! ------ etaioinshrdlu This is about 10x larger than i would call a few lines :) ~~~ MrOxiMoron still way less lines then I would have thought, especially because it has no dependencies. ~~~ bhargav But the title does not mention that. It says few lines. Maybe 100, 200, 300 lines are few. Its misleading and otherwise discredits a good project. This project even has a GUI/IDE. I believe that is a stronger selling point rather than "few" lines of code or "little work", "easy way" or any of these other colloquial 'flexing' terms. ~~~ ghusbands It's worse than that - the title says "a few", which is basically always less than ten. If it said "quite a few", it would certainly be accurate. If it actually said "few", it wouldn't be as bad, though still misleading. ------ sanxiyn FYI, there is a mature implementation of this idea called YieldProlog. ~~~ photon_lines Thanks :) Yup, there are also constraint programming libraries in Python which can be used for providing similar functionality, and they're definitely worth checking out! ------ garganzol Very impressive. Does anybody use Prolog scripting engine as part of their applications? For example, to write a solution lookup function for some specific problem that would be a nightmare to solve otherwise. As a side note, I found that Lisp (the Scheme flavor) is essential in many applications. First of all, as a small and capable templating engine. Secondly, as a sophisticated NLP (natural language processing) engine. ~~~ tannhaeuser I've used ad-hoc test case generation using Prolog (MC/DC, all-permutations and other combinatorials) which is a quite natural application for Prolog. Around 2005 I've also used Prolog to generate Java code for analysing/monitoring business processes based on formal business process descriptions on a research project for a Telco who went all-in on SOA. As part of that, I also started to develop decision procedures for static type checking of XML-manipulating programs, along with validators for common markup meta-languages (XSD and subsets). Many years ago I've also developed custom file parsing/business rules checking using Prolog. Plus, a couple ad-hoc parsers and DSLs. And, having developed 2 1/2 prolog engines so far, I'm planning to include ISO Prolog in my upcoming document storage/search system based on SGML, where Prolog is an excellent match since it's both an ISO standard (like SGML), and even has a binding to a document query language based on ISO/IEC 13250 (eg. the proposed "tolog" language, though alternatives were proposed and an ISO/IEC 13250 query language was never completed as a standard). ------ timClicks How long did it take you to grok unification? It has always seemed quite mindbending to me and I don't think that I have ever properly understood what's happening ~~~ photon_lines I didn't grok anything at first actually. I had familiarity with Prolog and wanted a refresher, so I decided to take a look at implementation attempts done in other languages. I found one which did it in a few lines of Javascript, and you can find the full read and implementation here: [https://curiosity-driven.org/prolog-interpreter](https://curiosity- driven.org/prolog-interpreter) . My apologies if I didn't make it clear that this is a port of the original write up - I did include this in the first paragraph of the README though, so maybe I should have been clearer? Originally, I was trying to learn Kotlin along with wanting a refresher in Prolog, so I attempted to do the port using Kotlin and gave up half way though. I didn't have the patience to try to grok too many things at once, so I decided to go with Python due to it's simplicity, popularity, as well as the fact that I'm a lot more fluent in it than I am in Kotlin. Anyways - sorry if I'm going off track. To answer your question, I grokked the implementation details through porting / refactoring the original code. The concepts / unification I was already familiar with from taking a university course which involved Prolog and from using it in a large AI project. From what I remember, it took me quite a long time to grasp the language and its power!! ------ truth_seeker Nice. For complex operations with reasonably sized data pypy would be a good choice. ------ inetsee Racket also has a Prolog-Style Logic Programming DSL named Racklog. ------ peter_d_sherman Absolutely Brilliant!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: LaTeX based Résumé / CV creator - cvsintellect https://www.cvsintellect.com/guest/page/home ====== cvsintellect Blog post: [https://medium.com/news-cvsintellect/cvsintellect-v2-0-is- he...](https://medium.com/news-cvsintellect/cvsintellect-v2-0-is- here-4cc5ba1f9ee9) Launch Post: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288875](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6288875) ------ cvsintellect As part of launch on HN we are giving 50% off on "pro" accounts. Feel free to contact us at admin@cvsintellect.com. ------ jawbone Looks amazing. Are you targeting the College Crowd? ~~~ cvsintellect Thanks! :) There are different segments we are targeting. College, 2-3 year experience, 5+ year experience & 10+ year experience. You will find template to match each taste. ------ rashmi2312 Great work!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
A no-coding-required Google Reader alternative (prototype of the possibilities) - webwanderings https://sites.google.com/site/usmsmnews/ ====== webwanderings I cropped this together using nothing but Google Sheets and Google Sites. It is not a bad alternative if you are of busy type and only wish to take a quick glance or view of news as it is happening on the day/time when you are viewing. It's a sort of River of News. It is not a suitable alternative if you wish to save your feeds or even do search (something Google Reader provided as its best feature).	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Apple ios 6 passcode hack - atiman http://gadgets.ndtv.com/mobiles/news/apple-acknowledges-ios-61-passcode-hack-says-fix-coming-331170?pfrom=gadgetstop ====== sudarshan1234 it was known	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Rob Pike: Reflections on Window Systems (2008) [video] - pmarin http://epresence.kmdi.utoronto.ca/1/watch/630.aspx ====== justin66 "To be honest, looking back on it, Unix today is worse than the systems that Unix itself was created to get away from." ~~~ Dewie Can anyone here corroborate that there are better alternatives to operating systems than the Unix-likes? Maybe anyone that agrees with Rob Pike's view on this in particular? All I seem to hear is that Unix-y OSs are great, but I don't hear much about any potential alternatives. So I'm curious about them. ~~~ wolfgke What Rob Pike is refering to is of course Plan 9 and its derivatives (say Inferno). Whether you want to consider them Unix-likes or not is your choice (many HNers will say it's more Unix than Unix). If you look for desktop alternatives to Unix, OSes to look at are BeOS (an open source clone is developed under the name HaikuOS) and the Windows NT kernel (don't hurt me: the Windows NT kernel is IMHO far more elegant than, say Linux or Mach. What is crappy is especially the WinAPI; please look deep below the surface: Here Windows gets nice). The reason why you won't find many desktop/server alternatives to Unix can be read here: [http://herpolhode.com/rob/utah2000.pdf](http://herpolhode.com/rob/utah2000.pdf) Thus lots of OS reserach is either focused on embedded stuff or virtualization instead of desktop or server. Accepting this, especially have a look at the L4 kernel family (a family of very small and fast microkernels). If you like highly secure designs, you'll probably like seL4, the first formally verfied kernel. Also QNX is worth a look (QNX is Unix, accepted; nevertheless a very elegant kernel design). ~~~ vezzy-fnord I'm not sure what huge technical advantage the BeOS model offers over contemporary Unix-likes in this day and age, other than its file system support for extended attributes, which are a controversial topic and nonetheless still used by things like XFS. I'd also like some clarification on what you think is good about the NT kernel. It seems far too entangled with other cruft that forms the Windows stack. That said, I'd also like to mention the Hurd. At this point, it's really a fragile ad-hoc reimplementation of 9P file servers on top of a modded Mach, but such a model was still quite daring for general purpose computing back during the Hurd's original window of opportunity (1989-1995, or so). Probably would have advanced the state of modern OS at least a bit, if it weren't for managerial incompetence. It's still a Unix at heart, though, despite many important extensions. ~~~ wolfgke > I'm not sure what huge technical advantage the BeOS model offers over > contemporary Unix-likes in this day and age, other than its file system > support for extended attributes, which are a controversial topic and > nonetheless still used by things like XFS. BeOS was very optimized for multimedia, which is an interesting property I think. Also the GUI library used multithreading from beginning. This surely isn't interesting for servers, but for desktop computers. > I'd also like some clarification on what you think is good about the NT > kernel. It seems far too entangled with other cruft that forms the Windows > stack. For a lack of time for explanations I will only give one example: How to do fast asynchronous I/O (You know: Asynchronous IO: The hot thing that node.js is about ;-) ;-) ). Under FreeBSD/Linux asynchronous I/O is just synchronous non-blocking I/O (FreeBSD needed to implement kqueue to even allow this in a fast way; the Linux developers implemented epoll (which is incompatible to kqueue :-( )). Under Windows NT it is an easy problem that has been solved (from beginning?). See > [http://sssslide.com/speakerdeck.com/trent/pyparallel-how- > we-...](http://sssslide.com/speakerdeck.com/trent/pyparallel-how-we-removed- > the-gil-and-exploited-all-cores) for details. ~~~ vetinari > BeOS was very optimized for multimedia, which is an interesting property I > think. Also the GUI library used multithreading from beginning. This surely > isn't interesting for servers, but for desktop computers. BeOS _claimed_ to be optimized for multimedia, but that does not mean that it was. I remember, that I was able to have fluid DivX (3.11) playback on PII-300 running Windows and Linux, but not on BeOS. What BeOS _did_ have is DirectShow-like media architecture, using nodes and pipelines. But at the time, it was not an effective architecture. (And yes, the BeOS engineers never managed to support VESA GTF in their display drivers, meaning that the picture on my monitor was always shifted compared to other OSes). ~~~ pjmlp DivX? Back when BeOS was still on sale, Windows latest versions were Windows 2000 and Windows 98, with XP around the corner. I never remember using DivX on those systems. ~~~ vetinari Yes, DivX. The original hacked codec appeared in 1998. It got boost in popularity when the movie The Matrix came out (1999). This happened in Windows 98 timeframe. Windows 2000 was in early beta, not yet on sale and XP was unheard of yet. The current linux were Redhat 5, 5.1 and 6; BeOS 4 and 4.5. ~~~ pjmlp Actually I think I was still only using Real back then, but cannot really remember. I would need to go dig into my Zip floppies collection, a few thousand kilometers away from my current location. ------ f2f i loved plan9. i was into it before the 3rd edition was released and i built a small career out of it. it was and still is the most enjoyable system to work with. i'm happy it's getting its dues in retrospect and is now considered a cool thing, but i can't help but remember how just after the first open release everybody and their uncle kept complaining about trivia: "how can I become root?" "it doesn't do x11?" "its license isn't gnu-open?" rob is probably right: licensing killed plan9, but so did everybody who couldn't see the forest for the trees. the linux juggernaut was too popular back then. ~~~ mercurial I'm not sure licensing was the only reason. A pitch that goes "we work like X, but better" is unconvincing. Especially when it ends with "in an incompatible way." ~~~ gcb4 their motto if i recall was never that. they had two demos about being Unixier... one involved tar-ing a process in one machine, sending to another one (or mounting that machine cpu over the network, don't remember) untar-ing and the process continued from when it was first packaged with ui state and all. ~~~ smorrow That was Plan B. I've never used it, or read the papers or the manual, but everything was centralised on a single box. The reason the tar thing works at all is because all it contains is pointers to your centralised state. In case anyone is trying to wrap their heads around the above comment. The closest Labs equivalent would be Protium, which is for writing programs like he mentioned with the sam/samterm split but with reattachability. Like all the most interesting application-level softwares for Plan 9, that actually do something for you, it wasn't released. ------ bishop_mandible The Blit video he mentions: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emh22gT5e9k](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emh22gT5e9k) A similarly interesting talk by him on CSP-inspired languages (Occam, Erlang, Squeak, Newsqueak, Limbo, Alef, Go): [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DtUzH3zoFo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DtUzH3zoFo) Slides (not shown in the video): [http://go- lang.cat-v.org/talks/slides/emerging-languages-cam...](http://go- lang.cat-v.org/talks/slides/emerging-languages-camp-2010.pdf) Interesting as well: From parellel to concurrent (on Sawzall and Go): [http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Lang-NEXT/Lang- NEXT-2014/Fro...](http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/Lang-NEXT/Lang- NEXT-2014/From-Parallel-to-Concurrent) ------ mwcampbell In the middle of the talk, Pike said that the idea of a workstation in every office was one of the stupidest things he'd ever heard, but then decided not to digress and explain why. Has he discussed that at length in any other paper or recorded talk? ~~~ smorrow They're more expensive first of all. and each one has to be administrated individually, especially if it has a local disk. If the kernel is kept locally, then you have to go around each machine every time you compile a new one. Same thing for applications. Same thing for let's say /usr/dict or something stupid. Plus it's another mechanical component which can fail. If the user directories are local instead of on a central box, then you 1) need to be at a specific one to get your stuff, and you 2) can't just cd into someone else's /usr/*/src and collaborate. The Labs word for timesharing was "communal" computing, if that helps. For a school or company, in which the computers are provided by the organisation itself, the Plan 9 way is very obviously better than insular systems. There's more, but it's another whole tangent. Since you asked, the main Plan 9 paper ("Plan 9 from Bell Labs", 1995) does say "the early focus on having private machines made it difficult for networks of machines to serve as seamlessly as the old monolithic timesharing systems. Timesharing centralized the management and amortization of costs and resources; personal computing fractured, democratized, and ultimately amplified administrative problems." but even more to the point would be: with a terminal, you just plug it in and turn it on. ~~~ cwyers "For a school or company, in which the computers are provided by the organisation itself, the Plan 9 way is very obviously better than insular systems." Only if you can guarantee 100% (or close to) access to high-speed network connections at all time. The value of a computer with meaningful local storage and execution is that it continues to work when the network is gone or isn't performing well. And it takes a lot less bandwidth to send data to a user's computer and let local applications worry about dealing with the data than it is to send a full screen to the user, if you're talking about GUI. You can also smooth out latency issues a lot easier. So I don't think it's obviously better in those cases. But it's very obviously worse OUTSIDE of those institutions. Here's Pike's description of his dream setup[1]: "I want no local storage anywhere near me other than maybe caches. No disks, no state, my world entirely in the network. Storage needs to be backed up and maintained, which should be someone else's problem, one I'm happy to pay to have them solve. Also, storage on one machine means that machine is different from another machine. At Bell Labs we worked in the Unix Room, which had a bunch of machines we called 'terminals'. Latterly these were mostly PCs, but the key point is that we didn't use their disks for anything except caching. The terminal was a computer but we didn't compute on it; computing was done in the computer center. The terminal, even though it had a nice color screen and mouse and network and all that, was just a portal to the real computers in the back. When I left work and went home, I could pick up where I left off, pretty much. My dream setup would drop the "pretty much" qualification from that." That's fine, so long as all you want to do on your home computer is do more work. But that's such an incredibly narrow vision of computing. The truly personal computer enabled a lot of things that weren't possible under the old dumb terminal model Pike pines for, and has made computers accessible to many more people. We'll continue to get some of the benefits of this as the "cloud" continues to be integrated into things, but I don't think we're going back to the "communal" computing model, and if we do, it's going to be because someone looks at the benefits of the personal computer model and finds a way to provide them in the communal model, rather than sitting there and pining about how it was in the old days before the peasants ruined everything. 1) [http://rob.pike.usesthis.com/](http://rob.pike.usesthis.com/), thanks to tjgq for providing the link below ~~~ smorrow > dumb terminal > send a full screen to the user I think you're confusing Plan 9 with thin clients. Even the Blit in the video was a smart terminal ("you can run programs on it"). The way Plan 9 works is > send data to a user's computer and let local applications worry about > dealing with the data. It was apparently different in the 90's ("terminal was a computer but we didn't compute on it") but nowadays in Plan 9 you do nearly everything on the terminal. For different reasons: the WM, the browsers, the editors run on the terminal for responsiveness; image and music decoders run on the terminal because they need a higher bandwidth to the screen/speakers than to the fs (jpegs, mp3s, etc are compressed); plumber and factotum run on your terminal so that you get exactly one instance of them per session, and that they die as soon as you end your session. The central boxes are only really used for FS/backup, auth, cron, maybe mail servers or whatever. So nearly everything runs on the terminal, but it's a Plan 9 terminal so it's still just a matter of plug it in, turn it on, set up netbooting (once). > it's very obviously worse OUTSIDE of those institutions. What I was going to say before I decided that it was too much of a tangent was: and Plan 9 NOT being a proper distributed OS could be a plus: it's possible to use recover(4) or lapfs(4) and bring the laptop outside the network. No-one actually does that, and lapfs isn't even a real Plan 9 program in C. but it's still made feasible by the fact that your editor and so on is not on the far side of a connection and isn't going to go anywhere. unlike on e.g. an Amoeba terminal, which really is just a window manager, no editors locally, no browsers or viewers. I dunno about using "backup" to describe the Plan 9 file server, but that's even more unrelated to my original comment. ------ bishop_mandible Who's the guy at the end saying "let's forget where I work and where you work", asking the "hard" question? ~~~ theoh Bill Buxton. He works for Microsoft now but used to work for Alias\|Wavefront (also in Toronto as I understand it.) ~~~ vanderZwan I don't know how famous he is in programming circles, but in HCI and Interaction Design he is a well-known and respected for his fantastic research on two-handed interfaces. ~~~ theoh I encountered him in a talk at Siggraph 2001. He is a charismatic guy and used a lot of creative examples of interface design. In particular he showed [http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ammassalik_wooden_maps](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ammassalik_wooden_maps) It is sad that Maya is now an Autodesk product: Autodesk is such a square, white bread, corporate outfit. The interface to their flagship AutoCAD is ludicrously clunky and antique, while something like Revit (another acquisition) is clever but really dumbed-down and limited in scope. Oh well. ------ qewrffewqwfqew For anyone else wanting to watch this on Android, or just have an mp4 and slides in pdf: the archive is linked near the bottom of [http://genius.cat-v.org/rob-pike/](http://genius.cat-v.org/rob-pike/) ~~~ qewrffewqwfqew and more talks from DGPis40 here (Pike's link to the event is broken): [http://hciweb.cs.toronto.edu/DGPis40/webcasts.html](http://hciweb.cs.toronto.edu/DGPis40/webcasts.html) ------ qnaal but I guess we're stuck with it until we come up with a better way to install emacs ------ zvrba An interesting bit of trivia about [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_9_from_Outer_Space](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_9_from_Outer_Space): The film's title was the inspiration for the name of Bell Labs' successor to the Unix operating system. ------ robert_tweed Is there a mirror of this somewhere that doesn't require Flash?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Truly Decentralized BitTorrent Downloading Has Finally Arrived - eugenejen http://torrentfreak.com/truly-decentralized-bittorrent-downloading-has-finally-arrived-101208/ ====== slang701 This is really great and you had better check it out below [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B<br/>); [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B<br/>); [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B) [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B<br/>); [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B) [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B<br/>); [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B<br/>); [http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26We...](http://www.xilisoft.com/ipad- magic.html?utm_source=John%26Wei&utm_medium=Text%2Blink%2B&utm_campaign=iPad%2BMagic%2B<br/>); ------ wahnfrieden How does this actually discover peers without any centralization? ~~~ jamii You can bootstrap as soon as you have one peer. The software is distributed with the addresses of 4 existing servers which are run by the Tribler guys to make this easier but even if they go down people can still send invitations to their friends. ------ egorst 87Kb (more than 1800 lines) of license agreement. I prefer just to click Cancel during installation. ------ krakensden It looks like it's only aspirationally multiplatform, not Win/Mac/Lin like the article says. ~~~ jamii I've used it on both Windows 7 and Ubuntu. The Ubuntu version is a little fiddly to get working because Ubuntu ships with a crippled ECC library. ------ dknight How is it different from DC++ application wise? ~~~ jamii From the other thread: The core principle is similar. DC has centralized hubs which handle searches and upload files directly to users. Tribler has a distributed search engine which runs on every peer and uses bittorrent to share files. Effectively every single Tribler node behaves like a DC hub. As a result it is much harder to take down. ------ joe_the_user Sounds like an interesting application. Anyone have any idea what protocol this uses? The only thing I could figure was that it's written in python. I'm sure there are plenty of efforts similar to this. Any others deserving of mention? ~~~ jamii Most of the underlying protocols are described here, though it is a bit out of date: [http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.78....](http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.78.4174&rep=rep1&type=pdf) Essentially the core protocol is a gossip overlay. This generates random connections between peers in the overlay. Over these connections peers transmit information like recently seen torrents, recommendation lists, download/upload totals for other peers etc. Each peer proactively distributes known torrent files so that every peer builds up a database of torrents. Then search just works by broadcasting queries to nearby peers. The algorithms used have dozens of applications outside of filesharing. I wrote my MSc dissertation on a similar subject: <http://scattered-thoughts.net/one/1283/644001/538941> The code for Tribler is naturally very specialised to their purpose. At some point I want to sit down and reimplement them in such a way that they can easily be reused and recombined for other applications. I have some vague ideas about building a prototype trust-based distributed database for dot-p2p.org based on similar principles. ~~~ joe_the_user That's pretty amazing, actually. How hard would it be put this algorithm into a general-purpose library accessible by multiple applications? ~~~ jamii I _think_ that if you just want to use the same setup as Tribler you can just directly use their code. What I'm interested in is separating and generalizing the various protocols involved rather than having them all knotted together. ~~~ joe_the_user Me too, It seems like a logical part of that would be to have each protocol documented and encapsulated in a library. Also, I'm working on a multi-protocol client which would aggregate a number of sources, so it would be especially nice to the have a library to call so that I could add one more source. In any case, your work looks fabulous and I will spend some time digesting your links.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: Lack of self-discipline driving me hopeless. Tips? - Damnit Dear Hacker News,<p>I am a longtime member here. I would never think I would be one of those writing this but here it goes.<p>I have a terrible problem with focus and discipline. I simply cannot manage to achieve both for any prolonged period of times. For the last five years, I have tried very conciously to become disciplined and no matter what, after a few days or weeks at best, the pattern breaks and I am back to my unproductive, terrible self.<p>I also cannot really enjoy or focus on anything or anyone for too long. This is the most scary part. I cannot be in a relationship for more than a week or two before becoming very ambivalent after the initial high. I cannot continue working on projects--all of them I would say I enjoy--for more than a few weeks at most.<p>I am 23 and finishing up school(took some time off to do failed startup). Much of this could be accepted during my teen years and 20s. People close to me respect me for my passion, for my entprenreurial spirit and all of those things. They barely know this miserable side of me and those that do don't know much else to help me.<p>I always thought I knew what I loved(startups). At this point though, anything I love seems to have become very irrelavant. I make new friends and before I know it, I am avoiding them. I want to socialize but before I know it, I'm avoiding it. I want to work on my startup but before I know it, my mind is just in a confused weird daze. I have no idea what is wrong with me. I have so many things to be greatful about. I am 100% confident that I am holding myself back. And yet, I don't know how to get out of this shitless pattern of life.<p>After a million self-help programs and motivation books that haven't been of much help, I thought I'd post this on HN.<p>More recently I have started reading up more on suicides. I am too weak to ever attempt it. But I also never thought I'd ever be so tired and hopeless in life to be googling something so sick.<p>Thanks!<p>-A dude ====== fdschoeneman Dude, you don't have ADD. You aren't bipolar. You're a normal young man -- or at least within the range of normal for young men. Forget therapists. Forget drugs. Forget everything you've been told, and join the Army. Seriously. Trust me. Yes, yes, I know that you don't know me. But you're describing me in this post, and a lot of guys I knew back when I was in: Smart guys, but bored. Can't concentrate in class. Can't suffer fools. Takes a lot to motivate them. They need to be passionate about something before they will even try it, and then they try it, and things don't happen as quickly as they thought they would, and they get discouraged, and their minds wander. And then they try something else, half-way. Fuck that shit. Become a marine. Try to become a paratrooper. Do something physical that attracts a better class of recruit, and don't stop till you get there. It will teach you to finish things that you start. And along the way you'll probably be doing more good for the world than any ten Peace Corps volunteers. Yes yes, I saw that Collateral murder video. Wikleaks is a bunch of liars. When you finish, you'll have learned an important lesson. Which is that more than anything else, winning requires that you show up. After that, if you still feel useless, you will have plenty of time to kill yourself. ~~~ waterlesscloud I can say that without question the Marines changed my brother for the better. Much, much better. From lost and aimless to driven and motivated. ~~~ drguildo I assume he still has all of his limbs? ------ petercooper I'm only bringing this up because no-one did but read up on bipolar disorder and see if any of it clicks with you. There's a _wide_ spectrum of bipolar disorders (it's not all just super mania and super depression) and what you're saying sounds like it _could_ be connected to this (the flip flopping, the doing OK one moment, not so good the next). Of particular interest should be bipolar II: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipolar_II_disorder> Bipolar is, IMHO, a significantly bigger deal than having ADD or a mere lack of willpower. It is a commonly misunderstood condition and one that a lot of normal advice regarding depression or personality disorders will _not_ help. Unfortunately it can also be a very difficult condition to "admit" you have, especially to yourself, so it's worth at least reading up about it ASAP "just in case." Disclaimer: I have a bipolar disorder that's self managed (no medicines) and over the last few years I've come up with a lot of techniques and tricks to take advantage of it and reduce its negative effects. Before that, though, things were.. not so good :-) ~~~ Damnit Yeah I've read up on it and it's one of my default "jokes" to new friends("dude! you've no idea how bipolar I am")--only they don't know that I am not really joking. Still I have a lot of stigma about officially getting tested for this stuff. ~~~ BipolarBob Funny this should come up because I'm also a 23 year old university student (undergrad) and I started medication for bipolar II a week and a half ago. I've had similar problems with focus and discipline. I've tried alleviating them by exercising (working out with the ROTC at 6 AM), eating well, making important commitments, doing Buddhist mindfulness exercises, listening to Eckhart Tolle, writing myself a contract that I signed in front of my friends/classmates, trying to create a startup with some good friends, and many other things that typically ended in (painful) failure. I had successes here and there, but the mental effort required to hang on until the end was often huge. I have the tendency to make commitments and create relationships when I'm in one of my highs, and then proceed to fumble them when I inevitably reach a low. I dropped 2 semesters of college before I looked for professional help. I started by seeing a therapist, not an MD. I found the sessions beneficial and they helped me get through a rough patch, but after two months things weren't really coming together. At my therapist's discretion, I saw a psychiatrist. I told him my situation in it's entirety. I didn't let myself think about trying to save face. I told him the grittiest details if I thought they were important for him to understand what I was going through. I definitely had strong misgivings before making that step. For me the worst was "What if everyone goes through the same difficulties, and I'm just weak and cowardly?" However, my track record clearly showed I needed help. It was mostly a matter of allowing myself to be humble enough to accept it. After only a week and a half of taking Seroquel, it's hard for me to say how it's going and where it's going to take me. Early though it is, I've noticed a change for the better. I like to think it's a temporary solution, like the way that you would put a tarp over a hole in your roof before you actually get it repaired. Psychiatrists and therapists see people for things like this all the time. It's familiar territory for them. I could have saved myself a lot of heartache if I'd gotten professional help sooner. Best of luck \- Another dude ~~~ mr_twj Same here but with Olanzapine + Valproic Acid + lithium + Paroxetine - 2 years in age + a suicide attempt. ------ charliepark You should absolutely find a psychiatrist or counselor. They deal with people going through this ALL. THE. TIME. I absolutely believe that people run to medications too quickly these days, but drugs like Adderall et al. help people like you to find focus, break self- destructive patterns, and get back to a baseline of normal. ~~~ Damnit I have considered addrell many many times only to hear from close friends that it will turn me into a bot. That's kept me away from it but perhaps I should reconsider...again. ~~~ j_baker I can personally attest to the exact opposite. Aderall literally turned my life around. That doesn't mean that it will do the same for you of course. Just remember that everyone's different and that what works for you may not work for your friends. ~~~ Damnit Could you elaborate how adderall effected you? Totally understand if you can't but just in case! Thanks a lot. ~~~ MichaelGG Amphetamines (Adderall, Vyvanse, Dexedrine) and methylphenidate (Ritalin/Concerta) are powerful stimulants. They'll give you plenty of energy and ability to focus. This explains why they are rather commonly used by students and other folks. The life changing aspect, for me, is that they can sometimes break me out a depressive episode. I'll have days sitting around, desperately wanting to work on something, but ending up watching TV, eating, and sleeping. This of course makes me feel bad about having not done anything, which just worsens the situation. Stimulants can change that. Apart from the energy and focus, they often propel me into doing something. I've taken them, feeling pessimistic and resigning myself to another day of sitting around. But they'll kick in, I'll pull up my laptop, and code 8+ hours straight. That bit of progress alone is enough sometimes to break out of the depressive streak and get on with things. But please, before starting any medications, make sure you have a psychologist to monitor you. Do not underestimate suicidal thoughts. The closest I've been to suicide is when I tried out an anti-depressive. Medication that can pull you out of depression can also provide you the energy and willpower to follow through with suicide. ------ patrickgzill My suggestions: 1\. You will grow out of some of this, even without therapy and/or medication. At least I did. 2\. Exercise and eat right, try cutting down especially on caffeine, sugar and anything else that seems to have a weird effect on you. 3\. Take up something you are bad at or that you have never done. Such as learning a different language, guitar, etc. Reason is that you are skimming the cream off the top of your abilities - I think if you choose something you can fail at, then you realized you failed but are still alive, it will give you a better perspective. This world is very tough on non-conformists. Hang in there. ~~~ noname123 While OR's reply is really helpful (and funny enough, because I was in the same situation as you were in when I was graduating school and I followed pretty much OR's suggestion, weight lifting, taking up guitar and a rec basketball league and generally not stress out and enjoy life and it worked really well ... for awhile until my old depression/anxiety came back), I feel that they are topical medication to much more deep-rooted issues. Although most don't admit it, graduation from college is a scary experience; some sees as a transition into the real world, prepared or not, an evaluation for what they have achieved during college, if they have made up for their disappointments in high school or a continuation of the disappointments, or as a crystal ball to determine the future (e.g., a 4.0 GPA in CS/Econ leads to job at Goldman Sachs or Bio to Harvard Medical School, to a respectable life); Or "I didn't make any lasting friends or relationships, I'll be a loser for the rest of my life," or that I have found my niche, geek bent for SF conventions/hipsters bent for bohemian gentrifying neighborhood/prep bent for loft in a upscale yuppie neighborhood. The reason most people can't commit to relationships or friendships are rooted in their own insecurity; either a feeling of inferiority/superiority when in company of others, e.g., "Lisa thinks that I'm cool, but she doesn't know who I truly am, just my pomped-up version of myself in the two times I did her" or "Fuck Dan, what does he know? He went to an arts school". It could also be that you aren't sure about what you want yourself, "Should I focus more on startup's or my social life? Should I climb the corporate ladder or pursue my own personal vision?"; Unclear personal visions leads confusion to whom you want to associate with and the values that you want to see in your friends/significant others. Add it on top of that is your expectations that come with your startup dream. What do you wish it to validate? Because most human endeavors, when you boil down to it, isn't about money. And also, it probably isn't one of those vague feel-good mantras, "make a difference in the world, " "to innovate," or "to push envelope." The reason, most of the time is pretty personal, hence the term, "the revenge of the nerds." Why do you want to pursue your startup? So that you could be the next Sergey Brin and get invited to your high school/college graduation as a and say "fuck you" to everyone in the audience, to get the girl (or the boy), to prove your parents or former best friend or ex-girlfriend, or to correct something in the unspoken rules in the current mainstream social conventions that has hampered/traumatized you. Answer these questions and don't resist it if they lead to paths totally different than pursuing startup's. Although most people don't like to admit it, pursuing startup's is like pursuing medicine. In the beginning, the prospect is exciting and promises the riches and respectability; it is only later that most people realize that becoming a doctor haven't solved all of their personal problems and just brought on a whole slew of more professional problems. So, don't go to medical school unless you can't imagine doing anything but medicine. ~~~ Damnit I considered that. When I returned to school, I promised to stay away from start-ups for at least a year. My life sucked even more perhaps. Hopping onto my current startup brought some joy--though not long-lasting. But _nothing_ has brought me long-lasting joy and that may be the crux of the problem. ~~~ noname123 So startup is a important part of what makes you happy, but focusing on it solely will not make you happy. Now you are going to have to find out what are the missing ingredients that will make you happy, and what you are willing to give up in your startup dream (as hard it may be) to achieve those missing parts. Because focusing solely on startup's or on banking on the success of your startup will not help those other parts of your life. ------ csmeder I have said this 3 times on here already, however, it has been so effective I feel its worth sharing again. This is the only thing that has worked for me and it worked fantastically: 1) Start with some Black Tea. In my experience the caffeine in black tea causes less of crash than coffee. 2) Hemmingways Hack: [http://www.secondactive.com/2009/08/boost-your- productivity-...](http://www.secondactive.com/2009/08/boost-your-productivity- with-hemingways.html) 3) And the Pomodoro Technique <http://www.pomodorotechnique.com> This has hemmingsways hack built in. If done right (read the PDF) it is amazing. \----------------------- As far as that last paragraph, it sounds like your depressed. _Depression is the most common mental health concern in our culture today. The main reason for this phenomenon is our dysfunctional lifestyle. We have stripped away supports such as family and community and replaced them with material objects, larger homes, entertainment centers, and more time at work for money and success, rather than interest, meaning, or passion. The lack of support, connectedness, and meaning leaves people feeling empty, lost, and depressed. These negatives feelings are symptoms trying to tell us that we're being deprived of essential human nutrients: to be seen, heard, and understood. Thus, depression is a healing crisis._ \-- <http://www.wholenesstherapy.com/public/anxiety.htm> Like everyone else has said go see a counselor. You should be talking to some one about these feelings. To me it sounds like you depression is stemming from a feeling of a lack control and a feeling that you don't have the power to make a change. If you can, I recommend reading this book [http://www.amazon.com/Transformation- Understanding-Levels-Ma...](http://www.amazon.com/Transformation- Understanding-Levels-Masculine-Consciousness/dp/0062505432) ~~~ Damnit Thanks for the link. I am considering visiting the school shrink. ~~~ BlakeA After reading your thoughts about how you feel I can honestly say I currently still feel the same way about my life. It wasn't until Senior year in High School that I started to have the same feelings as you and experienced thoughts of suicide or depression along with anxiety and was given Zoloft by a doctor when I was 18. I was really outgoing in high school though but did have some rough times my senior year with the typical girl bs causing fights and what not. I also had a therapist session every other month or so (didnt start until college) to talk to about whatever really and also problems with my family. Pretty much everything I endured with Zoloft and therapy didn't make me more confident or helped me accept the fact that I don't like to make mistakes and that in turn makes me like the The Too Many Aptitude Problem - TMA. One thing it did help me with was my suicide thoughts and even stopped me from writing good bye letters. <http://knacks.esmartdesign.com/#Aptitudes_and_Mental_Illness>. - TMA What I am trying to say is that after every thing I endured over the span of a 1 and half I was on Zoloft I really thought I was recovering from my daze I had. I felt better but not cured. But it seemed it caused a worse daze making me just pass through things in my life without real thought. My mind started to seem off and I changed from my true self. I wasn't as social, I was more cautious, and I think I lost the person I was in Senior year. This all came to a realization after I was finally taken off the drug just as my freshmen year of college came to an end. One thing that can really help is therapy though. So totally give it chance. I know I used the tissues in the room a lot when I talked about what I was going through because his answers/questions always made me really think. To me any drug with any type of extreme side effects is not a solution but it could be for you. Just a thought. Take it easy. ------ mikecane First, get suicide out of your mind. The very thought is ridiculous. None of this is worth killing yourself over. Second, what expectations are you setting for yourself? If your self-vision is not meeting reality, that's a major cause of disappointment right there. Change your self-vision. Third, who said anything is "wrong" with you? People have different temperaments. Some people bond tightly with others, some do not. As long as you're not harboring sociopathic or homicidal thoughts that prevent you sticking to others, it's not much to worry about. Fourth, in regards to expectations, do you imagine what _others_ might expect from you -- and this is the underlying reason to avoid them? Does having to see other people feel like confronting a school test, with that sinking feeling you're being put on the spot and might fail? Well, that's shyness. Medicine claims to have a pill for that, but I really don't trust mind pills (all pills have revenge effects sooner or later). Lastly, you are young. The opportunities available to you are many -- perhaps too many. Whittle down everything to what you really love and want to do. Once you've got that settled (and this won't happen in just one day, so be patient), once you know your passion, everything else falls into place on its own -- because you will naturally gravitate to people who share that and being around them won't feel like a test. One other thing. You might want to read _The Outsiders_ by Colin Wilson. This will give you some insight into just how different people can be -- but that didn't stop any of the people in that book from gaining prominence. I hope some of this helped. ------ damoncali Find a therapist. This is the kind of thing they are expert at a fixing. Don't jump straight to drugs, just find out why you do what you do. There is probably a good reason for it all. You just need a little help sorting it all out. ------ Tycho Maybe you're being too hard on yourself? Most people don't have the productive energy in the first place that leads to start-ups or side-projects or even perhaps new friendships. In fact the moments in my life where I feel really inspired and enthusiastic about something (usually leading to greatly increased productivity) are few and far between. Sure I'd like to have more of them, but I don't think I could ever make that the norm. Sounds like for you, those moments are frequent enough you believe they could be sustained indefinitely... Otherwise I don't have much advice except do well for _yourself_ and never be ashamed of it. ------ rmundo Are you a perfectionist? Do you want to accomplish so many things your mind reels with the possibilities, but can't figure out which ones are worth the all out effort it takes for success? Did you always think, "I've got some great things ahead of me", and now you ARE grown up and this IS the future and you're worried about what you have to show for it? Maybe you want to have great friendships and do great things and all these seem to require so much energy and attention and so many steps to not mess up. If that's the case, I'd say try dialing back, focus on enjoying the journey and less on the result, because really there is no guarantee that the results will be awesome. You say people respect you for many things but that you have a "terrible" problem with discipline and focus, something I suspect most everyone has. Maybe you're just giving yourself too much pressure and need to take it easy for a few months? Since you're still in school, have a chat with a psychological counselor on campus. To me it sounds like you might be temporarily stressed out or burned out from the efforts of your previous startup. Peace. ~~~ Damnit _Did you always think, "I've got some great things ahead of me", and now you ARE grown up and this IS the future and you're worried about what you have to show for it?_ Yeah, did my first relatively successful startup in high school. Got into one of the top incubators(may be even YC). Have many people that would kill to be me. And yet, they don't know about the monsterous rut my life is plagued with --mostly because when I do get my "mojo", I am super productive and successful(even if just for few weeks or months). I am very hard on myself and hate drama. Yet I find myself turning into that failure I never saw myself becoming and can _never_ accept. Really, I cannot go a life as a failure. I still have plenty of belief that I can change--but it's taken _a lot_ of hit in the last five years of trying and falling back to the same place. _Since you're still in school, have a chat with a psychological counselor on campus._ I'll do this. Last time I went to the school shrink, I was prescribed a pill but I never used the prescription. I got my idea for a startup and most of the issues went away(I got into the incubator; startup failed but still did relatively ok)...but looking back, it seems like it was only a temporary fix. ------ swombat I know what you mean. I have similar issues. I tried to put together my advice in a series of articles titled "Hyperbrain user manual", some time ago. Hopefully you'll find some useful techniques there: [http://inter-sections.net/2008/08/28/hyperbrain-owners- manua...](http://inter-sections.net/2008/08/28/hyperbrain-owners-manual-1-the- big-picture) [http://inter-sections.net/2008/09/01/hyperbrain-owners- manua...](http://inter-sections.net/2008/09/01/hyperbrain-owners- manual-2-accept-and-reject-your-limitations) [http://inter-sections.net/2008/09/05/hyperbrain-owners- manua...](http://inter-sections.net/2008/09/05/hyperbrain-owners- manual-3-keep-tasks-closed) [http://inter-sections.net/2008/09/11/hyperbrain-owners- manua...](http://inter-sections.net/2008/09/11/hyperbrain-owners-manual-4-the- value-accumulator) [http://inter-sections.net/2009/02/23/hyperbrain-owners- manua...](http://inter-sections.net/2009/02/23/hyperbrain-owners-manual-5-the- butterfly-approach) Hope these help! ------ euroclydon Definitely find a therapist if you have suicidal thoughts, but also consider spending some of your time with those less fortunate than yourself. This can add a lot of perspective. For example, John Vonier founded La'Arche <http://www.larche.org/home.en-gb.1.0.index.htm> , a set of homes where individuals with and without mental disabilities live together, and he firmly believes that the non-disabled benefit at least as much and probably more than the disabled from the relationship. ------ carterschonwald I second (or nth) the see a doctor and talk about your focus and mood difficulties. The root issue of your difficulties might simply be a chemical imbalance of some sort (some variant of bipolar disorder (manias and lows) or inattentive adhd). Go talk to a doctor such as eg a psychiatrist (get a referral from your normal doctor perhaps?) and be very very clear about every relevant anecdote in your entire life about your troubles. Mood/attention disorders can be very frustrating when unmanaged, especially since in many cases when you talk about difficulties that are ultimately due to such to most other people, their response is like "no biggie, just do it" or the like. That being said, this is just one avenue worth investigating and many of the other posts will probably speak of much more likely applicable approaches. But seriously, its always a good idea to talk to a doctor when theres nontrivial physical or mental distress that is evading solution. ------ Gatsky Difficult to say much from a forum post... errors in self perception are probably a large part of the problem. I don't think you have a motivation problem. You seem to start lots of things. I have a motivation problem. I haven't started anything (let alone an actual 'startup') in a very long time. One thing that strikes me is how long you last with what ever endeavour you undertake... 1 - 2 weeks is very short, especially for a relationship. I don't think that is enough time to genuinely lose interest. I take this to mean that either you didn't really want to do the thing in the first place or are afraid of something. I don't think medicalising the issue is a good first option, as other people have said. You describe some depressive-like features such as hopelessness, loss of enjoyment, social withdrawal, weird dazes... but once you label this as a disease, it becomes very difficult to deal with it in other than a medical fashion. Having said that, if you are reading about suicide, I would get professional help. I don't have any particular advice. It may be that entrepeneurial pursuits (which are open ended, with ill defined goals and little feedback) are not the right thing for you at this stage of life. I would also suggest you try something which places no pressure on you, and isn't encompassed by the failure cycle you describe. An example would be some sort of volunteer work, or a (team) sport/hobby. (A startup doesn't count as volunteer work.) ------ mgkimsal I wouldn't rule out something medically not quite optimal with your brain and you may want to talk to a professional about some medication to help bring things in to a balance (you didn't mention that you'd done that yet or not). Medical aspects aside, it sounds like you've not been able to find a niche yet. I'm not trying to trivialize this, but you obviously do have some passion (as others note) but you can't channel it in to something productive for very long. It also sounds like you're trying to do this all on your own. There are people who remain stuck in one routine for years or decades. You have the ability - probably a compulsion - to get in to new situations routinely. Believe it or not, this would be seen as an asset in many organizations. A 'presales engineer' position (if you're technical) might be a great position to get in to, as you're constantly getting in to new situations and people, most of whom you won't need to deal with a few weeks or months after the sale is made. Without sounding trite, suicide isn't the answer. You've likely got quite a lot to offer. You're on HN after all ;) I hate to just say 'go get counseling and medication' - I think there's probably other things you can do outside of that, or in addition to that course. I realize I don't know you much, except for what you've posted here, but I really don't think things are as hopeless for you as they may feel right now. I don't think I've had things as bad as you're describing, but I am known for an extreme inability to focus/concentrate on anything for very long. I don't tout it, but have worked on coping strategies over the years. Eventually I found a book by Barbra Sher (<http://www.barbarasher.com>) - well, she's got a few. Wishcraft might be a decent one to start with. It's free, and while a bit airy fairy at times, might help you to see things in a different light. I was first turned on to Sher when I was reading up on the problem of TMI (Too Many Interests). [http://knacks.esmartdesign.com/#The_Too_Many_Aptitude_Proble...](http://knacks.esmartdesign.com/#The_Too_Many_Aptitude_Problem_TMA_and_) was the first article I'd found, which seemed to describe me to a T. I've since self-diagnosed myself with that 'condition' and went looking for info which would help me learn more about that. There's no 'magic bullet cure', but that bit of self-knowledge has helped me avoid situations which I knew would make me miserable, and have slowly forged a better, more fulfilling life (though even now, I keep changing my goal posts). The biggest thing I learned from that little journey is that there's nothing 'wrong' (in an absolute sense) with that condition - it's just different. If you'd care to discuss any of this further, please ping me at any time at mgkimsal@gmail.com or 919-827-4724. ~~~ Qz Wow, that Too Many Aptitudes thing is spot on for me. I've been struggling with that exact problem, every other month I'm a hacker, a fiction writer, a philosopher, a graphics designer, a jeweler, a social worker, a fashion designer, etc, etc. My latest effort has been just to accept that my interests will rotate and rather than abandon old projects, just come back to them when I get interested in them again, and hopefully eventually I will complete something... ~~~ mgkimsal Check out <http://wishcraft.com> to grab a PDF book from Sher. This book: [http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Revolutionary-Program- Ev...](http://www.amazon.com/Refuse-Choose-Revolutionary-Program- Everything/dp/B000S6MFDG/ref=pd_sim_b_1) helped me identify myself more. I got this book for my wife: [http://www.amazon.com/Could-Anything-Only-Knew- What/dp/04405...](http://www.amazon.com/Could-Anything-Only-Knew- What/dp/0440505003/ref=pd_sim_b_4) and she said it helped her refocus things. The takeaway from all of this is that TMA page helped me identify and 'diagnose' (in a loose sense) that condition. The Sher books above helped with some practical advice on how to live and deal, and sometimes thrive, with the condition. Her term for someone with TMA would be 'scanner' , and she's written about scanners for years. I've been juggling things for a while, and currently I'm a publisher (groovymag and jsmag), a consultant (really just consulting sometimes), a developer (hands on coding), a trainer, speaker (2-3 conferences per year), have written a book, and am working on some other projects for later this year which may help open some doors in to new avenues. Had I stayed at my job I would have been more compensated financially but far less fulfilled. That said, I _still_ wrestle with feelings of unfulfilledness, and some of that comes down to not being able to execute on all my ideas. What I'd _like_ to do is get to the point where I'm comfortable hiring people to do a lot of the grunt work fulfilling my ideas (I don't particularly care to _do_ the work, I just think it needs to get done). This doesn't mean I'll never take a traditional full time job again, but I'm a lot more demanding and critical when I talk to potential employers. That still comes up now and then, and I'm a lot of aware of myself and open when talking about employment. Nothing has yet fit the bill, but I'm not shutting the doors to that possibility. I just don't think it'll be likely. It'll need to be a kickass company and/or working in an extremely engaging problem space with some freedom for me to float around some. Very few traditional jobs fit that bill. ~~~ Qz Thanks for the links. Right now I'm in the position where finishing college has been a 7 year ordeal and I still don't 'know what I'm going to do'. Started off in CS but it required way more singular focus than I am capable of (was at CMU), so I switched to creative writing, which allows a lot more flexibility in terms of what I decide to put on a page, but not particularly clear career paths... I have what I think are some pretty awesome web/software ideas, but I only ever spend a few days in a row working on them because coding requires that sort of singular focus that I can't maintain for much longer than that. And then now there's potentially (probably) a girl in the mix, so who knows what's going to happen... ~~~ mgkimsal I had no idea what to do starting college, then I dropped out. I went back later (long story) - ended up taking a logic course in philosophy program - aced it, and routed myself in to a philosophy degree. What the hell do you do with a philosophy degree? Get a programming job of course! (which is what I managed). ~~~ Qz I was basically doing the drop out thing while I was _in_ college. I would take 4 courses a semester, focus on whichever one piqued my interest, and then fail or drop out of the other 3. Wasted a lot of money. ------ honopu Hi, I don't really understand your lack of self discipline. I am going to probably go off on some incredibly poorly written tangent here, but please work through it; friend :) The lack of focus and discipline is something i totally understand, and I think that it might be a product of your your readings if you have in fact worked through say the Kiyosaki books or equivalent. You had a taste of the high from doing your startup, you hopefully learned a whole hell of a lot and you really like that idea(that life) and that's fine. Maybe you were sold on the ideologies they sell, and that's great, they can be achieved, I promise. Maybe it isn't working out for you right now, but you are merely 23. I am 29 now, everything(literally) in my life has changed since I was 23. Education, housing, girls, friends, employment etc. I think it boils down to a few things really, your entire ambiguity toward life is something i somewhat understand but something you should really address. I think you need to find something to work toward, be it a new start- up or anything. Just because you "failed" once it doesn't mean you'll fail again. Remember that :) I think you need to simply pick something and get it done, something you can totally get behind. Maybe you are avoiding something you need to do that you aren't doing? That has been my case in the past. Also don't go through with suicide. I went through it with my dad a few years ago(he succeeded, after a botched attempt a month earlier).... It isn't something I would wish on my worst enemy's family... I hope you take care and heed the other advice here, I just felt compelled to weigh in and seeing this phone number from another user here makes me feel a little better about writing here on hacker news. ------ sliverstorm Your lack of focus on a particular thing sounds similar to the cycle I have found myself in. Discover, learn, master, get bored. I have my own concerns about this cycle, but it does have an upside you can channel; I have been picking up new skills left and right. As an example, I am currently fixing up a motorcycle I bought for real cheap. My passion for mechanics has long abated, but I still find it mildly pleasant and I want the goal (getting the bike running). Because I was so deep into cars and motorcycles for a while, I am quite excellent at servicing now. I know exactly what to do without much trouble, which enriches my life by opening doors and extending the life of my vehicles. Virtually anything complicated enough to be stimulating can work with this cycle. I am currently contemplating diving into nutrition. I'll get completely bored of food after a while, but for the rest of my life I'll have the skills and knowledge to tap into. ~~~ zackattack Read up on _Mastery_ by George Leonard. You seem to be describing a "hacker". I highly doubt that you truly master skills so quickly. Mastery should not be taken lightly. The actual process of mastery is consuming and immensely rewarding. ~~~ sliverstorm Ok, master is a poor choice of words. ------ justin_vanw I know exactly what this is like. I was about the same age as you when I started really getting worried about the same things you are. If you do everything I say here, it probably won't make you a dynamo overnight. It will help you avoid backsliding, though. Over the next few years, if you are diligent, you will learn new habits. Step 1: Throw your TV and any video game systems you have in the trash (or more sensibly, disconnect them and put them on craigslist so they are out of your house _today_ ). The whole point of startup culture is to give up some fun now (wait, working at a startup IS fun) in exchange for a huge pile of money later. You want to work 80+ hours a week, and probably have a girlfriend too. When does playing Xbox fit in there? In a few years, when you are the founder of a hot, funded startup, you can have an XBOX in your game room. Or you can play it now, and maybe the VC fairy will be impressed by your GTA skills. -- The point is, every minute spent fucking around is a minute you could be working or learning new skills. Step N: The next time you are wondering "why can't I be productive", imagine a little bell ringing in your head. The bell is there to remind you to sit down and work. If you find yourself browsing reddit or hn or some other site, add entries to your hosts file so that you CAN'T browse those sites. Often the anxiety that keeps a person from being productive is at it's worst at exactly those times that you would otherwise be the most productive. Never visit any distracting site like that from your work area or from your work computer. Step Na: Give yourself a little goal to accomplish (write it down) when you sit down to work, and don't let yourself get up to do something else (besides restroom breaks) until you accomplish the little goal you wrote down. When you do accomplish it, imagine another 'you' there, and see if that other 'you' would accept the quality of the work if you were an employee. Once you give the work a thumbs up, _force yourself_ to take a 15 minute break. Go outside for a walk, call a friend, just get off the computer. Once you are comfortable with this micro-routine (say after 3 weeks of doing it consistently), check out GTD. Resist the urge to go full on GTD now, however. Most likely you will get distracted setting up notebooks and org-mode or other yak-shaving instead of getting actual work done. Step X: Make an appointment with a psychiatrist that has experience treating adults with depression, ADHD and anxiety issues. It may help a lot, and it can't hurt. ------ daniel-cussen You sound like me a few years ago. I since found out I have ADD. You might have it too. You might want to get checked. ~~~ Damnit Have the treatments worked for you? I've come super close to getting tested for ADD, each time resisting out of fear that it'll only be another temporary fix(in pills). May be I'm wrong reading stories like yours. ~~~ daniel-cussen >Have the treatments worked for you? Yes. Sometimes completely, usually partially. >I've come super close to getting tested for ADD, each time resisting out of fear that it'll only be another temporary fix(in pills). OK. I believe you should get tested anyway; testing does not mean you have to follow through with treatment. Benefits from knowing you have ADD include being able to read about it. [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Attention-Deficit- Disorder-Unfocused...