Study finds political bias skews perceptions of verifiable fact - <AUTHOR> https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2020/06/study-finds-political-bias-skews-perceptions-of-verifiable-fact/ <comment><USER2> The problem is that "verifiable fact" is actually very complicated in any context where you're talking about politics. Two of the questions on the first graphic are about income mobility for people born in the bottom quantile. The graphic is correct, as far as it goes, but overlooks huge differences by race. While the average American born in the bottom 20% has a 7.8% chance of reaching the top 20%, that number is actually 25% for Asians.

Or, take the fact that the US lags Denmark in inter generational income mobility. Which is true, but it's also true that the difference is due mainly to taxes and transfers flattening the whole distribution instead of fundamental structural differences that enable more movement: [https://www.brookings.edu/blog/social-mobility- memos/2016/09...](https://www.brookings.edu/blog/social-mobility- memos/2016/09/23/denmerica-why-denmark-plus-america-could-be-the-mobility- utopia/amp). Put differently, it's not that the welfare system allows the son of a gardener to become an engineer, but that massive income redistribution reduces the disparity between gardeners and engineers. (For many Americans, that distinction could be dispositive in whether you support an expanded welfare system.)

So take these facts the next step. The authors studied these things in the context of support for reducing income inequality. Isn't there a very plausible argument here that the experience of poor Asians shows that there isn't a systemic structural problem keeping people in the bottom 20%? Or, isn't it plausible that the generous welfare state doesn't really fundamentally change people's' trajectories, but just reduces the divergence between those trajectories? And if you teach people the first set of statistics but not the second, are you educating them to make up their own minds, or feeding them facts to support a preconceived notion?

Stepping back: experts should certainly understand these facts. But what do we expect ordinary people to take away from them? Consider the work done by Piketty and Saez on income inequality: [https://www.vox.com/policy-and- politics/2018/1/10/16850050/i...](https://www.vox.com/policy-and- politics/2018/1/10/16850050/inequality-tax-return-data-saez-piketty). Defining "income equality" actually is quite a quagmire. For example, in their 2003 work, P&S excluded the effect of tax transfers (such as the earned income tax credit) which significantly overstated the degree of inequality. Or, they mention that marginal tax rates were higher in the 1960s, but exclude the fact that the tax bases were narrower, such that the actual average tax rate on the top 1% hasn't changed dramatically over the decades: [https://taxfoundation.org/taxes-on-the-rich-1950s-not- high](https://taxfoundation.org/taxes-on-the-rich-1950s-not-high). And there are so many other confounding variables to account for. The immigrant population today is almost triple what it was in 1960. Because immigrants often start at the bottom of the ladder, an increasing immigrant share could make incomes seem stagnant even though they're growing within each different demographic. You also need to account for household sizes, major differences in marriage rates, etc. There are an enormous number of variables.

I'm not trying to take a side on this issue, I'm just using it as an example. These are issues of vast complexity. The facts are things experts can fight over. But do we really expect people to make political choices based on this information? Invocation of "facts" and "experts" have an intuitive appeal, but the "fact" is that for almost any disputed political issue, the facts are far from clear. So people use heuristics: ideologies, knee-jerk reactions, general principles, values. It's not clear to me that's wrong.

<comment><USER3> > While the average American born in the bottom 20% has a 7.8% chance of > reaching the top 20%, that number is actually 25% for Asians.

Exactly. Amy Chau wrote a great book called The Triple Package that points this out and the fact that its not just Asians (which broadly lumps Indians and all other Asian cultures together): Nigerian immigrants, Cuban exiles, Lebonese, Mormons, Iranians, Jews, all see roughly the same phenomena of surpassing average American household income. Its considered taboo to point out that income inequality is largely cultural.

<comment><USER2> > Its considered taboo to point out that income inequality is largely > cultural.

I wouldn't say "cultural" because that's pretty loaded. My point is more that if there were something structural about the economy that kept people in their class (big banks, bad public education, etc.) you wouldn't see high mobility in certain sub-groups. There has to be other factors in play--who knows what they are. But I wouldn't assume they're necessarily "cultural."

<comment><USER4> > I wouldn't say "cultural" because that's pretty loaded.

It may be loaded, but our cultural differences need to be considered. On average Asian and Indian cultures place a stronger emphasis on grades. This plays a large role in why they have been very successful by some metrics. If certain questions are taboo, then we might overlook factors that are setting them back. That doesn't mean that external factors aren't relevant, but we need to consider everything.