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Attention-Deficit-Disorder- Unfocused-University/dp/0300119895) About the pills: it turns out ADD is a chemical problem. I have heard about it being treated with therapy (talking to people) but really, the real fix is pills. In my case at least, there is a hole in my brain shaped like amphetamines (Adderall, Ritalin) and if I take amphetamines I have nothing to envy people without ADD. When I first took them I felt something I had never felt before: an incredible sense of urgency and desire to work. Is it a temporary fix? In some senses yes, in others, no. It can be temporary in that SSRI's induce tolerance, much like cigarettes or coffee. But this is hardly a Red Queen scenario. Most people with ADDs reach a dose they're comfortable with and can work with from here to forever, with some caveats your doctor can tell you about. I would not compare it to padding your schedule to deal with time overruns due to procrastination. This is a fundamental change in the way your brain works. And if you don't like the idea of taking pills, consider this: there's really no other way out if you have ADD and are part of the 80% of ADD patients who respond positively to pills. I highly recommend it. ~~~ Damnit This is very insightful. Thank you! ~~~ daniel-cussen No matter what you choose to do, I hope you get better :) ------ mmaro Read P.J. Eby's "Thinking Things Done". It's unfinished, but chapters 1-7 are very good. You have to sign up for his mailing list to receive them. I found out about this from <http://lesswrong.com/lw/21r/pain_and_gain_motivation/> Consider spending a lot of time alone, or at least outside any institution for a while. Hell is other people. It's hard for me to think clearly when other people's thoughts are an important part of my day. Consider meditating. (See the recently posted "Mindfulness in Plain English"). I just started, but I'm already getting the same euphoric level of concentration that I get from programming. ~~~ stretchwithme I second that. Eby's good and so is meditation. If you really get into meditation, consider reading the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. The religious elements don't make sense to me but he understands what mediation does for the mind. ------ Loic If you read the literature, from ancient Greek to nowadays, you will find that every body is fighting the same thing at different degree. The main problem we all have on this Earth is that our life is relatively short and when we are comfortable enough to have food/friends/etc. we automatically start to ask ourselves, directly or not: _What do I want to do in my life?_ From what you described, you have no answer to this question. You can see a psychiatrist, take some drugs, use all the GTD tricks or whatever, if you do not have this goal of what you want to do, this will only make the problem worse. You will be able to do a lot (in fact you already do a lot) but you will still have strictly no reasons to focus on anything. So go, find a goal. Find friends who can help you to find a goal. Find strangers, too. Go meditate a week long. Do whatever you need to clear your mind and find 1 or 2 things you can do fully (your mind, your body etc.) for at least the next year (you are young, your life goal will change a lot) and do it/them. You are lucky to ask yourself what is going on in your 20's. If you do not answer this question, imagine getting a standard job + family and then asking yourself the same question with 40... so, do it now and again on a regular basis. We are all in the same boat and for most of us, the long term goal of our life is just a pleasant string of short/middle term goals with happiness on top of it. ------ edge17 Sounds like you need some momentum to get the wheels turning again. Your mind sounds a bit claustrophobic - that is to say, lots going on that's making you go crazy. Go find some adventure and get off the road you're on. Go do something that 'crazy' people do. One time I was really really frustrated, so I traveled around the world (sounds absurd, but that's basically how simple my thought process was and how little planning i did. I just convinced myself I could make it up as I go). Getting on the road will distance yourself from a lot of things on your mind, provide some clarity on things that are important, and make you focus on immediate problems - like where to sleep so you don't get robbed and how you're going to get from A to B because the bus route in the book or on the website doesn't exist anymore. You'll learn a lot about yourself by dealing with things as they come, by meeting cool people, and by seeing new markets for your ideas everywhere you go. I was dead broke when I got back, and I slept on my friend's floor for 2 months before paying him any backrent - but hey, what're friends for. It didn't cost me a fortune, just most of what I made working summers in college. ------ caffeine Hi Damnit, Just wanted to say that I exhibit much the same set of phenomena that you do. I don't ever finish anything I start, I always look for something new, I ride the wave of exhilaration that comes from sinking my teeth into some serious new intellectual problem, coding 18 hour days, and then give up entirely a week later and endlessly refresh HN. I quit jobs and relationships etc. all the time, and then strike up new ones which seem to be destined to last forever. The difference is that it doesn't bother me so much. I'm quite happy with my life as it is. I think that the need for "production" and "accomplishing goals" etc. is largely a cultural artifact. It's not really important. I think it'd be incredibly boring to be doing the same job for a whole two years. It stopped bothering me roughly around the time I started exercising (martial arts) and meditating (zazen), so perhaps that has something to do with it. But that's also the time I graduated from school, so maybe it was the newfound freedom that made me happier. Note that I didn't change one bit - I still am a start-only person. It's just that I'm comfortable with it now. I think you should just enjoy it, if you can. ~~~ Damnit Thanks for taking time to comment. How did you work your struggles with discipline? ie. I have tried meditation/yoga/working out many times only to relapse and give up week or month later. This pattern has repeated so many times in the last 5 years I have reached a point I don't want to try anything new because of the fear/knowledge that it won't stick. ~~~ caffeine > I don't want to try anything new because of the fear/knowledge that it won't > stick My point was ... so what if it doesn't stick? Just don't worry about it. So you're a person who starts things but doesn't finish them. Big deal. Just enjoy whatever you're doing while you do it and when you're sick of it and feel like something else, do that. Just go with it. You can't fight this kind of thing .. just roll with it, accept and enjoy the fact that this is your personality. At least you're not boring! That mindset is how I deal with this, and it's worked fine for me. You don't _have_ to be or do anything. You're OK already. ------ c3o A friend of mine committed suicide last December, at your age and from what I can tell, in a similar situation (he was even also a previous YC participant). It hurts how much reading this reminds me of him. You mention some people know this side of you (to what degree?) but that they don't know how to help you. I think it's critical that during this rough patch you're going through, in addition to receiving anonymous advice here on HN, you surround yourself with supportive people in real life. Even if it's just one person that sticks with you through this, that you are completely open to and stay in close touch with about your plans and progress as you try therapy, medication and various other techniques. For ideas on how to involve other people without having to be embarrassed or being too much of a burden, read about Jane McGonigal's "recovery game": [http://blog.avantgame.com/2009/09/super-better-or-how-to- tur...](http://blog.avantgame.com/2009/09/super-better-or-how-to-turn- recovery.html) I wish you all the best. ------ d0m I sympathize with you. All I can say is that.. don't give up. Somewhere, sometime, you'll ready enjoy what you're doing and you will look back at this sad time of your life and think: Damn, I'm so happy I didn't give up. Also, it's easy to make friend and I agree with you that it's hard to be motivated to stick with them.. However, I'm sure you'll encounter real friend where you won't need to be motivated.. you'll just enjoy being with them as they will be part of your life. Same with girls.. once you'll find someone that you really like (and not only the first kick), you'll be actually happy to spend time with her and she'll help you to get more motivated. Finally, next with the startup.. once you'll really enjoy your project, it will be so much easier to stick with it and get motivated. And sometime, the best way to motivate you, is to start small and publish something.. with real people around the world waiting for your next version, it really does give a little kick in the but :p ------ f1gm3nt I'm in the same boat. I have always loved and tried to make startups work. I read all the books and all that jazz. I took a giant leap of faith and failed. Slowly but surely I have started to get my life in order again. I have tried sucide before and failed. After that I have refused to try again. I see that as the easy way. Now I'm starting to get my hopes back up and there are people around me that believe in me. I would highly recommend reading "think and grow rich". Ever heard of the book "the secret"? They ripped off that book. I often find myself too making new friends only to not keep them after a year or so. Sometimes less. That's part of life. Find something you like to do and obsess over it. That's what I'm doing now. Also you will always need balance in your life and the focus and motivation will come. Again, if you haven't read think and grow, read it and follow the instructions outlined within that book. If you have read it, read the damn thing again. ------ stretchwithme I've struggled with trying to make a success of my company too and my family is far away and I've had thoughts similar to yours. But I always came back to the fact that I can always do something different. I can drop everything and go back to where I grew up and just take an ordinary job. Remember that there is nothing more important than your life and desire to succeed at a startup or in corporate America or anything else is just conditioning and not necessarily important at all. Personally, I took a contract job recently where I can only work 8 hours a day. Its great to hang it up at the end of the day like a normal person. There's nothing wrong with taking a break from struggling with a startup. Things will come together later. Its not supposed to be so hard anyway. There's a difference between intense creative collaboration and solitary unhappy struggle. I truly hope this helps. ~~~ Damnit _Remember that there is nothing more important than your life and desire to succeed at a startup or in corporate America or anything else is just conditioning and not necessarily important at all._ That's something I cannot come to terms with. I really want to succeed. I _know_ I can succeed if I just became disciplined and focused. ~~~ stretchwithme Not sure of the situation but for me nothing focuses me more than having a real customer and/or collaborator to whom I've made real commitments to. When I've worked on my own, its real easy to get distracted and rationalize putting things off. I'd be lucky to get in a full eight hours. But working with others, I found myself working many hours beyond even the time we spent directly collaborating. Because I had to deliver on my commitments. I think many people need that. ------ foxtrot A dude - you summed my self up perfectly too. I have been on anti-depressants before and they didn't help too much, however the thing with anti-depressants is you cant compare two days side by side, 1 on meds and the other not, they just dont work like that. You have to be on them for a month before they start to work and once you stop they stay in your system for a couple of months. I always hated anti-depressants and was one of those naive people who say its all in your head, and to an extent it mostly is. The problem is that if its in your head how do you change your way of thinking. Personally I get pre-occupied with the thought of failure rather than success, and when you constantly think you will fail at something you immediately put you self on the back foot regardless of what you want to do. ------ xmmm Oh god, you are me! I haven't been able to identify these troubles I've been having my whole as a problem. At least now I know it's not normal and I should do something about it. Thank you very much posting this. ------ swah Most people are like that, in varying degree. The internets have certainly made it easier for us to stop doing stuff for more attractive stuff. If I was in jail with only one book, I bet one could really read it and grok it. Something similar is happening to me right now: a website I was developing has moved beyond the "cool" phase to the "now I need hard work" phase and I already started playing with another website... ------ AbyBeats Don't change who your are.Take a Job and do stuff that fits you.You will be more productive and best at what you do like that.I am a completely dis- organized person.I sleep when I feel like it,I do stuff when I feel like it etc...So I chose freelancing which suits my style and I am a happy man. "Its not becoming like someone else,its accepting who you are" Good Luck ------ lookACamel Join the military. Sorry...just a knee-jerk reaction. Maybe you could see a psychiatrist or doctor? This may be a sign of a problem best treated with medication. ------ dwwoelfel "After a million self-help programs and motivation books that haven't been of much help" Which self-help programs and books? ~~~ Damnit You name it. Toni Robbins, Eckhart Tolle, Think and grow rich. After a while they just become noise if you don't have the self-discipline to follow them. ~~~ marilyn The best bit to get out of many of these guys is that each of us needs to find our service to others. What can you do to benefit and serve other people? When you find the answer to this question, you will be led to both success, and meaning. ------ jules You feel like you need to accomplish something important. You don't. Just have fun! ------ mooneater Your chi is weak. Practice martial arts. Good for exercise, good for confidence, good for chi. Try Jujitsu. Wake up! ------ todayiamme Reading this I felt as if someone was holding up a mirror to me. I am a borderline personality, so in some ways I know how you feel. On the other hand I should be the last person giving you advice as I am a work in progress too, but I need to say a few things to you. First of all, I know that you probably feel inside that it's wrong for you to be like this, and sometimes you just question why you're a freak. Other times you might question your very existence, and how far you have fallen. After all being hysterical isn't something that you look forward too. I used to feel exactly the same, but then you have those days when everything is beautiful and you are high in ways that is so difficult to define in words. Those days make you wonder even more why you're like this, but the thing is that its okay. There is nothing wrong with you. I know that this is so clichéd and you hear this all the time, but its true. It takes some time to digest and even more time to accept, but consider the possibility. This curse might actually be a boon in a lot of ways. Second, is there anyone you love and trust? Talking to people helps a lot, especially when you are down and out. It, in fact, saved my life. I wouldn't be alive bashing this out right now if someone hadn't loved me, guided me and accepted me. I know that you probably won't talk to them because you don't want to be a burden, but can you imagine how they feel about you? They will in fact be glad that you reached out to them in the darkest moments of your life, and it will show you a side of humanity that most people never see. As this forum proves people can be extremely kind, loving and generous. A lot of people are will go the distance to help you heal. Let them do that. You are not a burden either. In fact, it's quite probable that you've made a contribution to their life in a way that even you can't define. So, don't plunge the icy dagger of death into them. Reach out to them. Also if you want you can email me at yesthisisananonymousid [at] gmail. (can't post my real id on this forum in case someone from my past reads this) Third, taking those pills will not be a good experience. At times they are a constant reminder that no matter what you do, what plans you make, what you think, what you dream. You are at the mercy of those tiny bundles of chemicals, and a bunch of receptors in your brain. _DON'T_ let that stop you from taking them. They are a lifeline in that chaos, and sure there is a cost to taking some of them but it is worth each and every moment. It helps you to breathe in a way that you had long forgotten, and that sense of freedom from your moods is an amazing feeling. Moreover, as time passes on you'll be able to leave that crutch, or reduce it to barely perceptible amounts, and live life free. Fourth, I want you to know that you really aren't alone. Even though we have never met, and probably never will I want to tell you that I can empathize with you and if you wish I want to be there for you. Take care. P.S. - You might get some mileage from the awesome advice lionhearted and others gave me in this thread (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1484882>). ~~~ Damnit Thanks man, really appreciate your support. Helps to know I'm not the only one going through this stuff. ------ raheemm I suggest working with a good business or life coach. Look for ones that focus on getting things done. They will help you stay accountable, motivate you and chew you out when you need to be. ------ eytanlevit Hey dude, I strongly identify with your feelings - I know that place very well. Here is the way I hacked it out: 1\. Regarding relationships with girls\friend - After years of having too many friends, I understood that almost everyone I met wanted to be friends of mine, this lead to an overload of friends, and made me be not a good friend of a lot of freinds. Once I realized that, I decided to stop socializing with everyone I met, and focus on my closest friends. Another hack regarding friends - I found that having a certain structure, like meeting every thursday to play poker and playstation - was really good for me.(Of course that I socialize beyond this routine, but this baseline routine with friends really made our friendship strong and fulfilling). 2\. Focusing on one thing: I found that working with partners really helps me focus, it is true regarding learning, programming and founding startups. If you wish to create a new startup - find a partner and make it with him\her - level out with him that you have a focusing problem - and that he should call you out if he sees that you are unfocused or unproductive. this is very powerful, this discovery has changed my life, it allowed me to open my startups, and today I am the owner of a very successful israeli bootstrapped start up(founded with 2 partners ofcourse). 3\. hacking suicide thoughts\meaningless feeling - most important hack of all - imagine being a mountaineer, climbing on the everest, your feet hurt, it is difficult to breath, it is cold, but you still do it because it is your fucking dream. Now image climbing the everest without a special reason, without having the dream of climbing it - the pain would be the same, but you would hate it so much, it would take so much energy from you, you would be miserable and stop pretty early on. My point is, my friend - that if you feel that pain overwhelms you - you are currently climbing the wrong mountain(You don't have a burning desire). You should stop climbing(trying to focus, trying to better yourself, trying to do things) - and decide what is the thing you really want to do. You might not know, you might have some options and you won't be sure which is the "right" dream from you, I can tell you this, life is precious - you should be brave(taking the risk of maybe it is the "wrong" dream) and choose your dream - and fucking go for it full power. Even if in the end you will understand that you didn't "really" want to do that dream, the only true way of finding out is doing it fullpower. \--------- If all fails - I highly recommend finding a life coach, I have found that they are extremely useful, not trying to figure out whats wrong with you, but just giving you power to do the things you really want to do(and finding out what these things are). ~~~ Damnit Pain is one thing and it's understandable to fight pain while running a startup. But where I'm at now--this indifference to life--is scarier than pain. It's weird. I should be able to work through it though! Thanks for the uplifting words. ------ fleitz Ok, first of all, there are no easy answers to this, but the good news is it's mostly how you are looking at things. You need to find an environment that fits your personality, you like start ups and can't stay focused? Great you're the support guy, there are always a million little things you can do. When you're not being distracted by support emails / calls you can fix the bugs they want fixed. Relationship? You're 23, don't worry about it, you don't need a long term relationship right now and probably haven't figured out what you really want in a partner. Exceptional partners are just that, exceptional, you're not going to meet that person everyday. A week or two? That's not a relationship thats getting to know someone. You can't stay focused on a project for more than two or three weeks? Great, there is a new methodology called agile. It's perfect for you. Your project is now a feature. You have two weeks to implement it. The good news is you're not going to be prone to embarking on any Sisyphean tasks. If you want inspiration I have a contract due in 6 hours and I'm sitting around posting on HN. I can't focus either. You need to stop trying to conform to your environment and start trying to find an environment in which your traits are invaluable. Stop beating yourself up over who you're not, start embracing who you are.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: ZipBooks – Free invoicing and autobill, time tracker, bank feed, reports - bradhanks https://zipbooks.com ====== bradhanks There is also an iPhone app that has a lot of the same functionality. [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/zipbooks-free-accounting- inv...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/zipbooks-free-accounting- invoicing/id1086811538?mt=8) ------ samdung This looks good and promising. I just hope and wish you become a profitable, self-sustaining business and don't close down in a few years. ~~~ bradhanks We have VC backing and are getting a pretty encouraging response, so we are optimistic about our chances. ~~~ Chris2048 Do you have an exit strategy? As in, something binding in the case you exit or shut down? ------ rachidbch Congratulations. The concept seems fantastic! Wish you the best. ------ shefaliprateek looks great, eager to try out. congratulations on the launch!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
The eviction crisis is starting to look a lot like the subprime mortgage crisis - howard941 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-eviction-crisis-is-starting-to-look-a-lot-like-the-subprime-mortgage-crisis-2019-07-03?link=sfmw_tw ====== celias On The Media did a podcast series about evictions in the US [https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/scarlet-e- unmasking...](https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/scarlet-e-unmasking- americas-eviction-crisis)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: Where can I learn more about programming video and audio codecs? - radmuzom Pardon me if this is a stupid question, but I barely have any knowledge about programming audio and video codecs.<p>Is it just software knowledge? Or do I need knowledge about hardware / physics / electronics to actually write code which would say decode a file and display the stored video inside it on my screen. ====== stephengillie If you _want_ to learn about the physics of electron scanning, it probably won't hurt. :) But the basics shouldn't be too complex. I can only give you general details, hopefully someone else visits this thread with more specifics. For video, all you're doing is reading an image from disk, decoding (decrypting) it, displaying it somehow (send it to a display buffer? Have a window drawer draw it?), and then starting with the next image in the stream. There's some timings, and reuse of data from the previous image, but it can all be done programmatically. I'm more fuzzy about audio, but I believe you're basically loading audio data from disk, decoding it, then output to an audio buffer that does the DAC etc for you. Timings again, but still nothing that's not programmatic. ------ knweiss Monty's videos are a good start: [https://www.xiph.org/video/](https://www.xiph.org/video/) [https://www.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/](https://www.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
WTH is happening to Rails? I'll tell you. - emiller829 http://metautonomo.us/2011/06/14/wth-is-happening-to-rails-ill-tell-you/ ====== trustfundbaby I don't think the author really gets why people have a problem with what's going on with Rails, and the article strikes me as a "I like this why don't you?!" type deal vs making a reasoned argument for why the constant change in the Rails way of doing things is necessary. > If you’re learning a new language, a strong community consensus about a > right and a wrong way to tackle problems aids learning \----------------- Right, but the problem is that there doesn't seem to be a 'right' way, That's the problem. We were all prototype a few years ago, now it jquery ... we (well I) hadn't heard of coffeescript till a few months ago and now its a default option in rails, The way we were constructing ActiveRecord finders had been set all through Rails 2, now we've changed it, the way we dealt with gems was set all through rails 2 now its changed completely in Rails 3. I like change, I like staying on the cutting edge of web technologies, but I don't want to learn something, only to discard it and re-do it completely to bring it up to date with a new way of doing things all the time. > If, as coders, we aren’t constantly striving to improve the status quo, > what’s the point? \--------------------------- The point is that you have to realize that Rails isn't just your personal plaything any more, people are invested in it just as much any one person or group of people. I have 5 Rails 2 apps that I support at work and a couple more outside of that, they're all on rails 2 ... bringing them up to Rails 3 without disruption, isn't going to be trivial and I'd be nice if folks acted like they understood that and didn't dismiss similar concerns, or berate folks for having concerns. To that end, my personal preference would be to see fewer but more substantial releases and a little bit more engagement with the community before making major decisions about the framework instead of the steady drumbeat of updates and (seemingly) unilateral decisions (that coffee script decision really irked me, can you tell?) ~~~ sabat The Rails core team does seem to treat the project as if it's a personal playground. But the improvements they make do seem to (usually) be good ones. Since it's almost always the case that you can eschew their choices, the complaints I hear are not compelling. ~~~ ericb I think you're missing the perspective of someone who has a major body of apps to maintain. I easily upgraded a trivial app. Now I'm slogging through a month long Rails upgrade process on a very large app. Unless you've been stuck with a large upgrade like this, it is probably hard to understand the upgrade pain. That said, I love the changes in Rails 3. Considering strings unsafe and escaping them by default is great, bundler rocks, arel is very nice, and the mailer api is nice. The rapid change and code purity ideals in the Rails world leads to benefits, so I tolerate it in Rails in spite of its costs. This idealism has unfortunately infected projects in the Rails ecosystem that are really just infrastructure (where change should occur slowly). As examples, both Rspec and RubyGems are willing to break compatibility and code that I rely on for benefits that are neglible, aesthetic, or invisible to me. The difference is, when Rails breaks something, 90% of the time it buys me something. ------ joshuacc _The difference is that Steve Coast, the post’s author, casts himself in the role of a crusader for the newbies._ I find this all a bit odd, since as a Rails newbie[1], I found Rails 3.0.x very easy to learn with a little help from Michael Hartl's tutorial and the Rails Guides. Perhaps this is an example of the "curse of knowledge?" In other words, that since Coast found Rails 2 easier, he assumed that newbies would as well? [1] Front-end developer with little back-end experience. ~~~ trustfundbaby Wait till you have to keep up with the changes when 3.1 then 3.2 come out six months within each other, and start to change and deprecate things that you learned in 3.0.x ~~~ jharrison You don't have to keep up if you don't want to. Your apps will not stop working if you choose not to upgrade. I have apps still running on Rails 1.x and 2.x. They don't get huge traffic and they are meeting the customer's needs. There would be no business advantage for these particular customers if I had to charge them to upgrade. ~~~ makmanalp Will they keep doing security patches for those? ~~~ jarin They have been pretty good about doing that. There was a security patch for Rails 2.3.x 6 days ago: [http://weblog.rubyonrails.org/2011/6/8/ann- rails-2-3-12-has-...](http://weblog.rubyonrails.org/2011/6/8/ann- rails-2-3-12-has-been-released) ~~~ jamesbritt It's not just security (and other) patches for Rails, it's maintenance for the assorted plugins one inevitably ends up using. If you've a Rails 2.x app with plugin ActsLikeWhatever, and you run into some problem with that plugin, chances are the fix will only be in the newest, non- Rails2, release. ------ flocial This is the typical "rails" response. Rails will make you a better programmer by teaching you the right design patterns, etc. Of course, it does indeed give you a proper structure to building a web service and can be quite educational. However, it can make life difficult once you start straying from "their way" even if you know exactly what you're doing for even simple things like mapping to a legacy DB with schema intact (not gonna happen). Conventions over configuration is nice but it requires some stability. Part of the problem is the leadership. They take the stance, "you bastards are doing it wrong" if you want to do things a little different. The community almost split when they managed to swallow Merb and keep Rails. It's toned down quite a bit but that negativity definitely carried over from the early days and infects the community (swearing in presentations and porn references, etc.). But these thinking aids aren't exactly radical paradigm shifts that will expand your mind and make you a significantly better programmer for the rest of your days. Rails is one of the most influential frameworks and did a lot to advance the field but now there are other frameworks that are much easier to learn and get a functional web service started. So saying dissenters are slow to learn, stubborn or haven't been writing tests really doesn't do anyone a service and doesn't make anything clearer, sorry. ~~~ bxr >it can make life difficult once you start straying from "their way" even if you know exactly what you're doing for even simple things like mapping to a legacy DB with schema intact (not gonna happen) Yikes, unfortunately this knocks rails off of my to-try list. I've got a non- web application with an unusual, but by no means bad, schema. I've found it makes a good measuring stick for frameworks/tools. I have nothing against doing things in the way of a particular framework, but I have existing code to bring to the party too, if something isn't going to play nice I ignore it. I can't live with building something that exists in isolation. Its either not going to work with what I have, or hold me back when I want to build on top of it with something else. ~~~ sebilasse Give datamapper a try, might be better for your case. ------ jarin I think most of the arguments people have any time Rails does a major change can really be re-interpreted as: "I have a moderately complex Rails app that I want to upgrade, but I don't have much confidence in my tests, I maybe don't have proper separation of concerns, and I just know that one hacky thing I did a while back is going to bite me in the ass." It's just something that happens over time in any moderately complex app. I see Rails point release candidates as a good reminder to bust out rcov and spend a few days plugging up the gaps in test coverage before the stable release comes out. If you've been procrastinating upgrading your Rails 2.3.x app to 3.0.x, you're really gonna have fun going straight from 2.3.x to 3.1. Sometimes you just gotta rip off the band-aid. ~~~ bgentry _"I have a moderately complex Rails app that I want to upgrade, but I don't have much confidence in my tests, I maybe don't have proper separation of concerns, and I just know that one hacky thing I did a while back is going to bite me in the ass."_ This says it all for me. Upgrading an app or parts of an app that have great test coverage is really pretty straightforward. It's only more difficult if you weren't following best practices all along. ~~~ joshwa > _Upgrading an app or parts of an app that have great test coverage is really > pretty straightforward. It's only more difficult if you weren't following > best practices all along._ Like people working with Rails in the the real world with real, less-than- perfect programmers. Yes, if I'm an ideologically pure, saint-like programmer with 100% test coverage and purely idiomatic ruby, then upgrades should be a breeze. Except the plugin ecosystem problems still arise-- even the 'perfect' programmer has to be perpetually upgrading to the latest-and-greatest plugins since the last authentication/taggable/whatever plugin has been abandoned in favor of the flavor-of-the-week. ------ tptacek Hard to take too seriously any OO fundamentalism from someone who cites the Gang of Four patterns as if they were sacred scripture. Actually, they're techniques for working around the limitations of languages like C++, and when evoked explicitly in Ruby tend to be a "code smell". This comment has been a service provided by the small bot running in my brain programmed to respond to mentions of the GoF book with a link to Norvig's presentation on them: <http://norvig.com/design-patterns/> ------ lisperforlife I maintain a couple of non-trivial Rails 2 apps, have just shipped a couple of Rails 3 apps and am preparing to write a Rails 3.1 app. I had always been using Sass and Haml for my views from the Rails 2 days. I moved over from shoulda to rspec 2 for Rails 3. All my solutions run partly on MRI/1.9.2 and have certain parts in JRuby (document parsing, search, etc). I had always been minifying and combining my Javascript. Sass with Compass/Blueprint took care of minifying and compressing my CSS. The only change that I am not comfortable with as yet is CoffeeScript. But after playing with it for a couple of hours I understand that this is an excellent choice. I have been a Python programmer before and significant whitespace in CoffeeScript or Sass does not bother me. I am extremely thankful to the people in the community who are putting their time and effort to build such great software and essentially giving it away for free. I am personally both awed and humbled by the excellent work put in by all the individuals who directly or indirectly contributed to Ruby and Rails across all the versions. If not for them I would not have quit my day job. If not for Rails, I am pretty sure that I would not be enjoying my life, as much as I am enjoying it today. The point is that Rails has grown up to the point where makes it simple to write complex applications. For small projects, these choices may seem to be an overkill. But trust me, when you put it into production and start getting traction you will thank Rails. I have built applications with Sinatra and Rack and assembled my own Rails environment using tons of middleware and a lot of glue. I know how hard it is to do it the right way and appreciate the fact that Rails makes it a cakewalk for us. I sure learnt a lot of Ruby but I would choose Rails any day as I know that there has been a lot of thought put in by the community to make it awesome. ------ mcantor I've lost count of how many times I have tried to do something in Rails which was trivial in every other framework I have ever worked with; struggled; gone to #rubyonrails or a mailing list and asked for advice; and had people tell me that I was "fighting the framework". I understand the benefit of not having to make every single decision from the ground up when you're getting started on a project, but sometimes I worry that working with rails is actually warping my thought patterns to fit its myopic vision of how web apps "should" work. To phrase it differently: I feel comfortable with a framework or community forcing me to change _how_ I achieve some higher-level goal. But when that convention prevents me from doing something, _period_ , I start to worry. ~~~ trustfundbaby Thats how Rails is ... I fought it at first, but you either come around or you don't. There isn't much middle ground with rails, you have to accept that and plan accordingly. ~~~ gaius Like everything Ruby, you have to drink the Kool-aid, or walk away completely. ------ perlgeek > In most cases — for mere humans, anyway — there really is a right way to do > things. Ruby is an Object Oriented programming language. There are literally > decades of prior research in the field of OO software design, and they’ve > resulted in a lot of really well-documented and well-tested design patterns > for building software. ... coming from the people who are known for relying heavily on monkey patching existing classes. Or did that change recently? ~~~ prodigal_erik Allegedly they have faced enough mutually-inflicted pain to realize that monkey-patching was a bad idea, and so it's no longer cool. ------ runjake The rapid pace of Rails is a turn-off to me, and I do bounce between it and the more "sane" Django. But I think that's more a reflection of myself (being an "old" guy who's "been there, done that" several times over and resistant to change and trends) and not the fault of Rails. So I try to keep up. But Rails is good for the web. The web was pretty stagnant at one time, and it sucked, and didn't keep up with the needs of users and businesses. And that's why I don't have a real problem with Rails' rapid pace. It keeps everyone on their toes, including their competitors. ------ betageek I agree with a lot of what the article says but I do think the newbie coming to rails at the moment has to do a hell of a lot more to start swimming compared to the "good old days" of Rails 2. Ruby 1.8 or 1.9? Use RVM? How does this Bundler thing work? What the hell are all these deprecation warning? Rake's broken? etc. etc. 3.1 brings asset pipelines where it seems you need to install a Javascript runtime on the server to deploy?!? Even when you get your app up and running the load times in 1.9.x at the minute mean you'll be hanging around waiting for rails to generate files and your going to have to get Spork running to make any kind of rapid TDD/BDD. Rails used to be the easy way into all this modern development goodness, now that "blog in 20 minutes" simplicity has gone along with the famous screencast. ------ dochtman It seems actually kind of obvious that "opinionated" software would have a higher rate of change than other kinds of software: opinions change faster than the other stuff. ~~~ ahi I was thinking just the opposite. When it comes to frameworks, opinions are good things. But you kind of look like an undependable jackass if your opinion changes every 5 minutes. ------ joeburke All the frameworks "are growing up", this is nothing to be proud about. The real question is: is the framework becoming mature? Because RoR has this tendency to reinvent itself every 18 months or so, the answer to the question is a resounding no. It's being used mostly to explore new ways to create web sites, but RoR is more and more becoming a framework you really want to avoid if you need to create a production site that you are planning to work on for years to come. ------ synnik When one person drives the platform strategy, and it is opinion-driven, then conflict like this is inevitable. You either agree or you don't, and if DHH changes his mind, you might changes yours, too. I don't think it is a statement on the platform at all - just a repercussion of one of its tenets. ------ clu3 At least you guys Rails have something new to look at, good or bad I don't judge. I've been using Zend framework for the last 3 years and it's latest version 1.10 has lived like "forever", until the day ZF 2.0 comes out, which has been "promised" a long time ago ~~~ trustfundbaby In PHP's defense ... Development on CakePHP has been chugging along like a champ for a while now. ------ tluyben2 I don't think this is a good thing. I built a few rails apps and currently we are doing our startup in rails and java and depressingly enough Java is actually nicer for me. He's talking about well documented gems; which ones? I haven't seen much of those; it's usually 'go read the source code'. And all those 'great OO practices' where suddenly some class is behaving totally different because you installed a plugin is GREAT when it works. When it doesn't you are debugging yourself silly through all that meta programming crap. And having (as in, stuff stops working) to change your code through minor versions? That's not growing up, that's just crazy behavior. ------ MartinMond I remember a blog post from 2008: Rails will be retrofitted to make it easy to start with a “core” version of Rails (like Merb’s current core generator), that starts with all modules out, and makes it easy to select just the parts that are important for your app. Of course, Rails will still ship with the “stack” version as the default (just as Merb does since 1.0), but the goal is to make it easy to do with Rails what people do with Merb today. <http://yehudakatz.com/2008/12/23/rails-and-merb-merge/> ~~~ epochwolf And they have been moving in this direction. Here's configuring the middleware: <http://guides.rubyonrails.org/rails_on_rack.html> Here's a stackoverflow question on how to disable ActiveRecord: [http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2212709/remove- activereco...](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2212709/remove-activerecord- in-rails-3-beta) Have you seen ActiveModel? It gives a common interface for orms to interface with so swapping out ActiveRecord doesn't break half of the view helpers. Rails 3 is far, far easier to extend and modify than 2.3 was. ------ ryanisinallofus "It's growing up" sounds like "it's turning into java" Now I know it's not that bad but I can see a future where instead of just having the rails book, you have books for every new thing and option possible and the section looks like the Java section where Struts, Spring, and even Scala/Clojure all make the idea of switching to to rails seem far more daunting than it needs to be. ------ radagaisus What's with the PHP bashing? MVC and ActiveRecord were in PHP frameworks and code before rails was born. ~~~ sigzero It's easy to bash PHP. ------ jasongullickson Right or wrong, I'm looking forward to whatever fills the spot that Rails left behind. It was a pleasure to work with a few years back and I miss that. If you've seen something that fits the bill, please pass it on. ~~~ ryanisinallofus Sinatra I guess. You can choose the orm and templating language you want- which sort of just turns it back into rails. Still working in Sinatra does give you that fun feeling of old Rails. ~~~ jasongullickson I liked being able to think of an idea, sketch out a schema and have it up in (admittedly ugly) webpages in a matter of minutes...and on almost any machine in just the time it took to download the package (no crazy dependencies, etc.). The fact that you could then evolve this into something production-ready (arguably), well that was just icing on the cake! ------ bxr Thank you for making "You just don't get it" point number 1. I like to know early on when I should bail out and stop reading something. ~~~ emiller829 Had you continued reading, you'd see that I backed the point up by explaining what I meant. :) ~~~ josefresco Bxr is suggesting that you either move that conclusion to the end or eliminate it completely and define your argument so that the reader can figure out whether or not "he gets it". If I had to guess I'd say he would prefer the latter. ~~~ pointclick i prefer the way he said it.. same as bxr, i'd like to know early on what i'm about to waste time on.. i finished reading the whole thing.. ------ gusi I dont think that rails should worry about complaints coming from php developer..... ~~~ zoul <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem> ~~~ gusi <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2688788> this is what i was referring too much of these are in ruby on rails from the beging ... <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_management>	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
CentMail: Donate to charity and fight spam - rlm http://centmail.net/ ====== patio11 There are two components to this offer: one is a $5 donation to charity. The other is a spam-fighting scheme. Analyze them separately. The spam fighting scheme is not a workable idea. Sorry. If the person doing the verifying is a human, they don't need the stamp -- they can (and will) judge the mail in an instant based on their own arbitrary and capricious criteria, such as "Mail from Mom is not spam" or "Mail from the merchant whose double opt-in list I just signed up for is spam if I don't know how to delete in Gmail yet". If the user doing verifying is a machine... well, in point of fact, there are no servers on the Internet who support your own one-off anti-spam measure. (If you're just wrapping a slightly-more-well-known measure in attractive mapping, you win marketing points and still lose on deliverability.) You have no buyin from Gmail, Microsoft, et al who have the email accounts that people actually want to deliver to. Your plan fills no business need for anyone. If I want to pay $0.01 to make sure my email gets delivered, I have an option for that: MailChimp. (It works fairly well for me, incidentally.) They do it by keeping in good graces with the major mail providers, kicking off clients, staying away from banned lists, and aggressive list scrubbing. CentMail will have to do all these things better than the commercial providers to make sense as a commercial offering. The $5 to charity is not improved by the included bundling of the spam fighting scheme. If you want to donate $5 to charity, you can do that right now. P.S. I used to work in anti-spam research at my previous day job. I have a lot of natural sympathy... for approaches which work. ~~~ ErrantX > If the person doing the verifying is a human, they don't need the stamp That was my thought too. Can it be improved? If there is an API to create a unique key based on the contents of the message (and the headers) that the client can then verify with centmail (or w/e). Sure it wont do anything for mail NOT covered with centmail. BUT you can dump anything with a faked key (likely spam) and let in those with a real key. Then anything else goes to the spam filter as usual. Kinda like a more worldly version of PGP signing. Obviously that kind of scheme would require much more support from email vendors. ------ radu_floricica It's a bit of a "feel good" thing, but I don't see it becoming useful. It needs to get really big in order to work, and I never liked whitelists anyways. ~~~ dreeves Perhaps not quite as big as you're imagining though. If there's, say, a spamassassin rule for it (we actually wrote one for our initial version of the centmail protocol) then it might be worth your while as a sender to sign up, to help avoid ending up in people's spam folders. The main thing we're hoping for though, to achieve any kind of critical mass, is that you'll want to sign up initially as a sender simply to promote your favorite cause. Confer the popularity of Causes, the Facebook app. We certainly don't imagine Centmail as a panacea; but you could imagine it becoming a reliable additional feature for your spam filter. Think of it like hashcash, but instead of burning money/effort, you send it somewhere useful. Come to think of it, maybe this could be made more palatable by combining the hashcash concept with some seti@home-style distributed computation problem. Look for aliens in order to send email! ~~~ radu_floricica Yeap, anything that certifies you spent some effort in sending that mail can whitelist you. This can work! ------ spooneybarger purely from the charity side: what if your idea of good isn't the same as mine? maybe i don't want my money going to xyz? and would you be sending 100% of the donation through? If I want to do good, I'll do what I already do, donate directly to the charities of my choice. ------ btw0 This is obviously a stupid idea. Email is free, shouldn't cost even a cent.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Photo of plane crashing in NY. - rokhayakebe http://scobleizer.com/2009/01/15/plane-crash-in-nyc-captured-on-real-time-web/#comment-2004872 Sorry. I fixed it. ====== RiderOfGiraffes Why have you called this "Video of plane crashing" when there appears to be no video of a plane crashing? ------ smoody where is the video of the plane landing in the river?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Building the Spaced Repetition Website I've Always Wanted - bjfish https://www.knowki.com/blog/building-the-spaced-repetition-website-i-ve-always-wanted ====== syockit Drats, no Unicode support! I hope it saved my page/card in its original form, or else I might have to retype it again by the time support is available.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Parable of the Polygons – a playable post on the shape of society (2014) - anirudh24seven http://ncase.me/polygons/ ====== anirudh24seven Previous discussion on HN: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8716538](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8716538)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Contrasts in How Google Suggests Searches - davidw http://ben.casnocha.com/2009/11/contrasts-in-how-google-suggets-searches.html ====== zach All trumped by "what is the situation" vs. "what is the deal", I think. Too easy? On the other hand, "how to make" is relatively erudite compared to "how to cause." ------ proemeth Showing how there is information in google requests, as well as in indexed pages. I wonder are these statistics analysed/available somwhere? ------ blasdel _"There is nowhere we are more honest than the search box. We don't lie to Google."_	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Samsung rains paper airplanes from space on the heads of Earthians - hoag http://www.itworld.com/offbeat/136204/samsung-rains-paper-airplanes-space-heads-earthians ====== hoag Anybody else rolling their eyes at this?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Apple is Filtering “Jailbreak” Term in the US iTunes Store - ausman http://www.shoutpedia.com/apple-is-filtering-jailbreak-term-in-the-us-itunes-store-11080/ ====== jonhendry I suspect someone at Apple is snarking surreptitiously, and making an unauthorized statement about how "jail breaking" is a dirty word at Apple, by adding it to the list of expletives Apple probably uses on the site. You can still search for the term, and matches still come up, even if the word is "censored". Which is a pretty ineffective way of blocking people from finding things that mention 'jailbreak'. ------ blrblr Guess I won't be able to download that awesome AC/DC song then. ~~~ Wickk The items in question are still there, it's just the name itself that is getting formatted. Side note: Why are the post that are giving apple the benefit of the doubt of this being a mistake getting downvoted? Really guys? ------ fruchtose I'm inclined to believe this is a mistake and not intentional. We're talking about _music_ here, not apps. ~~~ DHowett "All the categories are affected with this filter including _Apps_ , songs, albums, podcast episodes, and iTunes U episodes." Emphasis mine. Further proof: <http://db.tt/OTqocIJJ> (apologies, commenting via mobile.) ~~~ fruchtose Oops. Frankly, I don't know how I missed that. This leads to me believe that it was a mistake on Apple's part to censor "jailbreak" in everything outside of apps. Even then, it's a pretty inane decision. Apple won't approve any jailbreak apps in the first place, so why the censorship? ~~~ alephnil The podcasts and iTunes U are affected by this as well, so it means that Apple stop people from finding content that talks or teaches about jailbreaking as well. ------ codeka I'm happy to give Apple the benefit of the doubt here, maybe it was one individual working on their own and not part of some "company policy", but I don't really see how you can "mistakenly" add a word to a dictionary. ~~~ mattmanser This is exactly the sort of thing a programmer might add as a joke when demonstrating on a local copy and forget to take out for the live deploy. ------ jonhendry Works fine for me. Apps, music, TV shows, podcasts, iTunes U. ------ andyzweb fnord	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Robots and industrialization in developing countries [pdf] - doener http://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/presspb2016d6_en.pdf ====== JoeAltmaier I had a dream where I had the last programming job in the world - writing cobol printer drivers. Then somebody came in and put a box on my desk. "What's that?" "Its a device that can write cobol printer drivers". I stood up, and went to the door, and opened it, and there was only a grey blankness. Then I woke up. ~~~ aswanson Why would computers need to communicate through printouts, tho? ~~~ robotresearcher Pink slips gotta be printed. ------ disordinary It's interesting and a little scary, we're going to have to drastically rethink the way our economies operate and what our lifestyles will be like in the future, and fast. The problem is we've seen that people struggle to let go of old ideals, for instance climate change deniers, because they're reluctant to let go of their lifestyle despite all evidence that it's not sustainable. Unfortunately, the more you fight it the harder the fall will be. This also makes Trumps promise to bring manufacturing back to the US quite interesting, because the labor cost is too expensive in places like China and they are loosing the manufacturing jobs themselves, just to automation. The only way to reverse the tide would be for large subsidies on US based manufacturing, and tariffs on imports, i.e. a protected economy, which has never worked in the past. In fact manufacturing IS returning to the US, Foxconn has been building US factories as have other large contract manufacturers, it makes sense from a supply chain perspective. But the return of manufacturing does not equate to a return in manufacturing jobs, those jobs are gone and will never return. And many, many more jobs will be lost within the coming years. ~~~ grecy > _This also makes Trumps promise to bring manufacturing back to the US quite > interesting...._ The voting in of Trump shows how conservative and not forward-looking the US is. Vast swaths of the South are hell-bent on keeping things the way they are (for better or worse). The US has also been one of the "lower" OECD countries for a decade or two in a lot of measures [1]. I won't be surprised if it's one of the last OECD countries to have a strong manufacturing sector, requiring humans to do a lot of work that in other countries has been replaced. Other countries will figure out how to rethink economies, happiness, purpose, etc, and the US will just keep doing what it's always done. I think there will be tens of millions in OECD countries living with basic income (or something in a similar vein) with tens of millions in the US are still laboring at work. [1] The US is at or very near the worst among OECD countries in: infant mortality, child poverty, child health and safety, life expectancy at birth, healthy life expectancy, rate of obesity, disability-adjusted life years, doctors per 1000 people, deaths from treatable conditions, rate of mental health disorders, rate of drug abuse, rate of prescription drug use, incarceration rate, rate of assaults, rate of homicides, income inequality, wealth inequality, and economic mobility. ~~~ disordinary It's very easy to judge, but when you're in the situation that you've lost your job of 20 years because the plant you work at is no longer competitive, your bank is about to foreclose on your house, and you have to pull your kids out of university because you can no longer pay the tuition. Then the promises of the Trump campaign (and Brexit) become very persuasive. The scary thing is if the politicians themselves actually believe in what they're saying. But maybe they're right, the US has the benefit of being a huge country with most of the resources it needs to survive within its borders, perhaps you tear up trade agreements and start a policy of being more reclusive to protect your industries and employment. I see one huge advantage that the US has in a global world though, and that is (at least for now) it is by far the dominant player in the web space. Countries like Russia and China have their own services that are playing catch up on their US counterparts, but they are still well behind for the most part. In any future imaginable the web, or a successor is going to continue to be the biggest part of our lives and therefore the worlds money will continue to flow into the US. Despite what I just said, I too worry about the US. There seems to be a deep seated suspicion of anything socialist and most of the solutions to a massively automated society seem to be socialist ones (i.e. a universal basic income, or the government regulating businesses to provide for the common good). You'd hope that if it came to that scenario the US would follow suit and provide for its citizens that cannot work. But there is precedent for the opposite, the world went through a similar scenario in the 30's with the great depression. Most countries in the OECD came out of that decade with comprehensive social welfare systems, the US did not. ~~~ T-A > In any future imaginable the web, or a successor is going to continue to be > the biggest part of our lives Reality check: the Internet economy (all of it, not just the web) contributes ~5% to US GDP [1]. [https://www.statista.com/statistics/250703/forecast-of- inter...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/250703/forecast-of-internet- economy-as-percentage-of-gdp-in-g-20-countries/) I would also not be so quick to dismiss especially China's web companies. It's a different world on the other side of the Great Firewall. ~~~ disordinary I was talking about the flow of the worlds money in the future. ------ dfabulich Many of the folks here like CGP Grey's video on this topic, "Humans Need Not Apply" [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU) But you should watch that in contrast with one of his newest videos, "The Rules for Rulers" [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs) > The more the wealth of a nation comes from the productive citizens of the > nation, the more the power gets spread out, and the more the ruler must > maintain the quality of life for those citizens. The less, the less. > Now if a stable democracy becomes very poor, or if a resource that dwarfs > the productivity of the citizens is found, the odds of this gamble change, > and make it more possible for a small group to seize power. ~~~ imaginenore That's why basic income is inevitable. We simply don't have enough jobs for everyone. ~~~ dfabulich I used to think this, but I no longer do. If we get mass automation, I think we're going to get one of these outcomes: 1) Individuals have their own robots. For example, everybody gets their own automated hydroponic garden, enough to provide them with sufficient calories. 2) A dictatorship seizes control of the automation and lets the people starve. I think it's very unlikely that we'll have a welfare-capitalist society where major corporations own mass automation, where the government taxes the corporation so highly that government can pay for everyone else to survive. Taxing mass automation to pay for basic income is just too fragile. If the people themselves aren't providing wealth through productive labor, then at some point, somebody will try to starve them instead of feeding them, and they'll succeed. ~~~ zizee Some throwaway thoughts: Having all production automated will result in falling prices, including the cost to automate something. This should result in a lot of competition, driving prices down even more. In this scenario, it is difficult to imagine someone having a monopoly on production for long, unless they are already a dictator. Dictators tend to have to keep at least a portion of their population happy, otherwise they lose control. A large portion of the population with nothing to loose (as they are starving) tends to result in revolution. If the cost of production (or cost of imports) is close to 0, what motivation (beyond bond style villany) does a dictator have to make their population starve? If everyone is out of work, no one has any money to pay for the products of the capital owners. What's the point of that? ~~~ dfabulich > Dictators tend to have to keep at least a portion of their population happy, > otherwise they lose control. The portion can be very small. It has to include the military, and it has to include the people involved in creating GDP, but if production is centralized (e.g. because the nation's resources are in digging stuff out of the ground), then the masses can be kept very poor. Watch the "Rules for Rulers" video I linked above. Resource-rich dictators don't need to provide public education or adequate roads, say nothing of adequate food. "The people stay quiet, not because this is fine, or because they're scared, but because the cold truth is: starving, disconnected illiterates don't make good revolutionaries." So can production be centralized in the face of mass automation? I think so. Look at farming. Seizing control of all of the farms in the 1880s would be a massive operation spanning the entire North American continent. Seizing control of today's Big Farming conglomerates would be relatively straightforward for a modern dictator. Which is to say, we'll get through this _if_ the automation is decentralized, but if it's like farming, where a few _expensive_ machines make all of the food for hundreds of millions of people, then we're on a path to ruin. ~~~ henrikschroder > we'll get through this if the automation is decentralized I'm following the 3D-printing and makerspace movement because of this. It's imperative that blueprints for vital objects to be 3D-printed aren't locked up by copyrights. ------ anigbrowl I have yet to see a political party with a coherent response to the looming specter of automation. Don't get me wrong, I'm very much in favor of robotic technology, but it's not compatible with existing capitalistic structures. ~~~ dogma1138 Well there is considerably less threat to workers in regards to automation in the West than in the developing world, we've outsourced everything already to the developing world, now the developing world is about the experience the same thing. The west has sufficient capital and social infrastructure to get by even without a preemptive socioeconomic changes the developing world doesn't have the luxury. The girls that work in sweatshops in Bangladesh won't be able to retrain or become master crafters selling overpriced crap on Etsy because you'll going to be buying clothes from a dispensary that would 3D print or weave the clothes in minutes to fit your size and specifications perfectly, while people in the west can. Truck drivers will likely to find other things to do since there will be sufficient capital to pay for jobs, newer generations would have jobs that don't exist yet, heck as long as the west keeps generating wealth the "self employed neohipster economy" can continue growing, we have youtube stars that make millions each year, and there aren't as few of them as you think, you can make a pretty good money from selling bamboo sticks on Etsy, and when everyone will have a 3D printer, weaver and CNC milling machine in their home or at the local 7/11 people would be able to sell their designs on the printer's template store. Just like smartphones enabled everyone with even basic programming skills to make a decent income from selling apps, like youtube and other sites enabled people to make money by generating content, automation including on-demand manufacturing will generate new opportunities. But these opportunities will likely to be limited to the already privileged just like every other opportunity beforehand, the developing world always gets the scraps of the table. ~~~ disordinary The west is going to loose millions of jobs, and you're talking about replacing them with thousands. The mainstay of developed countries are the service industries, but already we've lost bank tellers, checkout operators, petrol station concierges, etc. to automation. Next in line will be couriers, truck drivers, taxi drivers, etc. Eventually most jobs will be lost. As a developer, if I'm lucky enough to have a job in the future, it will be writing specifications for code that will be automatically generated. We aren't going to replace all of those jobs with hand crafted jewelry. ~~~ intended What people need to consider is that new jobs are being made and economics has not stopped working. The question is - are the new jobs as well paying as the jobs which are lost. ~~~ anigbrowl Some new jobs are being made, but not enough. Actually, serious economists are beginning to worry that macroeconomics _is_ broken and that the existing models of economic development are no longer functioning as expected. I think the chief economist at the World Bank counts as a 'serious economist' and urge you to read his paper described in this news article: [http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/policy- trends/...](http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/policy-trends/world- banks-chief-economist-romer-says-macroeconomics-in- trouble/articleshow/55508187.cms) I really love economics, but you've got to realize that while microeconomics is extremely rigorous and everyone should know some of it, macroeconomics involves a great deal of ideological assumptions and hand-waving, and doesn't have a good theory of technological disruption any more than it has a really good theory of oligopoly. ------ dmichulke I cannot help it but see this as a socialist opinion piece. _Clearly, without the introduction of a major tax on robots as capital equipment, robot-based manufacturing cannot boost the fiscal revenues needed to finance both social transfers, to support workers made redundant by robots, and minimum wages, to stem a decline in the living standards of low- skilled and medium-skilled workers._ If robots do the work AND there is a functioning market, this will have two effects: \- substitution of low-skilled labor \- cheaper prices across the board People most often forget the second item and ask for transfers as if people were automatically entitled because socialism. But they will get their share via the second item. Also, work is infinite because human needs are infinite. Maybe servants in households become more popular again, who knows? If work weren't infinite we would all be unemployed already, according to the theories of 19th century economists. Yet here we are, working, and repeating the same mistake. Another argument is that in the worst case we can just destroy all robots (and factories and wheels while we're at it), let's find out if we're better off after that or worse. Finally, the current economic mainstream calls out "deflation" as the biggest threat to the economy, yet it is deflation that will increase real wages automagically. Of course, highly indebted entities (such as your government) will want you to believe otherwise so they claim that everything grinds to a halt if we just have negative inflation for a few months. Also, Central Banks would lose their justification if deflation is discovered to be not as bad as claimed. ~~~ Retric I make decent but not insane money and feel zero need to budget because there is just not all that much stuff I want to buy. Unlimited wants is really an unproven assumption not reality. PS: Planned obsolecence for example is a direct result of limited wants. ~~~ dmichulke While I do believe you don't want more stuff, I have a hard time believing you wouldn't want more _time_ , be it via a chauffeur, cleaning service, butler, cook, someone to run your errands or wait in line at the doctor. There is also improvements you might want to have like \- a faster computer \- a bigger apartment Now I know these options are not on the table today because you can get along without them but I doubt that if the price was low enough that you'd skip them. But if indeed none of this convinces you, let me know your profession - my bet would be you are a well-earning Zen monk :) ~~~ majewsky Why would I need to invest into having more time when work is supposedly going away, this leaving me with more time automatically? ~~~ dmichulke I did not say "need to", I said "want to". Please comment below and say "I promise I will never want more time or more money, neither today nor in the future" if this is untrue. EDIT: I used _human needs_ before but I'm not sure this is entirely synonymous to _human wants_ ------ cconcepts In my line of work, the recent increases in health and safety legislation and resulting costs of compliance with having personnel on site in situations where they might get harmed in any way means that the return for automating processes is HUGE even compared to five years ago. My prediction is that we will be forced into a situation where we have millions unemployed and needing universal basic income because they were educated to be employed in a system that suddenly lost its ability to accept any risk to people....which coincided with the technological ability to automate their jobs away. The fact that people get hurt will eliminate their ability to be a viable means of production in many industries. ~~~ abrkn I like to think about the locomotive train. It must have been a very difficult time to be in the horse business. Yet here we are. ~~~ lxmorj And where are the horses? ~~~ intended That's actually good enough to spread quickly. ------ rdtsc Happened to father-in-law. Worked at a printing company. Before used older machinery which needed more manual operations, more fixing and supervising. Company bought a new German printer, it was automated and more advanced. Required only a fraction of people from before to run it. Owners tried not to be evil and kept a lot of employees. People who used to do more intense manual work, were now standing around watching the new marvelous German-engineered printer do its magic. Some of the positions were almost made up just give workers a chance to stay longer. At some point they offered people money to quit. Some took that option, including father-in-law. Not sure what happened to others. Basic income is a good idea. I am behind it. But people like my father-in-law would be against taking it. They'd need to do some work, to feel like they are useful and they are earning a paycheck. I think the idea has to be promoted carefully so it doesn't seem like a handout or redistribution of wealth. Not exactly sure what the solution would look like. ~~~ erikpukinskis Why not just pay people to do what they were doing before? You still have to paint, but you do it for free for whoever wants it. Since you're doing it by hand, and can take as long as you need, you can do more personal work, for people you care about. Paint a church. Paint a local business. Have a skeleton organization that basically just works as a dispatcher and collector of time sheets. You still only get paid for work done. ~~~ rdtsc Could, be yeah. They tried some of that there and it worked for a bit. I think the company probably found it unsustainable and first they offered a lump sum for people to quit, then they might lay people off. At some point the idea is that companies who automate and don't keep the people because, well that's what makes them more money, will win or out- compete those who don't. Maybe basic income can be used to incentivize people to learn more -- learn to program, social help (learn to help others, provide care for elderly), learn to manage and maintain robots, maybe find a way to strengthen the community (we'll pay you, but if you help build or maintain the local school you get paid more...?) ------ tbrownaw So, way less drastic than the number of agriculture jobs taken by machinery (reduced from "practically everyone" to "the U.S.A. is at under 2%"). Cool. ~~~ IndianAstronaut People don't realize that the tractor was basically the number one job killer for humanity. We went from 70%+ of the population involved in farming to less than 3%. We created new industries and jobs from that and we will do so again. ~~~ JoeAltmaier What jobs? There is a limit to human needs. At some point the robots will feed, clothe, transport, heal and entertain us all. What remains? Hobbies? We will have to invent make-work things for folks to do I guess. And call it work. ~~~ jlj Art, music, creativity. Spending time with friends and family. Getting back to basics. Going fishing, hang out at the beach. Stargazing. Plant a garden. No commute or cubicles, work for the sake of doing interesting work. Traveling to Mars for fun. If all of our basic material needs are fulfilled, and we only take what we need, it would be an interesting and rewarding ride. That's the optimist side of me speaking. It could go the other way too if we humans want to keep fighting and arguing over resources and power. I hope that we could learn to get past that if everyone has what they need. I think about the change my 94 year old grandmother has seen in her lifetime. The technologies and types of jobs we have now compared to her early days are mind blowing. The rate of change today seems orders of magnitude faster and keeps accelerating. Bring on the robots. ~~~ intrasight My grandmother was born in 1901 and passed away in 2000. The list of new technologies that came into being during her lifetime is astounding. Your todo list is very sensible and, in my opinion, very doable. Other than a couple items, I do it now. I would like to be optimistic and say that in the future with more automation that many more could live as well as I do. ------ nopinsight There are four major categories of jobs that can resist automation: 1) Entrepreneurs and organizers who initiate new products, services, movements, or new styles of arts and interactions. 2) People experts--designers, entertainers, artists, experience enhancers, high-level service personnels, value-enhancing salespeople--who understand deep human needs and use their creativity, empathy, interpersonal skills, and technology to realize them. Routine "people jobs" that customers wouldn't pay more to interact with humans could be replaced by AI agents, in some cases in humaniod robotic bodies. 3) Well-rounded analysts who can communicate with clients and stakeholders and translate their needs into fairly high-level specifications for automation technology to perform. Low-level programming jobs will increasingly become more of a niche as software & platforms can adapt better through machine learning and upcoming AI advances. More and more software will be programmable, implicitly and explicitly, by end users. 4) Locomotion specialists--physical therapists, specialist nurses, dentists-- who integrate theoretical knowledge and experience with their flexibility and dexterity. Robotics technology will take a good many decades before it can cost effectively compete with these experts. I think we may achieve human- level ability to think and solve problems flexibly before these people are challenged. _(Let me know if there are categories I miss.)_ \-- It seems to me categories 1) and 2) above may have the most openings for workers in the future. Education systems in most of the world are badly inadequate for preparing people for those jobs, however. The worst-fit systems are in developing countries where they are still heavily rooted in models for training 20th century industrial workers. Open-ended educational models like Montessori need to spread much more widely to prevent inequitable jobless future for the masses. Note: Basic income is orthogonal to having respectable occupations and providing value to community. It is likely that human psychology has been shaped, culturally and even evolutionarily, in a way that people need a purpose and a valued occupation to live and feel well. (Perhaps the average number of working hours will be reduced to 3-4 hours per day and people will be free to pursue their hobbies and social activities.) ~~~ corecoder What about caregivers, like baby sitters, nurses etc? Will we entrust unattended machines with our children any time soon? ~~~ corecoder Also: we are mainly talking of automating manufacture and transportation, but are we that close to automating house and road building and repairing? Edit: damn autocorrect ~~~ nopinsight Yes, on-site constructions seem to be among those I left out. The locomotion, weight-balancing, sensory, and reasoning skills required are close to or at AGI level as well. It could probably be grouped with category 4 above. ------ Chathamization I wouldn't be surprised if that happens in the developing world. As someone else pointed out, if your economy changes from a mostly agricultural one to one more similar to developed nations (where most people aren't involved in agriculture), you're naturally seeing most of your old jobs disappear to automation (and many new ones open up). In the developed world we don't seem to be going through much of a automation revolution at the moment - for example, U.S. productivity growth is actually fairly low right now[1]. [1] [http://www.bls.gov/lpc/prodybar.htm](http://www.bls.gov/lpc/prodybar.htm) ------ chiefalchemist Yet another election issue that never was. Let's hope everyone promised manufacturing jobs doesn't get upset when they find out the truth ~~~ randomdata There does seem to be a plan there. The President elect plans to abolish the federal minimum wage[1]. Not even robots can compete with free. [1] [http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/05/09/donald- tr...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/05/09/donald-trumps- excellent-economic-idea-abolish-the-federal-minimum-wage/) ------ Pica_soO Good thing, that in our heads, we are just medieval community monkeys, yearning for a role, a place in our daily life. Well - the replaced already replaced a president, to replace those that replace them, in the short and long run. Now- if everybody loses his place in society's maze at this pace, then the unraveled community's will take up the mace and smash the enlightenment straight in the face. The Last AI to go may as well, be the UN-Report Writer in space. "Anything that gives a human being meaning - as long as it chooses it voluntarily, is off limits to the machines." Hammer that in stone, put it up on Palo Alto Plaza. The scape-goat hunt is in full progress, and once the Society runs out of scape-goats, they will start to bite into the financial protective shields of the transformation accelerators and propellers. He who runs out of propaganda money last, shall sit upon the crumbling hill - victorious? Makes for a interesting Fermi Paradox solution- society self-medievialized and religious entrenched against progress and machinery until the cosmic dice ends it. ------ known Freedom from Robots [http://marshallbrain.com/robotic- freedom.htm](http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-freedom.htm) ------ Lazare I can't wait to live in that world. The sheer increase in wealth and quality of life that this will represent, at every stratum of society, is going to be immense. ~~~ cmurf Let's pretend food, clothing, and shelter (structure) can be made cost free due to automation/robots. Land itself right now is not free, it is either owned or rented. In either case people need an income to pay for that. Where does this income come from? Or, do you destroy land ownership? And if it's destroyed, how is it determined who lives where and how much they get if all land "costs" the same. ------ emblem21 Robots solve one problem very, very well: Labor shortages. Rural America is poor, not because it is not rich in natural capital and real estate, but because it suffers from a perpetual labor shortage. (14 percent of the U.S. rural are spread across 72 percent of the Nation's land area) Urbanization has a monopoly on talent at this point in time because of globalization and the wealth structure of internationalist neoliberal capitalism. (The Silicon Valley model) Robotic labor will change that, especially given the strictness of UAV laws in the US and the UK today. They are practically legislating that drones must find profitability in low-value, low-population areas. Fine. Challenge accepted. To give another example of such labor shortages, 75% of the United Arab Emirates population is Chinese, Indian, Pakistani, and Filipino immigrants doing construction jobs. The other 2.3 million native UAE nationals can't possibly engage in all of the ancillary labor opportunities that Dubai money commands. Wealthy nations are suffering from labor shortages all over the world and have been for decades. They've raced to solve these problems in the only way they know how: _attracting the flow of post-colonials because of standards of living arbitrage_. (Very often, people used to being so poor being treated like garbage in a wealthy nation is a significantly better prospect than staying home) In the EU, for example, they can no longer print their own currency, but each member state can still issue bonds. They are already engaging in socialist taxation regimes, so raising taxes to pay for the bonds is impossible. Therefore, you need to enrich your corporations by giving them access to cheap labor and pray you can tax them before they allocate their new found wealth in the Isle of Mann. Unfortunately, this impulse isn't such a clean transition, as most of these old world nations (with old world money) have the political, institutional, and cultural reflex to give new blood two options: _Comply with your role in our social pecking order 100% or be exiled /imprisoned/exterminated._ Race riots, cultural flare-ups, demographic conflict, and other Huntingtonian events can easily be exploited and exacerbated by political opportunists, ultimately destabilizing the very social configuration that made your nation attractive to begin with. No matter what the well-wishers say, when it all goes belly up, civilizations always divide themselves along ethnic (the American definition) lines. If we continue to refuse (as many have since the 1970s) addressing the labor shortage problem with our established institutions, people like me will be forced to address it technologically and your cherished institutions and the morality that they stand upon will be ground into the dirt upon its passing. ~~~ jordanb A labor shortage means wages go up. If wages aren't going up then there's no labor shortage. An alternate theory for why resources aren't being exploited is an aggregate demand shortfall. This would result in low capital utilization, low labor utilization and slow growth. Which model better fits the facts in the world today: the one which supposes there's a labor shortage or the one that supposes a demand shortfall? ~~~ emblem21 > A labor shortage means wages go up. If wages aren't going up then there's no > labor shortage. This is correct in theoretical economics. This is incorrect in actual economic practice only because theoretical economics has no game theory model for political advantages. In fact, the entire concept of these advantages are hand-waved away as "corruption". Labor shortage only justifies wage advantage among specialist workers. (Programmers, lawyers, accounts, and other symbol artisans) Labor shortage among common workers justifies _cost crisis_ for the producer, forcing them to engage in political games via lobbyists to discover advantage for the cheapest worker and alter the laws to make that worker accessible. (The Ford model) > An alternate theory for why resources aren't being exploited is an aggregate > demand shortfall. This would result in low capital utilization, low labor > utilization and slow growth. The current aggregate demand shortfall happened after 2008, in which the Fed absorbed all toxic mortgages and cut off the productive forces of the world to supply the American housing boon. The entire global economy was geared for that type of collective oil consumption, and when it became obvious Americans couldn't pay their mortgages, the jig was up. Yes, this resulted in slow growth for the PREVIOUS configuration of human interaction. (The Miltonian model) Every housing opportunity short was taken off of the books AND off of the market, depriving housing service labor wealth opportunities and consolidating them all into the Fed. Thus, the housing market was forced into an artificial labor shortage because of artificial inventory contraction. In exchange, the banks were given an asset swap, flooding them with liquidity, and they all sought profit opportunities overseas to pay themselves out of outright nationalization in exchange for their hard assets. Thus. the post-war American consumer role of first and last resort for world productivity was intentionally stifled by Federal Reserve intervention, resulting in time- specialized capital utilization, which cause low mass capital and mass labor utilization, finalizing in slow growth. > Which model better fits the facts in the world today: the one which supposes > there's a labor shortage or the one that supposes a demand shortfall? Current demand shortfall is a byproduct of the factors I have mentioned above, and hardly a model worth extrapolating from unless you can eliminate the Federal Reserve's role in the matter. In a world in which there is no consumer of first and last resort, what is the alternative? China absorbs its own productive capacity? African consumption absorbs… what? Facebook's benevolence? You're left with an intentionally fractured world in which nations are forced to realign their entire political and social arrangements to maximize oil consumption from a dynamic list of competitors to stave off politically destabilizing labor shortages. This means that, if oil is deprived from your nation, you will absolutely experience a politically destabilizing labor shortage! You will not be able to mobilize your masses to chase global opportunity because you will be priced out of the game before you even start… unless you engage in socialistic configuration to absolutely control prices, and then you're just managing peak production limitations. If my reasoning holds, then the question is thus: Is America experiencing an oil shortage? ~~~ stale2002 Oil prices are lower than they have been in years. We can buy as much oil as we want for cheap. ~~~ emblem21 Consuming oil means you are engaging in economic activity. If oil is cheap, then the profits from that economic activity should be higher across the aggregate of labor. If oil is cheap and it is not being consumed, then the profits to be had through its consumption _are not high enough_. If the oil is cheap and it __is __being consumed, then the profits to be had through its consumption are _too low_. If the profits of oil consumption are not high enough, then what we are actually describing is a labor shortage because the _human_ cost of living has deterred additional oil consumption. Thus, labor that does not have to shoulder such costs of living (robotic) CAN consume oil and achieve profits to sustain its own consumption. So if oil is cheap and no one is buying it, it is because we have a labor shortage for that particular oil price point. ------ pilooch Bernard? ------ c-smile Don't worry! Mr. Trump will build the wall between us and robots. And those robots will pay for it. Hasta la vista! ------ treelovinhippie I think what we need is a new economic paradigm whereby humans work in symbiosis with AI and ever encroaching automation. There's a model I'm working on where the base economic protocols are coded into a decentralized blockchain platform like Ethereum. Usually the knee-jerk easy response to automation is universal basic income. And while I wish/want us to all have a UBI; those in the developing world will definitely be the last groups on the planet to receive one. The future vision of the blockchain is the complete dismantling of all hierarchies and total autonomy at the individual level. So governments, organizations, VC, companies, jobs etc are replaced with DAOs and blockchain- based co-ops capable of the same or greater complexity and value-add without the hierarchy. The big issue I'm facing, and I think the whole ecosystem is facing, is how do you transition the global economy to that future? It needs to be incremental but rapid, familiar but new, to exploit existing human incentives and status quo's while hiding all the unfamiliar crypto jargon behind the scenes such that anyone can immediately and intuitively adopt the new economic protocol. ~~~ disordinary I wonder if it's going to be that big a deal where you live, the huge companies now know no borders. We live in a world of such scale that it's nearly impossible to compete with the companies that are established. As we loose jobs to multinationals and automation then something has to change in the way we structure our economies, because the income divide will grow as the rich (who earn wealth from owning) will not suffer as much as the middle class and poor (who earn money from working). At the very least companies like Google, Amazon, Facebook, etc. Are going to have to start paying fair taxes in any jurisdiction that they operate in. The fact that technology will be cheaper and more accessible (see the SpaceX internet satellite constellation) and no one will have jobs in the developed or developing world, coupled with the fact that in general poorer countries seem to have more natural resources (that can be automated but still generate wealth for the house country), means that things might actually level between the developed and developing. Of course the big companies will be based in the US and Europe, but unless you're giving every single person shares the money that they make will go to a few. In this admittedly doomsday scenario the money will actually drop because people won't be working to pay for services or buy products, but the scale will be such that they will still be highly profitable. Expect revolutions before that day.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Explore the President's Stock and Business Returns - bingdig https://www.govtrades.com/executive ====== bingdig Thanks so much for all the support and volunteers on our original Show HN post showing senate data! We've been able to add executive branch data and are well on our way to adding data for members of the House of Representatives. Hope you enjoy. ------ gregory194 This blog can referred before we invest in a share and make the right choice, keep writing blogs of this kind . Good one.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
The ABCs of virtual private servers, Part 1: Why go virtual? - evo_9 http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2011/02/virtual-private-servers.ars ====== prodigal_erik A hypervisor is just an operating system (arbiter of resource use) relying on legacy operating systems as compatibility shims, because it has a native API nobody wants to deal with. It seems strange that we see resource contention problems when applications try to coexist on an operating system, and our response is to give each app its own guest O/S and then try to make _those_ coexist. Why do we expect an improvement? I can't believe the existing O/S schedulers and paging policies were so poor that anything similar written from scratch for a hypervisor will automatically make better decisions despite less visibility into what's going on. That said, I can certainly see a win in virtualization for testing. If your production system will have a large set of discrete machines communicating, you can simulate that with a much smaller pool of QA machines (maybe just one). ~~~ regularfry I could be wrong, but I don't _think_ the argument for virtualisation was that it would fix resource contention, except possibly under some fairly rarefied conditions. ------ axod Downsides to VPS 1. You pay stupidly high monthly costs based on RAM. This makes little sense, as RAM is ridiculously cheap. 2. You pay masses for bandwidth if you go over. ~~~ regularfry 1\. You'll always pay more renting than buying in the long run. The difference is a factor of how efficient the market is, I guess. A high memory quad XL instance on Amazon has near enough 64GB of RAM, which you can have for $2.00 per hour, or $5300 for a reserved instance for a year. If you wanted to buy that much outright, you'd be paying a couple of thousand _just for the DIMMs_. Then you've got to buy and maintain the box to put them in, knowing that it'll have depreciated _significantly_ over the year. I guess it depends on what you're actually planning to do with the RAM once you've got it, but it doesn't look like too bad a deal to me. 2\. That depends on your VPS host, really. ~~~ axod 2\. Show me a VPS host that has cheap bandwidth. For example, lets say we need 10TB of transfer. Slicehost: $3,000 (0.30/GB !!! WTF are they smoking) Amazon: $1,250 (Assume 5TB in, 5TB out, in US) Linode: $1,000 (0.10/GB Good for VPS, but still crazy) Typical dedicated server: $99 with 10TB included. Amazon is ridiculously expensive. I know it's really "hip" to use it, but it's throwing money away. I guess if it's VC's money then who cares if you get to say "We're cloud hosted!!!". Bandwidth pricing on VPS hosts is just crazily expensive. ~~~ tasaro 10TB/month averages out to 32Mbps. From what I've heard, try using anywhere near that on your typical "all you can eat" provider and you'll either be QoS'd enough to never achieve it or you'll suddenly be in violation of some finely printed Terms of Service. ~~~ axod I do around 5mpbs on dedicated servers without issue, I've peaked at 100mps without too much fuss. ------ uggedal Though a bit dated, I wrote a performance comparison of some of the providers mentioned in this article: <http://journal.uggedal.com/vps-performance- comparison> ------ latch Wrote an introduction to hosting a while ago if anyone's interested: <http://openmymind.net/2010/10/26/An-Introduction-To-Hosting> Goes beyond VPSs and tries to look at the different options, plus the options typically available. ------ fleitz VPSs are great if you need less than the resources of one server, need a number of machines for a short period of time or your tasks are not disk IO intensive. All that work you did to make your IO sequential goes to waste as soon as you put it on a VPS. It will be interesting to see if SSDs overcome the typical VPS limitations. ~~~ btmorex I'd say VPSs are great if you're CPU bound, okay if you're memory bound, and terrible if you're disk IO bound. Basically, CPU time is an abundant resource that's easily partitioned, but can be shared. So, you're guaranteed your share, but you often actually get more than your share. Memory is strictly partitioned. You always get your share, no more, no less. Disk is almost impossible to partition fairly (performance, not space). Furthermore, the more active disk users there are the worse the total performance is, so if you're unlucky enough to have a neighbor that uses a lot of disk IO than you effectively get double screwed. What would be interesting is if someone came up with a VPS with dedicated disk resources, but as far as I know no one has done that. ~~~ tres For your better quality VPS providers, memory isn't really an issue because memory is dedicated. For your old time OpenVZ/Virtuozzo low-end box, that's not the case. You can oversell every resource on an OpenVZ box... Back in the day SW-Soft was claiming you could provision hundreds of VPSs on a 32 bit server. I never saw anything close to that, but I've seen some amazingly oversold servers trying to keep up with disk I/O. One of the nice things about Xen is that disk I/O can be controlled somewhat because each domU has a specific process in dom0 for disk access. So you can ionice things & provide a somewhat more controlled access to the disk. ~~~ sparky Memory capacity is typically dedicated (e.g., Linode), but memory bandwidth is difficult to allocate statically, and can be a huge problem even if you're fine on capacity. For example, a simulator I like to run has a 50-60MB working set, much larger than on-chip cache but well under my allocated 512MB of RAM. However, other concurrent users can disproportionately use up DRAM bandwidth, depending on their access pattern and the OS scheduler. ~~~ tres I've never seen a hardware node get anywhere near saturating the bus before disk I/O became an issue. So yes, there is a potential for saturation; however, I'd be really happy if that were my capacity bottleneck. ------ epynonymous i use vps for development and beta environments. anything production quality needs to go on physical hardware. ~~~ latch needs? is there some type of law for this where you live? Have you seen the list of _production_ sites running on EC2? (<http://aws.amazon.com/solutions/case-studies/>) Linode also has some pretty impressive sites...linode.com probably being the most obvious one. ------ bradleyland This really has nothing to do with the content of the article, but it's one of the reasons I respect Ars so much. There is not one mention of "cloud" outside the vendor's specific product names in the entire article. In other words, Ars' authors and editors don't play the buzzword bingo game.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Google App Engine SDK for PHP - k0t0n0 https://developers.google.com/appengine/downloads#Google_App_Engine_SDK_for_PHP ====== DonaldDerek Heard about it in the Google IO, I wish there was a NodeJs SDK for app engine to be honest..	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Notice: We're turning off the YC application form at 10pm Pacific - pg Since people are still applying, I thought we'd better announce when the application form will be turned off. If you want to apply, do it by tonight at 10 Pacific time. Please don't get your hopes up, though. The odds of a late application getting funded are much lower, and the odds of us funding one this late (the first dinner is on Tuesday) are very low indeed. ====== davidu I'm sure you'd agree that the quality of an idea has no bearing on the time that it was submitted. So I wonder... Do you think you've missed any investments because the company timing didn't coalesce with a funding cycle? ~~~ koenigdavidmj Then they wait a couple months and show up much earlier in the next cycle. ~~~ lanstein nice handle :) ~~~ spicyj I assume that's just his name and middle initials? ~~~ LaPingvino koenigdavid = king David ------ mrduncan I'm curious - how many at this point (if any) have been funded which were submitted late? ~~~ pg 4 ------ alex1 Will every application get a response, even if it's a rejection? ~~~ pg Yes.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
WeddingInviteLove: A Comprehensive Wedding Invitation Designer Directory - limedaring http://thenextweb.com/apps/2011/04/15/weddinginvitelove-a-comprehensive-wedding-invitation-designer-directory/ ====== iseff Looks nice. There's also OneWed (<http://www.onewed.com>) which has a directory of all types of wedding vendors as well as their sister site, Nearlyweds (<http://www.nearlyweds.com>), which makes beautiful wedding web sites. I highly recommend them (disclaimer: I'm also friends with them. :)). ~~~ gadders But are those created by Hacker News posters? [http://www.limedaring.com/im-a-designer-who-learned- django-a...](http://www.limedaring.com/im-a-designer-who-learned-django-and- launched-her-first-webapp-in-6-weeks/) I definitely intend to use that service for my next few marriages. ~~~ limedaring :) Thanks! ------ terrichan Congrats! I've been following WIL's progress as a designer co-founder myself. Proud of ya that you learnt to program urself. ~~~ limedaring Thanks! Still got a ton to learn, but working for yourself makes it fun and definitely worth it. ------ sushumna hey Tracy, I've been following WIL's progress for quite sometime. Very impressive.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Deep learning may need a new programming language - bobjordan https://venturebeat.com/2019/02/18/facebooks-chief-ai-scientist-deep-learning-may-need-a-new-programming-language/ ====== xvilka What about Julia[1]? Seems like a perfect fit[2]. [1] [https://julialang.org/](https://julialang.org/) [2] [https://juliacomputing.com/domains/ml-and- ai.html](https://juliacomputing.com/domains/ml-and-ai.html) ~~~ orbifold It is not typesave and doesn’t really support programming in the large. I think the best bet is something like Swift or Microsoft could come out with a C#/F# compatible thing. ~~~ mark_l_watson I was curious about Julia, mostly to experiment with the Flux machine learning library. I tried some ‘general purpose’ Julia programming: network IO, consuming RDF data, some natural language processing/text processing, etc. I was specifically interested in the question ‘could Julia be my general purpose language?’. In reality, I am too much into Lisp languages, Haskell, etc. to seriously want a new language, so this was just a two evening experiment. ~~~ dunefox > In reality, I am too much into Lisp languages, Haskell, etc. to seriously > want a new language, so this was just a two evening experiment. But what did you think of Julia? ~~~ mark_l_watson Julia is a very nice language. Still, I would not use it for a large project with many developers: similar situation as Python. ------ ovi256 >Python ... the language forms the basis for Facebook’s PyTorch and Google’s TensorFlow frameworks The state of journalism today ... their Github repo web pages show that there's more C++ than Python in both repos. ~~~ throwawaymath To be fair, while that's true I think what's meant here is that Python is the language of choice for _using_ Tensorflow and PyTorch. Probably no other language is used to interface with deep learning libraries and primitives as much as Python. ~~~ ovi256 >I think what's meant here is that Python is the language of choice for using Tensorflow and PyTorch So it's a good editor that's lacking too, besides the fact-checkers. ------ sandGorgon This is the reason why swift for tensorflow initiative was started by Google - [https://github.com/tensorflow/swift/blob/master/README.md](https://github.com/tensorflow/swift/blob/master/README.md) Facebook will obviously go its our own way. Given their investments in the JS ecosystem, im hoping they end up choosing Typescript for this. ~~~ dtech Is Facebook adopting Typescript or are they still full-in on Flow, their own competing typed Javscript alternative? ~~~ sandGorgon [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18918038](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18918038) Jest is a Facebook project for testing React. They moved from Flow to Typescript. [https://github.com/facebook/jest/pull/7554](https://github.com/facebook/jest/pull/7554) Dont want this thread to go OT. But I do think Typescript will be an awesome counterpart to Swift-for-Tensorflow on the ML side. ------ thecatspaw Im sorry, but this very much feels like a fluff piece. Yes we _may_ need a new programming language, or we may not. Half of this article is about hardware, while only a small part of it is about programming languages. > There are several projects at Google, Facebook, and other places to kind of > design such a compiled language that can be efficient for deep learning, but > it’s not clear at all that the community will follow, because people just > want to use Python Are the libraries not implemented in native code? The brief mention that python gets does not really detail what is wrong with it, aside from not beeing compiled I guess. But that is no issue if the libraries are native, so I dont see a reason to move away from python, let alone create a new programming language for it ~~~ lugg You don't have to check baby's diaper to know they went number 2. Python ML code is a bit of a joke. If you're any kind of semi professional developer who sees deep learning code for the first time and doesn't say "what the fuck would you do it like that for", I simply don't know what to tell you. Im not saying a new language will fix this problem but some new primitives and idiomatic options protecting people from themselves probably wouldn't hurt the industry. Likewise, something more ergonomic might actually improve onboarding new developers into the space. ~~~ ageofwant poo-poo, people will insult your sensibilities using whatever language you choose, the "problem" is not them, or the language or its idioms, its you. If you write ML code for money, you are a pro, the end. Python is not perfect, but everything else is worse, far worse. What is the product that falls out of a ML pipeline ? ML pro-tip: its not hand-crafted artisanal code. ~~~ lugg My complaints about ML prettiness were unclear but to clarify it's usually criticism aimed at library authors who often come from very academic backgrounds with very poor sense (lack of exp?) of just how lazy professional developers are. Case in point, you don't care if it comes out as poop because you're getting shit done. Hell it seems like you don't even care if you have to wade in it for another 5 years. Kudos, but what if i told you if the tooling authors could have ensured you never wrote poop but still got shit done? ------ amelius The main problem, imho, is that (for best performance) most libraries require the programmer to create a data flowgraph, and to think in terms of this graph. However, this is the perfect job for a compiler. In mainstrain compilers, dataflow analysis has traditionally been the task of the compiler, so it seems silly to break with this tradition. A new (compiled) language could bring us back on track. ~~~ spinningslate I'd probably argue the opposite. Dataflow is a natural way to think about ML activities. The problem is that no mainstream languages offer dataflow as a first class construct; at best it's a set of libraries. That creates some impedance mismatch between intent and implementation. That compilers already do dataflow under the covers would hopefully mean that implementing a first- class dataflow language wouldn't be too hard. ~~~ giornogiovanna What would a language primitive for "dataflow" look like, and what would it offer over an implementation as a library? ~~~ spinningslate There are a few things, nicely covered in "Concepts, Techniques and Models of Computer Programming" by Van Roy and Heridi [0]. Briefly: 1\. First-class dataflow variables 2\. Syntax for creating flows (c/f pipe in *nix shell) 3\. Transparent parallelisation All of these things exist in libraries of various sorts, but can feel cumbersome compared to native syntax. [0] [https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/concepts-techniques-and- model...](https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/concepts-techniques-and-models- computer-programming) ------ posnet I know Nim has some interesting working going on here, [https://github.com/mratsim/Arraymancer](https://github.com/mratsim/Arraymancer) As well as that esolang that appeared a few months ago on the front page. [https://github.com/mrakgr/The-Spiral-Language](https://github.com/mrakgr/The- Spiral-Language) ------ widforss It would be hilarious if everybody suddenly shifted to a Prolog implementation with ML functionality ¯\\(°_o)/¯ ~~~ XuMiao I like the idea. There are two types of ml jobs. One for modeling and another for computation. The former deals with the communication with human. The latter deals with the communication with machines. I would prefer that a statistical logic programing language (maybe extended from prolog) for the modeling part. A strong compiler tool or service that compiles it into any machines, on cloud or edge. Most of the time, what human likes to achieve is small and declarative. But for any small modifications of the program, we have to think about the computational flow, deal with the type errors and tune the low level efficiency of CPU and GPU. It's a waste. I like the settings of SQL where modelers use SQL to mine data while engineers maintain the performance of the computational engines. ------ Kip9000 There's already Nim ([https://nim-lang.org/](https://nim-lang.org/)), which is Python like syntax and statically typed, with easy parallelisations etc already. What's lacking is the adoption as it wasn't hyped up. There's rarely a need to create yet another language and wait till it becomes mature and fixed all the issues with the eco system etc. If at all what's required is a way of translating all the Python libs to Nim or some similar effort. ~~~ dunefox In my opinion, I'd rather see F# or Julia succeed. ------ pts_ Why did everyone dump C++? Oh wait, they didn't. ~~~ pjmlp Depends on the context. On GPGPU programming certainly not, in fact latest NVidia's hardware is designed explicitly for C++ workloads. On GUI frameworks, C++ no longer has the spotlight on OS SDKs that it once had. ~~~ pts_ My point is all AI worth its salt (robots) is C++ based in production. ~~~ pjmlp There I fully agree with you, specially with NVidia doing C++ in hardware. ~~~ eggy NVidia is adopting ADA/Spark for autonomous vehicles work [1]. It's service- proven, compiles to C/C++ speeds, and is safe. I learned Turbo Pascal in college in the 80s after Basic, C and assembler in the late 70s, early 80s, and I am attracted to languages like Haskell, Julia, Lisp, and J/APL, yet after toying with Spark, I think it is probably a good fit to do safe, ML at C/C++ speeds. It would be easy to hook it into all the C++ of TensorFlow too. [1] [https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2019/02/05/adacore-secure- auto...](https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2019/02/05/adacore-secure-autonomous- driving/) ~~~ pjmlp Yeah that as well. I belong to the same fanboy club, which is kind of why I do like C++ and not so much about C. I just don't see many adopting it without legislation enforcement, which is why the focus is on autonomous vehicles, where Ada already has a good story. ~~~ eggy If I am not trying to write verbose, safe code with things like Rust or Spark, I still have a thing for low-level C vs. C++ bloat for fun stuff. I am going to commit this year to Spark, and probably Rust if Spark doesn't work for me, and then C++ after Rust. I have not used C++ in years, so I need to look at the latest and greatest before passing judgement. ------ risubramanian I wonder what he thinks about Julia. There are lots of projects to turn it into an "ML language". ~~~ dunefox I think it was explicitly designed as an "ML Language" from the ground up already. Do you mean packages like Flux and KNet? ------ anigbrowl I'd much rather a deep learning system that could handle simplified natural language and file operations, and then grow a network for specific tasks. Surely the point of AI is to liberate humans from having to write everything in code, and especially from needing to learn another language (which he fairly observes few people want to do). I do everything flow-based these days. It's not the fastest way (and I also have the luxury of not having to please anyone but myself), but it allows me to only think about my domain problem instead of programming language issues. ~~~ mark_l_watson Maybe not quite what you have in mind, but I have tried saving trained Keras models, loading them with Racket (a modern Scheme language), and implemented the required runtime. My idea was to encapsulate trained networks like ‘functions’ for use in other languages. ~~~ dunefox And? ~~~ mark_l_watson and... I think this is a neat idea and I thought other people might enjoy trying it. code (2 repos) is on github ------ melling Sounds like FB is also working on its own AI chips: [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-18/facebook-...