We need to ask uncomfortable questions. That's not bigoted in itself. Look at the gay community. A lot of gay men engage in very risky behaviour that can lead to the spread of STIs. As an LGBT person myself, I can tell you that it is still quite common. We need to be able to ask if they are doing self harm. In fact, we have asked these questions, which has led to measurable progress (STI prevention strategies have helped significantly).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> What share of US immigrants receive unemployment?

Democrats: 25.6% Republicans: 27.1% Reality: 5.5%

It seems the bigger bias comes from the general media than any particular party political bias.

<comment><USER6> I can't believe they thought it was that high. I mean general unemployment is no where near 27% and you'd suspect that with threat of losing visa status, immigrants are more likelier to take a job they dont exactly grok.

<comment><USER7> When arguing about immigrants and unemployment I always wondered why people get so upset over it. If the immigrant is even able to collect unemployment that means _they paid for it_.

So they're literally just getting the money back that they paid into it. Probably considerably less, even!

So why should anyone care that they're collecting a benefit that they paid for? I don't get it.

<comment><USER8> Unfortunately all media is biased, with most primarily taking a far left stance. This is likely just due to $$$ as we live in a capitalist society. If I owned a news station the questions I would ask is "what demographic is the most profitable to us?" and "what content brings in the most money?"

<comment><USER9> You are gravely mistaken if you think news stations slant "far left".

<comment><USER10> Are you referring to local news stations or national networks? I've also suspected CNN and MSNBC have a bias toward the "far left". What would you, caseyohara, accept as proof of left-leaning bias from CNN or MSNBC?

<comment><USER11> There is a _significant_ difference between being _left-leaning_ , and being _far-left_.

<comment><USER8> You are right on this point. However, everything is so politicized that you aren't allowed to be leaning in any direction. You are force to choose..which is ridiculous. To give an example, why is it unacceptable to many on HN to like policies from both Obama and Trump? Having been on here for a while, you will get applauded for 1 and spit at for the other.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> When asking "What percentage of US immigrants are Muslim", they saw 21% (D) and 25% (R). Not close to the actual number, but surprisingly close to the 24.1% of the world population who are Muslims. I guess both parties would be approximately correct if immigration was uniform across the entire world population!

(I don't mean to imply anything _meaningful_ by this, just that the answers for that question tickled a memory of world demographics)

</comment><comment><USER4> I think that the results of these types of surveys can be misleading, as they don't always ask if the respondent is unsure. Wouldn't it be better to ask them how knowledgeable they believe they are on a given topic before asking them about the exact numbers? Similarly, wouldn't it be better to ask them first about their support for a given policy change?

Many of these answers will simply be guesses. I think it would be far more informing if these answers were broken down by people who believe they are knowledgeable or who support certain policies.

</comment><comment><USER13> What's with all these articles stating obvious stuff everyone already knows? I remember a month ago there was an article about how breathing can affect health, like that was news or something. It was on the front page.

<comment><USER14> One of the big human problems in social science is that people are VERY happy to make explanatory narratives instantaneously on hearing a result... Which makes most results seem 'obvious' once reported.

One trick to circumvent this is to report the OPPOSITE conclusion first, and then say, 'actually, it was the opposite' after the listener says 'well, duh.'

In our own reading, it can be helpful to invert the conclusion and ask how surprising that would seem...

In reality, we don't know until we test... We have a lot of stories and biases that we carry all over the place, some are useful, most are shorthand, and many will lead us to wrong conclusions.

<comment><USER15> > One trick to circumvent this is to report the OPPOSITE conclusion first, and > then say, 'actually, it was the opposite' after the listener says 'well, > duh.'

 _Study finds political bias improves perception of verifiable facts._

I don't think I heard a lot of "well, duh".

> In reality, we don't know until we test... We have a lot of stories and > biases that we carry all over the place, some are useful, most are > shorthand, and many will lead us to wrong conclusions.

And even when we test, we don't really know, because we don't know whether we're talking about the same thing. What does "immigrant" mean? Are you still an immigrant after having lived in the US for 30 years? Is a naturalized citizen still an immigrant, or does he cease to be an immigrant when he becomes a citizen? Do you consider the children of an immigrant to be an immigrant? If so, for how many generations? Are you absolutely sure that everybody you talk to answers these questions the same way you do?

I'm often surprised how vague these political surveys are and how loose they play with language. And I'm even more surprised when they then use the data to make strong calls.

I'm pretty sure if you define the words, you get different results, e.g. ask about "immigrants in the last 10 years", or say "immigrants who have not become citizens that immigrated in the last 80 years". When you only use vague terms, you're not really asking what people believe the numbers to be, you're asking what people understand the term to mean AND what they believe the numbers to be for that understanding.