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-18/facebook- s-ai-chief-researching-new-breed-of-semiconductor?srnd=technology-vp) [https://www.ft.com/content/1c2aab18-3337-11e9-bd3a-8b2a211d9...](https://www.ft.com/content/1c2aab18-3337-11e9-bd3a-8b2a211d90d5) ------ henning Fortran is going to make a big comeback. I can feel it. ~~~ enriquto > Fortran is going to make a big comeback. I can feel it. It is indeed one of the few existing languages appropriate for generic experimentation in numeric programming. For example, computing the product of two matrices in C or Fortran is exactly as fast by writing three nested loops or by calling a library function. In python, julia, octave, etc, the difference is abysmal. This is a very sad state of affairs, that forces a mindset where you are allowed a limited toolset of fast operations and the rest are either slow or cumbersome. If you want to compute a variant of the matrix product using a slightly different formula, in Fortran it is trivial change, you just write the new formula inside the loop. But in python or julia you are stuck with either an unusably slow code or you have to write it in another language entirely. "Vectorized" operations are cool, elegant, and beautiful. But they should not be the only tool available. As differential geometers often resort to coordinates to express their tensor operations, so should programmers be able to. ~~~ cshenton Have you used Julia recently? Vectorised operations are just as fast relative to hand written loops as c and FORTRAN, you just need to appropriately annotate @inbounds and @simd. Sure that’s more work, but removing safety checks should be explicit. ~~~ enriquto Not recently, thanks. I will surely try! My main gripe with the julia interpreter was that it was ridiculously slow to startup (I was using it as a "calculator" from within a shell loop: each iteration spawned a julia to perform a simple matrix computation). Does this performance has improved recently? By the way, what do you mean by "removing safety checks should be explicit" ? This sounds like a problem that the language should be able to deal with itself without bothering the programer (e.g. if the bounds of the loop are variables of known value, it can be checked beforehand, so the bounds checks can be safely omitted). ~~~ dunefox AFAIK it was designed for long running processes, not for quick start up time. On the other hand, I don't find it that slow for experimentation on the REPL. ------ tzhenghao We may need a programming language for DL, but I doubt it'll happen soon, if it even happens. Lindy effect working in favor of Python here, as many data scientists have prior "big data" experience in it, and typical software engineers from the "scripting/tooling" world. People have been calling for the phaseout of C/C++, but even today's most popular DL frameworks have backends written in C++ in lieu of Rust. ------ qwerty456127 > Deep learning may need a new programming language that’s more flexible and > easier to work with than Python Whoever has imagination more rich than mine, how can a programming language can be easier than Python? What's difficult in it? The only thing I find inconvenient in Python is you can't simply put every function (including every member functions of a class - that's what I would love to do) in a separate file without having to import every one of them manually. ~~~ 4233456 Read it again. He/She did not imply that Python is hard. I do believe that he/she meant that they need way higher levels of abstraction than Python. Let's say Python is current C, they want something X that's like Ruby in compare to current C. ~~~ qwerty456127 It's just hard for me to imagine a higher level of abstraction. That's why I invite whoever has imagination more rich than mine to suggest ideas. ~~~ mehh Have a look at Prolog, that might expand your mind a little. ------ slack3r Yes. Deep Learning definitely needs a new programming language. Uber's Pyro is worth checking out. ([https://eng.uber.com/pyro/](https://eng.uber.com/pyro/)) ~~~ wenc Umm that's not a programming language as such, it's a probabilistic programming DSL built on top of Python/Pytorch. It's one level of abstraction up. ------ thosakwe I’m not the biggest Python fan, but I can definitely tolerate it, as long as I have a decent way to use the models from another language. ------ pi-victor i always thought Haskell would be amazing for this task. but python is really popular and easy to grasp. you'll end up writing a new programming language and people would still use python in the end. ------ kensai I thought that language was Julia. ------ return0 More likely a markup language ------ Scarbutt sql ------ known 1\. Features 2. Performance 3. Usability You can pick only two options; ~~~ awestroke Or use Rust to get all 3! ~~~ semi-extrinsic I'm sorry, but Rust certainly doesn't score high on usability. Compare e.g. the "Guessing Game" intro from the official docs, just look at how much more complicated both the code and the tutorial is as compared to how you would do the same in Python, heck even in Fortran: [https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch02-00-guessing-game- tutoria...](https://doc.rust-lang.org/book/ch02-00-guessing-game- tutorial.html) ~~~ adrianN I don't think comparing 100 line programs is a good benchmark for usability. Most software is much larger and the design choices you have to make for a programming language should favor programs with at least a few thousand lines of code. ~~~ pjmlp Then try to do a few thousand lines of code in Gtk-rs, including custom widgets, the issues with borrow checker and internal mutable struct data accessible to callbacks is what lead to the creation of Relm. ~~~ adrianN The GUI story in Rust is currently terrible, I agree. But writing GUIs in Python with wrappers to C(++) libraries is not exactly nice either ;) ~~~ pjmlp To me it looks pretty nice. [https://www.qt.io/qt-for-python](https://www.qt.io/qt-for-python) ------ nottorp This guy - or the article's author - hasn't heard of DSLs?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Why do Chinese political leaders have engineering degrees? - eternalban https://www.quora.com/Why-do-Chinese-political-leaders-have-engineering-degrees-whereas-their-American-counterparts-have-law-degrees?share=1 ====== noname123 IMHO, STEM careers not sure about now, but before the mid-90's were considered more prestigious in China than medicine and law. Back then, lawyers never really had a spotlight in Chinese commerce or politics given Chinese Community Party's one-party rule and state-owned enterprise dominated economy; also in civilian realm, Chinese business partnerships are governed by "Guanxi," your reputation and standing within your personal network than the culture of litigation in Western world. Also, hate to be blunt, medicine is not as much upheld in esteem (relatively) in China due to the perceived less value of human life and socialized medicine at the time: a country of 1.3 billion people roughly the same size of US with a fraction of the GDP, marred by the Great Leap Forward, cultural revolution and until recently one child policy. Chinese hospitals clinic's queues is more like going to the DMV where you bring and keep your own medical chart and queuing up, compare with the Western medicine's obsession for "personal well- being," "resuscitate at all cost". Individuals are not as considered as the State or the Collective. Now compare the puny individual with fragile bodies and limited agency to the grand gestures of the grand dams that conquer the Yangtze River or big bridges that crisscrosses metropolises. Children are taught at the early age that the reason for the Chinese "Century of Humiliation" is Qing Dynasty's reluctance to reform and adopt Western technologies; Chinese engineers that built railroads and scientists that built nuclear bombs were hailed as heroes as much as say, civil rights leaders in US social studies curriculum. ~~~ pm90 There were many reason's for the Century of Humiliation. The Qing dynasty did attempt to reform on a big scale [0], but it was very much restricted in what it could do by western meddling. [0]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self- Strengthening_Movement](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self- Strengthening_Movement) ~~~ douche The Qing dynasty, even at the best of times, was far more decentralized than the Communists ever were. Coming in at the disintegration of the Ming, the Manchus absorbed huge swatches of Ming defectors, rebels, and newly conquered territory. By and large, they adopted the pre-existing scholar-official system, and by and large the pre-existing scholar-officials, to run these provinces. The provincial governors were not quite Persian satraps, nor the warlords of the Nationalist era, but they had relatively wide latitude. Moreover, there were parallel bureaucracies, with the Chinese civil administrations, and the Eight Banners standing army cum garrison staffed by Manchus, Mongols and other non-Han. Corruption was rife, and to some extent expected - the level of training and education to pass the gate-keeping imperial exams to enter the scholar class took years and could beggar families or entire communities. Taken to the extreme, you see the case of Heshen, a Manchu official who had embezzled the equivalent of a decade and a half of tax revenue for the entire empire. Regardless of western meddling, the Qing dynasty was subjected to the deadliest and most destructive war of the 19th century, which nearly toppled the government. And it was largely the third parallel bureaucracy that arose around the two or three most successful leaders against the Taiping that led the westernization push. In the organizations of Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang you have the direct precursors of the local warlords who made such a mess of the country for the first fifty years of the 20th century. Already, they operated largely outside the government, building their local fiefdoms. ~~~ pm90 Interesting! I was always interested in why the Chinese Republican government collapsed so quickly into the warlord era. It seems like the power structures of that era were already in place by the time the emperor was thrown out, and once Yuan Shikai was gone, they just made it official. ------ PaulHoule Another good question is why is almost every American politician (and all of the democrats) a lawyer? You definitely see more diversity in Europe where you have Angela Merkel with a physics PhD. ~~~ rayiner The majority of Congress is not lawyers. That said, my theory is that because the U.S. is a low-cohesion, heterogeneous society, we're uniquely structured around the conflict-resolution process of litigation. The U.S. resolves through lawsuits disputes in areas such as labor, environment, civil rights, product safety, land use rights, social justice, and employment rights, which are handled through the political process in other countries. Unsurprisingly, people who have an interest in these issues, which are the bread-and-butter of Democratic politics in particular, are likely to go get law degrees. A really good example of this phenomenon is playing out right now with the Apple/FBI case. Over in Europe, they're going to pass laws that govern what companies must do to assist with law enforcement investigations. Here, it'll play out in the courts first, and Congress might not even take action if they're happy with the legal outcomes. ~~~ eigenvector > Unsurprisingly, people who have an interest in these issues, which are the > bread-and-butter of Democratic politics in particular, are likely to go get > law degrees. I'd argue the reverse. Many people have interests in these issues, but if they wish to pursue careers in politics, their only option is to go through the $100,000 law degree pipeline. Why would someone who wants to work on environmental issues be any more likely to study law rather than wildlife biology, except that the latter won't make you the social connections and money you need to have any crack at a political career? ------ Animats That was also true of the USSR. Anatoly Dobrynin, the Soviet ambassador to the US for many years, writes in his autobiography how he became a diplomat. One day, Stalin was annoyed at his diplomats over something, and remarked that the USSR needed diplomats who were New Soviet Men, like aircraft designers. Shortly thereafter, Anatoly Dobrynin, aircraft designer, was taken by the KGB from his drafting table at the Yakovlev Design Bureau and shipped to the Higher Diplomatic Academy in Moscow. He rose from there to ambassador to the US. ------ chvid I don't know about China. But western societies have developed a system of professional politics where politicians are groomed for politics early on. That is why they often become professional politicians early on and have degrees in a narrow set of fields and from a narrow set of schools. ~~~ jernfrost Think that depends a lot on the particular society. My home country Norway certainly "suffers" from the professional politicians, but they still have quite varied backgrounds: teachers, agriculture degrees, economists, political science, machine operator etc. I'd say it depends a lot on to what degree a society is elitist or not. E.g. France and Britain seem very elitist oriented societies where the elite is groomed in elite schools. While a country like Norway is strongly anti-elite and has no concept of elite schools. Every society has their particular traits. E.g. in Germany it seems like having a PhD in some science is almost a prerequisite for getting anywhere in politics to the point where some politicians have felt forced to fake a PhD to get anywhere. ~~~ digi_owl > Think that depends a lot on the particular society. My home country Norway > certainly "suffers" from the professional politicians, but they still have > quite varied backgrounds: teachers, agriculture degrees, economists, > political science, machine operator etc. But after a year or more in office, they all seem to walk and talk the same way anyways. And i can't shake the feeling that the diversity is slipping. One of the old boys of AP, and perhaps one of the last with a industrial background to hold a government position, said that when he began he could work a full day at the factory and then go to meetings in the afternoon. But that nowadays you basically had to quit your other job to keep up, even on the local level. ------ ArkyBeagle I've read enough Usenet for enough years to suspect that STEM may well be a liability when it comes to "soft" subjects, the sort that politics operates on. Just the realities of government finance and government debt seem to be beyond many in our field(s), because it's a bizarro subject. That China is run by nominally "engineers" could well be a significant problem for them. ------ sharetea These aren't the smart engineering politicians with a 10 year view China has foisted its fable onto the world. These are the corrupt paranoid politicians who know they are one mass protest away from having all their families disposed. These are fat and lazy billionnaires who have siphoned off local schools, hospitals, people, environments, and is about to abscond with riches. These are the people that see their debt-fueled economy collapsing, and know there's no more workers to be paid in pennies to be exploited. ""In total, 106 members of China's National People's Congress and 97 members of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Congress, are on Hurun's China Rich List. Their combined wealth hits $463.8 billion" [http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-politicians-are- rich-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/chinese-politicians-are-rich-2015-3) Kyle Bass: China’s $34 trillion banking sector set to collapse 30-40% [https://www.trunews.com/kyle-bass-chinas-34-trillion- banking...](https://www.trunews.com/kyle-bass-chinas-34-trillion-banking- sector-set-to-collapse-30-40/) ~~~ moreorless You sure love to bash on China. It seems like are your submissions/comments are anti-China. ~~~ sharetea i don't like evil government. do you? "China 'covertly providing oil to North Korea' Seoul claims Beijing falsifying its export statistics to keep Pyongyang's industry, military operational" [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/11...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/northkorea/11230327/China- covertly-providing-oil-to-North-Korea.html) Missiles Deployed on Disputed South China Sea Artificial Island, Officials Say [http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/18/world/asia/china- missiles-...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/18/world/asia/china-missiles- south-china-sea.html?_r=0) ~~~ 1stop But what is your measure of evil? US invaded Iraq twice for oil, and had deployed missiles to all sorts of non sovereign land, that had upset is neighbours. Literally a 1-1 comparison for both your examples. If that is your measure for "evil government" please point out a "good" government. ~~~ drdaeman But... what if there's none? ------ kelukelugames Getting an engineering degree in China was the equivalent of graduating from an Ivy. At least in the prestige department. ~~~ khc Is that true? My impression is that most parents wanted kids to be doctors and lawyers, until very recently at least. ~~~ kelukelugames I'm talking about Chinese people in China during my parents' generation. Are you thinking of Asian stereotypes in America? ~~~ byw I'd say in America it's mostly just STEM or business/economics, depending on your family background. Business for children of business owners, STEM for everyone else. There's also a clear political divide along this line in oversea Chinese demographics. Lawyers, although well-paid on the higher-end, carry somewhat of a bad rep of being predatory and unreliable income-wise across the spectrum. ------ em3rgent0rdr most Asian leaders have engineering degrees. The flip side of the question is: Why do Western leaders generally lack STEM degrees? Why should the US be ruled by lawyers? ~~~ Mikeb85 > Why do Western leaders generally lack STEM degrees? Because STEM degrees don't give one any insight into governing people. > Why should the US be ruled by lawyers? Politicians make laws. Lawyers know the law. Seems like a good fit. ~~~ icebraining The US National Science Foundation includes social sciences (anthropology, economics, psychology and sociology) in the list of STEM disciplines. ~~~ Mikeb85 Really? Crazy. Here 'social sciences' are usually considered an art degree. ------ klue07 In China, engineering is the most prestigious major as opposed to lawyers or doctors in the US. In highschool, if you aren't very smart, you are told to go into liberal arts. If you did well in school, you almost always went into STEM, even if that is not where your passion lies. So it's not hard to see why there would be a disproportionate amount of Chinese leaders with engineering degrees. On a side note for those who are interested. Here's a list of political figures who are from Tsinghua University (China's top engineering university): [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsinghua_clique](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsinghua_clique) ------ wrong_variable There are very good reasons given but I would like to add a simpler model - from the infamous book Germs, Guns and Steel. In poorer countries, the biggest problem is related to physical disadvantages. European and American Cities face physical disadvantages but nothing compared to Beijing, Delhi or Cairo. The biggest cities in the anglo-euro sphere are nothing compared to the mega cities in Asia. Scaling the living standard of a typical western to the entire continent of asia requires overcoming real limitations imposed by physics and the natural world. This is why engineering and STEM is so strongly focused in many asian societies. ~~~ jernfrost I am pretty sure Germs, Guns and Steel, never implied anything remotely like that. If you look at size as a main driver here, that does not match up with reality. South Korea, Japan, Singapore etc, neither of these countries are bigger than your typical mid sized to large european nation. I think people are reading a bit too much into this. In the stage of development many asians nations are today, western nations also had a similar reverence for engineers. What strikes me most when people from developing countries talk about unique cultural traits of their country, is that it merely represent a development stage. I can point to similar traits among earlier generations in my own country. ~~~ pm90 Could you please provide references? Genuine question. I'm interested to know if American or British society was as obsessed with engineering and medicine at some point as we see today in India and China. ~~~ venomsnake There was that period known as industrial revolution. A lot of the great inventors were either born nobility or knighted. So Britain valued their best engineering minds. ~~~ GFK_of_xmaspast Or, conversely, most of their 'best engineering minds' came from classes already valued. ~~~ pm90 Probably because only they had both the education and the free time to pursue these things. ------ jordache also the more non-religious Chinese culture would typically lean towards other personal qualities for selecting positions of power. Scientific prowness would naturally be one of the criteria. So none of that "That man is great Christian!" as some sort of qualifier. ~~~ icebraining Well, I live in an European country with plenty of lawyers and other law- related professionals as members of parliament, yet the religiousness of the candidates hasn't been a topic for decades, at least.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
An Entrepreneurial Counter Culture is Looming – The Startup Market is Not OK - rizzn http://siliconangle.net/ver2/2009/09/18/an-entrepreneurial-counter-culture-is-looming-the-startup-market-is-not-ok/ ====== patio11 Capital available in $200,000 chunks would be an interesting world: 1) You'd presumably want to make the offering mass-customizable, like a typical residential mortgage. There are a few levers to play with, sure, by 98% of the contract got vetted by the company lawyers _once_ as being Good Enough and folks can take it or they can leave it. This allows you to close deals quickly, avoid spending much time teaching buyers about your process, and have the deals offered by junior staff. Most home buyers want a house, they don't want a mortgage. Most startup founders have a business to have a business, not to raise capital. (Note that this would make "comparison shopping" easy.) 2) Automate and outsource more of the process. Banks can profitably do loans for $200,000 houses because there is an infrastructure of people who can say "Yep, this is a $200k house" and FICO scores, which let you push a button and get a quick estimate of my propensity to default in a second. I know we all think we're beautiful snowflakes, but I'm willing to bet there is a function which can be evaluated cheaply that is unfair, misses all sorts of edge cases, has numerous theoretical problems, and nonetheless is Good Enough when only $200k is at stake. 3) As you reduce the amount of marginal effort in each deal, it becomes possible to scale it to the moon, in a manner similar to e.g. mortgages and mutual funds. (The fund has a lot of money, the individual investors have comparitively little money and reduced exposure to any single investment, etc.) ~~~ jacquesm The big reason banks can say that about a house is that there _is_ a house, which is a commodity (or at least, they were until recently), so if the deal does not work out the bank can sell the house. Without collateral of some sort this will not work. And if you have collateral you could simply either sell that or mortgage that (and plenty of founders do). ------ danielrhodes I found the article was rather long and a bit confusing. I wanted to summarize and clarify it: There are more companies these days, but VCs are funding the same number of companies as before with the same huge expectations. Why not instead fund more companies with a lower amount of cash so as to not miss some opportunities. My answer: putting all your eggs in one basket in a competitive environment will likely lead to better results than spreading the money out among a bunch of different baskets. Most startups are going to fail anyways, even with $200K of funding because the markets they are hitting are not that huge, not to mention all the other hurdles. What funding a bunch of different companies does is make a clear market winner harder to come by, which screws everybody. It's better if there was one clear winner sooner rather than later. My bet is handing out smaller investments like $200K would actually make the IPO market worse since most companies would get too tired to ever make it big enough to IPO. The quick answer to why IPOs have not been good recently (other than the economy sucking): Sarbannes-Oxley made it very expensive to IPO with big requirements which means that the next best exit is selling. To sell, you have to get big fast to become attractive to suitors. Profitability/revenue is not a requirement/important for selling to a larger company (they use startups to cheaply get new talent and good ideas rather than quickly adding new revenue streams). So why don't more companies focus on revenue as a backup plan? It's very distracting and doing so means you might only scrape by. With such a do or die environment, the goal is not to create good businesses which will survive, just ones that will become great. The good thing is that as it has become cheaper to run a startup, people have more options and can create self-funded sustainable businesses aimed at smaller markets. You won't become a billionaire doing that, but you'll get by. That's fine with VCs though, they are after big returns. If you are comfortable with creating such a business, by all means do so, but don't be pissed when a VC is not interested, even if it does make a little money. There is clearly room for both. If you do hit on a massive market opportunity, they can always catch up with you later. So what is something like Y Combinator? It is a cheap way to vet companies for VCs and angels who see too many startups without enough information on them to make a good value judgement on whether they'll succeed. You don't need $200K to do that, you just need a small amount of money. ~~~ sielskr The writing in the parent is significantly better than the writing in the original post (the web page not on Hacker News). So, thanks, danielrhodes, for summarizing! ------ plinkplonk "Technology, however, isn’t the driver any more for startups. The scarce talent is business model engineering and product marketing" How true is this? Sounds like wishful thinking from a non programmer to me. (Please note : I am not saying that marketing/product engineering is not important. They (obviously) are. I just think "Technology, however, isn’t the driver any more for startups" is too broad a brush) ~~~ TimothyFitz I think his point is that scaling up on the web is a solved problem, which is mostly true. If you look at most startup's pitch/plan the biggest risks are not in technology. Steve Blank would say there's Market Risk (will your customers want it?) but minimal Invention Risk (can you deliver it?). Contrast this with biotech where you're trying to cure diseases. Minimal market risk, tons of invention risk. Read more here: <http://steveblank.com/category/vertical-markets/> ~~~ plinkplonk "his point is that scaling up on the web is a solved problem, which is mostly true" Maybe, but that isn't what "Technology, however, isn’t the driver any more for startups" means. "Technology" is a lot more than "scaling on the web", even in software based startups. "Steve Blank would say there's Market Risk (will your customers want it?) but minimal Invention Risk (can you deliver it?). " Steve Blank is also careful to qualify that statement with "for some types of startups" (unlike the author of this article, hence my "too broad a brush" judgment). Assuming every software startup, even when the web is used as an interface, is a "web 2.0" startup with minimal Invention risk is intellectual laziness. "The scarce talent is business model engineering and product marketing" This doesn't have any supporting arguments/evidence/data. sounds like something a non programmer MBA type person, for whom of course programming is easy and programmers are commodity hires (like say receptionists) would say. I'd like to hear a supporting argument for why great programmers, who are what startups are usually desperate to hire, are not "scarce talent", but marketing folks are. Sure, for _some_ startups, that is no doubt true, but as a generalization it seems too broad, which was my point. So yes I've read Steve's book too and like it a lot :-), but I don't think this dichotomy of risks supports the original article much. ~~~ TimothyFitz I think we're agreeing. As I do for all blogs, I just assumed the courtesy implicit prelude: "This is my opinion shaped by my experiences and most likely only applies to the system I'm currently interacting with." I mostly agree with his sweeping generalization if applied to, say, the subset of startups that get coverage on Techcrunch. ~~~ plinkplonk "I think we're agreeing." Yes we are. "As I do for all blogs, I just assumed the courtesy implicit prelude: "This is my opinion shaped by my experiences and most likely only applies to the system I'm currently interacting with."" As did I, but if, as a writer, I made an unqualified claim (even if true) that is completely out of whack with my _readers_ experience, I think it is fair to get push back. This is perhaps due to my coming across this article on HN vs directly on the original site. I think the article is a decent one (not great, but decent). "I mostly agree with his sweeping generalization if applied to, say, the subset of startups that get coverage on Techcrunch." As would I. But this is HN. :-) ------ TimothyFitz "The scarce talent is business model engineering and product marketing – building for scale isn’t the problem anymore. I can build a hack protytype that works well into the "validation" stage to establish a funding event or customer revenue stream then use the new capital to rebuild, hire and grow." This interestingly follows my own career growth. I was the tech lead responsible for scalability/reliability at IMVU for a long time, but eventually our bottleneck clearly shifted from reliability back to marketing/product development. Around that time I switched teams, and have since been the tech lead for our marketing team. It might sound less sexy to other engineers, but getting to be on the bleeding edge of marketing for virtual economies is constantly challenging and fun; especially with IMVU's data driven culture. ~~~ arijo Do you think IMVU would be the great company it is today if it started with two product marketing folks and one business "model engineer" and all the programming was outsourced to "commodity" coders in elance.com or getafreelancer.com? ~~~ plinkplonk that seems to be a reaction to an exaggeration of what Tim said. He clearly said(emphasis mine) "I was the tech lead responsible for scalability/reliability at IMVU for a long time, but eventually our bottleneck clearly _shifted_ from reliability back to marketing/product development. " I read it as, " _Once_ we got reliability sorted out, the bottleneck _moved_ to marketing/product development." He never said IMVU could have been built without good programmers(of which class, he is an instance), but product dev/marketing _became_ (or were) equally important (or more important) and so he moved to that team. At least that's how I read it ~~~ arijo I agree. However the point I was trying to make is that technology expertise continues to be a "scarce talent" which seems to be the opposite view of that supported by Tim's post. ------ jf781 I really am enjoying the thread here on my post. Interesting to see some of the comments thinking that I'm anti-development with my quote about product mktg and validation is the scarce resource. Of course great architects and developer are the scare resource but I've seen many code a great solution right now a cul de sac of no market. to me the biggest issue driving this counterculture that I'm seeing is "trust" of the capital markets. Especially since most of the productive actors in this marketplace have lived in a successful open source movement culture for 25 years. The capital markets (VCs) are at odds with this culture. There are many other points in the post that I would be happy to discuss if there is interest. ------ wattersjames With cloud computing rising to prominence as the underpinning of many modern web applications the amount of technology already 'assumed' in any new application design. This trend seems to align with John's key point. ------ ruslan I read through the article but could not get the roots of "shrinking venture market" problem. Can someone please summarize/provide better explaination ? ------ lsc do you really think handling a (non-technical) investor will be less work/less distraction than contracting part time? Sure, contracting takes time away from what you want to do, but it's pretty easy, and clients don't push you to do things that may not be in the interest of your customers. ------ rizzn This is the final draft based on the original Hacker News thread and conversation about a month ago.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
New features in C# 7 - avita1 https://www.kenneth-truyers.net/2016/01/20/new-features-in-c-sharp-7/ ====== feylikurds New features in C# 7: Tuples, Record types, Pattern Matching, Immutable types, and Non-nullable reference types. ------ nickpeterson These are nice, will probably allow some C# code to be more succinct. I wonder if this will eventually help improve F# interop? ------ nikolay With the new Microsoft, C# definitely looks better than Java!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Haskell Researchers Announce Discovery of Industry Programmer Who Gives a Shit - pchristensen http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2010/12/haskell-researchers-announce-discovery.html ====== jmillikin 140 points? Really? I know it's fashionable in these parts to make fun of Haskell, but it's just not _funny_ unless the writer knows something about the language. Would you upvote these articles? * Why C++ is More Object-Oriented Than Smalltalk * Stupid Ivory-Tower Academics Claim "Perl Is Too Slow for Weather Simulation" * LISP: It Would Be a Lot More Useful Without All the Parentheses It's especially galling considering pg's various articles on language expressiveness; remember this quote, folks? """As long as our hypothetical Blub programmer is looking down the power continuum, he knows he's looking down. Languages less powerful than Blub are obviously less powerful, because they're missing some feature he's used to. But when our hypothetical Blub programmer looks in the other direction, up the power continuum, he doesn't realize he's looking up. What he sees are merely weird languages. He probably considers them about equivalent in power to Blub, but with all this other hairy stuff thrown in as well. Blub is good enough for him, because he thinks in Blub.""" When somebody tosses around phrases like _how to subvert Haskell's type system to accomplish basic shit you can do in other languages_ , it's a big red flag that they've never used Haskell, and possibly have never even seen Haskell code. ~~~ raganwald I think it's great that you've tried to provide a review criticizing this post. But please resist the urge to tell me what I ought to find funny, just as I have resisted the urge to tell you what you ought to find interesting. Especially resist the urge to criticize others for liking things you find unworthy. Your comment's criticism of the OP is appreciated. Your comment's criticism of other members for voting for the post is, well, something else entirely. ~~~ jmillikin Surely there are better places to post funny but thought-free links than Hacker News? ~~~ raganwald Privately, I agree with you and I haven't upvoted it. After that, I suggest that our options are to (1) Flag it if it's really off topic, and/or (2) Criticize it, which I think you've done well. My only concern is whether we should (3) be galled or outraged that others have their own idea of what ought to be #1 on HN. I like humour, and it seems like we share a personal preference for the kind that makes you laugh and then think hard when you realize that there's something incredibly insightful at the heart of the joke. Alas, I'm not skilled enough to pull that off myself. All I can say about Haskell is to quote Alan Perlis: _A language that does not change the way you think about programming is not worth learning_. And given that, the sad observation that most "Industry Types" as stereotyped in the OP are not interested in changing the way they think about anything. It's more than a Blub thing, it's a comfort zone thing. ~~~ bpyne I think comfort zone plays a part in IT developers seeming uninterested in "new" ideas. Closer to the heart of the problem IMO is that most business applications are just not very interesting. You can reduce them to: take input values from screen, run SQL query, and post query results back to the screen. Writing good SQL is the most challenging part. In order for apps to be more interesting - making new ideas in IT appealing - businesses must be willing to re-examine their processes and change them with an eye towards better automation and some business intelligence. However, getting a single department in a business to change its processes is as monumental as changing global warming. Of course, another issue altogether is COTS reducing the applications actually written in-house. Making intellectual investments in powerful programming languages is just not sound when a developer is simply writing "glue" code between vendor systems. People do generally get jazzed up in IT departments when new technologies come around. Sure, there are technological curmudgeons, but very few. Enthusiasm gets dampened when it is clear that a good business case cannot be made for the new technology. (I used "new" relative to an IT department's current environment and not in reference to age of the technology.) ------ davidmathers "Avoid success at all costs." _I mentioned this at a talk I gave about Haskell a few years back and it’s become quite widely quoted. When a language becomes too well known, or too widely used and too successful suddenly you can’t change anything anymore. You get caught and spend ages talking about things that have nothing to do with the research side of things. Success is great, but it comes at a price._ \-- Simon Peyton Jones ------ j_baker "We crafted a fake satirical post lampooning Haskell as an unusable, overly complex turd -- a writing task that was emotionally difficult but conceptually trivial." - This is pure gold. ~~~ gvb On the "truth is stranger than fiction" front, I got a good chuckle from the monads-in-Perl link <http://www.perlmonks.org/?node_id=620692>: "Anyway, I think it would be worth doing, if it could be expressed readably, but I was not able to figure out a way to do that." There is some deep irony in monads in Perl not being readable enough for _Perl._ ~~~ JoachimSchipper Actually, the "modern Perl" people are promoting a Perl style where your program contains more letters than special characters. They seem quite influential. ------ JonnieCache If you don't find this funny, then you really need to examine your sense of humour, because this is not about making fun of haskell. It's barely about haskell at all. It is fantastically well constructed exercise in comic writing. Stop thinking about the programming language wars for one minute and reread the text again, and look at the multileveled semantic games the author is playing. I thought most here were good at that? Doug Hofstadter would be proud. ------ angusgr I chuckled, and I'm happy Steve Yegge might blog some more, but this feels a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. ~~~ joshes If only because you could fit all of the Haskell programmers into a barrel of standard size? I think that's the point of the article, actually. ~~~ angusgr More because it's easy to poke fun at Haskell in this way, even the Haskell people know they come off as obtuse and academic. AFAIK there's been much soul-searching in their community about how to get past that. While Steve Yegge is a good satirist, I see this post as an extended version of this joke from the "Mostly Wrong History of Programming Languages": _Haskell gets some resistance due to the complexity of using monads to control side effects. Wadler tries to appease critics by explaining that "a monad is a monoid in the category of endofunctors, what's the problem?"_ ~~~ jfb I love that joke, because I barely understand it, but minimal understanding just makes it funnier. ------ mixmax If Douglas Adams were to write about programming this is how he would do it. That's a compliment. ~~~ yters Or the Onion. Not as much of a compliment... ~~~ snth I agree that this seems to be exactly in the style of an Onion article; however, I think The Onion has put out some hilarious stuff. For example: [http://www.theonion.com/articles/fuck-everything-were- doing-...](http://www.theonion.com/articles/fuck-everything-were-doing-five- blades,11056/) ------ nickik "I believe the root cause of the popularity problem is Haskell's lack of reasonable support for mutually recursive generic container types." \-- Super funny! ~~~ j_baker "If we can create a monadic composition-functor wrapper that is perceived as sufficiently sexy by hardened industry veterans, then I think we will see an uptick in giving a shit, possibly as much as a full extra person." ------ yters She explained the trap they set for Briars: "We crafted a fake satirical post lampooning Haskell as an unusable, overly complex turd -- a writing task that was emotionally difficult but conceptually trivial. Then we laced the post with deeper social subtext decrying the endemic superficiality and laziness of global industry programming culture, to make ourselves feel better. Finally, each of us upvoted the post, which was unexpectedly contentious because nobody could agree on what the [HN] voting arrows actually mean." Apparently their approach was more successful than they thought. ------ tumult GHC Haskell actually supports mutually recursive generic container types, but you must enable type class system extensions which make type checking undecidable. ------ brian6 This successfully trolled me, because I think Haskell is really good stuff made by really smart and cool people. Surely there was a better target for satire. I'm an industry programmer (in C). I also have a bunch of packages on Hackage. ~~~ wtracy Are you sure it's not making fun of the people who _don't_ use Haskell? ------ presidentender Will there every be a satirical Steve Yegge post on HN that spawns any discussion other than quotes from the article itself? ~~~ derefr That's what makes Yegge posts so long, I think: he thinks of everything people could say in response to his original "core" post, and then includes it in the post itself. ------ csantini "Finding a person who gives a shit about Haskell is an inherently NP-complete computer science problem. It's similar in scope and complexity to the problem of trying to find a tenured academic who didn't have the bulk of his or her work done by uncredited graduate students." ~~~ prosa Surely you could implement this search in at least O(n) time? ~~~ eru At least is easy. At most is hard. ~~~ wahnfrieden "At least, if not better." The context disambiguates the direction of magnitude. ------ natmaster Facebook uses haskell. <https://www.facebook.com/careers/puzzles.php> (They only accept answers in languages they actually use.) ------ edw519 This was actually a personally test disguised as a blog post. See how you scored: If you didn't understand it: You're not a hacker and never will be; go get your MBA. If it upset you: You are a hacker without a sense of humor. You belong in a room without other people. Fed Ex will deliver your circuit boards tomorrow. If you laughed once: You are an aspiring junior programmer. Keep on working hard and best wishes to you. If you laughed more than once: You are a seasoned hacker. Nice to see you here. If you sprayed Mountain Dew on your keyboard: You have that rare combination of understanding both bits and people. You must do great work. If you are cutting and pasting these gems for your bulletin board: You and I must be kindred spirits. Email me. Let's do a start-up together. ~~~ Alternatively If you write a post attempting to categorize everyone's sociability and competence based on how close their reactions are to yours: You are edw519 ------ rapind Loved the article, but someone please explain "faster than a teabagger with a grade-school arithmetic book". I'm pretty sure I got all the others. ~~~ gvb _...their Giving a Shit gene shuts down faster than a teabagger with a grade- school arithmetic book._ [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_movement#Use_of_term_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_movement#Use_of_term_.22teabagger.22) The implication is that TEA party constituents have no interest in actually understanding the grade-school math necessary to understand a budget. ~~~ rapind Thank you very much (Canuck here so I don't usually get the political references). ------ stylejam Honestly I think this is my personal funniest post of 2010. And no, it's not making fun of Haskell. ------ mkramlich my new favorite Yegge post. very funny. and so true. :) ------ alphaoverlord Sniff sniff. Whats that smell? O right, Onion worthy. ------ codexon <Insert Dons and the usual angry Haskell fanboy diatribes here> </satire> ~~~ dons Diatribes? ~~~ codexon Stop pretending Dons. It is quite amusing that you are voted up 5 times for such a content-less comment yet you and your associates are powerless to downvote the article. ~~~ dons I'll have my associates look into this matter. ~~~ mwotton there is no cabal	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Paul Graham's near-death experience - nickb http://valleywag.com/tech/acquisitions/paul-grahams-near+death-experience-295574.php ====== pg The fact that Viaweb happened to be at the mercy of its investors at that moment hardly meant it was worthless. In fact it generated lots of revenue for Yahoo. I believe roughly the same amount as Broadcast.com, which cost 100x as much. ~~~ far33d This comment made me think "wouldn't it be weird if PG owned a basketball team?" ~~~ pg If I had that much money, I'd never buy a sports team. I'd found a town. That's the luxury I dream about. Probably just as well I can't have it though; it would be a huge time sink. ~~~ far33d It's also funny to think that everyone has a dream about "what if I had some plateau of wealth higher than the one I occupy now" ------ zach I like how they have to add "a rich sum for the time." It's like "You kids out there getting $50M Series C's, understand that $50M was a lot of money back then!" ------ palish _"We suspect Paul Graham will not be very popular in Sunnyvale today."_ What's that even mean? Who is "we"? This post is sensationalist to the max. ~~~ nickb They mean Yahoo!. ------ run4yourlives Wow, that's a post with zero substance. I can't possibly vote this up. Out of all the great stuff in Paul's last essay to comment on, this is the best they could do? ------ rms I think they're posting from Burning Man, so I would blame this nonsensical post on the drugs. ~~~ gscott Right, when the giant man was burned early it was found that it was really put together with marijuana plants. Hence the entire population at the event were confused why they had the munchies so bad and wrote only 'quicky' articles between snacks. ------ nmeyer One of the dumbest posts I've ever seen on valleywag. ~~~ kkim Considering the competition, that's quite a statement.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Possibly The Coolest Facebook Application To Date - transburgh http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/09/21/possibly-the-coolest-facebook-application-to-date/ ====== AF Is he serious about this being the coolest application to date? I mean really, a music video that will end up embedded on even more people's profile page and which will be interesting maybe the first time I watch it but then I'll be annoyed with because it has no point whatsoever? If that's the best Facebook has to offer... ~~~ karzeem Here's what happened: I added the app, made a message to see what it looked like, and then sent it to no one because I didn't think my friends would care. Then I removed the application. Granted, some people will definitely get a kick out of sending and receiving this, but its replay value is close to zero. It's weird how TechCrunch has some occasionally interesting insights but usually manages to revert quickly to ridiculous pronouncements like this. This "app" is certainly one of the coolest ads I've seen in a little while. I'm definitely more likely to buy the next Dylan album I see. But it is far from being a real application, let alone the coolest one ever. The coolest app on Facebook four months after the platform launch is a one- trick pony pushing a Bob Dylan album? That says a hell of a lot about f8, but it says even more about TechCrunch. The tech print media has earned a trend-monkey reputation, but tech bloggers make them look like the Encyclopedia Britannica. ~~~ rms Media often reaches the point where it is just as much about entertainment as useful information. This Techcrunch post didn't teach you a whole lot about Web 2.0 business or technology. It was just playing into a clever viral marketing campaign. In the end, it's hard to fault Techcrunch because the application is pretty cool. ~~~ karzeem It's very cool, but in a way that demands a qualifier. Arrington should have written something like "This isn't hardest app to make, or even close to the most important, but it's a brilliant little idea." He also should have said that it's got low replay value. I see what you're saying, but the tone of the post suggested that Arrington was using "coolest" to mean something pretty profound. ------ tocomment What makes this a Facebook app? Shouldn't it just be a webpage? Perhaps a webpage with an option to put the video you generate into your Facebook profile. Shouldn't a Facebook app make use of Facebook specific features?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: I need help 'guessing' initial startup cost - donohoe I'm only asking for napkin level calculations here, so...<p>Imagine you're putting together a startup for a new magical product/service. You know you will need experienced 3 engineers (lets say 5 years experience covering web, mobile apps, backend), 1 designer. Add 1 for business dev/marketing/ceo'ish responsibilities. Assume that these people are highly qualified.<p>Now we need to factor in medical, dental, 401K, office space, admin, laptops/desktops/devices/licenses, server space, business card, legal, expected travel expenses and such... I know there's more I've left out...<p>Presumably it would need funding for at least 1 year (aim for 3?)? Also assume that the into toon is to launch a service/product within the first 9 to 12 months which marks the beginning of a revenue stream.<p>Bearing in mind I only need an estimate and I recognize that there are a million things that factor into the true and final cost and I won't hold anyone to this...<p>How much funding would you need? ====== rfrey Sounds a bit like a question you'd get out of a time capsule buried in 1998. But I guess you might have such a kick-ass idea that you have investors queueing up to fund it, or you might be rich and willing to fund yourself, and just want to budget. Figure 200k/person for the first year including equipment, overhead of hiring, etc. You'll need to allocate at least 20% of your company's equity for stock options. Server space is cheap and competent engineers will set you up with something on a "pay as you need it" basis. That said add $2000/month for kicks and giggles. Legal is a black box. Are you doing a new kind of game? Around 50k for trademarks, etc. Going after the music companies? One trillion dollars. Office: where are you? San Francisco? $1500-2k/month. Kansas City? They'll pay you to take the space if you throw in a little dance routine on Friday afternoons. Travel - Are you sending your sales guy to Europe twice a month? Having board meetings in Aruba? I guess you can do a Kayak search as well as we can. So if you're going to hire everyone and start building toward the Big Release, which is not recommended by the way, figure 1.5 million for the first year. If you read Steve Blank and Eric Reis' stuff you could probably do it on $200k with higher odds of success, but you'd miss out on hiring a bizdev/marketing guy, shopping for dental plans, etc. ------ answerly As others have mentioned below, there are probably at least one or two intermediate steps between where you appear to be now (earliest stages of business planning)and being in a position to raise a significant financing round. You'll need a product and probably some initial traction with users and, hopefully, revenue. That said, you can calculate a rough monthly burn rate by adding together the estimated monthly salaries of the employees you referenced in your post and increase that number by 130-150%. This roughly accounts for all the operating expenses. If you need guidance on salaries try checking out resources like salary.com. You'd probably want at least 18 months of cash in the bank. This gives you a year to execute and six months to focus on sustainable profitability and/or additional later stage financing. So, monthly burn rate x target number of months of cash in the bank is your target financing amount. Hope this helps. ~~~ donohoe This is clear and exactly what I needed. Much appreciated. ------ thewordpainter there's all kinds of factors that could affect that answer. for example, we have a core team of four with five additional interns at the moment. our cost? zero. we're as bootstrapped as it gets, and nobody has taken any pay to date...but we're based in athens, ga where the cost of living is minor. i would recommend considering 100% of a pie and how much each member you described would be worth. from there, be flexible & generous with your equity as you're filling out the team. equity is your biggest asset at the stage you're at. hope that helps! ------ joystickers Is this a joke? ~~~ donohoe No. This is probably a dumb question to many people here. I'm asking as I have no idea, because all I know is how to code and build things and nothing about startups or business. However others here have deep knowledge on the subject. So I'm asking for help and not cynicism. ~~~ joystickers I apologize if I offended you. First thing I would do if I were you would be to check out resources like Mixergy, This Week in Startups, and read Rework by 37Signals. I know that isn't a direct answer to your question, but that's because I think you're asking the wrong question. Can you elaborate on what you want to build and why you need a fleshed out company right off the bat? ~~~ donohoe I wasn't offended, I just wanted to be clear to you and anyone else that I wasn't kidding and I realize the naivety it carries in some ways. I cannot elaborate on the product.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Thousands of Ruby on Rails sites leave logins lying around - Cbasedlifeform http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/28/thousands_of_ror_sites_leave_logins_lying_around/ ====== Cbasedlifeform I am not remotely qualified to judge this, alas. Can someone please indicate how valid this is? ------ jafaku Classic Rails.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: What are the best tools to implement Pirate Metrics? - submarine My website (and service) is finally built, and I'm readying to let my subscribers know about it. Before that, I'd like to set up the metrics.<p>I hear Google Analytics or Totango are good. Is there anything I should be using before launch? ====== gk1 Google Analytics works right out of the box, but is also powerful enough for more advanced set-ups. I consult on GA setups, so if you need any help just reach out (contact info in profile). ------ ycmike Mixpanel and it's free! [https://mixpanel.com/](https://mixpanel.com/) ~~~ submarine I know this sounds silly, but once people are on my site, how can I modify it without disrupting the service? (it's all php/js/html) ~~~ ycmike Mixpanel should handle that. I would also look into using Optimizely if you plan on testing a lot. ~~~ submarine I meant, the actual code. Right now, I'm modifying the source directly because nobody is on the site. And I just refresh the page to see the changes. I'm guessing I should put a copy of my code somewhere else , test there, and then upload the changes when I'm donE? ~~~ ycmike I see now. Yeah I am not sure about that one myself.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Men and women can't be just friends - sperm https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/men-and-women-cant-be-just-friends/ ====== acchow researchers brought 88 pairs of undergraduate opposite-sex friends into…a science lab. Ok, so this research has nothing to do with men or women - just horny near- adults. ~~~ isubkhankulov read on... >> Males were significantly more likely than females to list romantic attraction as a benefit of opposite-sex friendships, and this discrepancy increased as men aged—males on the younger end of the spectrum were four times more likely than females to report romantic attraction as a benefit of opposite-sex friendships, whereas those on the older end of the spectrum were ten times more likely to do the same. ~~~ namlem Yeah, but what was the age range they tested? If they're comparing 22 year- olds to 18 year-olds, they're still only covering a small range. ~~~ kbenson _Accordingly, we aimed to compare the extent to which emerging adults (late adolescence to mid-twenties) and young and middle-aged adults (late twenties to about 50) experience attraction to their cross-sex friends_ From the linked paper. That's for the follow-up study. ------ kbenson FYI, this is from 2012, The paper is under the link "New research"[1]. 1: [http://bleske-rechek.com/April%20Website%20Files/Bleske- Rech...](http://bleske-rechek.com/April%20Website%20Files/Bleske- Rechek%20et%20al.%202012%20Benefit%20or%20Burden.pdf) ------ itchyjunk First off, this is too vague of a generalization based on their sample size. It makes for a nice casual read but I can't take it too seriously. Though, I must note, my anecdotal experience also makes me think this is more of a norm. This also agrees with observed primate behaviors. Males have an incentive to identify potential mates while female have incentive to pick one out of the many available. (Male can impregnate many females in a year, female can only bear one child at a time.) Friendship and romance also have overlapping characteristics. Example: "bromance" where it's not sexual but outsiders might see characters typically associated with romance. It's too big of a topic and I would probably write an essay. ------ thescriptkiddie Ya, I don't buy this. I know this is just my experience, but I've had plenty of "just friends" who were members of the opposite sex, and nothing bad ever happened. ~~~ wsc981 Just speaking for myself: I have never persued a friendship with a woman if I was not at least attracted to her. I don't see female colleagues at my current job as friends and I feel the same about the girlfriends of my friends. Those are just platonic relationships to me that I am not interested in deepening in any way. ~~~ throwaway91111 That is so odd to me. Why would you pursue (platonic) relationships with men if there's no attraction? Are you only attracted to women? (I'm assumig you're male.) Or are you talking about sexual attraction? Do you view women as only sexual? I am simply trying to figure out what men provide that women can or do not. Personally (as a man) I can't make heads or tails out of how to interact with other men outside of work; I am precisely the opposite of you. ~~~ wsc981 I am only sexually attracted to woman of course. But at the same time I think men are generally more fun to be around. Woman are in some way 'less funny' on average. ------ manicdee Apparently the writer of the article can not comprehend the difference between attraction and action. I can find someone attractive without trying to have sex with them. Men and women can be "just friends", and this is not incompatible with "men are more likely to find friends sexually attractive." Whether this is due to biology, sociology, culture, or space aliens is anyone's guess. ------ cmac2992 Am I crazy or is their surprisingly little quantitative data? Are we talking a 5% effect or 80%? ------ antisthenes Ah, the undergraduates. The most studied group in America! ------ rustynails About 1/2 of my friends are female. Over the years, I've had a few of my expressions of interest rejected. However, I've had quite a few female friends "give up because I didn't get the message they were interested". I've been abused, called stupid, asked if I was gay, etc by female friends who were interested in me. I once had to ask a mutual (female) friend what happened because I couldn't get a word out of one woman. "You can't be THAT dumb, can you?". I call bs on this one. I've had too many instances of being explicitly hit on (about 1 in 3 of good female friends at a guess) to believe the "women aren't attracted to male friends". However, I have plenty of female friends who I just like because they are amazing people.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
AWS OpenVPN Endpoint Script - Ttlequals0 https://github.com/ttlequals0/autovpn ====== teknologist I've been playing with this lately: [https://github.com/jlund/streisand](https://github.com/jlund/streisand) It's essentially a set of Ansible scripts that will install a set of VPN daemons on your cloud instance* , such as OpenVPN, Stunnel, OpenConnect, L2TP/IPsec, Shadowsocks, and more. Seems to be running well so far. * supported providers are Amazon EC2, DigitalOcean, Google Compute Engine, Linode and Rackspace. ------ ljoshua I also like the Tinfoil Security VPN setup, which does it for you fairly automagically using DO: [https://www.tinfoilsecurity.com/vpn/new](https://www.tinfoilsecurity.com/vpn/new) ------ andy_ppp Funny this should appear; I just (literally connected for 16m 27s) ended up using this today to create something similar on digital ocean... The Starbucks wifi has a mind of it's own. [https://github.com/hwdsl2/setup-ipsec-vpn](https://github.com/hwdsl2/setup- ipsec-vpn) Recommended. ------ neximo64 I've played around with a couple of ways to get into AWS machines, Zerotier seems the easiest hands down ~~~ mdekkers Zerotier looks great, and affordable. Do you use this in production? any drawbacks? ~~~ neximo64 Its free and open source as far as i know (you mentioned affordable). The drawbacks i've had so far are on bad routers (double NATs) where it gets a bit sticky with connecting, otherwise all quite good, one of the best pieces of software i've ever used. If the configuration when connecting behind a NAT on a badly configured router i've never really had a bad experience with ZT. I use it to connect into my AWS VPC then connect to anything I need to as if it were local. ------ phasecode What advantage does this have over the OpenVPN Access Server on the AWS Marketplace? It does everything except attach the EIP at the end. ~~~ Ttlequals0 The goal for this was a dynamic approach to create and destroy endpoints on the fly. The OpenVPN Access Sever is typically for a more permanent deployment.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: What's been your experience with AWS Lambda? - champagnepapi ====== eb0la I tried it writing a _trivial_ python script that called a webservice every 5 minutes and stored the .json response in S3. Advantages: \- Cheaper than having your own micro.t1 server and setting crontab. \- I have information about how much time it takes to actually run the script. Findings: \- Test & debug: inside lambda only. Didn't like this, but for trivial stuff like mine it worked. \- "Crontab-like" granularity: you cannot trigger a lambda function every X seconds. The minumum is a cloudwatch periodical "cron-like" trigger. \- The script took much more execution time than I thought. It also required less memory, but this is not a problem ;-). \- Every line you print() to stdout goes to a Cloudwatch log. It's both helpful and something to care about because Cwatch is not free. ------ mindcrime I've only used Lambda for one thing, a simple website monitoring / alerting setup, but it worked wonderfully. I wrote my Lambda function in Java since I know Java better than the other options, and even in a verbose language like Java the actual code was probably 50-75 lines of meaningful code (not boilerplate). It just reads a file from S3 with a list of URL's, opens a connection to each in turn, and for any entry that experiences an error, it sends an SMS message to my phone using SNS. I probably spent an aggregate 3-4 hours on the whole thing, and it works great. And since I am only checking 4 times a day, it'll take me forever to use enough Lambda to cost anything. It may not be perfect for all uses, but for this little thing it works out really well. (Aside: Yes,I could have used an off-the-shelf package like Nagios, or a SaaS monitoring service. I did this in part to learn Lambda anyway, and also because I like the idea of something I control and can customize myself, but which doesn't require maintaining a server, yadda-yadda.) ~~~ champagnepapi Awesome! Yeah I was thinking of creating a REST endpoint for form submission and get a text alert, just to test out the waters with Lambda. ------ kkoppenhaver Currently using it to build a service for image processing/generation from a given HTML template. Relatively simple to do in python and once it's hooked into API Gateway, easy to access and restrict as well. In addition, I've used it as the backend for an Alexa skill, which works quite nicely[1]. [1] [https://github.com/kkoppenhaver/last- episode](https://github.com/kkoppenhaver/last-episode) ~~~ ocrimgproc Can you share what kind of service is that? ------ vanrysss I don't recommend building your API with it unless your engineers' ops skills are on point. I'm currently contracting for an org that is transitioning from java & clojure services hosted in a colo backed by postgres to full on lambdas written in node backed by dynamoDB. They've built a very impressive Rube- Goldberg machine for taking some data from an etl process, inserting it in dynamo, and then retrieving when an endpoint is hit. In the meantime code quality and development speed have taken a nose-dive with a very important deadline looming in the near future. Lambdas are great for event-driven tasks and cronjobs though. ------ jpetersonmn I've been using AWS Lambda for a few weeks now. Mostly for trivial things like tagging and infrastructure automation. I like it as it supports python. For what I'm doing I don't need any external libraries so it's pretty slick. No server to maintain, etc... I'm struggling a bit to find event patterns that work in cloudwatch to trigger my lambda functions though. For instance when a volume becomes "available" I can't find an event pattern that triggers off of that, etc... If anyone has any tips or documentation you can point me to that would be awesome. ------ twunde The main thing to keep in mind with Lambda is the number of library dependencies you're pulling in and your development workflows. I believe that you're limited to a certain file size per a lambda job, which includes dependencies. Developer workflows, just means that you'll need to come up with a way to sync lambda jobs with your version control (we currently have a deploy script for our workflow). I do have one ex-colleague who's all in on Lambda. His company just uses lambda to do all their backend processing. ------ QuinnyPig Lifecycle management of functions needs a better story. That said, I use a number of under-the-hood functions to build and power Last Week in AWS, I’ve replaced a number of cron jobs with it, and a lot of AWS billing work (transitioning objects, tag propagation, etc) can be efficiently handled at large scale via Lambda. I’m just not sure I’d put it inline for anything life-critical just yet. ------ thisone It truly depends on what you're feeding the lambda with. I wouldn't recommend it for stream processing, ie reading streaming data from kinesis. If you're going to read streaming data from kinesis, write a KCL application. I can say 99% you will need the flexibility you get. It may seem like nothing, but not knowing when the lambda context is going to recycle can also be a real pain in the ass. ------ PaulHoule I use it together with DynamoDB and SES to support an email newsletter system that involves verification, unsubscribe, delivery notifications, etc. Spins like a top and costs very little ro run. ------ jokull Replaced it with Task Tiger ([https://github.com/closeio/tasktiger](https://github.com/closeio/tasktiger))	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: What does it mean to have a attack on a problem - quietthrow I was reading Richard Hammings lecture - “you and your research” where he mentions about having “an attack on a problem”. He mentions he didn’t work on time travel , antigravity etc because he did not have an attack on that problem. And because he didn’t have an attack on the problem they were not important problems.<p>What does it mean to have a attack on a problem? ====== SamReidHughes It means you have some path you can take to make progress on the problem. For example, suppose I want to compute the sum for n = 1 to infinity of 1/n^2. I can't think of any way to solve it. But one day you discover that you can calculate 1-1/2+1/3-1/4+..., by sticking x^n terms on it: sum(x^n * -(-1)^n/n), differentiating, giving you sum((-x)^(n-1)), recognizing that's a geometric series for 1/(1+x), which clues you in to see if the initial series was a Maclaurin series for log(1+x), and so it is, the sum is log(2). This gives you a new attack on the problem: Try parameterizing the series on a variable, like the sum{x^n/n^2}, or sum{1/(nx)^2}, or what-have-you, perform some manipulations, and see what happens. If that doesn't work out, another attack is to compute an approximation of the sum on a computer, by adding up the first hundred million terms, and seeing if it approaches a value you recognize. Knowing the actual value might give you clues about the solution technique (if you want to prove the answer). Before the age of computers, you might approximate it with the integral 1/x^2 from k+0.5 to infinity, with the first k terms added. Or you might develop general techniques to approximate the sum f(n) more exactly, using the derivatives of f(x) to adjust for the errors that basic integral approximation gave. If you find out that it's approximately X, then maybe the series is related to some other formula that is known to give you X. Then by performing some manipulations, you might show the two are equivalent. That's another attack on the problem. And then any time you see a formula with 1/n^2's in it... maybe you could somehow connect that to the series. ~~~ quietthrow Thanks for the answer with the examples. I am not much of a math person so am not following the math example but I think I (at least) directionally get what you are saying. Follow up question: Based on what you are saying does it mean that forming different hypothesis on ways to solve the problem can be considered an attack on the problem OR it has to be more than a hypothesis whereby you might have a general approach to solving that class of problem but the detailed steps for solving a particular instance of that problem needs to be figured out and tested? ~~~ SamReidHughes Either. ------ muzani It's more that you have something to start on. We can tackle problems like building a Mars colony. We can make rockets, we can do life support, we can scout the area, calculate trajectories, figure out how to make rockets that land. However, we can't do time travel because there's nothing to start on. ------ hieloz Richard Hamming wrote that serious scientists should have a list of problems that they would like to work on, but they can't work on all of them at the same time, and some are off the active list because there is no attack available. An attack is "a good starting place, some reasonable idea of how to begin." This is an article that will help you understand "attack" . [http://www.the- rathouse.com/2013/Fanaticism.html](http://www.the- rathouse.com/2013/Fanaticism.html)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Matt Taibbi on the JOBS Act - jellicle http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/why-obamas-jobs-act-couldnt-suck-worse-20120409?x ====== maxcan I find this perspective so incredibly frustrating. Its as if people feel that stock investments need to have zero risk. Anyone who dumps their entire life savings into a pre-seed startup and gets wiped out, quite frankly, deserved it. Matt Taibbi would serve the public much better if he wrote about the real world risks involved in these investments, the need for diversification, and other ways for individuals to make risk appropriate investments.. ------ jellicle This was submitted earlier and got no discussion, so I resubmitted it with a more neutral title. Taibbi has some excellent points. Overall, in the long run, this is going to hurt the startup industry. There will be numerous publicized incidents of massive fraud. Many people will lose their money and they will tar the entire industry with that perception. Casual investors are going to get robbed blind by scam artists, and anyone intending to run a real, honest business should be against these legal changes. ~~~ retroafroman I agree. I think we're too busy cheering about how smart and progressive we are, making it so that games and iPhone stands can get crowdfunded, to realize that this is going to come back to bite us. In this case, someone outside the industry, like Taibbi, is a good sanity check, though he does have his own reasons for opposing it.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
FBI Director Comments on San Bernardino Matter - robbiemitchell https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-director-comments-on-san-bernardino-matter ====== bradleyjg _It should be resolved by the American people deciding how we want to govern ourselves in a world we have never seen before. We shouldn’t drift to a place—or be pushed to a place by the loudest voices—because finding the right place, the right balance, will matter to every American for a very long time._ So why are they asking the courts to stretch the 1789 All Writs Act beyond its breaking point, instead of going to Congress for a new law? The magistrate that signed off on this isn't even an Article III judge. ~~~ mhays Except he did go to Congress, and came back with nothing, forcing him to use the AWA. So who is pushing who exactly? And who has a louder voice in criminal justice matters than the FBI? ~~~ BWStearns Hadn't thought about it this way before, but he might be turning to the AWA because a reasonable piece of legislation can't make it through congress. ~~~ justin_vanw Reasonable according to whom? This is why we have _Rule of Law_. There is no "we follow the law when it seems reasonable". Whatever the law is, it should be followed, and it does not matter at all what anyone's personal opinion is regarding what the law should be. Perhaps it is more complex than this, for example in cases of civil disobedience. However, civil disobedience is for cases of conscience when you cannot _personally_ participate in something that is immoral, so you refuse to participate or you protest it. The key here is that this is ignoring the law to resist immoral uses of power, not ignoring the law to remove intentional restrictions to the application of allocated authority. This applies doubly to the legal system itself. An appeal to the inability of legislatures to "get things done" has been the argument of every tyrant since Caesar. ~~~ BWStearns I was suggesting following the rule of law. Congress passes laws when they get around to it. I'm not in any way advancing that we should ban encryption or support backdoors (effectively banning encryption). I will not however pretend that I have exhaustively considered all legislation that would allow the FBI to open this phone without setting dangerous precedents. I can't think of any at the moment but I don't think anyone in a position to do anything with an answer is trying. The issue is too good a political bludgeon to bother even seeking some creative solution to the problem (again, not that I am 100% sure there even is a legislative solution that wouldn't be a vastly undesirable and possibly unconstitutional blow to encryption). It is not a good starting presumption that no reasonable answer can be reached, especially when the topic under discussion isn't a core issue like "backdoor all encryption" but rather "is it possible to pass reasonable and generally acceptable legislation such that Apple can legally be compelled to aid this decryption effort without setting a terrible precedent?" There may be no solution to that problem, which is fine, but don't suggest that I was endorsing some vaguely Orwellian shit because I don't presume as a given that our opponents on the general issue of encryption have malicious aspirations of tyranny. ~~~ ltbarcly3 It's not vaguely Orwellian. Given an ability to disregard the rule of law, and sufficient charisma, and some hard times, any country can become a dictatorship in 5 years. We can't kill every charismatic person, and we can't prevent hard times. We can insist on the rule of law. ~~~ BWStearns I suggested that a disagreement might have a non-specified solution a) exists and b) would be achievable through legislation, passed by an elected legislature. Nothing I suggested requires killing charismatic people (?) or advocates against the rule of law. Normally when people intentionally misread me in the most uncharitable fashion possible I can at least see the deranged logic, but in your case I can't see what evil you claim I am advancing or how you arrived at that conclusion. ~~~ justin_vanw I am still talking about your original comment. I understand your clarification, I was nitpicking that you were saying my response to the original comment was 'crazy' or something, but without the context you gave in your reply I think my original response was appropriate. I agree with your larger point, there is probably a workable solution that balances the threat of government with the benefits of government, but I disagree that it is 'not getting things done' that is the cause of us not finding that compromise. In general, I think that appeals to 'a lack of will' are almost always incorrect. People, even politicians, are generally good and want to find good solutions. There is a lot of disagreement on what is a good solution, and even more disagreement on what the long term consequences of choices are. This is why there is gridlock, and if you read the Federalist Papers (in the case of the US), you will see that this gridlock is a Feature of the system, not a Bug. ~~~ BWStearns Every time I hear someone defend the recent state of affairs by bringing up the gridlock being a feature and not a bug, I feel like someone who owns a delivery truck that won't go more than 10 mph. I go to the dealer and ask what the fuck, and the dealer says that there's a speed governor on the truck that won't let it surpass 80mph and the governor is just working better than usual. ~~~ justin_vanw That is a clever analogy. I think we are fine though, we are safer than ever before. We don't need to extend government snooping power, because there is no need to do so. If someone disagrees, that is fine, but that is why we have a speed governor. People have always complained about decisions being made too slowly, but they have never been made faster, if anything they are made more quickly now than ever before. Congress used to only meet a few times a year for a few weeks! ~~~ BWStearns When they only met a few times for a few weeks they were passing laws that were readable in whole by individuals during those sessions. The scope of their responsibilities has increased and I expect them to apply a correspondingly high degree of effort. I want the legislature to be passing laws rolling back the security state, I want them to cancel or rework programs that don't work across the board. They can't do those things if they spend all their time in some arcane ritual circle jerk whose only and ultimate goal is just to make some of the other participants ultimately look more ridiculous than other participants. We've normalized and accepted parliamentarian bullshit at the expense of governing (on both sides, but the republicans are the undisputed masters of the dark arts) for a couple decades now. Legislative lethargy (sorry, had to) is supposed to derive from lengthy debate and substantive disagreement, not from participants purposely tanking the process to score points in the cheap seats. Part of the reason that they got shit done in a couple of weeks in ye- olden-congress is that it was closer to a turn based game, news traveled slower and so the results of the whole session were what constituted news, not every little BS stunt. The frustrated and vindictive part of me hopes that not a single senator or congressman pays a price for their cynical abandonment of their duty to govern. That way, next term we see months long shutdowns of the whole federal government and a collapse of federal services until [Bernie\|Hillary] signs a budget that reallocates all non-entitlement social spending to some insane shit that polled well among likely voters suffering from bathtub-gin induced brain damage. The revolting (both senses) congressmen won't actually care about getting the spending reallocated, but them "standing up to" [Bernie\|Hillary] will play well with their group so so be it. Edit: to clarify the frustrated and vindictive part would be rooting for it in the sense that the worst part about democracy is that people get the government they deserve, and at the moment it doesn't seem like the process thinks we deserve much. ~~~ justin_vanw Again, you seem to think we are getting 'worse' government, but we have the best government we have ever had. Just because you can see it close up (in a historical sense), you are aware of it's warts. But I assure you, the governments of the past had all the problems we have today, and many, many, many more. If you were to get in a time machine and go back even 50 years, you would be shocked at how _corrupt_ the government was then compared to now. Stop with your short sighted, historically ignorant whining already. ------ noobermin I'll go ahead and say that it sounds extremely sincere and straight-forward, much unlike most official statements I've seen from the FBI. He does _suggest_ that his view is right, but he does the right thing, as apple did, in supporting a public discourse about the so-called balance between privacy and safety. I know many people seem to gravitate to the extremes on every issue, but both Cook and Comey are right in saying that we as a nation need to question our fundamental assumptions in our thinking and think through what the would be the best balance between the two, if there be any. As Comey says, and I personally agree with this, the "balance" shouldn't be decided "by corporations that sell stuff for a living" or by "the FBI which investigates for a living,"...or in general, the government. We shouldn't be grass in a fight between two elephants. The American people need to decide how much involvement both government and large multinational corporations have in their lives. That's what this all comes down to, after all. ~~~ allworknoplay Security vs privacy is a false dichotomy here. Backdoors can help law enforcement achieve some goals but weaken overall security. The debate is security vs security, and framing it any other way reflects either willful deceit or ignorance. ~~~ FreedomToCreate Encryption could also help obstruct justice and let criminals get away with things. Most people won't understand till it impacts them personally but imagine if you are robbed of all your money and the answer of who did it lies in a computer you are able to get your hand on. Wouldn't you love it if the police had a backdoor now. You are wrong in framing the debate as security vs security. Its like everything else when it comes to liberty and protection. The question is how much liberty are we willing to give up for protection. We can't let a corporation or the government anchor our opinions on the left or right. ~~~ autoreleasepool Can you cite a case where encryption has obstructed justice or prevented a crime from being solved? ~~~ FreedomToCreate Yes, [http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/12/opinion/apple-google- when-...](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/12/opinion/apple-google-when-phone- encryption-blocks-justice.html?_r=0) Also I believe even without the citation that the notion that criminals can use encryption to protect themselves is pretty obvious. ~~~ autoreleasepool Even more obvious is the notion that innocent civilians use encryption to protect themselves from mass survelence and needless data collection. Is the end goal no longer total information awareness? [0] Side note: that was a rather scathing and slanted article you cited. It would have been nice to see the simple facts of the case presented in a neutral light. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_Information_Awareness](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_Information_Awareness) ~~~ FreedomToCreate My point is that encryption is good and bad, but we can't completely enable it to be utilized for criminal activity. There will be the need for a resolution to be reached on who gets access to this information, in what situations, and maybe even strict prosecution if the information is ever used incorrectly. ~~~ autoreleasepool Encryption is either secure or it isn't. You can't have a middle ground. It's unfortunate that under rare, and very particular circumstances criminals can perhaps evade crimes because they have access encryption, but it's also unfortunate that they can get away with crimes because they have access to guns, knives, vaults, cars, basements, gasoline, matches, duck tape, chain saws, shovels, etc... Yet we don't cripple the effectiveness of these items for the sake of preventing crime. Doing so would only harm the quality of lives of the vast majority of innocent people who we trust to use these thing for their own benefit as free citizitens of a free country. ~~~ FreedomToCreate >unfortunate that they can get away with crimes because they have access to guns, knives, vaults, cars, basements, gasoline, matches, duck tape, chain saws, shovels, etc... But investigators can get access to basements, cars, knives and guns and use them to solve the crime. In this case, post-crime, there is no way to gather information that could be important. ~~~ autoreleasepool > But investigators can get access to basements, cars, knives and guns and use > them to solve the crime. In this case, post-crime, there is no way to gather > information that could be important. Which is irrelevant to how these individual items are used to actually prevent the crime from being solved. While encryption prevents access to information that may or may not be useful, guns are used to kill witnesses that are never found, shovels are used to burry bodies that take decades to find, cars are impounded or destroyed after a getaway, I could go on. Often enough, even if any of these items are found, it doesn't help solve the crime because the criminal was simply too smart. I fail to see why encryption is being treated differently than any other legal thing we, as free and innocent citizens, have access to. The cynic in me believes the only actual difference is in the level of familiarity the majority of the voting population has with this particular legal thing. They seem to have, unfortunately, been misinformed and poorly educated about this issue and technology in general. ------ 25cf These people are either being intentionally deceitful or are simply incompetent in understanding the full implications of what they're asking. Either possibility is disturbing. ~~~ sneak Despite the obvious application of Hanlon's razor, the latter is simply not plausible. The release statement opens with a stone cold lie. [https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/70115236890220134...](https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/701152368902201344) [https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/70115264061335142...](https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/701152640613351424) [https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/70115296105404006...](https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/701152961054040069) [https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/70115860701918412...](https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/701158607019184128) [https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/70115891912992768...](https://twitter.com/matthew_d_green/status/701158919129927682) ~~~ studentrob So they know this leads to an Orwellian state and they do not care? Maybe, but it would be political suicide to admit that. Certainly Comey is being deceitful in his first sentence. Even Hillary called for a Manhattan-like project to circumvent encryption back in December [1]. That shows it's something that's being discussed in Washington quite frequently. I doubt any will ever admit they're trying to lead us towards an Orwellian state. Also, encryption is part of our protection from that. Heads of state and encryption currently appear to be directly at odds. [1] [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/democratic-debate-transcript- cli...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/democratic-debate-transcript-clinton- sanders-omalley-in-new-hampshire/) ------ autoreleasepool In other words, they're sticking to their story. No mention of the iCloud password reset either. ~~~ maratd > No mention of the iCloud password reset either. Exactly. How can you not address that? They necessitated this whole mess through their actions. I try not to ascribe malice to what can easily be explained through incompetence, but to not even mention it? Shameful. ~~~ beedogs Honestly, I'm ascribing it to malice. ------ tomschlick Didn't he and other FBI/DHS officials just get done testifying to congress for the need to backdoor encryption standards?! Yeah, sorry, but I don't think I'm gonna trust them even though they promise it will only be this one time. ------ dclowd9901 You don't get it, Comey. The problem isn't that you want this information. Obviously you want this information as an investigator of a crime. The problem is, we can't fucking trust you or anyone enough to cross that bridge, because we know if it's there, you're just going to want more. You and every law enforcement agent in the United States has lost our trust. Call it overreach, or overzealous prosecution, high incarceration rates, crooked judges sending kids to jail for kickbacks... fuck if I list any more, I'm going to want to drink some more. I'd love to live in a world where I trusted a government, which is supposed to be a composition of its people, more than a profit-motivated, self-interested business, but in some weird turn of events, something vastly different has festered in the last 15 years. You blew it, you asshole, you and every other cop. ~~~ FreedomToCreate A few things. If you want to make your argument legit, refrain from calling the other person names. Second, besides drinking and making yourself essentially useless, what are you doing to improve this situation. One person may not be enough to make a difference but its better than zero. America is entirely being driven by fear and anger. The current presidential race is a perfect reflection of the hate, anger, and fear that Americans believe exists. The system is a reflection of what the "good" people allow to happen. The FBI has a job, and Apple has a commitment to its customers. Technology is going to get more advanced, does that mean that we should let it be a tool to obstruct justice. You may not trust the people tasked with the investigation, but people should also look at the fact that the encryption here is obstructing justice. Tomorrow if a criminal kidnaps a bus of school children and the police are able to get a hold of a locked phone that holds their location, would you be as opposed to the current situation? The creation of a method to disable the phones encryption is a slippery road, but the option of not aiding the FBI is also a slippery road. This is a organization created to protect the people. We need to have a open discourse on how the information can be taken off this phone while minimizing the loss of public security and privacy . This is not a black and white issue like many people are treating it. And just to make it clear, I do agree that the government has done extremely questionable things as well as committed offenses against the publics privacy. We need to fix the issue of distrust, because a lack of trust in our system is equal to cancer within a body. ~~~ dclowd9901 Counterpoint: Just going out on a limb here, but I'm pretty sure James Comey isn't leafing through Hacker News reading our arguments. If he'd like to have a civil discussion, I'd be more than happy to bring the civility. Second, our system is essentially set up to make me powerless. It's actually engineered that way. I do what I can to educate people around me, but when it comes to voting or having any control over who's in office or who officiates our most important government positions, the ball's not just not in our court, it's on another planet. Technology, as you said, will continue to get much more advanced. I reckon at some point, literally every moment of our lives will be perfectly catalogued, from birth to death. This is why what Mr. Comey wants scares me so much, because you can practically hear him salivating in that letter. We have guarantees built into our constitutional freedoms, and one of the most important guarantees is that the government can't compel us to do things. Sure, there are laws to maintain the peace and common order, but you don't have to house or attend to military in your home, you don't have to testify against yourself, you're not compelled by police to follow their wishes until you're under arrest (which they ostensibly can't do without probable cause), and you don't have to aide in an investigation if you're not involved. These are vital because the moment we're legally compelled to aide investigators, all bets are off. We are no longer able to even protect ourselves against undue search and seizure. ~~~ FreedomToCreate I agree with you. The motives of those with access to this information is questionable and being forced to do things impedes personal liberty, but the people who wrote the constitution could have never imagined this type of situation. It quite literally requires an in-depth discussion by the people and those we trust in power to develop a solution, but the idea that no backdoor will ever exists is not realistic. Look at history. The encryption the Nazis had created helped them commit terrible acts of war and it was the backdoor the Allies discovered that helped bring justice to them. I'm being devils advocate here because I don't people should view this as "us vs them". Comey may seem like he is salivating to you, but he does raise the notion that at the other end is a corporation, who also has an agenda. ~~~ autoreleasepool > Look at history. The encryption the Nazis had created helped them commit > terrible acts of war and it was the backdoor the Allies discovered that > helped bring justice to them. Are you suggesting the Nazi's were the only ones to use encryption during World War II? You forgot to mention at least 9 other nations (including the USA) [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_cryptography](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_cryptography) ~~~ FreedomToCreate My point is to show how encryption in the wrong hands can also have terrible consequences. This is a two way street. ~~~ autoreleasepool > encryption in the wrong hands can also have terrible consequences. So can literally _anything_ in the wrong hands, though. ~~~ dmix Cars, cellphones, fertilizer, kitchen knives, baseball bats, apple seeds, etc. Encryption is only special because of the power dynamic that shifts in the average citizens favour. ------ symlinkk > We don’t want to break anyone’s encryption or set a master key loose on the > land. This directly contradicts Tim Cook's statement, in fact he used the same term "master key": > In the physical world, it would be the equivalent of a master key, capable > of opening hundreds of millions of locks — from restaurants and banks to > stores and homes. It either is a master key or it isn't. ~~~ rtpg It isn't. the FBI asked for a specialised OS image that would have a check so that it could only work on this specific phone. Combined with Apple's encryption/signing of the update, this image could not be applied to any other device. So the "work" asked of Apple would produce something that would only work on the phone with the warrant ~~~ symlinkk So Tim Cook was wrong? Look at what he wrote: "Specifically, the FBI wants us to make a new version of the iPhone operating system, circumventing several important security features, and install it on an iPhone recovered during the investigation. In the wrong hands, this software — which does not exist today — would have the potential to unlock any iPhone in someone’s physical possession. The FBI may use different words to describe this tool, but make no mistake: Building a version of iOS that bypasses security in this way would undeniably create a backdoor. And while the government may argue that its use would be limited to this case, there is no way to guarantee such control." ~~~ rtpg Yes, Tim Cook is lying (EDIT: perhaps not lying, but being creative with the meaning of "potential"). The software asked for by the FBI would only work on one phone because it would both have a check for the specific phone, and be signed by Apple (so can't be modified). The software would need to be modified and resigned by Apple to be used on another phone. ~~~ ubernostrum Really? You really, honestly, truly and genuinely believe that if Apple just does this for them, just this one time, just for this one phone, then that's the end of it? That the FBI and other law-enforcement agencies would _never_ , not once, not for the rest of the lifetime of the universe (and certainly not, say, about 24 hours later) come back and say "Well, we're glad you helped us with that case, now here's this list of other cases we'd like help with, and now you've proven that you can do this we're going to be bringing you a lot of these"? That's what Tim Cook is worried about: it won't stop with this one phone unless it's stopped before that one phone gets unlocked and becomes the precedent that makes this just another routine thing. _Every_ now-routine violation of privacy and security was originally marketed as "just this one case, this one's unique and special and sensitive and we absolutely _have_ to get it done, just this one, trust us" and eventually morphed into "eh, it's Tuesday, time to ship off another truckload of requests to have this done to people". ~~~ rtpg Of course the FBI will ask again and again. And Apple could be compelled to comply each and every time. The slippery slope argument being applied here is that FBI search warrants will now work on phones less than the iPhone 5S from now on (until Apple closes the iOS update backdoor I guess). This is far from "China will be able to mass-hack into iPhones from now on"-style comments I've seen from others. The fact is that Apple left a backdoor in their phones and are now being told to exploit it. An argument against having the backdoor in the first place. ~~~ schismsubv Apple _will_ be compelled. You either don't understand the US legal doctrine of stare decisis or are being intentionally obtuse. Furthermore, the US legal system encourages elaboration on stare decisis, applying prior case law to novel cases rather than hashing out new decisions. This means that creative applications of this ruling ("give me an uncontrolled backdoor") are simply a question of time once the landmark case is made. ~~~ rtpg considering that the single-use nature of this exploit is a fundamental part of the ruling (and of the validity of the search warrant itself), you would not be able to use precedent to just get an uncontrolled backdoor. ~~~ schismsubv Whether the exploit is single-use, about a phone, Apple, the 5c, or any other specific parameters is fundamentally irrelevant. What this case is doing is setting precedent that the courts can compel a company to _create_, no matter how trivial one may think that creation may be today. _That_ is the precedent so many draw exception to, because stare decisis is also a doctrine of incrementalism, of gradual expansion of interpretations. Today Apple is compelled to create a very controlled firmware; who's to say in the figurative tomorrow that Samsung won't be compelled to create and send a firmware update to a specific Blu-Ray player that creates an air microphone out of the laser? Where does it stop? To be complete (as was pointed out in another sibling thread) incrementalism may be curtailed if implications are carefully argued and acknowledged by the judge. I am skeptical of the value of that approach, but have no hard argument against it. ------ ryanlol >The San Bernardino litigation isn’t about trying to set a precedent or send any kind of message. It is about the victims and justice. This is a big fat lie. The way US legal system works makes any case like this about setting a precedent, be it intentional or not. The fact that the FBI director goes and straight up lies about this just supports the theory that it may very well be intentional. ~~~ mirkules I don't believe this is tied to the San Bernardino case. The topic of weakening encryption has been brewing for the past 6-12 months, and the FBI is using the SB case as a convenient hammer to put a nail in the coffin of encryption. [http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/28/the- fbi...](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/28/the-fbi-used-to- recommend-encryption-now-they-want-to-ban-it) [http://www.dailydot.com/politics/second-crypto-war- hearing-w...](http://www.dailydot.com/politics/second-crypto-war-hearing- washington/) [http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-fbi-has-no-idea-how- to-...](http://motherboard.vice.com/read/the-fbi-has-no-idea-how-to-solve-its- encryption-problem) These were all about a year ago. ~~~ ryanlol >I don't believe this is tied to the San Bernardino case. The topic of weakening encryption has been brewing for the past 6-12 months, and the FBI is using the SB case as a convenient hammer to put a nail in the coffin of encryption. This is about much more than just weakening encryption. I think Congressman Lieu put it well >This FBI court order, by compelling a private sector company to write new software, is essentially making that company an arm of law-enforcement. Private sector companies are not—and should not be—an arm of government or law enforcement. ------ imh > ...it does highlight that we have awesome new technology that creates a > serious tension between two values we all treasure — privacy and safety. I hate this narrative so much. Just because we happen to be storing everything we do now, doesn't suddenly create tension between privacy and safety. We used to not store it at all! It's really just a question of _keeping_ privacy with new tech. ~~~ rando289 Yes, it's a false dichotomy. Either we have a police state, or the terrorists win, take your choice! Don't forget the children, and the .0001 % chance of horribly brutally muderdered by terrorists! ------ pnwhyc I think it's reasonable to say that the HN crowd is predominantly more educated on this matter than the average American. We are not the target audience of this letter. Neither is Apple. Comey is playing on the emotions and technological ignorance of the bourgeois. He refers to brute force hacking as, "...try to guess the terrorist’s passcode..." Then he plays on Americans' current distaste for large corporations and says that the, "American people," need to decide whether this is right or wrong. No, we don't. Every cryptologist, cyber-security expert and halfway decent IT is saying that this is a catastrophic proposal with the power to mutilate the fourth amendment and send a whole Jenga tower of rights tumbling after it. It shouldn't even be a question. The FBI appears to be using this tragedy as a trojan horse by which to commit atrocities upon our crucial freedoms. No, our thoughts and prayers are not enough, but our privacy and security is far too much. ~~~ studentrob > We are not the target audience of this letter Maybe, but it's fun to discuss, and there are enough of us spread throughout that can educate on this single issue. It's pretty easy for me to explain to my non-tech friends the implications of what the FBI is asking. Word of mouth travels fast and I would give pro-encryption the upper hand in this "debate". I have not heard anyone outside government protesting that Apple yield on this issue and I doubt I will. In fact, the only ones who speak up against encryption are those who do not listen to the people. Since they're supposed to represent us, they will be very easy to not vote for. Like you said though, it isn't even a question, encryption is here to stay whether the American government permits it or not. Ironically, by putting up such a fight, the government is simply telling criminals where the weak points are in law enforcement, and are thus empowering criminals. I hope our government can have a good sit down with tech company leaders and experts in cryptology. Despite Comey's request to have an open discussion, they seem to be excluding this group. It's apparent from his discourse, Hillary's, and Obama's that they've spent no time sincerely listening to anyone with any knowledge about the benefits of encryption. The "conversation" he so desires has only happened in Washington among people with no tech background. Presumably there will be some public hearings coming up. ------ studentrob Could Cook even compel his employees to write the desired operating system? If I worked there and was asked to violate/reverse the core of my company's principles, I would quit. Frankly, this type of order would deeply hurt moral at Apple. I imagine Cook knows that, and in addition to doing the right thing, he must double down on ensuring employee retention and future sale of products. End-to-end encryption is a feature many people buy the phone to get. If that disappeared, many techies would stop recommending it, and sales will slide. There's a lot on the table here. I don't even think you could measure the impact for reimbursement by the government. _sigh_ , at least you CA folks elected Ted Lieu, good job! ------ BWStearns I wonder if they did or what would have happened if they had approached Apple in a non-compulsory manner regarding this. He is right on the fact that the specific task they're seeking Apple to perform is more or less obsolete and will be entirely so shortly so I'm inclined to believe that they're not really going through all this to abuse that specific tool (though the precedent would be worth the fight in order to abuse it). It would be sad, but entirely his fault, if his prior efforts to set bad faith precedents to end-run consumer encryption alienated industry to the point where productive conversations are no longer possible. ~~~ plorg It seems that Apple got sick of servicing these requests, particularly as they started increasing in frequency. The NYTimes [0] reported earlier this week that Apple had been basically complying until last year, when they decided that they could no longer deal with the burden of evaluating the large amount of legal orders they were receiving and unlocking or retrieving data from phones. It seems unlikely, given their (new-ish) stance on privacy that they would comply with any request at this point. [0] [http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/19/technology/how-tim-cook- be...](http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/19/technology/how-tim-cook-became-a- bulwark-for-digital-privacy.html) Edit: I'm not trying to suggest that Apple is suddenly being arbitrarily obstreperous in cases where they may have once been compliant. Apple made a decision to change course and it wouldn't make any sense for them to go back on it just because the FBI asked "Pretty please?". ~~~ ubernostrum As far as I can tell Apple has _never_ complied with a request for what the FBI is asking for here. It has complied in cases where the phone was not encrypted, or where a backup in iCloud could be made available to law enforcement, but Apple has never actually produced, signed and installed a custom "this phone only, and only so law enforcement can brute-force it" version of iOS. And given that we're talking about a federal government that was perfectly happy with pictures of the TSA's master luggage key being published in newspapers, I don't fault Apple one bit for being scared of handing over what are basically the keys to the kingdom. ------ CodeWriter23 > We simply want the chance, with a search warrant, to try to guess the > terrorist’s passcode without the phone essentially self-destructing and > without it taking a decade to guess correctly. That’s it. Bull crap. The FBI has it within their power to break the encryption in less than a decade by spinning up tens of thousands of EC2 GPU instances. Forcing Apple to develop products that don't yet exists is simply a choice of economy, with the added benefit of being able to strongarm any other business into creating new products in the future if it suits the FBI. ~~~ tzs > Bull crap. The FBI has it within their power to break the encryption in less > than a decade by spinning up tens of thousands of EC2 GPU instances. How? They either need to break the PIN or they need to break the AES256 key that is used to encrypt file metadata. They cannot use EC2 GPU instances to attack the PIN because the function that derives the AES key from the PIN uses a key that is unique to each phone and not readable by software so they cannot get a hold of it unless they resort to opening the crypto chip and trying to read the key by examining the hardware (and if they do that, they won't need a GPU...any desktop computer would be able to brute force the PIN quickly). They can use EC2 GPU instances to go after the AES256 key for metadata encryption, but that will take a hell of a lot longer than a decade. ------ joolze "The San Bernardino litigation isn’t about trying to set a precedent or send any kind of message. It is about the victims and justice." When the government revokes the Gulf of Tonkin resolution I will again put faith in its ability to act responsibly with emergency powers and provisions that might, just might set a precedence. Until then, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, fuck you. ------ cmurf I don't like it, but I think we're better off if the courts side with FBI on this case, because it should accelerate the inevitable: either Apple and other mobile device makers give up on privacy and governments around the world get whatever they want, or they make zero knowledge devices that can't expose their data unless the user complies. In the meantime, FBI losing this case just means they try again. And again. And so will other governments, not just federal, but state and local. And foreign. The reality is Apple can change the software to in effect cause the data to become accessible. Apple doesn't have keys to the front door. But they have the power to weaken the hinges. Saying they won't do that isn't the same as it not being possible. ------ jkelsey It's a real media posturing war going on right now. I wish Apple would win the argument on merits of the argument alone, but it's obvious with this the FBI thinks it can rely on the terrorism argument alone. Notice that Comey doesn't even bother to refute the technical and legal precedent arguments that Apple and other privacy advocates raise in the media. Google or Facebook have to get involved and put something on their homepages; else, I think that the FBI wins this. ------ exodust There's a certain hypocrisy I'm noticing in these forum discussions whereby many of you are distrusting the FBI, but apparently you're fine with Apple having the best chance of cracking your phone. Everyone is going on about encryption, but notice it's not just encryption that protects us, but also vendor-controlled measures such as self-destruct. I prefer a level playing field in these matters. I don't want the FBI to have a better chance at cracking my phone than anyone else, but I also don't want Apple to have the best chance either. It's all or nothing. My vote is for strong encryption, but up until that point, everything else should be on the table for all parties such as crime investigators, not just exclusively controlled by tech giants. ~~~ Russell91 The hypocrisy is only superficial. It seems at first thought that the government (being owned by the people) would be more trustworthy. But... Based on incentives, the government is incentivized to put as many people in jail as possible. Apple is incentivized to make people's phone/laptop experience as good as possible. Based on worst-case actions, Apple can use your data to 1) sell you more devices, 2) generally reduce your consumer purchasing power, or unlikely 3) sell/share your data and seriously compromise your privacy. The government, on the other hand, can throw you in jail, for life. Based on history (Germany, Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, ...), governments have demonstrated real threats with user data in hand that corporations have never really come close to competing with. ~~~ exodust Your idea that Apple are incentivized to make people's phone experience as good as possible sounds like a wishful proposition. There's plenty of examples of Apple features and restriction designed as eco-system lock-in, behavior manipulation, or control limiting for commercial reasons. "What's good for Apple is good for our customers" is what they want you to believe, but as a long time iOS device owner, I reject that on numerous grounds. There's also an equivalence flaw in your argument that sounds like it's coming straight from infowars.com: "the government is incentivized to put as many people in jail as possible". I'm with your on incentives though. And one thing Apple have no commercial interest or incentive for, is fighting crime. We don't live in Star Wars. There's more than dark vs light. My position doesn't mean I am not aware of western government corruption, bungling, even war crimes. But I am not permanently polarized, forever holding "the government" in contempt for misguided actions and evil intentions. On history... if we're talking tyrannical governments, then "protection of user data" I suggest would _not_ have stopped any given government in your examples from unleashing hell on its people one way or another. ~~~ Russell91 Well I think my main point was just to say that the "hypocrisy" you mention actually has a rational backing. Not that the backing is bulletproof, but it's certainly more than a hypocrisy. You seem to most strongly disagree with the assertion that "the government is incentivized to put as many people in jail as possible". It's pretty clear from my original comment that "the government" is referring to law enforcement agencies, such as the FBI. Note that the FBI has thousands of agents whose performance is measured ultimately by the percent of cases they close. Thus, the claim that FBI agents "are incentivized to put as many people in jail as possible" is more an observation than some crackpot theory. It doesn't mean that we should change that - running a law enforcement agency any other way wouldn't make much sense. But it does provide the rational backing for someone to be more concerned about worst-case government abuse of data than worst-case corporate abuse. ------ zmmmmm > Maybe the phone holds the clue to finding more terrorists. Maybe it doesn’t. Interesting admission that they don't really have "probable cause" here, rather they apparently want to go on a fishing expedition. I guess if the owner of the phone is already established as a terrorist then that is cause enough, but I still would have expected them to be arguing they have specific reason to believe the phone is necessary for their investigation. ~~~ gregd The owner of the phone is San Bernadino County, which gave the FBI permission to search the phone. Pretty sure probable cause is a moot point when the owner of the phone grants you permission to search it. ~~~ zmmmmm Absolutely. I just think it significantly weakens their argument to admit they don't even know if they phone data will be useful. I would have thought when they are going to court to compel a company to do something they would be asserting something more than "who knows, it might be useful?" in support of their case.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Who owns the space between reclining airline seats? - sethbannon https://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2017/05/recline-and-fall?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/ed/whoownsthespacebetweenrecliningairlineseatsreclineandfall ====== totalZero I firmly believe that if your seat reclines, you are totally entitled to use the full extent of that recline. The only issue I've ever had with this was when a Lufthansa flight attendant barked at me to set my seat upright as I was napping while the person behind me was eating. It was a transatlantic flight. Never flew Lufthansa again. ~~~ nemo44x I think you're right to a point but there is a thing called etiquette. And we should respect that and not infringe on another person's enjoyment when inappropriate to do so. In terms of longer flights I find it ridiculous when people fully recline the second they are allowed to after takeoff. A small recline (20% for instance) is fine as it doesn't infringe on the person behind them and adds a sometimes necessary level of comfort that a fully upright seat does not. Fully reclining right after takeoff is rude and a breach of etiquette I believe. The main reason why, on a longer flight that is, is because drinks and food are served pretty quickly after the aircraft is stable. This means the person behind you requires a tray for a time to consume their beverage and meal. Etiquette says you should allow the person behind you to take advantage of this space during this time. Even if you choose not to partake in this event, you should respect the person's behind you who may in fact need this space to enjoy (as much as they can!) their meal with ample space. After the meal's waste have been collected is when I find it acceptable to go back all the way. This is often the time people begin to nap or sleep and the space is better used for this purpose. Some common courtesy, compassion and politeness goes a long way in making a better, more enjoyable place for everyone. ~~~ mylons you having to work on an airplane is your problem. if you HAVE to work on an airplane, ensure you can do so by getting a business class seat or better. by failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail. ~~~ always_good There's such little etiquette in airports and airplanes that it's a good opportunity to vent a little rage at everyone else. I think it's healthy. Like Purge Day in that movie "The Purge". For example, how everyone stands up immediately as soon as the plane lands. Someone 5 rows back managing to depart before you because you remained seated until it's your row's turn, but they have one of those oversized carry-ons and can't even get it down. So they essentially cut in front of you just to make you wait on them. Don't want anyone to be any less miserable than I am while traveling. It would unfairly deprive them of a great character-building experience. ~~~ palimpsests Alternatively, the amount of stress and tension amongst the collective in airports and airplanes is such that I think it's a great opportunity to practice being more compassionate and human with each other, versus "venting rage at everyone else" \- to let someone else go first in line, to clean up after yourself and maybe the past couple of other people who used the airplane lavatory before you, to take a couple of breaths and slow down before ripping into the airline counter agent for some real major or minor inconvenience. I completely agree that learning how to healthily express anger is extremely important, but I don't think we need to seed more misery amongst each other than what is happening by default already. ------ phil248 I've stuck to a policy of never reclining my seat on domestic and daytime flights. Unless of course the person in front of me starts a chain reaction. I believe it is a reasonable policy, but no one else seems to follow it. ~~~ grepthisab I do this too. I have long legs so if the person in front of me reclines, I have to as well. But otherwise I don’t recline and am very cognizant of the people behind me. One time the people in front of me reclined, so I reclined, and the people behind me asked me to unrecline. I told them the situation, and they asked the people in front of me to unrecline, they did, and I did. ~~~ phil248 A rare happy ending! ------ _ph_ One big question not asked is: why is it accepted that airlines install seating and set row distances such that when fully reclining you severely impact the person sitting behind you? ~~~ chx Because the flying public again and again votes with their dollars for the cheapest ticket everything else be damned. ~~~ nightski You are acting like there is a choice. Every large airline that can move me around the country has the exact same experience. The only "choice" is first class. However that is not a choice. It's not 10% or even 20% more. It's like 200-300% the cost of a normal ticket. ~~~ totalZero Most airlines in my country offer an upgrade to premium economy for something like 40 to 80 USD. ------ joncp This has already been fixed. With newer planes, the seat's pivot point is above the knees of the person behind. ~~~ stefantheard Also how can this possibly be true for every human being? I'm only 6'5'' and for any plane I've been on this has not been true. Including "newer" planes eg. the 787 Dreamliner. ~~~ tomjakubowski 6’5” is something like 4 SDs above the mean for adults (male & female), FWIW. ~~~ sjmulder So what is it worth? What help is this to someone 6'5"? He can hardly change his height to be more in line with the average person. ~~~ tomjakubowski It might help them to better understand the tradeoffs airlines make when designing their cabins. There are always exit row seats, which not only have longer seat pitch but also have rows ahead which cannot recline. Maybe airlines could waive the modest upgrade fee for passengers of extreme height. ------ tedunangst So the front row has nobody reclining into it. And the back row doesn't recline. So even if everybody reclines, that's not equal. ~~~ francisofascii For some airlines, the price of the front seat is more than the back seat. So the inequity is factored in. ~~~ misja111 But not for the seat in the back. ------ eximius I wish there was an airline that offered 'All Business Class' flights. It'd really just be a marketing trick to try to escape the High Volume/Low Price vs. Low Volume/High Price dilemma. I don't know if it'd work, but I would like to see someone try. (Arguments saying it can't work because thats how flights used to be and ended up where we are ignore that those changes were gradual with all airlines competing together to erode their quality. A new market entry of what I describe would be sufficiently different to have marketing reasons to not compete on price, etc) EDIT: Welp, apparently its been done and doesn't work or is simply less profitable. Still makes me sad there isn't a middle ground between sardines and sheiks. ~~~ Jhsto Last time I checked flights between SF and LA I saw this company: [https://www.flyvictor.com](https://www.flyvictor.com) Very expensive, but at least everything is business class. ~~~ dingaling Fly Victor are a front-end agency for many small charter operators, they don't have their own fleet. ~~~ Jhsto Ah, interesting, the website did not convey that on a fast look. Thank you. ------ solotronics why dont they angle the seats towards the aisle a bit? this helps with parked cars I would think it would be the same in this case. ~~~ dingaling Thomson Aero Seating in the UK proposed an angled seating arrangement for economy / coach back in the early 2000s; no airline adopted it but they went crazy for the business-class version. Jet Blue have a special variation for their narrowbody airliners. One of the problems of angled seating is that it introduces additional lateral stresses on the body which have to be demonstrated during certification. ------ scarface74 I can't read the linked article because it's behind a paywall and the private browsing trick isn't working. The article seems to be based on the study discussed here. [https://twocents.lifehacker.com/your-reclining-airplane- seat...](https://twocents.lifehacker.com/your-reclining-airplane-seat-vs-the- lap-behind-you-wh-1795298389) ------ chx I find a reclined seat uncomfortable. Must be me.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Fusion is not 20 years in the future.It’s 50 years in the past–and we missed it - zero_kool https://fusor.net/ ====== ALittleLight "The deuterium in a single cubic meter of seawater contains the as much energy as nearly 1,400 barrels of crude oil - enough to supply the civilizaton's energy needs for hundreds of millions of years - until long after the Sun itself has flamed out." What does that sentence mean? It seems like a claim that the energy of 1,400 barrels of crude oil is enough to sustain civilization for a long time, but that seems implausible to me. Also, off by an order of magnitude on the timeline for the sun burning out. Whenever I read stuff like this now I start to get paranoid that this is written by GPT-3. ~~~ i-am-curious That's 1 cubic meter. We have a lot more seawater? ------ joeberon I can’t possibly believe that this would not already have been pounced on by both scientists and major governments if it were as promising as made out here, sorry. ~~~ mathw Likewise. Also, it says there has been little progress, but there are numerous test reactors providing loads of data, ITER is being built, there's a lot of knowledge about how to do this now. It's still tremendously difficult and probably tremendously underfunded, but I'm not sure the claim that "many" have concluded it to be impossible is remotely founded. But I do have a friend who works at the UK's fusion research centre, obviously she believes in what they're doing! ------ vbezhenar [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusor) : Fusors are not considered a viable concept for large-scale energy production by scientists. ~~~ C4stor Who is to say we need "large-scale" energy production though, except the companies selling energy ? ~~~ tlb They're also not suitable for small-scale energy production. You have to put in more energy (to accelerate the ions towards the center) than you can get out (as heat). ~~~ sneak Seems like a perfect project for SoftBank.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Why Klout Should Not Be A Synonym For Influence - nlwhittemore http://www.waxingunlyrical.com/2011/02/18/why-klout-should-not-be-a-synonym-for-influence/ ====== nlwhittemore I think Klout is doing really interesting stuff and I love how much they're sharing about their methodology and ideas on their blog, but I like how this post refocuses our eyes on the prize of understanding the true measure of influence: people's ability to get others to do something.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
From Congress, a Law [JOBS Act] Befitting a Sausage Factory - JumpCrisscross http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/04/03/from-congress-a-law-befitting-a-sausage-factory/?nl=business&emc=edit_dlbkam_20120404 ====== sp332 >Grant Thornton asserts that the decline is a result of changes in market structure. One reason is decimalization — pricing stocks in cents rather than fractions — that took profits out of trading that had previously given brokers an incentive to list small companies. Is there a simple explanation for why changing from fractions to cents would remove profits? ~~~ JumpCrisscross Market makers make their money off the bid-ask spread, i.e. buying at the bid and selling at the ask (you and I, on the other hand, must do the reverse). Before decimilisation the minimum spread would be 1/16 (or even 1/8th) of a dollar. Today it is not uncommon to witness penny (or even fraction of a penny) spreads. Thus, the minimum theoretical spread realisable from making markets in a security dropped by 84% ($0.0625 to $0.01). If previously broker-dealer A had a cost of one cent per trade and broker- dealer B had a cost of half a cent per trade, it just meant that B-D B made more profit - he couldn't undercut A. Thus both would survive. Today competition has driven the bid-ask spread to cost delta so low that market makers need large volumes to break even on their operations - this kind of volume can only be realised in frequently traded securities, i.e. larger companies. Essentially, the wider spread subsidised inefficient market making operations, e.g. the making of markets in smaller companies. The positive externalities of those activities may have outweighed the dead-weight loss of the implicit subsidy. Note that there is a valid counter-argument that says fractional pricing meant a company that today has a penny spread and a company that today has a dime spread would be seen as equally profitable to deal in, on a unitary basis, from the market maker's perspective, while today the less liquid stock is far more profitable (again, on a unitary basis). Thus, by this line of logic, decimilisation _increased_ the incentive for market makers to make markets in less liquid securities, e.g. smaller companies. ------ SoftwarePatent > Congress simply doesn’t understand financial markets and instead legislates > to the political winds. Sure, and while we wait for that to change (never happen), let's allow people the freedom to make their own decisions about fundraising and investing. This bill is realistically the most we can hope for, especially in an election year.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
The Internet plans net neutrality 'day of action' on September 10th - jslampe http://www.theverge.com/2014/9/4/6104505/reddit-kickstarter-and-others-plan-net-neutrality-day-of-action ====== kb120 Reddit thread where Katie from pornhub announces that porn sites will join: [http://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/2fg8ky/large_us_tech_f...](http://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/2fg8ky/large_us_tech_firms_plan_go_slow_day_in_protest/ck8zhi5) ------ jslampe Find the widget at [http://battleforthenet.com/sept10th](http://battleforthenet.com/sept10th)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
N.Y. Times Scales Back Free Articles to Get More Subscribers - artsandsci https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-01/n-y-times-scales-back-free-articles-to-get-readers-to-subscribe ====== concam We desperately need the continued work of serious investigative journalism outfits. Even the existence of organizations able (willing?) to report fact- checked stories held to a high editorial standard seems tenuous. These businesses are not a public service but in my estimation all Americans benefit from an independent fourth estate. If you read NYT articles with any regularity I strongly urge you to subscribe. For me the cost of a digital subscription is trivial relative to the value I get from it. ~~~ noncoml Subscriptions is not the solution. It's an old model that doesn't work anymore. What we need is micropayments. ~~~ chomp Micropayments have failed constantly since the .com bubble days. The whole thing with micropayments is that the content creator is hoping that the cost to purchase the article is going to be low enough to where the user isn't going to notice the money. But they will notice. You're forcing a person to read a headline (and maybe a half paragraph intro) and then deciding if it's actually worth buying the article. That's a decision that the average person is not going to put up with. The best solution is to support publications that produce consistent and high quality content. The best model for this (that we know of) is recurring payment. ------ rblatz So I've been debating subscribing to the NYT, but the sheer number of options has delayed me from doing it. My wife and I both love crosswords and would love to get access to the crosswords, and I'd like to get a subscription to support journalism. Last time I looked it wasn't really clear to me which subscription(s) I should get so I delayed the choice. Now I find myself actively avoiding most NYT links because I want to "save them" for the stories I'm really interested in which means in general I almost never click on a NYT link anymore. So now I'm wondering if I should even bother subscribing. This seems like it will make me even less likely to subscribe, especially since I don't want to reward this business tactic. ~~~ nrhk In my opinion, journalistic integrity is more important than ever and I'll gladly pay for quality instead of being swamped with clickbait. I don't want my journalist to be beholden to advertisers instead of trying to provide the most truthful, unbiased facts to their readers. ~~~ cwg999 Unfortunately they will be beholden to their owners and the bias of their editors, but I agree that is better than clickbait at any rate. ------ matrix I'll subscribe to the NYT again when they stop requiring you to phone them to unsubscribe. I was a previous subscriber, and when I wanted to unsubscribe, I discovered there was no way to do it online. This is, of course, an intentional move to make it hard to unsubscribe. My advice to the NYT: learn from Netflix. ~~~ ambirex Don't subscribe from their website, but from their app. You can cancel on your phone without having to call them. ~~~ DrScump Why install any app from an untrustworthy entity in the first place? ------ tetrazine This move seems to betray a lack of nuance in understanding of readers by the NYT. To be clear, I find the idea of paying for journalism and news media, in combination with or instead of ad support, to be compelling and important. However, I think it is also important to recognize the pragmatic value of the decision to offer free content, when this is the norm on the internet. The NYT has lost a great deal of trust from it's readers in recent years, including those of various political and social leanings. Many opposed to the growth of populist, right-wing movements in the US (and to a degree abroad) see the NYT as emblematic of a news media more interested in humanistically profiling far-right extremists, including self-avowed white nationalists, than in highlighting their evils. They also find the NYT to be a major nexus of sensationalist coverage of the Trump presidential campaign and administration, distracting from balanced and substantial coverage of the race in favor of an obsession with email scandals and essentially unimportant (but amusing or provocative) actions by Trump and his entourage. On the other side of the American political divide, many have found the 'failing' NYT to be unrepresentative of their experiences as Americans, and have begun to dismiss it's coverage as partisan and often distorted. The paper's attempts to introduce balanced coverage, especially in the editorial pages, has been met with vitriol from both liberals and conservatives. Outside of partisan politics, coverage of issues like the Las Vegas massacre have been criticized by many as sensationalizing the attack and encouraging copycats, including by academics. When the most venerated news institution in the United States cannot heed what is increasingly accepted in academia and abroad as responsible reporting procedures for mass attacks, it is concerning. Journalism need not be free to consumers, and I personally believe it would be better off as a directly subscribed medium with little to no ad support. But this does not seem an appropriate or strategic time for a newspaper that desperately needs to rebuild its trust with readers (especially with young millennials) to ask for more subscription dollars. I have heard of many people who have cancelled or allowed to lapse subscriptions to the NYT (subscriptions I was surprised to learn they had) over the issues I've mentioned. Subscription volume may be up, but I suspect deeper trends in subscriber and nonsubscriber perceptions are at work and this change will damage the NYT in the long run. Of course, this is a fragile time for news media, especially print, and it is not surprising to see a paper opting for short-term earnings. ~~~ forapurpose > The NYT has lost a great deal of trust from it's readers in recent years We need some evidence of the level of trust and its change over time. I've read such things about the NY Times since I first learned of its existence. It seems to be the nature of journalism, telling people uncomfortable, undesirable things about red-hot issues. ~~~ mancerayder Now this isn't specific to the NYT, but the NYT has absolutely been guilty of sensationalism: [https://medium.com/the-mission/the-enemy-in-our- feeds-e86511...](https://medium.com/the-mission/the-enemy-in-our- feeds-e86511488de) That's different than uncomfortable challenging, comfort zones and so forth. Here we see misleading headlines to drive traffic. Next, I lean left and yet found the NYT obsessively copycatting Democratic institutional thinking: supporting corrupt NY Mayors, relentlessly defending lost Presidential candidates despite nefarious behaviors, and in years past as Chomsky demonstrates, beating the drums of war in foreign policy. I found them obsessing over race and gender divides, even if it meant eclipsing greater threats. Transgender policy and statues, in. Redistribution of wealth to the rich... too complicated to obsess over. They've run negative coverage on people I admire, like Chomsky and Sanders, because those buck the trends within a fractured Left. Next, I live in NY and find their local coverage heavily biased with stories of the idle rich. I'd love to send examples of this, but I'm pretty sure I have one article left to read this month. I pay for a 15 dollar a month, Kindle subscription to the Financial Times because of the thoughtful, in-depth analysis, sometimes with multiple viewpoints in different articles on one topic, and a FAR less American-centric information resource. When it comes to politics, being culturally myopic is a sin that the NYT is in my unhumble opinion guilty of. ~~~ forapurpose I know about Chomsky's criticisms and those accusations. I'm not commenting on their accuracy; I'm saying they are old news. The question is, do we have data showing that the level of trust has changed recently, or even what that level is? ------ jknoepfler So, if you're a long time reader of the NY Times, clue me in to what sets it apart as a valuable source of information. Respectfully, I don't currently understand what others see in it as an information source. Look at the front page right now: _Flynn pleads guilty_ (news, public record - the exception!) _Republicans say they 'll pass the tax plan in the Senate_ (probably a press release or word from a PR office) _Rex Tillerson might be replaced by someone even worse than himself_ (probably a press release or word from a PR office, posturing) _A meta-regurgitation of sex harassment news_ (posturing) _Why North Korea 's missile is very scary_ (almost certainly a statement from a public relations office in the SK government, in collaboration with the US government, since it includes a statement about a phone call between the respective heads of state) _A string of variety fluff blog posts_ (entertainment). I care about quality journalism, but these articles are mostly posturing/outrage-jockeying or fluff, and what news there is consists in barfing up press releases or statements from public relations offices, spiced up with a little expert vetting from whomever they could get on the phone. It reads like a textbook dystopian "Manufacturing Consent" newspaper. So, I don't know. I pay for a subscription to a few news outlets (a few of whom are can be just as bad as the NYTimes, such as NPR), but I certainly don't see a reason to pay a premium for name brand news that isn't any more substantive than skimming AP reports off a news feed. ~~~ Chaebixi An example: [https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/business/dealbook/arbitra...](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/business/dealbook/arbitration- everywhere-stacking-the-deck-of-justice.html) (part of an in-depth series). ~~~ jknoepfler Thanks, I'll give it a read! I think I'd had a bit of coffee when I wrote that. ------ hateful For me, if I open an article on the Internet and it has as little as a popup asking me to subscribe to an e-mail, I close it and move on. ~~~ dawnerd CNN has taken it to the extreme with a full page takeover when you try to leave ------ cflewis As always, Amazon is a big elephant in the room: [https://www.amazon.com/The- Washington-Post-Digital-Access/dp...](https://www.amazon.com/The-Washington- Post-Digital-Access/dp/B072MHQFJ1) WaPo is $4 a month for the 50% of US households who have Amazon Prime. That's about a quarter of the price of what NYT is asking for, with a quality and political bent that's fairly similar. NYT can't compete until its on a much closer pricing footing. ~~~ aezell The NYT site and app are VASTLY superior to the Post's. I subscribe to both and find that I turn to the NYT more often because the reading experience is so much better. ------ Lendal I'm happy to pay for good journalism, but I'm not paying separate subscriptions to every decent newspaper. If they had some sort of alliance with the Post and the Tribune, or something like that it would be very cool. As it is, I recently signed up for the Washington Post which means I now have to cancel the New York Times. :( People have money to spend, but you need to offer them some better options than the current model of paying separately for every news outlet. ------ g09980 > Scoops on the Trump administration’s scandals and sexual-harassment > allegations in Hollywood have already contributed to a surge in Times > subscriptions Earlier today HN had the article about Japanese elderly, which was a sad and wonderful read and I highly recommend it. I wish NYT had more of this long- form, thoughtful "teach me something about life elsewhere" reporting, instead of a "what crazy thing did Trump do today" tabloid-ism. ~~~ Lavery If you haven't already, check out the New Yorker. It's a weekly magazine, so obviously not quite the same, but what you're describing is their bread and butter. ~~~ mark-r New Yorker articles seem overly long for no good reason. ~~~ gnicholas The articles have to be long enough to include at least one word with a diaeresis. ~~~ mark-r I didn't realize how serious you were - I was reading an article there today and came across the word "reëxamine". ~~~ gnicholas > _If you’re reading something and you encounter a diaeresis, chances are > you’re reading The New Yorker._ [https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/mary-norris- di...](https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/mary-norris-diaeresis) ------ aezell One thing not to miss when you get a subscription to the NYT, Washington Post, WSJ, or other large newspaper/magazine is the access to the archive of articles. If you like long-form, feature-style articles instead of current events news, there is enough stuff in the NYT archives that you'd never be able to read it all. ------ zjaffee Note that a lot of public libraries and universities provide free one day access to the NYTimes, and by using such passes you are supporting the company as there are fees paid when users take advantage of these things. ------ AceJohnny2 At this point, I'm glad to get away from the abusive ad-supported model and support sources of information I trust directly. Information wants to be free, but it's not free to gather and vet. ------ pascalxus I'd like to do my part and support good journalism and pay for my NYT articles on a per article basis, say 5c-15c per article. They won't let me. Strictly speaking as a consumer, Am I the only person who doesn't like subscriptions? Do the subset of masses who are willing to pay for journalism really prefer subscriptions over one time use payments? I guess i'm just weird. ~~~ Chaebixi > Strictly speaking as a consumer, Am I the only person who doesn't like > subscriptions? Do the subset of masses who are willing to pay for journalism > really prefer subscriptions over one time use payments? I guess i'm just > weird. I don't think Americans in general like metering. There's a lot of resistance to data caps and cell phone plans are heading towards being "unlimited." The thing that sucks about one time use payments is that you're either thinking "do I really want to pay for this little action?" all the time or you don't and get surprised by your bill. Though I wouldn't mind paying $10/month for a subscription that included unlimited access to one major news site and up to $5/month credit for metered access to others. Unfortunately, the realities of competition will prevent that. ------ cafard I don't like this. I get the NYT and The Washington Post delivered. My wife reads the NYT on-line quite a bit, I read it only occasionally on-line. With 10 articles per month, I'm fine not logging in. Now, I have to find out our subscriber information. ------ lnrdgmz The NY Times paywall has got to be one of the easiest paywalls to bypass. You can either browse its site in private/incognito mode (or using Firefox Focus on mobile), delete a cookie, or disable Javascript on their site (though this isn't ideal when viewing some of their interactive pieces). I wonder if this is a deliberate compromise to ensure that nobody is ever really locked out of their content. ~~~ mark-r Subject to change at any time of course. I used to enjoy the occasional article from WSJ, now I just get annoyed when I see one of their headlines because I know I can't read the article. ------ oh-kumudo Good to see ad support media going away. The programmatic publishing model is a failure on many fronts. As the online payment options sought in recent years, back to subscription is a sensible choice and I will happily follow. ------ corvallis I’m a subscriber, started at $14 a month, and now I pay about $7 a month after calling to see if they’d let me latch on to a promo rate. I don’t understand this hostility toward paywalls or paying for a subscription. Just a generation ago, most households paid for newspaper subscriptions, and even some magazines. I am happy to pay for the journalism from what I consider to be a high quality news source. It makes me a better- informed individual. Many of the users of HN are attempting to monetize a service or product using a subscription model. Yet you don’t want to support a newspaper doing the same thing? Do you feel that the journalism should be free, or free to you? If so, why do you feel that entitlement? News sources such as WSJ, NYT, Economist provide education and value to individuals and society, and people who earn enough to get a Starbucks on the way to work and go to the gym on the way home (also a subscription model) should not have this level of disdain for the idea of paying for content from a reputable newspaper. ~~~ basseq Just a generation ago, most households paid for newspaper subscriptions, and even some magazines. I'm forming this hypothesis on the fly, but I wonder if people had a deep- seeded notion that they were paying for the _delivery_ (the paper, ink, on their doorstep) vs. the _content_. "I pay for you to bring the news to me" where today, "I come to your forum to hear what's going on." I'm also wondering if there needs to be more journalism as a public good—or a nonprofit. Not tabloids or 24-hour-newscycle hysteria, but true investigative reporting. ------ maxxxxx All these subscriptions are starting to add up so I don't want more. I wonder if they lowered their prices whether they could make up for it by more subscribers. I guess they have run the numbers... ~~~ dralley What we're really missing is an analog to the old "stick a quarter in the machine, get a newspaper" model Plenty of people would gladly pay a bit of money to get access to a day's news when they want to, without a subscription. But it has to be easy, not "type in all my credit card info to get one paper". ~~~ pmlamotte Blendle is somewhat similar to what you're talking about, though it's pay per article as opposed to per day. [https://blendle.com/](https://blendle.com/) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blendle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blendle) ------ nasredin I know most of you know this, but... Deleting cookies will get you another 5 (used to be 10) "free" articles. Also Guardian US, which is free just with nags and a terrible ADD design is a mediocre alternative. ------ kkylin An on-line only subscription is far less than the donation I give to my local NPR affiliate each year. Well worth it. ------ SN76477 Is this how we keep the poor uninformed? ~~~ croon No, that is done by buying up most local tv stations and airing propaganda. ------ RickJWag I won't pay. I look often, mostly following headlines from 'Real Clear Politics' (which has both left and right-leaning links). NYT leans too far left for my tastes, I won't pay to support that. I'll read free articles (to try to gain perspective from the other side) but no way will I pay. ------ michaelmrose So long, and thanks for all the fish. ------ dreamfactored do any of these publishers have paywalls for specific premium articles rather than x articles per week? presumably they could a/b and tweak more that way ~~~ Larrikin I would love this feature. NYT does real investigative journalism and should be paid for that, but it annoys me to no end when I'm browsing my news feed and click a fluff article as a time waster and it's a WaPo or NYT article and I see my counter for the month go up. ~~~ Chaebixi > NYT does real investigative journalism and should be paid for that The problem is that's the stuff I wish the most people had easy access to, or order to build momentum to fix the problems. For instance, I post a link to their series on binding arbitration every time that comes up somewhere. That's a good example of something that doesn't sound bad until someone explains it to you. ~~~ Larrikin I'm fine with those being a limited number of articles per month. If its something important that needs to be shared with people who don't follow the news regularly, then it shouldn't matter if you can only view 5-10 articles a month. If you're regularly following the news and are consuming all of their most important pieces that will matter historically, then you should be paying for it. ------ eighthnate If there is anything more toxic than social media, it's traditional media. If you value your mental health, uninstall facebook, end your subscription to NYTimes/WaPo/news media, turn off foxnews and go do something else. ------ natural219 Why doesn't New York Times et al just go for the full donation model? Make the articles free, put a bug Jimmy Wales-style banner at the top, probably rake in more money. Are they still pretending like they're a prestigious institution or something?	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
The Psychological Power of Satan - yiedyie http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=psychological-power-satan ====== GeorgeOrr You would think adults would be past playing with imaginary friends. But they can't even get over their imaginary enemies. ~~~ yiedyie Is like that apocryphal story of Hitler saying that if the allies would win it will be a victory for all because they would have made a better and bigger war machine.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: Do you still buy/read technical books? - gcatalfamo If you decide to learn new skills (e.g python) or about a subject (e.g. ML) do you still rely on technical books for it?<p>I find myself looking more and more for alternative sources, but it could be just me, not finding a page of code written in a book all that useful.<p>Note: this is not about the quality of the content, but about the appropriateness of the <i>medium</i> nowadays. ====== itamarst Books are often the only way to get a really good big picture overview of a subject, because of their scale and editorial process. * Blog posts tend to be too short, so you only get some details or a really vague outline. A book can do both big picture and relevant details. * Documentation is usually written by someone who knows the system too well, so too often it leaves out a lot of things that the author thinks are obvious but aren't obvious to readers. ------ danielvf Yes, I still occasionally buy tech books, but only for kicking off learning a new skill. I can read a book in an evening and get the big picture of how things work as well as the underlying philosophy of how the small pieces work. Hopefully I've also gotten at least one person's view of the best practices for that tech. After that I try to build something. When I'm done with the first play project I rarely return to the book. ------ shakna For theory, absolutely. Its still hard to beat the Dragon books for compiler theory, and SICP, Lisp In Small Pieces and others are still some of the best for PLT. New skills tends to be different, because the technology is new, theoretical underpinnings haven't been researched well enough to be expanded out into a book. I'd never get a book on jQuery, because I don't need the theoretical underpinning, just the documentation. A basic understanding of the implementation is enough. However, I would pick up a book on Dot, the Typed Calculus being explored with Scala in the Dotty compiler. Because I'd be learning the mathematics of type safety, and using types to more effeciently generate machine code. However, learning to use Scala would be incidental to that experience. ------ tedmiston I use technical books as a medium much different than a quickstart or tutorial for a library / framework / etc. Last year I bought a Safari Books Online Subscription [1]. It's something like ~$400 but usually goes half price on Black Friday. The core is virtually every O'Reilly book and many from other technical publishers too. I've bought a couple technical eBooks or paperbacks this year, but for the most part this subscription has replaced that. It's also nice to not accumulate physical clutter for when 2+ years from now that book about hot JavaScript frameworks today will be ancient. [1]: [https://www.safaribooksonline.com/](https://www.safaribooksonline.com/) ------ jtcond13 Books are most useful for matters that don't change very much, which would probably include most academic subjects. Programming language books are good when they're more general in nature (e.g. John Resig's JS book) but are less useful when learning, say, a specific library. In the latter case, online materials seem to be a better guide. ------ amerkhalid Not as often but I still buy technical books. Last book I bought was, Head First Android. I enjoy reading books but most technical books I skim through in a couple of days. However, that gives me enough big picture ideas that when I am actually working on a problem, I know what keywords to type in Google. ~~~ tedmiston I feel like a lot of people don't take the Head First series seriously, but honestly I'm a fan. Sure they are pretty light and big picture but I've come to realize I enjoy building that foundation and figuring out the details myself rather than having an exhaustive tome tell me everything. ------ jetti I rely on technical books on certain subjects. For instance, I would get a technical book on compiler design patterns because those are pretty timeless. On the other hand, I have stopped buying books that are new programming language specific because the languages tend to change and make the book obsolete. I've experienced this with a RoR/Ruby book I bought that wouldn't even work with the newest version of RoR at the time. The book was useless. ------ eb0la I still read tech books but not in paper since last summer when I signed up to Safari Books Online. I usually start building new skills with MOOCs, which also help me discover books that will help me later as a reference after the course ends. In this case I prefer paper books, not online ones. ------ PaulHoule I buy them in PDF form and read them when I do cardio at the gym. ~~~ tedmiston Tried this once and my eyes can't handle trying to read while moving. Maybe it's the astigmatism. ~~~ colig I find the recumbent bicycle is the steadiest way to do reading and cardio at the same time. ------ douche All the time. Not particularly for a specific technology, especially in fast- moving domains like web dev, but for more broad practice and theory, the concepts are more timeless. Think Code Complete, or The Art of Unit Testing, or Working Effectively with Legacy Code, or Peopleware. I'm also a fan of the Syncfusion Succinctly series[1]. They are short, quick overviews of a particular tech, that you can pretty easily go through in a evening and make a good jumping off point for digging deeper. [1] [https://www.syncfusion.com/resources/techportal/ebooks](https://www.syncfusion.com/resources/techportal/ebooks) ~~~ tedmiston Two more similar ones that come to mind are _The Pragmatic Programmer_ [1] and _Pragmatic Thinking and Learning_ [2]. [1]: [https://pragprog.com/book/tpp/the-pragmatic- programmer](https://pragprog.com/book/tpp/the-pragmatic-programmer) [2]: [https://pragprog.com/book/ahptl/pragmatic-thinking-and- learn...](https://pragprog.com/book/ahptl/pragmatic-thinking-and-learning)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
If The Message Is Important, It Will Find Me - winanga http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2009/05/if-the-message-is-important-it-will-find-me.html ====== callmeed I'm all for managing "message overload" and there are plenty of ways to do it. However, the door swings both ways ... if you're gonna ignore people you no longer have a right to expect replies to your emails/msgs ~~~ anamax > if you're gonna ignore people you no longer have a right to expect replies > to your emails/msgs Wilson asked me (personally) to tell him the product of one of his portfolio companies would work for an application that I was designing. I spent a fair amount of time looking at said product after it became clear that I wasn't going to use it so I could write up a reasonably comprehensive discussion. Yup, I spent more time. I sent this writeup to him by e-mail and he never bothered to respond. ~~~ jsteele I introduced some of my friends doing a company to Fred, and had one of the CEOs of a current Union Square investment (that is doing well) also recommend them by email. He said to me he would meet with them, and never emailed them back. ------ DLWormwood I've tried taking this attitude in the past, but it only works if you have a well developed social circle with friends and colleagues who have a good estimate of what you think is important. Otherwise, you suffer from two disadvantages from the philosophy... 1) Information that gets to you will be filtered by an "importance guesstimate." Some information will not reach you, because your social circle will regard the info as useless, irrelevant, or "impolite." This last one is dangerous, because such information is the kind this disproves the axiom "What you don't know can't hurt you." 2) People in your social circle may have a higher view of their own judgment that they do of yours, even if they correctly know what's important to you. Therefore, you will sometimes get information you DON'T want and waste your time because your friends and associates will have their own agendas to push in providing extra info to you. ------ pierrefar Marketers have been dealing with increasingly-"deaf" audience for ages now. This is just a high profile example of it, but it's not new nor revolutionary: it's part of the trend. ------ danohuiginn loudness != importance	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
About the “Security Issue” on VLC - tiri https://twitter.com/videolan/status/1153963312981389312 ====== LeonM So none of the tech news websites contacted VideoLAN and published their articles without checking their source. I believe this sums up the problem with online news: being first matters most to news sites. It drives traffic. Accurate reporting comes second. I feel bad for VideoLAN, according to them the bug was in a 3rd party lib and was fixed 16 months ago. ~~~ jbk > So none of the tech news websites contacted VideoLAN and published their > articles without checking their source. Actually, one did: numerama. That's all. > I feel bad for VideoLAN, according to them the bug was in a 3rd party lib > and was fixed 16 months ago. My night and morning have been difficult, as you can imagine... ~~~ JosephRedfern I'm sorry that you're having a bad couple of days thanks to shitty journalism. Thank you for your efforts in developing VLC, it is a great tool. ------ p49k Gizmodo posts the headline on their front page, "You Might Want to Uninstall VLC. Immediately" Following the debunking of the story, what does Gizmodo do? Leave it on the front page and change the headline to "You Might Want to Uninstall VLC. Immediately [Updated]" ~~~ GunniH They actually did. >You Might Want to Uninstall VLC. Immediately. [Updated: Maybe Not] Is the current title... ~~~ NikolaeVarius Its amazing how a title can have two entirely contradictory, non committal claims telling you to do a thing, and yet tell me absolutely nothing useful. ~~~ madez Will you still read Gizmodo or consider it a trustable source? ~~~ NikolaeVarius I read gizmodo every once in a while for mild entertainment. I have never considered it, or anything related to Kinja, to be trustworthy in any shape or form. ------ paddlepop MITREs response to this is a perfect example of the old-school security team mindset. If I had a nickel for every security team I've worked with that a) treat reporting as gospel and don't validate it, and b) don't talk to the developer. From my experience the key issue is they don't understand the issue enough to engage in a meaningful discussion with the developer ~~~ jbk But the biggest issue is that they refuse that we become the CNA for VLC bugs. So, they are the root CNA for VLC bugs, and they don't triage them correctly. And don't update the issues when we mention them. ~~~ nbabitskiy Why can't you be an authority of your CVEs without consulting an American gov agency? I'm sure, VLC org is way more trustworthy for nine out of ten people on the Earth. ~~~ jbk Because everyone uses CVE. And then, it gets in the press... ------ hs86 libebml is in the Ubuntu universe repository which means that it is not supported by Canonical. And in the Debian changelog for this package I don't see any mentions of a security issue that was fixed 16 months ago: [https://metadata.ftp- master.debian.org/changelogs//main/libe...](https://metadata.ftp- master.debian.org/changelogs//main/libe/libebml/libebml_1.3.9-2_changelog) I am loosing more and more confidence that these "package the world and freeze everything in place" distros are the right choice for end users. ~~~ thegeomaster > I am loosing more and more confidence that these "package the world and > freeze everything in place" distros are the right choice for end users. I'm there with you. I use a rolling distro (Arch) and I update all packages to the latest versions whenever I'm bored. I do this because I can't remember the last time something broke this way. I've been doing that for ~6 years on 3 different machines. On the other hand, a lot of my friends use Ubuntu as their main OS and they constantly have mysterious issues with software, trouble installing stuff (a ton of things require binary-only vendor-run PPAs which then often have out-of-date versions), etc. So I'm wondering, at least for desktop use-cases, what exactly is gained there? I would've thought that freezing all packages and issuing a release would allow a much more rigorous QA process and make the system rock solid. But somehow a huge company (Canonical) cannot make a system that is as stable as orders of magnitude less popular, volunteer-run _rolling_ distribution. Something just doesn't add up to me there. It could be a bias of my sample, or Canonical just not caring much about the desktop experience anymore. (I run a lot of machines on Ubuntu LTS and for the server-side it's pretty good.) ~~~ effie Canonical probably does care less than in their desktop golden years, now they are perhaps focusing on the server os market (cloud). The distribution model has the advantage of single click install. Great for basic users, but you run outdated software, sometimes with well known security holes. For power users who can take some work in maintaining their system, it seems to me that your way - keeping up with the latest version of all software - gives you better security. ~~~ mort96 What do you mean? Arch works the same way as Ubuntu; there's a package manager, you use it to install software from the system repositories. `apt-get install vlc` is no easier or more user friendly than `pacman -S vlc`. I imagine gnome-software even works it does in Ubuntu, though I haven't tried using it. The only difference is that Arch updates their repos' packages as soon as a new version is available upstream (after some testing of course), while Ubuntu doesn't. ~~~ effie I meant the LTS model such as Ubuntu 18.04 gives you old version software with the possibility of worse functionality and more security holes. Arch may be more up-to-date than Ubuntu, but it isn't in the same category; it is not LTS, and it is not as widespread. ~~~ mort96 I was mostly responding to the part about how "The distribution model has the advantage of single click install". What's the difference in how "single click" installation can be between rolling and LTS? ~~~ effie The point is classic distributions which support their product for a long time (Debian, Ubuntu,RHEL,Centos) are easier to use for basic users you can meet on street. With Arch or Gentoo, you are right that there is a package manager which makes installation of software easier, but the system is not easy to use for BFUs. When problems with installation/upgrades arise (which is more likely for Arch/Gentoo), you are expected to spend some time becoming proficient GNU/Linux user who resolves things in command line. ~~~ Dylan16807 Citation needed on the number of problems, assuming the classic system is actually being updated from release to release so it can continue to receive critical updates. ------ codewithcheese > The reporter is using Ubuntu 18.04, which is an old version of Ubuntu, and > clearly has not all the updated libraries. It's not a "old" version of Ubuntu its the latest LTS. ~~~ M2Ys4U LTS == old. That's the point of LTS. ~~~ remedan The point of LTS is that it's old but still receiving security fixes. ------ Aissen It's funny jbk did a talk at Pass the Salt this year entirely prophesying this type of event (it's not the first time this happens…): [https://passthesalt.ubicast.tv/videos/vlc-and- security/](https://passthesalt.ubicast.tv/videos/vlc-and-security/) I took live notes (not nearly as colorful as the talk) here: [https://anisse.astier.eu/pass-the- salt-2019-2.html](https://anisse.astier.eu/pass-the-salt-2019-2.html) ------ carlob Completely OT: does anyone else find this style of posting stuff on a very long twitter thread hard to read, and somewhat worrying in terms of dependency on a proprietary platform? Why can't this be upfront on the videolan.org homepage and just linked from a single tweet? ~~~ lysp Change the twitter domain: [https://twitter.com/videolan/status/1153963312981389312](https://twitter.com/videolan/status/1153963312981389312) to: [https://threadreaderapp.com/videolan/status/1153963312981389...](https://threadreaderapp.com/videolan/status/1153963312981389312) ~~~ carlob I know about that, I was more interested in the political point of being beholden to a proprietary platform. I think that is especially important for one of the most widely installed open source apps (on non-geeks computers). ------ tptacek Just to clarify things: CVSS scores are almost completely meaningless and nobody should take them seriously. They're a Ouija Board that can be made to say anything. ------ throwaway_391 Slightly offtopic, but are vulns related to overflows no longer pocced publicly or are there mitigating factors which make exploitation impossible (eg K/ASLR etc)? The specific CVE listings I'm referring to are: [https://www.cvedetails.com/vulnerability- list/vendor_id-5842...](https://www.cvedetails.com/vulnerability- list/vendor_id-5842/product_id-9978/Videolan-Vlc-Media-Player.html) [https://www.cvedetails.com/vulnerability- list/vendor_id-26/p...](https://www.cvedetails.com/vulnerability- list/vendor_id-26/product_id-32238/Microsoft-Windows-10.html) ~~~ wepple Building a PoC to prove you can get reliable code execution is typically 10x harder than finding an issue and patching it. The modern approach is to assume that most types of memory corruption _could_ be exploitable, and just patch. Especially given that an inability for one person to reliably PoC does not mean it’s not exploitable; as soon as you say it’s not exploitable, Mark Dowd shows up and exploits the bug. ------ jokowueu >Yes, so your issue is your distribution is not up-to-date, not VLC. I've always found it odd that many of the packages on certain linux distributions were old . Like how one time the latest openvpn version on the latest Ubuntu release was a year old. ~~~ plopz Debian 8 is still on php 5.6 which is EOL, even if you upgrade to debian 9 you would be on php 7.0 which is also EOL. ~~~ apocalyptic0n3 Debian 10 is running 7.3, thankfully. But their LTS runs for 5 years and 7.3 will be EOL about 7 months before Buster and active support dropped about 17 months before. And PHP 7.4 is due out in November/December. So Buster will be outdated with its PHP release 6 months after release. ------ glandium Except if I missed something in my quick research, there doesn't seem to have been a CVE for libebml when it was fixed 16 months ago. So it's really not surprising that LTS distros don't have the fix... ~~~ middleload LTS depends on CVEs. And we see here that the CVE database is not entirely trust worthy. The chain is a bit broken. ~~~ madez But the press and slow moving organizations love it. ------ seapunk Compiled here: [https://threader.app/thread/1153963312981389312](https://threader.app/thread/1153963312981389312) ------ yrro What's the CVE for the actual security issue in libebml? ... I guess there isn't one. According to VLC upstream it was fixed in libevml 1.3.6. [https://trac.videolan.org/vlc/ticket/22474#comment:21](https://trac.videolan.org/vlc/ticket/22474#comment:21) ------ trilila gizmodo.com.au still shows "You Might Want To Uninstall VLC. Right Now. Immediately." in their title. This highlights the untrustworthiness of most "news" today, be it software, politics or business related. It's unbelievable how poorly researched articles can damage people and businesses alike. I think is this is one of the biggest pain points of today's world, and it needs solving fast. ------ lsferreira42 It's on the front page of the most acessed tech blogs in Brazil too, this is a shame! ------ xs83 I'm sorry but this is a shitty response from VLC: >The reporter is using Ubuntu 18.04, which is an old version of Ubuntu, and clearly has not all the updated libraries. 18.04 is an LTS version, many people (myself included) will be using this until 20.04 comes out next year! It is not old - it gets regular updates for both security and features - clearly the library for whatever reason is excluded. ~~~ bscphil They aren't blaming you for using the LTS version, and they aren't blaming Ubuntu for having an LTS version. The blame is (implicitly) on Ubuntu for not making sure the libraries their LTS version ships are up to date with the latest security patches. VLC itself isn't vulnerable - the problem is that some distributions are compiling it themselves with old libraries, which is 100% their own fault. ------ sleepysysadmin Delete ~~~ stronglikedan > _Is the fix lawyers suing them all for libel /slander?_ IMHO, it's definitely time for this to be allowed. ------ reneberlin The users booting up Windose to use VLC have a much bigger problem in terms of vulerability than this reportedly false claim on the VLC-app. But - they don't know. And the newspapers will not report it in a dramatic post like this one. ------ onli I don't like the exchange with TheRegister: > TheRegister: _FWIW we reported the VLC developers were skeptical. Happy to > update our coverage accordingly._ > _Tho, FWIW, the PoC .MP4 seg-faulted our 3.0.7 VLC installation._ > VideoLAN: _using a linux distribution? with an old libebml?_ > TheRegister: _Using Debian 9.9, using libebml4v5 1.3.4-1_ > VideoLAN: _Yes, so your issue is your distribution is not up-to-date, not > VLC._ No, the issue is that a lib VLC uses is not up-to-date, and it just happens that VLC be installed on a distribution, as is normal. It can't run on bare metal. If I understand [https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libebml](https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libebml) correctly it is possible the issue here is that oldstable Debian did not receive a (security?) update for libebml. But this still affects the users of the program. It's still something that could be justified to notify users about. But I understand the frustration about not being contacted, and I understand the project does not want to be seen as responsible for this if the fault lies with Debian. And it's absolutely possible the CVE on VLC are wrong, I remember being surprised a few times about their strange severity. But still. I don't like this blame shifting. If users do not run a unsupported distribution it is not completely unreasonable to assume his falls into the security sphere of the main project, VLC. ~~~ kalleboo Is it now the responsibility of every piece of software to check the versions of every library they're linked to for security patches? Shouldn't that be the responsibility of the distribution? edit: is there even a common method for the developer of a library like libebml to flag an update as a security fix to increase the priority of it, or is that up to the package maintainers of each individual distribution to determine? edit2: Or is that common method "file a CVE"? ~~~ onli My point is a different one: If a user or a journalist installs the current version of the software and he runs a current distro it is not a surprise that he assumes a (security) flaw that manifests when using that program is caused by the program. The main project does not necessarily have to fix it themselves, but ideally would notify the distro (and that would make for a good response). ~~~ kalleboo Your post said "notify users about", which is where my comment came from. Notifying distros is something they could do, but how many/which distros do they have to notify? It seems like it could be a massive job in itself. Hence my edit :p ~~~ onli Yes, you are definitely correct there. A project can't handle this well all the time. It's too huge a task and too decentralized a system. ------ fulafel I think the VLC developers come off as pretty defensive in this. They flame the reporter for opening the issue on the issue tracker, but on the issue the reporter says that he got no response from the VLC security contact which he tried first. Then, they dismiss the vulnerability and flame the CVE assigners, because VLC themselves are shipping a distribution with the vuln fixed, even though many Linux distributions and presumably other distributors of VLC remain vunerable - a situation clearly requireing vulnerability coordination and a CVE assignment. ~~~ jbk Absolutely not: \- the reporter never contacted us, we have a clear process and a bounty program. We checked again, he never did. \- we receive and process all security issues privately: we fixed 31 of them in the last update. And miracly, the other reporters managed to contact us. \- Linux is the smallest OS for VLC. \- An issue on one or two Linux distribution for a OOB-read crash is very very different from "VLC vulnerable on all machines, uninstall now!" \- The CVE number of 9.8 makes no sense. How do you even exploit this crash? \- VLC has DEP and ASLR activated everywhere. How do you execute code with this read issue? ~~~ pgeorgi Since this is tarnishing your brand, maybe ask Ubuntu to cease shipping "VLC" if they do such a half-assed job (enough effort to replace integrated libraries with system packages, not enough effort to maintain those packages)? ~~~ tgragnato > maybe ask Ubuntu to cease shipping "VLC" I want applications to be packaged by my distribution. Updates are up to maintainers (dependencies included), as it has always been. If MITRE wants to assign a CVE, warning people that they need an updated lib, that's fine. The issue is the trustworthy and handling of CVEs (... plus reporters). ~~~ jakear My impression is that VLC did issue an update to use a more recent version of libebml, but Ubuntu/Debian maintainers patched it to use universe’s outdated version (which they don’t even maintain!) ~~~ tgragnato Yes! A glaring example of dependency hell (in Debian words "incompatible library changes with reverse dependencies"). Patching for an older version of libebml is not an issue if that library is not vulnerable (that's why folks use LTS and stable). Want maintainers to know there's a vulnerability? Publish a CVE _for libebml_.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Now available: auto-scaling PostgreSQL deployments - mrkurt https://blog.compose.io/new-year-new-database-postgresql-on-compose/ ====== akurilin On this note, what is people's favorite way of scaling out Postgres? I'm told Slony + master/slaves configs are good for scaling out read-heavy situations, but it seems that there are a ton of alternatives on the market. Is there a comprehensive guide on the various options and tradeoffs for this kind of things? Good resources one could use to learn more about it? ~~~ bmurphy1976 Ugh, slony is awful. You use Slony when you have to do a live migration from one version to another (say 9.3 to 9.4) without any downtime. WAL replication is the way to go most of the time. I've used Londiste, it's better than Slony if you need partial replication, but still messy to use compared to WAL. Personally I haven't used any of the others (i.e. Bucardo). ~~~ akurilin Would you be so kind as to provide context on why WAL replication is superior to logical replication? I'm very interested in learning more about it. Also, what specifically did you hate about Slony? Any resources you'd recommend on this? ~~~ rpedela WAL replication is currently the official and best supported mechanism for replication. If WAL replication does not suite your particular use case, then that is when to start looking at Slony, Bucardo, etc. ------ buro9 This is great, but two things: 1) Where are you physically located? As I would want to move my API servers very close to the database for performance. Knowing which city and datacenter would help. 2) Please fix the logo in to the top left of your blog to go to your main website. It's a UI fail when logos do not go to the main website even when the blog is on a sub-domain. ~~~ mrkurt Postgres is currently in Ashburn VA (near AWS us-east-1) and Dublin, Ireland (eu-west-1). Good catch on the logo, that irks me too. ~~~ buro9 It would be great if you had more locations that favour non-Amazon customers though I understand why you would prioritise that first. I mostly use Linode [https://www.linode.com/speedtest](https://www.linode.com/speedtest) and the locations of AWS are generally good for Amazon but bad for other services. For example in London nearly all smaller hosting providers, as well as major peering connectivity, is based around the LINX locations such as Telehouse. Latency to the database is key, but without moving to AWS (which I wouldn't want to do for price and performance reasons) I couldn't achieve a low enough latency here to consider it. Another thing... "sign-up for free" quickly followed by "enter payment method". Which is it? I wanted to sign up, in part just to receive future notifications and also to get a sense as to the qualitative feel of your dashboard tools. For reasons outlined above, I'm not going to buy a service today. ------ mrmondo Great to see but I'd like some real numbers on the performance, in my experience AWS' poor storage performance has always been a show stopper for large database especially when trying to scale them if integrity is crucial to your platform. ~~~ mrkurt We don't use AWS's storage — at least not EBS. We run on our own hardware and on the i2 instances on AWS that have high performance ephemeral SSD arrays. Our benchmarks of the i2s show their IO performance is quite good, as you'd expect of local SSDs. ~~~ hydrogen18 How do you get persistence if all your storage is ephemeral? ~~~ mrkurt It's not all ephemeral, the physical servers we run are old-school redundant (RAID-10, two power supplies, etc). Even ephemeral is persistent — it's just something that'll go away if you migrate your instance to new host hardware. Deployments are on two servers and the write ahead log is streamed to both the slave and offsite secondary storage. Replication is async so there _is_ potentially a small window of data loss if a whole server goes. We are considering letting people opt in to synchronous replication, but don't have it available yet. ~~~ hydrogen18 Ephemeral storage is just that - ephemeral. Amazon can decide to retire your instance at any time. So your persistence plan is RAID 10 it sounds like. ------ gabrtv Not many PostgreSQL DBaaS offerings out there. This is great news. ------ sciurus Why should I choose this over Amazon's RDS? ------ halayli if you aren't going to tell me how the scaling is implemented, how it impacts ACID, and describe your edge cases well, then It's going to be hard to trust the solution. ~~~ mrkurt We don't have enough content about this yet, but we run a very vanilla Postgres setup on big, beefy servers and scale resources vertically, similar to how we start with MongoDB: [https://blog.compose.io/how-we-scale- mongodb/](https://blog.compose.io/how-we-scale-mongodb/) Scaling Postgres horizontally is not something most of our customers need right now. When we do release scale-out, it'll be obvious to customers how we do it — we might just make something from our good buddies at Citus Data available, for instance. ~~~ halayli Got it. thanks for the clarification. ------ marbemac First of all, this is great news - I use compose for Mongo and have been waiting for a PostgreSQL option. However, is the ram allotment similar to that given in the Mongo deployments - 1/10th storage? So, about $125/month for 1GB ram and 10GB storage. Making the obvious comparison to Heroku (which, granted, doesn't offer the autoscaling feature), Compose looks quite expensive. At a glance, it seems that on Heroku one gets the same amount of ram and 6 times the storage for less than half the cost of Compose. ~~~ Thaxll People are paying $125/month for 1GB memory and 10GB space? I see how AWS is making so much money, those prices are just insane. ~~~ wiz21 I sense you've never worked in a suit & tie enterprise... If you have backups, upgrade, access to monitoring tools, etc. 125$ / month is just 2 hours max of developer time. That's a _bargain_ and your standard Oracle admin should just feel threatened :-) (provided the company is willing to put its data on a server far away of its control room, which, I guess, doesn't happen so often :-)) so a bargain if you actually can make use of it... ~~~ Thaxll People that use Oracle don't even read HN, it's another league. ~~~ sanderjd Out of curiosity, what do they read? ~~~ mrkurt It's probably more accurate to say that people who buy Oracle don't read HN. Developers that use Oracle might read HN, and these are the people that are driving the future of databases. There's a reason most new DBs have an open source business model. :) People who buy Oracle are likely reading management publications, and possibly Gigaom. They're not reading technical discussions of databases. ------ gasping PostgreSQL wants to be web scale but it will never touch MongoDB scale. MongoDB is true web scale with full cloud compatibility and horizontal scaling like how clouds spread out in the real world. MongoDB mimics physics because physics is green technology. MongoDB is truly efficient with zero carbon footprint unlike PostgreSQL which is like diesel exhaust clogging up your network pipes when you try to shard upwards and outwards into the virtual scalable cloud atmosphere. PostgreSQL chokes your environment and doesn't support 10gen's new invention the MAPREDUCE which is the successor to outdated SQL. If you use PostgresSQL with auto-scale your will never support big data but MongoDB can scale up to even 100GB of big rich object data without relations so the data truly represents your client's needs. ~~~ julien_c This joke got old quite a long time ago. (And no I promise it's not because I'm using MongoDB.) ------ rpedela Cool, but why is it so expensive? $12 per GB per month? It is hosted on AWS so what does "high-performance" mean? ~~~ fizx Presumably they don't also charge separately for requests, CPU cycles, or bandwidth, so the storage costs include that. ~~~ mrkurt Correct. Storage is just the easiest way to define a service that's sold as a usage based utility. The price includes all the hardware resources, our support staff, DBA tools, etc. ------ rubiquity I'm trying to understand why this is being upvoted so much. ~~~ brlewis I upvoted in the hope that I'll find out that "auto-scaling" means it automatically scales to large numbers of reads and/or writes, which would amount to one awesome service. Since pricing is based on storage, I'm inclined to think it only auto-scales to high storage needs. I'm hoping to be wrong. The part where they say release 9.4 brought them within reach technically of what they wanted to do gives me some hope that I'm wrong. ~~~ mrkurt It automatically scales all resources based on data size. This means increasing IOPs, RAM allotments, and CPU capacity on the fly as the data grows. At 1TB of data, for instance, the DB would have access to 100GB of RAM, about 60,000 random IOPs, and 12 full CPU cores. ~~~ splitrocket Is dataset size the only autoscaling criteria? I.E. my data set is relatively small but with very large transaction volume. Additionally, do you have standard postgres modules installed? Specifically, at least for my use case, PostGIS? ~~~ mrkurt PostGIS is coming soon, the contrib extensions are all available to be turned on for DBs. Autoscaling is currently datasize only. You can scale deployments up manually, however, for DBs where our 1/10 ratio isn't quite right. ~~~ splitrocket Thanks!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: has anyone built an HN to Twitter auto poster? - mooreds Seems like it should be pretty easy with the official HN API and twitter API, so I was wondering if anyone had done it. ====== frostmatthew You should be able to accomplish this with IFTTT using Hacker New's RSS feed. I found this recipe [https://ifttt.com/recipes/5562](https://ifttt.com/recipes/5562) which would tweet all HN posts, but you can create your own recipe that will only trigger the action if the RSS entry contains keywords you specifiy (i.e. you could set it to trigger only when it detects your username). ------ Jeremy1026 There are some bots that tweet when a post reached 20, 50, 100, or 150 upvotes. @newsycXX[X] respectively. So, for 20 upvotes @newsyc20. ~~~ mooreds Thanks. I am actually looking for something that tweets from my account whenevr I post to hackernews.... to save me the trouble of posting twice. ------ mjhea0 is there an official API? you could easily use - [http://api.ihackernews.com/](http://api.ihackernews.com/) -or- [https://www.hnsearch.com/api](https://www.hnsearch.com/api)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Inductive Consensus Tree Protocol: A Scalable Blockchain [pdf] - kalix_systems https://ictp.io/ictp-whitepaper.pdf ====== kalix_systems Authors here: We originally started on this project because it was surprising and a bit frustrating that no one else had done it, but there ended up being a lot of fun technical and algorithmic problems to work out along the way. Happy to answer questions about the system. ~~~ _nhynes Incredibly cool system! I'm glad to see zkSNARKS finally being used as a smart contract primitive. Two questions for you: 1\. How does performance look for private ERC20-type contracts? zkSNARKS can be rather heavy to compute, so would that affect scalability? 2\. Is it possible to do cross-contract calls without knowing the recipient's private state? How does one construct a proof for a new state without knowing the original state? ~~~ kalix_systems > How does performance look for private ERC20-type contracts? zkSNARKS can be > rather heavy to compute, so would that affect scalability? For private contracts, the performance is not going to be good, so we recommend keeping private logic as minimal as possible. We looked into several different private computation models and SNARKs had the best performance characteristics, but they're still not great. > Is it possible to do cross-contract calls without knowing the recipient's > private state? How does one construct a proof for a new state without > knowing the original state? This isn't possible for private contracts, the use case here would be for "contract law" style contracts between bounded, known collections of individuals.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: Invest Your Money In What Matters to You - chazlupei http://www.valuedinvesting.com ====== bokonist There is a basic problem with socially conscious investing. Let us take the Kantian/golden rule perspective and imagine that every "good" person invested with a social conscious and avoided evil companies. The stock prices of "good" companies would go up, and the dividend yield/return on investment would go down. Then bad people could invest in the evil companies and earn a much higher rate of return, because they would be under-bought, under-valued assets. In other words, socially conscious investing is a way for good people to allow bad people to earn more money. If you want to be socially aware with your money you can either a) own a normal stock index, but donate a share of the profits from bad companies to charity and/or b) boycott the evil companies as a consumer. Boycotting is the only way to actually hurt the evil company and prevent people from profiting from evil. ~~~ josephschmoe Few investors would give up diversification for potentially good profits on stocks that have been dropping like a stone. Also look at this from the company's perspective: companies, wanting high evaluations so they can sell off their own stock at a profit, might try to actively push themselves up the "moral index"/"popularity index" \- that's a win for the common folk. ~~~ alphagenerator You're incorrect with regard to diversification. You can go short the good company and long equivalent bad company (or a basket of securities containing a bad company) and be more or less hedged until the premium for being a "good" company dissipates (and it very likely would.) You don't really lose diversification in this scenario, since you'd be able to construct a long/short basket that can have you market neutral with respect to systemic inputs to the valuations of both companies. ------ lsb I paged through the "Get Started" flow, and it took me to [http://www.valuedinvesting.com/signup/account- creation.php](http://www.valuedinvesting.com/signup/account-creation.php) \--- do you expect people to give their Social Security Numbers to a form not using SSL? ~~~ chazlupei I should have linked through: [https://valuedinvesting.com/signup/get- started.php](https://valuedinvesting.com/signup/get-started.php) ~~~ blahblahshep The whole site should be https and never load assets that are not -- from the start. Especially since it's an investing site with access to sensitive information. ------ maerF0x0 Frustrated that I wasted 10 minutes of my time filling out the form and never got my stock mix recommendations. I provided my data and you (the website) never upheld its promise of giving me a stock mix based on my preferences. ------ Jemaclus I like the idea, but the site design looks kinda fishy, so I probably wouldn't use it. Plus, I have some brand-name trust in places like Motif and Vanguard, which I don't have with Valued Investing. But I like the idea and where you're going with it. Hire a designer, get an SSL certificate, and let me invest, say, $500, and I'll sign up. ;) ------ batoure Has anyone read about shareholder activism. [http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21596518-america- shoul...](http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21596518-america-should-make- life-easier-not-harder-activist-investors-corporate-upgraders) I feel like a cooler impact statement would to start an investment fund where by the fund based on its size targets owning large swaths of shares in companies it deems as evil. Then leverages its position in those companies to shift the direction away from said evil things. Companies that are public and already not evil are going to be fine. But making evil companies be not evil would be a cool premise. ------ hluska I am Canadian and do not have a social security number, therefore I am not in your target audience. So, I encourage you to be extra skeptical about my critique. However, when it comes to investing with someone, my biggest concern is trust. I am a long term investor, so I am not terribly concerned with management fees. Rather, I am looking for trust. Not only trust that you won't steal from me, but trust that you will do a relatively good job of managing my investments. Unfortunately, this website and the signup process both severely eroded my trust. First, other people have mentioned this, but it has not been fixed so I will reiterate. This entire website needs to be https! Since it isn't https (and you still haven't fixed the link to the signup page), I have concerns over how you store and secure the data that you collect. Second, I notice that you use Google Analytics and you collect some very personal information that you will no doubt use for marketing purposes. For example, in your risk assessment, you ask what I would do if my portfolio lost ~ 30% of its value over three months. Are you using this information to determine how much risk I can stomach, or are you using it to know when to market to me? Despite this level of information and the questions it creates, I cannot find a privacy policy. Your site has a terms of service, but it is a .pdf and, call me paranoid, but I am extra careful with .pdf documents. Technically, since your site doesn't have a privacy policy, you're violating Google Analytics' terms of service. Your privacy policy may be included in your terms of service, so I could be completely wrong. Third, call me paranoid, but in light of these issues, I have some concerns investing with a company that is seemingly run by an MBA student, especially one with an interest in starting 'disruptive companies'. My current advisor and I have been friends for 14 years, he has been in the business for 10 years, and he has no plans to retire until around the time that I will (hopefully) retire myself. I am a long term investor, so I am looking for an advisor who is just as interested in a long term relationship. You might be, but nothing on your website makes me feel confident that you will be doing this in ten years. Finally, when I read your FAQ page, I noticed that if I want to see my portfolio, I have to log into Motif. Since I could use Motif myself, control my own portfolio, and not have to worry that I'll stop managing my own portfolio, it seems like I might be better served by signing up with Motif. You have an excellent idea and I like how much work you have already done to execute on it. I think that if you added some more polish, you would have a force to be reckoned with. I especially like your FAQ page and, with the exception of the last sentence (Cerberus is a hell-hound), I found your blog worth a read. ~~~ saryant > I am a long term investor, so I am not terribly concerned with management > fees. This is what you should be _most_ concerned with as a long-term investor. Investment fees can easily chew away at a significant portion of your gains over the long-term. The difference between a mutual fund with an expense ratio of 1% and a fund that costs 0.05% is $6661 over 20 years on a $10,000 investment (assuming both return 7% annually). In the end, it's the difference between $31,650 and $38,311. Obviously the difference grows with the size of your investment. ~~~ VLM "(assuming both return 7% annually)" LOL the median never gets returns above the median, which sounds like a tautology and nobody gets the same return every year except for long term .gov bonds and those aren't indexed for (real) inflation anyway. The point is you can't get blood from a stone and the median of active mgmt will always return somewhat less than the median of passive mgmt (aka the permanent portfolio theory or related funds). After all that active manager needs to adsorb income to eat whereas the passive manager might merely be a line of source code. However, what active management can provide is a smaller std deviation of returns, at least on average. So in the real world you won't get 7% every year unless you somehow obtained a .gov bond at that yield (good luck) or something like that. But it'll average 7%. And the std deviation of that will more or less decrease with increasing activity of mgmt aka increasing costs. There are guys who just waste money or go in parasite mode and there are cheap guys who do a great job, I'm talking about on average. So you're right for the wrong reasons, in that when you're young you want the highest return for compounding reasons so you get the most passive guy possible (possibly just a permanent portfolio psuedoindex fund) and don't sweat fluctuations, but half a decade outta retirement you want the most expensive guy out there so maybe you only get around 6% but its almost certain it'll be between 5.5 and 6.5 not all over the map. There's more to think about like diversification and selecting less risky (aka lower yield) as you get older etc, but this is a good gross summary. ~~~ saryant Rather than moving towards active management as you become more conservative, why not just rebalance towards safer investments like bonds, reducing your equity holdings without increasing costs? ~~~ VLM Rebalancing your portfolio is active management of the portfolio. Aside from that... With bonds at this time you can either get a return on capital below the real inflation rate (aka you're better off with metals which track inflation better than bonds or just spending it now to get more than you'll be able to get later) or you get to worry about return of capital with super risky investments. From a harm minimization standpoint you'll fall behind slower with bonds than just putting it in a savings account, so from that point of view its a valid strategy. Right now we're near a peak, nobodys buying equities but the retail guys who you can always count on to buy high and sell low, so I'm not talking about today but over a longer term. It probably wouldn't be wise to buy in near a market peak. An interesting observational definition of the start of a recession is there's no really good place to park your money. That's now. ------ watty I really dislike going through a survey about my investing and ending up on a sign up page asking for all kinds of information about me before I get results. ------ dangoor I like the idea, but I have to wonder if the 0.6% fee would be enough to make their form of socially responsible investing underperform the benchmarks. ~~~ chazlupei that's a great question. The management fee is slightly higher than online advisors that use broad-index ETFs (Wealthfront, Betterment charge ~.25% to .35%). However to get to an apples-to-apples comparison, you have to include the ETFs expense ratio (which can range from .15% to .45%). When you look at other socially responsible investing options (mostly mutual funds), the 0.6% fee is rather low. I wrote a post about historic performance of socially responsible investment (SRI) funds. Academic studies show that SRI funds meet or beat the benchmark in 89% of studies. [http://blog.valuedinvesting.com/performance-and- responsible-...](http://blog.valuedinvesting.com/performance-and-responsible- investing/) ~~~ dangoor Ahh, I see. So you're investing in stocks therefore there's no added expenses beyond the 0.6%. I definitely agree that 0.6% is lower than a typical managed mutual fund management fee. Thanks for the clarification! ------ xiaoma A serious flaw of this site is the pre-selection of what's "good" and what isn't. People's beliefs aren't that uniform. It's very possible that a value that's positive to the author would be negative to a user or visa-versa. Every filter should have both "exclude" and "prefer". ------ tco [http://www.valuedinvesting.com/how-we- invest.php](http://www.valuedinvesting.com/how-we-invest.php) Under Long-Term Growth: 'As an investor it take discipline to hold stocks during a downturn, but we will be there to give you confidence.' Not giving my money to anyone who misses typos. ------ Legend I looked at the site and liked the design though I agree with the rest of the comments here about SSL etc. One basic question I have is why did you choose Motif as against others such as TradeKing or AmeriTrade or E-Trade. Any particular reason for that? ------ kolev If you invest in something sentimentally and not in what will give you the best return, then you're not really investing per se. ------ kurrent this reminds a lot of investing in real-life ideas at Motif ([https://www.motifinvesting.com/motifs#catalog=our](https://www.motifinvesting.com/motifs#catalog=our)) ~~~ dangoor According to the Valued Investing page footer, Motif Investing is the broker used for their service. ~~~ kurrent nice catch. so is this site just piggybacking and creating custom portfolio's through motif? ~~~ nerdo Motif Investing allows users to create and share motifs. I don't understand why this site was made? ------ notastartup this just looks like another 'I make $xx,xxx everyday, you can to if you use our service'. Also the whole name, valued investing, which seems close to 'Value Investing' is awfully misleading. Value investing is buying a stock that the market, irrationally prices it far below it's actual intrinsic worth (requires accounting knowledge to sift through Q's and K's, and understanding of the business niche). The value that this site talks about seems like something based off socially conscious ethics which at most is subjective. 99.9% would rather see a green than losing money on a portfolio, regardless of whether I've made a right choice (subjective) by investing in the 'morally right' company. If you want to argue morally bad company, let's start with capitalism and inequality it naturally creates and that by investing you are furthering it. Also, contributing a measly amount of capital that would barely make an impact at a company where you'd have to amass a vast amount of money to be able to control it.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Mobile Carrier To Sell Service for $19/mo; Android Handsets For $99 Until Nov 27 - aaronbrethorst http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/07/disruptive-mobile-carrier-republic-wireless-to-sell-handsets-for-99-until-november-27/ ====== cpr As @jkincaid points out, this is a Bandwidth.com company. Bandwidth.com has built up a whole country-wide internet backbone system of their own to carry VOIP traffic (they carry Google Voice, for example), with lots of connectivity to the local area terminal points (I forget the jargon for that). We're really happy with Phonebooth.com (another Bandwidth initiative), who provide unlimited VOIP service (with a full virtual business PBX) to North America at $20/user/month. (And who apparently don't charge for calls to Europe (at least Ireland), as I found out recently.) It's perfect for our little 4-man distributed company; we each have a VOIP phone on our desks and can pretend we're all in the same office with extensions, etc. Bandwidth.com seems like a company to watch... ------ jkincaid RepublicWireless.com just went live with all the details. Here's the catch (they're quite transparent about it): The phone monitors how much data you're sending over Wifi vs cellular, and if you're using a disproportionate amount of cell data compared to the rest of the community, they can boot you. "The best way to know how you're doing is by checking out your Cellular Usage Index (CUI). If it's too high, we'll let you know and give you tips to bring it down. You have plenty of time. But meanwhile, you still pay a flat fee of $19/month no matter what." ~~~ derefr > if you're using a disproportionate amount of cell data compared to the rest > of the community, they can boot you. Sounds like a simple prisoner's dilemma, with the "selfish" incentive driving people to lower the total consumption. Of course, the prisoner's dilemma only has the optima it does because of a lack of shared information; people _can_ cooperate when they can strategize in some out-of-band way. For this service, the "cooperation" strategy would entail everyone conspiring to drive the average _up_ , so that the service provides more to everyone without anyone in particular having a "disproportionate" usage. ------ colinsidoti At $19/month for unlimited, they're probably operating at a loss unless they can build up a significant customer base. I imagine we'll see an incentive program soon..."Refer 5 friends and this month's bill is free." If you refer the 5 friends you talk to most, the company will save much more than $19. VoIP is cool, but traditional phone calls and text messages are not always ideal. I think innovation on the communication channels themselves would go a long way for this company. Think <http://voxer.com> Facebook is in a particularly good position to pull this off correctly. They already have a "cool" factor, and if they could come up with a communication tool that people really like, so much that you're jealous your friend has it but you don't, the people will come. Blackberry pulled this off for years with BBM, but lost its "cool" somewhat recently. ~~~ gcb > At $19/month for unlimited, they're probably operating at a loss unless they > can build up a significant customer base. that's a pretty bold statement. Care to elaborate? Seems pretty expensive when i pay exactly that to AT&T to have 6mbps at my home. we're talking about 1mbps maximum here right? ~~~ colinsidoti Unlimited Voice and SMS to other carriers is expensive. Look at Twilio's pricing or Skype's pricing, or any other voip provider. Text and calling to your own network is essentially free, but off network gets expensive. Granted, I don't know how big of a cut these voip providers take, but I can't imagine it's that high. Put it together with usage data, you quickly get over $19: [http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/u-s- teen-m...](http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/u-s-teen-mobile- report-calling-yesterday-texting-today-using-apps-tomorrow/) Edit: Just want to point out, I'm not saying this is a bad bet to make. They can attract a ton of consumers with a super low cost, and if those consumers do most of their communication in-network, eventually they'll be in the green. ~~~ jkincaid I don't know the financial breakdown, but it's worth noting that Bandwidth.com — the company behind Republic Wireless — actually runs the VoIP backbone that powers Twilio, Google Voice, and other services. So I'd imagine they get a better rate :) ~~~ colinsidoti Very interesting, I had no idea. A little more digging brings me here: <http://bandwidth.com/about/read/verizonAgreement.html> "Bandwidth.com, Inc., a privately held telecommunications company in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, announced today that it has signed a commercial deal with the Verizon wireline companies under which the parties agree to terminate each other's VoIP traffic at a rate of $0.0007 per minute." This is for landlines, but still a much lower number than I was expecting to see. ~~~ dlikhten Remember, this is Verizon selling off bandwidth it does not need since it's unused. To V its like free money. ~~~ jallmann There's still a carrying cost to that bandwidth inventory, so it's not completely free. ------ devicenull This isn't terribly amazing. I paid $130 for my Android phone, and pay $25/month through Virgin Mobile. ~~~ peterwwillis I have that too. The speed sucks dick but it's cheap. Thoughts: 1. I really hope it knows to just use cell while driving instead of trying to connect to random passing APs. 2. Am I the only person in America constantly surrounded by secured/non-free Wifi? 3. Why wouldn't I just pay less for my phone and $10 more a month for Virgin Mobile? ~~~ LilValleyBigEgo Virgin's coverage is ass. ~~~ peterwwillis Agreed. So imagine what this other company's coverage will be like - and they aren't owned by Sprint like Virgin Mobile US is. (incidentally, if you update your PRL on your Virgin phone to a Sprint list you get better service...) ~~~ memset How would I update my PRL? And what would I update it to? I had no idea that these caveats existed on Sprint's network, I had just (naviely?) assumed all Sprint-based service was "the same" ~~~ peterwwillis If you google usually you can find a guide for your phone on HTC or other developer/modder/hacker forums for smartphones. It involves getting codes specific to your phone and using some software and a USB data cable to upload new settings to the phone. It's similar to firmware flashing. Oh yeah, and they really really don't like you to do it because you're basically using parts of the network they don't want you to use. So whatever you do, don't tell Sprint customer service. ------ jonah I wonder if they have any kind of soft/hard limits on how many minutes / how much data you can actually consume over the cellular network. Theoretically, couldn't one could not join WiFi any networks and use Sprint most or all the time? ~~~ dvdhsu They'll probably try to make it so that WiFi must always be on. Then again, it'll have to be locked on the device, so it wouldn't be very hard to get pass it once the phone was rooted (the devices will run Android [according to the article]). Then, they would probably check to see who was using the majority of minutes/data on Sprint, and then have a talk with them (or throttle their data). I'm curious as to what they would do with people who sign up and don't live in cities. If you live in rural areas, it's doubtful you'll have WiFi the majority of places you go. They would probably end up losing money on rural subscribers, then try to make profits from urban subscribers. There might be a problem with a strategy like that though, because it doesn't seem their profit margins would be too high. I'm not sure how much it costs them to buy data in bulk from Sprint, but doing unlimited data for $19 isn't going to result in amazing profit margins. I'm also assuming that they won't be buying voice minutes, because if these devices can use multiple networks, the only way to keep a single phone number would be using VoIP. Of course, there's no way they would be buying text messages, because text messages can easily be sent over e-mail. ~~~ LilValleyBigEgo > I'm curious as to what they would do with people who sign up and don't live > in cities. I'm guessing they'll offer it in one or two cities, call it a revolution, fail to generate revenue and fade quietly into tax write-off oblivion. ------ tryitnow I hope this is just the beginning of a larger trend. I will check them out and I definitely wish them the best of luck. This is a market that desperately needs disruption. Does anyone know of any comparable deals like this? ~~~ LilValleyBigEgo Well they're not really disrupting anything, they're reselling Sprint, so they're actually _helping_ Big Carrier. ~~~ yuhong Yea, they just tackled on Wi-Fi onto it. Thinking about it, I wonder if (maybe together with Tucows etc.) they could lobby the FCC and Congress to solve the problem, for example. Of course, it would not be that simple, but... ------ GigabyteCoin I think I am going to get one just for the few trips I make to the USA every year (Canadian). I have an address in the USA so I doubt it would be a problem. This could be just the thing I have been looking for to check my emails and servers (religiously) at a decent cost compared to hotel and internet cafe prices. Not to mention the added convenience value. Some places charge almost $19/day for short term access so paying $140/year would be a steal. ~~~ GigabyteCoin The idea I had originally went out the door when I read about their "Cellular Usage Index" aka "their solution to their freeloader problem". Basically if you use more than "$19 worth" of cellular service per month... they boot you off of their networks. ------ nikcub This is the future, and it is time that it happen. I was talking about this to a friend on the weekend - that cell phone companies are enjoying the last years of being able to confuse consumers to profit. Deciding on a cell phone provider should be no different to internet providers - pay $20, $30 a month for a connection (unlimited) and that is that. ------ TheClassic Any idea how much bandwidth this sort of voip uses? I'm wondering if it'll affect PC online FPS gaming or netflix streaming. ~~~ reacocard From <http://republicwireless.com/how>: I have DSL at home. Will it work on that or will I have to upgrade to something faster? You need about 80kbps both ways to hold a call. The more bandwidth the better for improved call quality. Don’t forget that streaming video or downloading large files all use bandwidth, so your mileage may vary if you are trying to make or receive calls and watch Netflix at the same time. Sounds like it's more likely that your gaming or Netflix would adversely affect the phone than the other way around, though a router with QoS should fix that easily enough. ------ toisanji the monthly deal sounds great, but I'd like to know what phones we are allowed to use on the service. Is it going to be a low end barely useable phone or a nice smart phone? ------ gcb ha! an LG phone. no thanks. still interested on the plan if they provide an android image I can use with their wifi network. ------ LilValleyBigEgo That phone is the LG Optimus.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Nftables code merged, expected in Linux Kernel 3.13 - conductor http://marc.info/?l=linux-netdev&m=138203780210029&w=4 ====== conductor Nftables [0] comes to replace iptables, ip6tables, arptables and ebtables. It will introduce new common syntax for IPv4, IPv6 and ARP, and it has smaller kernel-mode code. Its working process is somewhat similar to BPF (Berkeley Packet Filters): the rules are being compiled into byte-code at user-level and passed to the kernel (using the Netlink API) where it is being processed by a state machine. [0] - [http://netfilter.org/projects/nftables/](http://netfilter.org/projects/nftables/)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Quickmeme banned from Reddit for alleged vote manipulation - OTRAustin http://www.dailydot.com/news/reddit-bans-quickmeme-vote-manipulation/ ====== minimaxir It's worth noting that another Redditor and mod from /r/AdviceAnimals, /u/ManWithoutModem, independently discovered different evidence that the Quickmeme posts were being manipulated. [1] No one believed him and he was demodded. He's not happy about it. [http://np.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/1gvnk4/quickme...](http://np.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/comments/1gvnk4/quickmeme_is_banned_redditwide_more_inside/caoiq3t) ~~~ ultimoo What is the 'np.reddit.com' subdomain used for? I had never seen it before, and it looks similar to the www subdomain. ~~~ Samuel_Michon ‘NP’ stands for ‘No Participation’. “Linking to np.reddit.com instead of reddit.com will cause the subreddit to display the No Particpation stylesheet. It’s a read-only mode where users linked through the NP domain cannot vote or comment. This works only if the subreddit has installed the NP CSS. If not, linking to the subreddit with the NP domain will cause to display without the subreddit’s custom CSS, and voting and commenting will still be possible. This way we can still watch drama as it develops, but if the subreddit wishes to preserve its own culture by discouraging popcorn pissers, they have that option.” [http://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/14xivv/annou...](http://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/14xivv/announcement_a_new_rule_to_discourage_invasion/) ------ citricsquid Now r/adviceanimals users are clamouring for a quickmeme alternative, because the present meme sites (eg: livememe.com) suck. Opportunity for anyone that wants to clone quickmeme.com in the next ~6 hours. ~~~ ChiperSoft Can't they just upload the quickmeme generated images to imgur? ~~~ wmil No, quickmeme doesn't actually generate the final images. Instead it layers a transparent PNG on top of the image. ~~~ prezjordan That's not true. They DO layer a transparent PNG on the image, but that transparent PNG has no content whatsoever. It's there just to prevent people from hitting right click and "Save Target As." ~~~ GhotiFish w... WOW. REALLY? I refuse to believe quickmeme became popular because reddit _liked_ it. That is very very anti-user. Edit: theeeey sure do! [http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3uwwk8/#by=ad](http://www.quickmeme.com/meme/3uwwk8/#by=ad) right click, view image, go here: [http://static.quickmeme.com/media/social/qm.gif](http://static.quickmeme.com/media/social/qm.gif) delete that element and do it again, go here: [http://i.qkme.me/3uwwk8.jpg](http://i.qkme.me/3uwwk8.jpg) ~~~ Domenic_S Never heard of spaceball.gif? ------ hayksaakian Ironic that this is posted by a HN user with no comments, and only submissions from the daily dot. ------ noir_lord Excellent, a few months ago clicking on a quickmeme (by accident normally when not logged in) link on android resulted in multiple redirects and an attempt to download an apk which was lovely. After that I used RES to filter quickmeme on all my desktops. ------ personlurking I'm not so concerned with Quickmeme et. al, (because I don't follow default subreddits) but rather I'm concerned with voting rings against personal accounts. I had an account for a substantial time where I posted good, useful comments frequently (for which I was upvoted frequently). Once, maybe twice in response to other commenters I disagreed with them, like 0.1% of my time on the site. Afterwards I found myself downvoted to hell no matter what I did, how long I waited between writing comments (ie, 6 months). Everything (quality comments) would go rather quickly to a 0 or a -1/-2. I had to make a new account, there's no way around it. ~~~ Phlarp I think this is one of the biggest concerns for Reddit going forward. Fighting bots can be approached systematically and with relatively decent results. Fighting coordinated groups with an agenda and voting brigades is a much harder beast. The SRS "fempire" is probably the scariest case study in all of this. ~~~ rmrfrmrf On the contrary, SRS is one of the most innovative uses of a subreddit since Reddit's inception. Think back to the days of forums, LiveJournals, mailing lists, IRC, etc. Whenever an issue of discrimination arose, it was _always_ derailed one way or another. Between vocal opponents, concern trolls, and "explain to me how this offends you"-types, it was impossible for someone who experienced discrimination to find a safe space to legitimize their experience. With SRS, instead of allowing any kind of discourse related to the validity of a claim, every participating member is required to just accept the claim as valid. There is no driving force to change Reddit, and there is no activism involved. It's simply a safe space for people who are offended to express themselves in an environment that won't be questioned, especially when Reddit is known for having a hive mentality. ~~~ Phlarp No offense, the warm and fuzzies are great; but this is the anti-thesis of intelligent and productive discourse. I wouldn't mind at all if they just wanted to create a safe place for these things to be voiced, but they threaten the integrity of the entire community with the current choice of actions. ------ wnevets the owners of grumpy cat hired a "meme manager" to promote and sell their meme. I now hate all internet memes. [http://mashable.com/2012/04/17/meme- management/](http://mashable.com/2012/04/17/meme-management/) ~~~ mpyne You're really surprised that a concept that has gained worldwide popularity might actually warrant "brand curation"? I hope you hated memes before grumpy cat then. ~~~ wnevets I did but grumpy cat was marketed to make money virtually at its inception. I remember them selling merchandise at NYCC last year, that's two weeks after they posted it on reddit. The commercialism and exploitation of this cat shortly after it's birth has really rubbed me the wrong way. ------ benologist I think Reddit (and HN) should make votes and ip addresses transparent for external analysis. The spammers hide behind these. They could also be more brutal with punishments, route every single link to the offending site through a page that says they were spamming so it's an inconvenience for people and a wall for search engines. ~~~ aw3c2 No, IP addresses are a private matter. The identities behind pseudonyms should never be exposed unless the affected person decides to do so. ~~~ geuis Expose them as a hash with a hidden salt. Maintains user privacy while exposing a static data point that can be used for analysis. ~~~ GhotiFish ah, that might work, if users can't be tied to upvotes, just that one upvote can be tied to others. Still, if someone finds a way to associate a username to a hash, then there could be real life consequences for that. I like the idea, but it's playing with fire. ~~~ benologist It doesn't have to be a reversible hash, just assign a guid for each ip address. There are probably subreddits where that information could be potentially harmful (eg upvotes in jailbait way back when) but that can be solved by not enabling it across the board, and it's not an issue here. Digg made their upvotes public from the start, and so do delicious, facebook, stumbleupon etc. ------ halayli Isn't that what Reddit did to bootstrap its site? ~~~ mahmud Reddit astroturfed their own site with fake users. These guys are 1) astroturfing other people's sites, 2) practicing unethetical tactics by down- voting links to competing websites with automated bots. ~~~ halayli The point is that they are equally dishonest. ~~~ raganwald Astroturfing your own site is a longstanding tradition in media. A long time ago in a career far, far away I wrote classified advertising software for desktop publishers, typically small outfits like trade magazines or penny- savers. When launching a new feature like classifieds, it does you no good to put out a blank page. So absolutely every customer that didn't already have classified ads would astroturf with fake ads. The ethics of their profession was to discard any mail-in replies unread. For example, one customer used my software for personals. They had a strict rule that any reply to one of the "fake" mailboxes was to be shredded immediately upon receipt, unopened. They didn't even want them laying around lest someone write down a name or return address. One there are enough "real" ads, the fake ones are phased out. I can't really say whether it is right or wrong, but I can say it seems to be a standard practice predating the world wide web. ~~~ GhotiFish that's interesting, but they sure do seem the same. I'm thinking the only difference here is cultural. Like how we don't view reporting a price as $4.99 instead of $5 as unethical. ~~~ raganwald Here's a phrase I feel comfortable using: It's a _deceptive practice_. ------ gboudrias What kind of idiot made the owner of quickmeme.com a moderator of the subreddit that contained presumably most of its posts? ~~~ NoodleIncident Red dit bans the posting of personal info. They didn't know. ~~~ gboudrias Hm, understandable, but then how did they learn it after the fact? ------ trotsky _And as such, content submitted within these subreddits are regularly featured on Reddit 's front page each day and capable of being clicked on by more than 1 billion people._ What an odd thing to say. That same hypothetical line of thinking could lead you to say that I'm capable of receiving a trillion dollars tomorrow, simply because I have a fedwire destination address and that much money could hypothetically be transferred to it. Neither has even a slight chance of actually happening. ------ _pmf_ But there will be nothing left! It will now be all fabricated Facebook posts and 4chan content that is intellectually low-brow enough for the Reddit hivemind to understand! ------ tommorris And nothing of value was lost. ------ danso > _Gaming Reddit for traffic has become a regular frustration for the > community, which boasts more than 22.9 million monthly visitors in the U.S. > alone. This is particularly true within Reddit 's default subreddits. All > new Reddit users are automatically signed up as subscribers of the site's > default subreddits, which include r/AdviceAnimals, r/Atheism, and > r/Politics._ Hmmm...maybe this problem could be alleviated by not auto-subscribing new users to a meme-based forum? Of all the great subreddits, AdviceAnimals (albeit, which is pretty funny sometimes), seems like a silly one to acquaint new users to. Have any of the bustups of voting rings been done algorithmically? That is, does reddit have a way to pick out cluster of reddit accounts that seem to behave like scripted bots? It seems all of the major domain bans (such as the Atlantic) were done through manual user suspicion and inquiry. ~~~ twentysix The top ten subreddits(excluding NSFW ones), based on the number of subscribers, are chosen to be the default ones. New accounts do not increase the default subscription count, until they subscribe or unsubscribe to any other subreddit. You can find some good comments on the matter here [http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1dtvwz/i_belie...](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1dtvwz/i_believe_that_ratheism_should_be_removed_from/c9ttixl) ~~~ prezjordan Also excluding any subreddits which specifically ask not to be included. I cannot remember specific cases of this, though. ~~~ cli A while ago, r/askscience was briefly listed as a default subreddit, until the moderators (and probably users) asked for the subreddit to be delisted. ------ peter_l_downs Who gives a shit? ------ rocky1138 This can only be seen as a good thing as Quickmeme tends to be an extremely heavy site with stuff that could be easily handled by simple image linking or, at worst, imgur. ~~~ minimaxir Quickmeme, for the most part, was only regulated to /r/AdviceAnimals, which says a lot about the quality of /r/AdviceAnimals. ------ dghughes It won't be enforced I see many sites supposedly banned still posting everyday websites such as physorg and the Atlantic. ~~~ mehrzad Weren't those bans lifted? ~~~ dhughes I don't know, communication isn't so great, I have no idea which sites are officially banned, which have bans lifted. There may be a spot on the reddit blog or somewhere else that I'm not aware of but really it shouldn't be my responsibility as a user to enforce it that's the job of admins and mods, that's why they exist. It doesn't seem to matter though because I have seen banned websites post even when they are supposed to be banned, reddit doesn't seem to block the url it just mentions the website is spamming reddit and that seems to be all we're told. There is an unofficial (?) subreddit that monitors of banned websites, look to the right at the sidebar for the link to the list [http://www.reddit.com/r/BannedDomains/](http://www.reddit.com/r/BannedDomains/) ~~~ danso The bans of The Atlantic and other large publishers has been lifted...it was said early on that the bans were just temporary: [http://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/v03qc/physor...](http://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/v03qc/physorg_is_not_allowed_on_reddit_this_domain_has/c50651w) And speaking of temporary bans...I thought dailydot used to be blacklisted from HN? I'm glad to see that it wasn't a permaban. ~~~ benologist It looks like dailydot has started running spam accounts - the OP and this one: [https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=sexyalterego](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=sexyalterego) [https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=OTRAustin](https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=OTRAustin) ------ Tuxlar Something something pots and kettles and allegations and blackness. ------ Uperte I have always thought imgur, quickmeme and other meme site (forgot its name) are owned by Reddit owners or executives. It is impossible to get upvotes if you embedded image on your site/blog. ~~~ citricsquid imgur.com is owned by Alan Schaaf, he's not associated with reddit. The reason images don't get traction if they're embedded on a website or blog is because they're not compatible with the reddit clients people use (mobile) and RES (reddit enhancement suite). Most people that use r/adviceanimals want instant gratification, if your image doesn't load in under a second nobody cares and will move on, it's why imgur is so popular: it's fast and consistent. ~~~ wnevets I believe conde nast owns reddit & imgur. ~~~ citricsquid Conde Nast purchased reddit in 2006, then in 2011 (maybe 2012) it became "independent" again with the parent company of Conde Nast, Advance Publications, retaining an ownership stake of the newly formed reddit, inc. [1][2] Imgur is a totally separate entity, the company was founded by Alan Schaaf using reddit as a place to "launch" it[3], they've never announced outside funding and there has never been any talk of reddit (or Advance Publications, or Conde Nast) having any ownership stake.[4] [1] [http://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/14unl6/reddi...](http://www.reddit.com/r/TheoryOfReddit/comments/14unl6/reddit_is_a_corporate_investment_and_we_are_the/c7gwhzp) [2] [http://www.reddit.com/r/lounge/comments/1g73ec/whats_reddits...](http://www.reddit.com/r/lounge/comments/1g73ec/whats_reddits_pledge_drive_pitch/cahlxny) (screenshot: [http://i.imgur.com/ZoQKmOh.png](http://i.imgur.com/ZoQKmOh.png)) [3] [http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/7zlyd/my_gift_to...](http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/7zlyd/my_gift_to_reddit_i_created_an_image_hosting/) [4] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imgur](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imgur) ~~~ v1tyaz Schaaf first posted about Imgur on Digg, and when it didn't gain traction there he posted it on Reddit. It was disingenuous of him to call it a "Gift to Reddit" in that post. ~~~ drivebyacct2 In what way is imgur not a gift "to" reddit? It might not have been "exclusively for reddit", but I'm willing to be a huge sum of money that most top subreddits, including the first 4 pages of the frontpage are dominated by imgur links. imgur was the first image host (before minus) that didn't suck, wasn't anti- user, freely allowed hotlinking and had a minimal page when they didn't hotlink. It's almost never down and the links don't magically fail or expire after they get lots of traffic like many other hosts.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Most stockmarket returns come from a tiny fraction of shares - known https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2018/06/23/most-stockmarket-returns-come-from-a-tiny-fraction-of-shares ====== stolk Does this statistic consider cap gains only? Or did the author take dividend into account? I'm not surprised that cap gains are concentrated in a few stocks, but overal wealth creation? I have my doubts. ------ mancerayder Paywall ~~~ alimw View Source ------ candiodari TLDR: very few stocks have outsized returns over a relatively short period of time (usually early in the life of the companies). Most stocks (>50%) in the S&P500 (which suggests the DOW would be worse) are just outright bad investments. ~~~ gmiller123456 Honestly I found it difficult to discern any coherent point from the article at all. At the end they just say "diversify". But they also say that a lot of stocks are poor investments, so taking "diversify" to the extreme will dilute/eliminate any profits you make. So, in order to provide useful information, they really need to be a lot more specific than just "diversify".	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
MetaFilter launches "Best of…" blog - turoczy http://bestof.metafilter.com/2012/04/Announcing-the-Best-Of-Blog ====== liamcampbell I have wanted this to exist for a long time.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Controlling Positive Feedback Loops in Online Communities - dsirijus http://dsirijus.tumblr.com/post/29826465855/controlling-positive-feedback-loops-in-online ====== JumpCrisscross Assuming the conclusion is true, this has interesting implications for our highly connected political media environment, which suffers from similar positive feedback loops with a preference shown to cheaply produced vitriol over informed debate. I'm not suggesting we censor, in fact I take this articulation as a reason to be sceptical of the author's conclusion, but any policy for managing a medium- sized discussion-oriented community should be at least in part scalable to the national stage. ------ lutusp It would help if the author actually understood what "positive feedback loop" means in engineering. It's not what he thinks, and social-science terms like "positive feedback" don't translate well in the more rigorous sciences. In strict engineering terms, feedback loops must always have a gain less than unity, and a stable, reliable system normally has negative net feedback. But this doesn't sound "right" to a social scientist, who understands these terms in an entirely different way. ~~~ JoeAltmaier So, is there some way of controlling the gain? Hellbanning is one way but thats bang-bang (gain is 1 or 0). How about, limiting the visibility of comments to a subset of the community. If they comment/answer, then show the thread to more. If they ignore (its a rant etc) then it quietly sinks into oblivion. Just an idea. ~~~ lutusp > So, is there some way of controlling the gain? In engineering, yes, always. In the social sciences, not always. > How about, limiting the visibility of comments to a subset of the community. That would mean the system isn't a single system any more. Apart from making the system two or more systems, it's undemocratic and probably counterproductive. Consider the classic example -- astrophysicist Jim Peebles had an idea about the Big Bang, that there should be a residual "echo" of the original event, "audible" in the present universe, in the form of a background radiation with a specific temperature that was relatively easy to compute. Peebles realized the radiation should appear in the microwave region of the electromagnetic spectrum, and it should seem to be coming from everywhere (highly uniform). Meanwhile, physicists Penzias & Wilson over at Bell Labs had a microwave dish with an annoying noise they couldn't get rid of. They scrubbed away bird droppings, they adjusted the front end amplifier, nothing helped, and it didn't matter which way they pointed the dish -- the signal seemed to be coming from everywhere. Penzias & Wilson called Peebles and asked hum what he though the noise might be. Peebles told them, hung up the phone, and said, "We've been scooped." Penzias & Wilson won the Nobel Prize. Now that's feedback. And it only happened because there were no communications barriers. ------ ChrisNorstrom I agreed with him up until his solution. Because "controlling input" is also unsustainable when a community grows. Who is going to control input? If you're talking about HN, even Paul Graham tried to control input and it's not working. Or maybe he's not doing it enough. Listen to the Mixergy.com interview with Paul Graham. At exactly 49:40 Paul says, "[hacker news] was originally called startup news but after 6 months we changed it to hacker news cause we got sick of reading about nothing but startup stuff." And yet here we are again, HN is nothing but startup news, I just gave up and joined in, no use swimming against the current. The sad part was that HN was originally a much better nursery to startups because all startups begin their life as a project, a hack, a mod, a solution. HN was all about code back then, which put off a lot of people who couldn't code (myself included) and slowly it turned into more startup news to allow for a larger audience. The question is which came first? Was it necessarily a bad thing? How can PG / Should PG force the community back into more of a hacker culture than a startup culture? I came up with an idea to control who the members of a community are by means of crowd-sourcing ([http://www.chrisnorstrom.com/2011/02/invention-creating- and-...](http://www.chrisnorstrom.com/2011/02/invention-creating-and- maintaining-exclusive-communities-through-crowdsourcing/)) but still, how can one control the hive-mind of the community to prevent it from wandering away from its original intent? We've seen what happens when one doesn't control the community. Maybe its time to play secret-dictator? ~~~ JumpCrisscross Federating that power of censorship, e.g. by weighting down-votes by karma (for HN), could help the community scale. Then one just needs to keep an eye on the most powerful censors and ensure they (a) aren't abusing their privilege, and, (b) are effectively policing along the right metrics. ~~~ lmm You've just suggested solving the problem of positive feedback loops by adding a massive positive feedback loop in the moderation system. That's not going to work. ~~~ JumpCrisscross Positive feedback loops are heterogenous - there are sensible discussion and down-vote taunts and reciprocation. _If_ people can be reliably categorized as promoting desirable loops and/or dampening undesirable ones, selectively amplifying their voices will promote quality. Instead of modulating input, which is not scalable, I'm suggesting modulating the dampening power (and potentially amplification power, e.g. upvotes from high-karma users counting for more) of a select and active minority. ------ buro9 I agree with most of this. In fact I agree so strongly that having witnessed the rise and fall of many a community I've run or been a member of that I think that there is a natural lifecycle of a community. I also believe that whilst you can artificially lengthen the life by controlling inputs, you can also kill a community by the very same methods... possible to do but very difficult in the long term. Instead of trying to control the inputs (censor, dictate), I'm embracing the side effects of a lack of censorship... a shorter life span perhaps, but a community that burns brighter during it's life. Effectively what this means is that I'm building community software that has at the very heart of it the notion that a community will die, and that a successful community will schism during the death phase as members attempt to preserve the bits they love. The idea being that communities rip themselves apart, and that at some point HN will do so too. And when it does it won't be replaced by a single "new HN", but instead by many smaller communities each serving a niche that existed within the larger. Even though those niches appear smaller than the thing they emerged from, they are likely to be larger in volume (active users, posts per day, upvotes) than HN itself was before it. As a metaphor for this, think of a kind of community cellular division: the splitting of a community into smaller microcosms that will eventually grow and then split themselves. In some ways you could argue that StackOverflow actually did this preserving the dictatorship through the Stack Exchange network. Except, I don't really accept that a dictatorship can know when a specific community needs to sub- divide itself to survive. I think that comes from within the community. In the software I'm creating, the very tools to gradually manage the creation of new microcosms is given to the users... in much the way that users can create subreddits and that helps reddit to grow. ------ webwanderings What this article is identifying as a problem is actually not a problem but a chaos. Chaos in the community is not a problem in itself but rather a next stage of dialog. You have to cultivate and live through the chaos in order to get to the next level, which is understanding. By censoring, you are pulling your community into a wrong and aimless direction. The bells and whistles like flags, up/down votes, are just distraction between the authentic dialog/substantive community and aimless/useless chatter. ------ davedx "You need to be a nazi", that's quite a conclusion to make. Any evidence of this actually working? ~~~ lutusp Steve Jobs, who built what is now the world's most valuable company, at least in part by being intolerable? Parenthetically, I strongly recommend the recent Iverson biography, it's first rate. I worked with Steve Jobs, I couldn't stand him, and I eventually refused to work with Apple. I am sure there are many others who came to the same conclusion. But this didn't stop Apple as a company.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
The Perils of Polyglot Programming - okal http://alexgaynor.net/2011/dec/23/perils-polyglot-programming/ ====== lucisferre This was another one of those blog posts that started with <insert inflammatory title about X being bad/dangerous/perilous>, followed by <poorly constructed straw man about X being done wrong in a way that rarely happens> followed by <largely obvious but still unsupported conclusion that X is actually really good but only when done right>. The empty argument sandwich. Polyglot programming is _not_ about using 10 languages in every (or any) software project. It isn't even necessarily using 3. The one statement made that was true was this: > 2\. Knowing multiple programming paradigm expands your mind and makes you > better at programming in every language. Which he then argued against with > Well, maybe the second I'll argue with a little: I think you can get most of > the benefits by using different paradigms within the same multi-paradigm > language Ironically, "#2" actually supports the counter-argument. Learning multiple languages would be extremely useful when then applying those paradigms within a multi-paradigm language (as an example playing with Erlang and F# has made me better with languages that support first-class functions like C#, Ruby and Javascript). In the end, the article seems to disagree with it's own title. There is _no_ peril to being a polyglot programmer. There is perhaps a peril in overuse and over mixing of tools, which we should all know and has nothing to do with _being_ a polyglot programmer. Perhaps a better title would have been the perils of indecisiveness, or having a lack of focus, or doing too much at once. I dunno. ------ arctangent > I think sometimes using the less optimal tool for the job carries overall > benefits. In that case, it's the best tool for the job! Balance between the theoretical and practical uses of technology is the crux of the issue. My day job is an unashamed Python shop, so even though other languages might be "better" for a task we're almost certainly going to use Python wherever we can simply because it makes our entire service offering more maintainable. That said, knowledge of alternate languages/technologies does allow you to vary the status quo where the benefits outweigh the costs. The real benefit of being a polyglot programmer (or neophile technologist) is that you have the perspective to see where exciting new things might be employed successfully in more routine environments. ------ ajays I don't know about others, but I find it hard to jump from one syntax to another. The other day I started doing some Java after months in Perl, and all my variable names were starting with "$", and I had "my " before declarations. I know an IDE can prevent this, but it took me some time to get my bearings. Having said that: exposure to a spectrum of languages makes one think differently, and, IMHO, makes one a better problem-solver. Just observe how you think of a problem when trying it in, say, LISP -vs- Prolog; or FP -vs- Java. ~~~ sounds Sure. Wild switching of languages is infuriating to your partners. Car analogy: it's like insisting you need to park all 7 of your vehicles — car, van, truck, harley, two bikes and a wheelchair — in the prime spots in front of the office. You'd be out of a job in an hour. And knowing all the languages helps you. (If only to successfully talk your partner out of wildly slinging languages around.) Ok, better example: to write a web app, you need a server-side language. Plus javascript. Plus CSS. Plus multiple browser interfaces and their toolsets. I think the article totally misses the point: polyglot programming is a fact of life. Adapt or perish. We could debate the relative merits of _fully_ _equivalent_ languages, but I think it's linkbait to demonize "polyglot programming."	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Mozilla Firefox Extremely Slowing in India. What Is in Your Country? - seonirav ====== mtmail As others have pointed out the question doesn't have enough detail [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20496174](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20496174)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Diffie Hellman Parameter Validation Attacks Explained - tptacek http://chargen.matasano.com/chargen/2007/9/25/adam-bozanich-did-not-uncover-an-nsa-ipsec-conspiracy-diffie.html ====== tptacek I don't post my own stuff often, but I just rescued this old blog post from our database dump, read it, and kind of liked it. It's short, tight, and is a pretty good example of why it's hard to build good crypto (and why you shouldn't use SRP as your authentication protocol). ~~~ thaumaturgy _headdesk_ I really need to add matasano's posts to my regular reading. Every time I get it in my head that I learned something new about security, I discover that I really know nothing about it at all. Assuming that I have a good reason for not just implementing SSL for account authentication -- systems of distributed content, for example -- do you have a recommendation for anything else? EDIT: I don't necessarily mean implementations in Javascript, which is silly pretty much no matter what you do. These would be objective-c or Java implementations, and the authenticating bits are stored already in the application which is distributed through trusted sources.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Neal Stephenson and friends fight for the future of ebooks with "The Mongoliad" - absconditus http://io9.com/5549740/neal-stephenson-and-friends-fight-for-the-future-of-ebooks-with-the-mongoliad ====== pavelludiq It sounds like an open source e-book that you have to pay to "develop" for. Great idea in general, but although i don't mind doing work for free, i mind others getting paid for it instead of me. If they incorporate some sort of payment system, so that part of the revenue goes to contributors it might be a different story.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: Audiohand, automatically aligns and mixes multiple recordings - wpg854 http://www.audiohand.com/ ====== supercoder This could be big for podcasters ~~~ _hq Here's an example. It's a bunch of banter, but we recorded this at a busy coffee shop with 2 iPhones - I was demoing it to a friend - [https://audiohand.s3.amazonaws.com/m/609-1426881609782.mp3](https://audiohand.s3.amazonaws.com/m/609-1426881609782.mp3) Also a link to an acoustic song using an iPad and an iPhone - [https://audiohand.s3.amazonaws.com/m/41-1420075167599.mp3](https://audiohand.s3.amazonaws.com/m/41-1420075167599.mp3)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: How do you prepare for PM interviews? - zhangtwin What resources do you use and how do you approach them? ====== rolandal PM as in Project or Product Manager? (there is definitely some overlap though) I look for a couple things, and ask questions that help evaluate their: 1) Technical background 2) Product instincts & creativity 3) How they've earned leadership 4) Ability to channel multiple points-of-view 5) Ship-ability ------ guyzero As an interviewer or a candidate? ~~~ zhangtwin I'm looking at this more from a candidate perspective both I think having a view from both sides is important. IE - what is the interviewer looking for in an ideal candidate and as a candidate what is the best way to prepare. ~~~ guyzero So there's lots of thing to say. Picking one I'd say have some meaningful stories to tell. Not to recite, but the interviewer will probably ask you some "situational" questions where she asks for you to demonstrate dealing with some specific type of problem in the past. So you need examples. And you won't be able to think of them on the spot. So think of them now. The format some interviewers use is STAR - Situation, Task, Action, Response. Describe what the problem was, what you had to do, what you did and how it turned out. This is not a strategic suggestion, but a tactical suggestion. But a large number of candidates that I've interviewed don't do well at answering this type of question and it keeps me from giving them a good interview evaluation since I don't really have an answer.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Ask HN: Has anyone made a product with virtual euro/pound account with a iban? - manojvenkat92 Hello folks, I'm ideating and building a digital bank for any immigrants coming into Europe for student/work purposes and offer them a digital euro account. I'm trying to get an account with Solarisbank but they keep turning me down. ====== flatfilefan Did you check TransferWise? ~~~ JPLeRouzic Something which could complement TransferWise in France is the French "compte Nickel" [0]. Nickel is a payment institution, opened to any natural person aged twelve or over, with no income requirement and no possibility of overdraft or credit. The target of this financial service is varied, it can concern people prohibited from banking (2.5 million in this situation in France in 2014), people deprived of means of payment who only pay in cash, those living under the poverty line (8.4 million people in France in 2014), in the process of divorce with a blocked joint account, but also seasonal workers, temporary workers, executives or students. Thanks to an interactive terminal at a tobacconist, the customer opens a Nickel in less than five minutes by scanning his identity card (national identity card / European Union passport or residence permit issued by a French authority), and entering their address and mobile phone number, the customer leaves with a box including a MasterCard debit card and two RIB. In order to fight money laundering, cash deposits are limited to 250 euros per transaction and 950 euros per month The MasterCard card fee is 20 euros (annual fee). In addition, there are fees for cash withdrawals from tobacconists (0.5 euro), from an ATM (1 euro) or even in the event of cash deposit at the tobacconist (2% of the sum). [https://nickel.eu](https://nickel.eu)	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
When Proton Meets Monopole (1983) - ableal http://www.npl.washington.edu/AV/altvw01.html ====== ableal By John G. Cramer, professor of physics at the University of Washington in Seattle. Found in a comment by [http://slashdot.org/~somepunk](http://slashdot.org/~somepunk) on [http://science.slashdot.org/story/14/01/30/1343238/amherst-r...](http://science.slashdot.org/story/14/01/30/1343238/amherst- researchers-create-magnetic-monopoles) : Amherst Researchers Create Magnetic Monopoles	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Eric Allen: TipJoy Textpattern plugin - ivankirigin http://svallens.com/eric/article/60/tipjoy-textpattern-plugin ====== ivankirigin An early adopter of Tipjoy made this cool plugin. Go and tip him for it, and use it on your Textpattern blog. ~~~ aston Hey, Ivan, I realize this isn't the right venue, but I'm not sure what is, so... I like you guys's product a lot. The execution's really clean, and it seems that all that needs proving is the model itself. My thought, though, is that you guys would drive a lot more tips if you focused on the people doing the tipping rather than the sites being tipped. Although there's certainly some altruism involved in tipping, I think the underlying drive for most when giving to charity is much more selfish. In real life, people make large donations to get their name put on buildings or to be respected as philanthropists. People tip in restaurants to not look cheap in front of their date and contribute to political campaigns so they can tell their friends they put their money where their mouth is. In all of those situations, there's at least the ability to prove to other members of society that you did tip. In the case where you've tipped well beyond what might have been expected, you even get to be famous. All of this comes down to the question: Why not provide widgets that show the top X tippers for a given website? You get peer pressure via the suggestion that you _should_ be tipping like these guys, and you let the people kicking in lots of money feel special and be a minor celebrity within that community. Seems like it could really up the usage of your product. ~~~ ivankirigin There is an issue of privacy, in that people might not want their tipping advertised. That said, we're definitely going down this path. We'll make the experience very open and social. I think the widgets idea is really excellent. As for the right forum, we've had another idea which we'll implement soon: an open tippable forum. The feedback form here: tipjoy.com/feedback Will soon have the option to "make this public". Below it will be a ranked set of feedbacks given. Users can tip the feedback (and the tips will go to the submitter) to get the features they want. I'm really excited about making this open and extensible, so tipjoy could provide a feedback forum for other sites as well. Lots coming soon! Thanks for the ideas!	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
I couldn't get into YC, so I joined a startup that did - Swizec http://swizec.com/blog/i-couldnt-get-into-yc-so-i-joined-a-startup-that-did/swizec/1855 ====== rmorrison My YC W11 company is hiring! Join Comprehend Systems to see first hand what it's like inside a YC company, while helping us create next-generation database and visualization software! If you're familiar with either Enterprise Java or custom JS visualizations (Highcharts, EXT-GWT, etc), you can submit your resume to careers@comprehend.com. ------ MatthewB Interesting. I'd like to know how you met the team you ended up joining. That is something I am looking to do as well. ~~~ Swizec That was actually surprisingly easy. We're both from Slovenia where the startup community is somewhat smallish. They've heard about me before and knew I was free. Then the fact that a hacker friend of mine was friends with one of them and they approached him to join, and him recommending me to join as well, really sealed the deal. In short: I had luck. But the sort of luck you work hard on creating. edit: this post is horribly put together, but I don't know how to fix it without devolving into bool algebra. Hope it makes at least some sense :) ~~~ MatthewB Awesome. Congrats. ------ ltamake On an unrelated note, does Disqus not work for anyone else? I'm clicking on the text area and it doesn't do anything. Anyway, congratulations! Sounds like you're really excited, which is a great attitude to have for this sort of thing. :) ~~~ Swizec Hmm ... that would explain the lack of comments on popular posts lately ... What browser are you using? ~~~ ltamake Chrome on OS X. Tried Firefox and it does the same thing. I don't think it's a problem with your site or code. It's probably on Disqus's end. ~~~ Swizec Chromium on OSX works for me ... will look into it. THanks. ------ daniel-cussen I'll be in Palo Alto from July 5th on and am awesome. I'm emailing you now.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Wgpu-rs on the web - grovesNL https://gfx-rs.github.io/2020/04/21/wgpu-web.html ====== echelon This is why Rust is going to eventually eat Javascript's lunch on the browser. I'm willing to longbets that by 2025 we see a Rust framework as the top browser toolkit. I'd even be willing to bet that there are popular frameworks in use by major websites that discard the DOM altogether for something simpler and faster. There's a reason why this has to happen, too. My sincere hope is that Mozilla and the Rust/Browser luminaries will develop cross-platform APIs for full device hardware abstraction. If we can get Rust/WASM to be able to access the same system calls, hardware resources, payment APIs, native windowing routines, etc. as the iOS and Android SDKs, then we can potentially build a cross-platform native web that is just as snappy as the two shitty walled gardens we have today. I really hope the performant web slays the app store. That's the dumbest trap we ever fell for. I'd love to visit a website and be playing native Minecraft in seconds. Sans Google Play or the App Store, with no bullshit monopoly tax. That would address one of the major problems in our industry. ~~~ smichel17 > I really hope the performant web slays the app store. That's the dumbest > trap we ever fell for. I'd love to visit a website and be playing native > Minecraft in seconds. Sans Google Play or the App Store, with no bullshit > monopoly tax. I don't, unless certain criteria are met. There is a consumer-friendly side of apps that is often overlooked in these types of conversations: generally, I get to decide when to update my apps, and the developer can't uninstall their app off my phone without my permission. Moving from apps to the web shifts the balance of power even further from user to developer. There are some apps (that require internet access) for which this is not true. For those, I share your sentiment; spotify has no reason to be an app. It's also possible to implement this amount of user control with the web, by caching the full version of a page, when you add it to your home screen (for example), and only replacing it after an explicit prompt (as a setting, ie auto-update). Until that happens, though, I don't wish for the death of app stores. Especially, f-droid is a great ecosystem. ~~~ Kamshak Even though I agree with the benefits of having control over updates seeing how popular SaaS has become I find it quite likely this will happen to (many kinds of) Apps as well. ------ twic I could really do with a diagram to explain how all the parts fit together. gfx-rs, Vulkan, wgpu-rs, wgpu-native, browser WebGPU, gfx-hal, Vulkan Portability bindings. Here's what i think: 1\. Vulkan is an API for doing graphics which is modern and standard 2\. Direct3D (part of DirectX, the names are sometimes used interchangeably), Metal, and OpenGL are APIs for doing graphics which are modern _or_ standard 3\. Vulkan, Direct3D, Metal, and OpenGL are all implemented by graphics card drivers and operating systems working together - this is pretty much the bottom of the software stack 4\. gfx-hal (along with gfx-backend-*) is a Rust library which abstracts over Vulkan, Direct3D, Metal, and OpenGL; its API is similar to Vulkan, but not identical 5\. The Vulkan portability bindings implement Vulkan (the "universally portable subset") on top of gfx-hal (to an extent - it seems like there are lots of little bits that can't be implemented for each backend) 6\. WebGPU is an API for doing graphics which is modern, standard, and easier than Vulkan 7\. WebGPU is (or soon will be) implemented directly by browers, on top of who knows what, Direct3D etc i suppose 8\. wgpu-core is an implementation of (a Rust projection of) WebGPU on top of gfx-hal 9\. wgpu-native is a C API on top of wgpu-core 10\. wgpu-rs is a nice Rust API on top of WebGPU, which can (now!) use either a browser's WebGPU, or wgpu-native gfx-rs is the name of the overall project. I'm sticking to text mode. ~~~ MrBuddyCasino So its silicon -> OS driver -> Vulkan -> gfx-hal -> wgpu-core -> wgpu-rs Anyone has an idea how much performance those layers of abstraction cost? ~~~ grovesNL Both wgpu and gfx APIs try to avoid any significant CPU usage in hot rendering/compute paths (e.g. by doing more work upfront instead of during rendering), so generally the performance cost should be fairly low for most applications. The Vulkan API is basically 1:1 with gfx-hal so the performance cost should be negligible when gfx-hal is running on top of Vulkan. There is some overhead when running on top of other backends (such as Metal or DX12) versus implementing separate backends for wgpu, but the design of WebGPU avoids most places where the overhead would become significant anyway. Similarly wgpu-rs only adds Rustier bindings to wgpu-core, so any performance cost should be negligible. There is some amount of overhead in WebGPU in general (caused by automatic memory management, additional resource tracking, etc.) versus directly using raw Vulkan/DX12/Metal, but WebGPU tries to find a good balance here between security/portability/performance/usability. ------ brabel One of the things that use wgpu-rs is Iced[1], a cross-platform GUI Library inspired by the Elm Architecture. Although the project started around May 2019 and is still highly experimental, it looks like they got a lot of progress made and things look promising! The interest seems incredible: they have 5.4K stars on GitHub (amazing for such a young project) and there are lots of impressive examples[2]. As someone who just learned about the project: hope this takes off!!! A lightweight, simple to use GUI toolkit that can run on the browser and desktop is really something developers desperately want. [1] [https://github.com/hecrj/iced](https://github.com/hecrj/iced) [2] [https://github.com/hecrj/iced/tree/master/examples](https://github.com/hecrj/iced/tree/master/examples) ~~~ red2awn I was just playing around with Iced yesterday, it is indeed very nice. I wish it has better docs though. ------ raphlinus This is very cool stuff. I'm waiting a bit for it to become more mature, then I'd like to use it as the basis for druid, a native Rust UI toolkit. As noted in another comment, iced is already doing that. One of the reasons I'm excited is that I believe I can get very high performance, and high quality 2D rendering using an evolution of the techniques explored in the piet-metal prototype. This work extensively uses GPU compute capabilities, which are not available in older versions of OpenGL or in WebGL. ------ snissn Can it do sha3 hashing in a web browser on the gpu? ~~~ kangz Yes, so does WebGL and with the same efficiency. Partial hash inversion is an embarrassingly parallel problem: computing a hash from a random number is independent from the other random numbers you want to compute hashes for, also it is a computation bound problem and not memory bound. It means you can build a fairly efficient partial inverse finder by running many fragment shaders ("pixels") in parallel and only drawing the one that finds it. This is doable in WebGL today. A key feature of WebGPU is compute shaders which sound like they can compute stuff so they would be better at hashing. But actually compute shaders give more flexibility which makes it possible to handle problems that are a bit less parallel, and they help optimize memory-bound programs (but don't help for computation bound programs). So compute shaders make it slightly less code to do a partial inverse finder, but do not make it dramatically more efficient. So to answer your implicit point: no WebGPU won't unlock capabilities that will lead to a rise in ads mining Bitcoin. (though it could maybe help for Ethereum mining) ~~~ snissn Can you share an example or tutorial? ~~~ grovesNL There are some resources for wgpu-rs linked from the blog post (such as [https://sotrh.github.io/learn-wgpu/](https://sotrh.github.io/learn-wgpu/)). There are also some tutorials available that demonstrate how to use the browser API directly: \- Raw WebGPU [https://alain.xyz/blog/raw-webgpu](https://alain.xyz/blog/raw- webgpu) \- Get started with GPU Compute on the Web [https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2019/08/get- starte...](https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2019/08/get-started-with- gpu-compute-on-the-web) ------ OwnsE This is really cool. I've been excitedly watching how wgpu is developing. I don't have much graphics experience outside of one ogl but it looks like it's turning into something seriously neat. ~~~ royjacobs Definitely. The last time I did any truly serious graphics programming was in the early noughts and the fact that I can now toy around with a really modern graphics stack in a reasonably straightforward, cross-platform yet still performant way is really wonderful. I've been enjoying my time with wgpu-rs so far and I intend to keep doing so. ------ lachlan-sneff I think that wasm potentially has a great future for cross-platform binaries. Eventually, hopefully, the same code that can run in a browser will be able to run natively on linux or macos without recompiling. A major blocker for this is that wasm applications are slower than native ones. There are a few reasons for this, and some of them, like simd support, are slowly being fixed, but an important one in my opinion is that memory in wasm requires bounds checks. Now, there are hacks to make that fast, but they work for wasm32 and not wasm64. I think architectures adding instructions for lightweight memory sandboxing would go a long way to alleviate this problem.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Show HN: Logr. The minimalist Python blogging solution. - brewerhimself https://github.com/BrewerHimself/Logr ====== antidoh "If you wanted an article named An Introduction to Software Engineering to appear in the Software category, the location of the file would look like this: /articles/Software/intro_to_software_engineering.md" And if an article fits in more than one category, would you put soft links to that article in various other category directories? I might not have made the categories implemented as directories, although I understand your desire for simple as possible. ~~~ brewerhimself I hadn't considered that some posts may fall into multiple categories, but I'll give it some thought. In the mean time, just choose whichever category works better. ------ brewerhimself I'm very interested in hearing some feature requests or any issues you notice. Feel free to post here so others can comment on your comment.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Feedback on new Fantasy Football Social Community - esinger My name is Evan, and I am the original founder of Pigskin Boss - fantasy football's first true social community. We just launched 4-5 weeks ago at the start of the football season, and was hoping to get your guys' feedback and thoughts about what we've built thus far.<p>We're currently building an automatic team import so all you have to do is provide your ESPN or Yahoo! login and it automatically pulls your roster from that site - something we're excited for.<p>I look forward to your thoughts! ====== joefarish Should I Make this trade Is it possible to see the Full Rosters of the teams invovled? For example, if someone has Romo as a QB2 then Romo +CJ2K for Lynch becomes a good trade. ~~~ esinger Yes, you can actually click on their username and it takes you to their office which shows their full roster. We're currently working on adding a link on the poll to make it easy that says "See full roster". Thanks! ------ esinger Go to www.pigskinboss.com to test it out.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Firefox introduces PDF viewer - riledhel http://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2013/02/19/firefox-introduces-pdf-viewer-to-browse-the-web-without-interruption ====== hosay123 It's worth pointing out this is done in _pure Javascript_ , and works by compiling PDF functions to equivalent Javascript functions which are then visible to Firefox's JIT. Despite being only around a year old, it still manages to render the majority of PDFs thrown at it (it's been my primary paper reader for the past 6 months or so). As for missing features like some complex gradients, I can't say I've missed them, except on occasion when dealing with shiny PR materials. Earlier versions occasionally emitted blank pages, but these could always be skipped thanks to a side effect of the PDF format. PDF.js has an amazing future for such a young project, and it is _the_ foremost demonstration of exactly how complex programming tasks can be expressed using native web technologies. Turns out 35kLOC of Javascript almost completely subsumes the functionality of a behemoth native application (Adobe Reader) that on some machines would require half a minute just to 'boot'. While Mozilla are pumping out stellar designs like this, Google are pushing crap like Native Client and their proprietary, binary-only Foxit Reader solution instead, complete with the hundreds of thousands of LOC of insecure C this entails. Rock on, Mozilla! ~~~ opinali Please take your time machine and go release PDF.js in early 2010. With good performance on the hardware and Javascript VMs of early 2010. _Then_ I'll grant you the criticism of Chrome's PDF viewer. Otherwise, trolling... fact is, Chrome is the browser that liberated the world from Acrobat Reader. PDF.js is awesome and it may be the way to go, but as of today Chrome's viewer is still much better -- please try <http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/fw4.pdf> in both browsers and tell me which one is sluggish and renders so-so, and which renders/scrolls instantly and perfectly and also allows you to actually fill the form. ~~~ Watabou On the mac, Firefox Nightly loads the PDF in a second while Google Chrome Dev loads in about three seconds. I can enter text in the pdf in Chrome while Firefox gives an annoying little "The pdf might not be rendered perfectly" error bar at the top. Let's try Safari: Loads in under a second maybe even faster, super quick scrolling, ability to enter text and the option to download the pdf on the bottom. This is the way browsers should handle pdf. We are just not there yet. I don't want to use Safari though. Firefox is the browser for me. I almost always download the pdf anyways and view it through Preview.app, especially if I want to actually input text in the pdf. I love Preview. It's like the best PDF reader out there. Preview is what liberated me from Acrobat. Well, switching to the Mac did that for me, really. ~~~ ___1___ I don't have firefox and a pdf view won't change that. Your description of Safari matches that of Chromium on Arch Linux. ~~~ Watabou Does Chromium have a built in PDF reader? I thought google adds that in for Chrome along with Flash? ~~~ natex It is not included, but can be installed. (libpdf) [https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Chromium#Open_PDF_files...](https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Chromium#Open_PDF_files_inside_Chromium) ------ twoodfin If you want to try PDF.js from your current browser, here's a demo: <http://mozilla.github.com/pdf.js/web/viewer.html> I wonder what's keeping this so ugly in Chrome. Also, does anyone know if printing is intended to work? It doesn't appear to have the pagination right, again at least on Chrome. ~~~ duaneb Looks much better than I imagined. Also painfully slow. ~~~ SteveMoody73 Most of the PDFs i read are electronics datasheets and they don't look half as good and it also seems to be missing the bookmarks as well. Scrolling through pages also seemed to take a long time. I think i will have stick to adobe reader for now ------ soapdog PDF.js rocks! Now, stay tunned for ASM.js because that too will rock (once it is ready). link: <http://asmjs.org/> ------ aviraldg Love it, but unlike Chrome's embedded PDF reader, it can't "stream" PDFs (a dealbreaker for people viewing media-heavy PDFs on slower connections) ~~~ baudehlo That's interesting, because PDFs are an inherently un-streamable format. It requires seeking within the file to work (hence why command line PDF tools can't take STDIN for the PDF file - or they fake it by copying to a temp file first). I wonder how google got around that problem. ~~~ jevinskie You could try to progressively render the file, pausing when a required forward reference isn't within the data you have downloaded so far. ~~~ jammmuel That seems to be what they do, in my experience. ------ johansch It fails with the 4th google hit for "sample pdf": <http://www.inkwelleditorial.com/pdfSample.pdf> (The main difference I see with Firefox 19 on win7 is that it loads pages significantly faster.) ~~~ chaud Seems to render fine for me in FF20 on W7: <http://i.imgur.com/G5PPEbN.jpg> ------ eumenides1 Dumb question: What's to stop Chrome from eventually adopting PDF.js? Personally, I see that as the future. Its open source, its "good enough", and Google doesn't have to license the pdf viewer anymore. Also it's a big coup against Adobe, when everyone with firefox and chrome can pretty much uninstall your Adobe Reader software. I haven't even mentioned shrinking the market on 3rd party PDF viewers. ~~~ nephyrin Nothing! pdf.js is already a part of the Octane benchmark and works well in chrome: <http://mozilla.github.com/pdf.js/web/viewer.html> Mozilla is about moving the web forward, not just beating the other guy, so I don't imagine there'd be any gripe with Google picking up pdf.js in chrome. ------ kunai Before this patch, this is usually how I would open PDFs in Firefox: "Okay, so I clicked on the link. Wait - where's the Download box? No, wait -- I told Firefox to download this MIME type automatically, right? Okay, but where is Evince? I thought it would load after I downloaded it. Okay, let me cd to Downloads, it's probably there. Okay, now I have to open Evince -- no, wait, I can just open Thunar to open it because the .pdf MIME is associated with Evince. Okay, so now I have to launch Thunar... Okay, now where is my Downloads folder again?" Granted, it would be easier if I weren't such a blockhead, but it's still a royal pain in the ass. ------ shmerl It's nice to have such an option, but it feels significantly less snappy than Kparts plugin in KDE which wraps Okular into Firefox. ~~~ CamperBob2 True, as with plain Adobe Reader. I spend a large part of my day reading .PDFs, both in and out of my browser, and Firefox became a much less effective "power tool" when they took the liberty of disabling the Reader plugin. I couldn't care less how long it takes to _load_ a .PDF -- snappy rendering and navigation is everything, and you don't get that from JavaScript. It took a surprising (to me) amount of hacking to re-enable native .PDF rendering. As far as I'm concerned, pdf.js is one of those increasingly-common cases where Mozilla has unilaterally decided that it knows Just What I Need, and followed up by attempting to impose it without offering me a choice. ~~~ Spittie I don't know what you did, but i can easily change that by changing the default action for PDF files in preferences -> Applications. I've been using PDF.js myself for i think a year now (Used to install it directly from their Github page), and it's a great reader if you aren't an heavy PDF user. I barely have to open a PDF, and when i do it's usually just text and images, not any fancy stuff. And i guess most computer users are just like me. If you open PDFs all day, and are a power user, i guess that nothing can replace a good standalone reader. It's still kinda slow, but it has done some incredible progresses in the year i've been using it. And i'm sure it will just get better and better. ------ homer-simpson What I don't understand is why Google doesn't have an open source PDF viewer? I mean, Chromium renders OpenGL, decodes movies, contains fastest JavaScript VM and it cannot view PDFs? Given what they did to JavaScript speed, can you imagine what viewer they would be capable of producing of? At least they should join Mozilla on improving pdf.js, IMO... ~~~ mccr8 Chrome already has its own PDF viewer, presumably implemented in C or C++ or whatever, so they probably don't care about making it available for Chromium. Perhaps they bought the rights to the source code they based it on, and are unable to open source it. ~~~ joshmoz Google pays to ship FoxIt's closed-source PDF engine with Chrome. ------ Create ...and it displays your visited sites in a grand panorama on the canvas in a new tab, despite having asked for always private browsing. It could be a regression of both the browser, and the unit test, which isn't such a good news. ~~~ nephyrin If this is the case for you please file a bug - a lot of private browsing changes have been occurring under the hood in preparation for proper per- window private browsing in FF21, so it's very possible a regression snuck in :( ------ brudgers I've been using it for about a month. It's my default PDF viewer, on my desktop - though sometimes it has choked on a file, and search has been an issue on large files. Generally though, it's a good solution that doesn't require dealing with Adobe updates all the time. ------ AshleysBrain Is this based on pdf.js? I couldn't seem to find out quickly. If so, very cool! Edit: I was being lazy, it definitely is. Very nice that it's plugin-free and a pure HTML5 solution. ------ Aissen I've been using it for while (it shipped before but wasn't enabled by default; which I did). It works great most of the time, and is hassle-free. It's also likely safer to use. Now, if only Gmail would let me preview attachments in it. They do it for Chrome's plugin. I tried messing with the URL arguments, but it seems the Gmail server won't even give you the inline (ie not a download) version of the PDF if your browser doesn't pretent to be Chrome. ------ stcredzero I would love to have a PDF viewer app for OS X based on PDF.js. Better still if it could be sandboxed and have other enhanced security. Just tried out Firefox 19, and the PDF reader is good. Responsive enough, with just the barest hint of render lag. Minor nit: Firefox isn't currently registered as handling PDF, but will still open it happily. EDIT: I have Firefox as my OS X Mountain Lion's PDF viewer app now. Works quite well! ~~~ jonknee Any particular reason? OS X natively supports PDFs (and is both much faster and more complete than pdf.js). ~~~ stcredzero Preview has had a history of security holes. PDF.js would at least be immune to buffer overflow exploits. ------ gmac I've been using this for a while in Firefox beta, and it's generally really good. I have two small problems with it, which perhaps won't be too hard to fix: 1\. PDFs of old academic papers that are just strung-together CCITT (fax) compressed monochrome scans. Preview.app, Adobe Reader and Chrome resample those to give a readable quasi-anti-aliased effect. PDF.js makes the text jaggy and spindly and hard to read. 2\. No back/forward navigation. ------ ozten I've been enjoying Pdf.js for months, as I use Aurora as my main browser. Aurora[1] is the the first step before Firefox Beta. If you want to use awesome features like pdf.js earlier... get on Aurora. It has been surprisingly stable channel for pre-beta code. [1] <http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/aurora/> ------ Nux Impressive piece of Javascript, but it's quite heavy on my CPU. I will continue using Evince for the time being. ------ hoodoof We have a major in house application that displays PDF files as a core part of its functionality. The Firefox PDF reader is very slow compared to Chrome's. Also, the second and subsequent PDF files you click on do not commence the display at the top of the page, the appear to commence display somewhere down the page, I'm guessing maybe at the position that the previous PDF scrolled to. So immediately you need to pull the scrollbar back to the top before you can start reading the PDF. So for now, just on speed alone we'll pass on the Firefox PDF reader. ------ skinnynerd This is really amazing, but I wish these two browsers would be pushing for a FOSS version of PDF instead. I do not think openXPS is entirely FOSS but it is a good place to start looking for an alternative. Here is an xps file on the web to see how your browser handles it: <http://www.rosebudschooldist.com/images/Feb%20Cal%202013.xps> ------ Aardwolf Thanks for doing this, but it is not working well for me! It takes way longer to load than a normal PDF viewer, is slow, and basically I gave up and closed it when pages were still black, or white, with a rotating loading indicator, minutes after a regular PDF viewer already showed it. This in Linux. Thanks! ------ forgetcolor just tried it on a large PDF. Chrome takes about 1 second to load while FF takes 10, and the visual result in FF is nearly unreadable (while in Chrome it looks just like it does in Acrobat). i'd love to have nice open-source native PDF support, but this surely doesn't cut it for release. ------ arthurrr If this is the future of computing, then I quit. I don't want to play anymore. ------ iyulaev Interesting. I was wondering why I had to re-enable FoxIt viewer after the latest Firefox update. Maybe it works well for some PDFs, but the first two I happened to open were formatted pretty badly. ------ klrr What, this is not what a web browser is supposed to do. ~~~ nine_k How about web browsers showing you graphics? Animated graphics? Videos? 3D graphics? ~~~ klrr Not locally. ------ magg how is pdf.js gonna be updated in firefox... i was using the dev version add- on of pdf.js and seems to work better than the one shipped in FF19 ------ curiousdannii Don't miss the announcement that Firefox for Android now supports ARMv6! Many ~$100 Android phones now have the option of a better browser! ------ ww520 As a pure Javascript solution, it can run on a wide variety of platforms, as far as the browsers are running. ------ unix-dude Works well, looks sleek, and only randomly locked up once (To be fair, I had tons of tabs open). Good job! ------ mariusmg Is there anyway to change the background/foreground color ? ------ av500 what happened to doing one thing and doing that well? what is next, office documents? ~~~ icebraining It does only one thing. Firefox doesn't depend on PDF.js and vice-versa, they're just bundled together. ------ ucpete Serious question: what took so long?! ~~~ biot Perhaps they gave up waiting for your implementation. ------ green_fox The experience on Android phones is solid but this core feature is really late to the game. I love firefox but cant keep using a browser thats always playing catch-up ~~~ datr I really like Chrome and use it when developing just for webkit inspector but I can't switch to it for regular browsing as I still feel like Chrome can't match the browsing experience of FF. For example: Tab Management In firefox I can much more easily have dozens of tags without them all becoming squished. Instead I get scroll bars and a drop down menu. With tab mix plus, tabs which I haven't read yet are highlighted. I also have a close tabs to the left option in the context menu (which I really love). Adverts Adblock in firefox seems to be much more stable than the chrome alternative and just does a better job generally of blocking adverts. (This one might be solved by the likes of privoxy but then I lose the tight integration with the browser.) Password Management I'm a regular user of last pass but in chrome it can't integrate with the http auth dialog which means I'm forced to open up my vault and copy and paste my credential manually which is a huge hassle. I really like Chrome and I'd love to use it all the time but these things (and a few others) prevent me from doing so. Does anyone know if there are any chrome extensions which address these issues? ~~~ robin_reala Re: your LastPass Chrome problem, you need to install the extension with a binary component (there are two on LastPass's site) ------ stuff4ben Why is this news except the fact that Chrome has had this for years? Was Adobe paying Mozilla in the same way that Google paid them for the search bar preference? ~~~ joshmoz Adobe was not paying Mozilla for anything like that. Chrome simply includes a paid closed-source product (FoxIt, iirc). This was and is not an option for Mozilla for multiple reasons. It took Mozilla a while to get here, which is unfortunate, but the result is an open-source PDF reader that doesn't add yet another binary rendering engine to the browser (think security, hack-ability). Creating it made Gecko and the web platform better, because it pushed us. There is more work to do, but it's a great start and a welcome change to how these features are implemented. A bit more info in a blog post that I wrote: [https://boomswaggerboom.wordpress.com/2013/02/19/exciting- st...](https://boomswaggerboom.wordpress.com/2013/02/19/exciting-stuff- firefox-19s-built-in-pdf-reader/) ~~~ Ygg2 Interestingly, there are also a prototype Flash in JavaScript called Shumway: <https://github.com/mozilla/shumway> And an IIUC a DOM renderer in JS <https://github.com/andreasgal/dom.js/> I don't know if PDF.js will ever reach full PDF compatibility (with all it's weird forms and other stuff), but I do hope so. With a liberal licence I can totally see people embedding pdf.js to render their pdfs on site.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
Is YCombinator astroturfing now? - richm44 Is it new that news.ycombinator is including what seem to be paid adverts like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10678405 that allow no ability to comment etc. without distinguishing them from content being submitted via the normal process? Have I just not being paying enough attention to spot the astroturfing? Anyone know why these adverts aren't being flagged as such? ====== minimaxir You have not been paying enough attention. Y Combinator startups have been allowed to post job listings for years. Granted, the ones for stealth startups are annoying. ~~~ richm44 And people can't comment on them etc? TBH I'd be fine with it if they were flagged as the adverts they are.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
How Facebook could solve "Missed Connections" right now, if they wanted to - dgurney http://concertwindow.com/6793/the-solution-to-the-missed-connections-problem ====== usaar333 "It stands to reason, therefore, that Facebook’s algorithm could scan any photo from any of its 800 million members, and recognize you if you’re in it. So, let’s take that one logical step further. Imagine you take a photo of someone and upload it to Facebook’s servers. Facebook can analyze the photo and tag that person’s face." This could work for a mutual friend at a party. But if the face recognizer is given a low-quality subway photo and has 7 million people to choose from (NYC residents) of equal probability, the chance of current technology getting an accurate match is nil. The author may be a bit confused how Facebook's technology works. Yes, it recognizes faces, but it also eliminates ~99.9999% of members as possibilties by leveraging the social graph. ~~~ FelixP It might still work if it could narrow down the possibilities to, say, a hundred photos or less. The user should be able to go the "last mile" and pick out the one they're looking for. I'd be curious to see if Facebook's facial recognition technology is this good. Also, lots of people out in public (especially in NYC) aren't necessarily residents of the given area, which potentially makes this _much_ harder. ------ daegloe Instead of revealing the individual's identity, FB could send them an automated msg pointing back to your profile with the option to connect (or at least chat). This would leave the decision (privacy protection) in the hands of the recipient. ------ siavosh Does anyone know if fb face recognition can actually work for all 800 million users or does its tagging do something like nearest neighbor to your friends which I imagine is a simpler problem. ~~~ apu It's not nearly good enough for this. While I don't know what they're doing, it doesn't matter -- the state of the art in face recognition is far lower than what this requires. I would also assume that Facebook's recognition performance is heavily dependent on the fact that everyone has a limited friend circle, because then the requirement is only that you can be distinguished among the few hundred or thousand people you've ever been photographed with, not the 100s of millions of users you haven't. While not directly related (nor the method they are probably using), here's a project that describes how using others in your photographs can help recognition: <http://lear.inrialpes.fr/pubs/2008/MV08/> ~~~ dgurney So, what if once you upload the "missed connection" photo, Facebook tags it with GPS and filters possible matches against your current location? That would narrow it down quite a bit. I assume they have enough GPS data from other users' photos and status updates to at least place them generally within a state or city at a given time. ------ fl3tch Worst idea ever. Worst privacy violation ever. This would would be a boon to stalkers, perverts, creeps, serial killers, and I imagine 99% of people would never opt into it. ~~~ Hemospectrum You would opt into it implicitly just by having your pictures on Facebook. Not necessarily just by having an account, mind you; your friends might upload and tag pictures of you. Yes, it would be a huge privacy violation. Facebook just likely wouldn't care. ------ kevs Is this really a problem? I can't imagine taking a clear picture of a stranger's face rather than exchanging a few words and introducing myself. ~~~ bermanoid Yes, that would seem to be the obvious reaction. But that's just because you're a "normal", someone that has, on occasion, interacted romantically in a fairly standard and direct manner with members of the opposite sex. Now, imagine that you're a forever-alone that spends most of his free time (well, that minuscule portion of free time that's not consumed by LoL, SWTOR, Skyrim, Minecraft, etc. [1]) on Reddit complaining about being "friend-zoned" and fantasizing about that magical girl that looks like a fashion model but "gets you", who likes you just for being a "nice guy" that's "smart", breaking from her natural tendency to go for "bad-boys" because your awesomeness was so obvious to her despite your awkward creepiness and social ineptitude. It's a very different world, one where the idea of semi-passively stalking randoms on the subway without any fear of direct rejection seems a lot more appealing... [1] I say this as someone that wastes an awful lot of free time on Reddit, as well as playing LoL, SWTOR, Skyrim, Minecraft, and many more, including some Facebook games that I'm far too embarrassed about to cop to on HN (even if I do work in the field and have the ostensible excuse of "market research")... ------ usaar333 Site is down. and seemingly no google cache. Someone have text saved? ~~~ dgurney yeah, server just melted. Up now. Here's text in case it goes down again: \- - - You know those Craigslist missed connections posts? The ones where you’re looking across the subway platform at someone, and you wish you could get their number, but you can’t really shout across the tracks? Well, I was in New York City this weekend and I had a sudden inspiration. There’s a (hypothetical) solution to the “missed connections” problem. And it’s sitting around in plain sight. Here’s how it works. Many of you are probably aware that Facebook has been steadily developing its facial recognition algorithm. It’s quite good at this point. It can scan any of your photos and tag you automatically, if you’ve enabled the feature. That means Facebook’s algorithm can recognize your unique face. It stands to reason, therefore, that Facebook’s algorithm could scan any photo from any of its 800 million members, and recognize you if you’re in it. So, let’s take that one logical step further. Imagine you take a photo of someone and upload it to Facebook’s servers. Facebook can analyze the photo and tag that person’s face. I bet you see where I’m going with this. You’re back on the subway platform — you see someone across the way. You raise your phone and snap a quick picture via the Facebook app. The train comes. While you’re pulling away, the app has displayed that person’s profile. You click “friend.” And just like that, missed connections are a thing of the past. Interesting, eh? Also, creepy. Obviously, if Facebook enabled this feature it would cause a firestorm of privacy concerns. But Facebook hasn’t exactly shown much concern for privacy in the past. And everyone does have a public profile, anyway… and subways are public areas. Given that the tech exists right now, I bet we’ll see this within a couple years. The implications are rather large. Dan	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }
How We Made Joins Faster, Part Three - nslater https://crate.io/a/lab-notes-how-we-made-joins-23-thousand-times-faster-part-three/ ====== mahesh_rm Anybody here with experience using Crate? Why would I pick it over TimescaleDB for IOT data ingestion? ~~~ ddorian43 It's elasticsearch with joins/subqueries on top. Many features missing from rbdms/elasticsearch, and features that neither of them have.	{ "pile_set_name": "HackerNews" }

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