A current example is asking about racism, where it's no longer just academia where you might encounter something like "systemic effects disadvantaging local minority populations" as the working definition, while the average person might understand it closer to "discrimination based on race". You'll get very different responses based on what definition the person is working with, even when you ask about the same metric, e.g. "how often do you witness racism in your work place?"

<comment><USER16> > Study finds political bias improves perception of verifiable facts.

This is one way of flipping it.

What if we go with

 _Study finds conservative bias improves perception of verifiable facts._

and

 _Study finds liberal bias improves perception of verifiable facts._

showing each to people who respectively identify with those labels? Then, I think we would see a lot of people going "well duh"

<comment><USER15> Sure, but that's just giving people compliments or confirming their world view, isn't it? I did understand the comment to mean that we find things obvious after we hear about them presented as the result of a study. I don't believe that at all, but I'm very much with you that it's correct with a modification: we find them obvious after hearing about them _if_ they agree with our world view.

I don't think that "ideology lessens your ability to perceive reality" falls under worldview, though, and I cannot imagine that anybody was surprised by the result itself. That doesn't make the study useless, it's interesting and important to know how strong the effect is, whether it changes over time or can be negated etc. But other than that? Study finds that people shot with guns die more often than control group. I don't think you need to be an anti- gun-activist to say "well, duh".

More importantly: how did independents and apolitical people guess? Were they closer to the "real" numbers?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Clickbait title.

Better title: _political bias skews guesstimates that COULD be verified._

Are we _really_ surprised that people don't know by heart the percentages of income mobility statistics? Also, although the questions, as posed, are technically _verifiable_ , that's not what people really care about - do I care about a statistic of income mobility that includes my parents (soon to be pensioners)? Not really; I care about future projections - the income mobility of myself, and my future kids. _That 's_ what policy bickering is about.

Edit: the _actual_ (not HN) title of the article is even more clickbait-y: _When we can't even agree on what is real_

<comment><USER18> > One experiment showed that even when given an opportunity to learn the facts > about immigrants in the U.S. for a nominal sum, those holding the most > negative and most inaccurate perceptions were the least willing to pay.

There's more to it than just what you pulled out.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> So much for the wisdom of the crowds. Danes look like they have more accurate perceptions about immigration, but I'm not sure if that's actually an improvement for society.

[https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/10/2/29](https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/10/2/29)

Sometimes it's better to have uninformed priors if you want to give everyone an equal chance.

</comment><comment><USER20> From what I can see the real problem is that most people don't care about facts anymore. They just want to hear what they think anyway and the political parties are too happy to feed that.

When you talk to left wingers and right wingers about the economy of the last ten years the left guys will tell you it was paradise until 2016 and then everything went to hell. The right wingers will tell you it was misery until 2016 and then the boom started. When you look at stock indices, unemployment or other charts you will see a steady rise over ten years. You won't even see that the president has changed. But pointing that out is futile. Most people don't want facts.

<comment><USER21> Looks like the stock market was flat-lining by the end of Obama's term.

[https://www.macrotrends.net/1358/dow-jones-industrial- averag...](https://www.macrotrends.net/1358/dow-jones-industrial-average- last-10-years)

You may not care about facts, but don't generalize too quickly.

<comment><USER20> When I look at this chart I see ups and downs but overall a pretty steady upward trend. I don't see eights years of Obama misery and then triumph under Trump. That was my point.

<comment><USER21> Your point was that people don't care about facts, which you are proving in ironic fashion. Even when presented with evidence and facts, you fail to acknowledge it.

<comment><USER20> What facts and evidence for what did you present?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I'm sorry, is this showing a _causal_ relationship between political bias and perceptions of reality? The headline and article make it sound like that, but it could just as easily be that your perception of reality causes your political bias. Or that some other thing causes both of them.

I can't see the paper to be sure because it's behind a paywall.

<comment><USER23> [https://sci-hub.tw/10.3386/w26675](https://sci-hub.tw/10.3386/w26675)

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> this is why zuck is right

</comment><comment><USER25> It turns out those polled are not good at knowing verifiable facts like:

 _What share of U.S. immigrants receive unemployment?_ _What share of U.S. immigrants are Muslim?_

Why do people even hazard a guess at this stuff? Does your average Joe registered voter really think they have such a handle on immigration in their country that they think they know the religion of everyone coming in and who is receiving exactly what benefits?

Talk about the Dunning–Kruger effect...

<comment><USER23> Because they've been asked to. And I expect that if there's hesitation, the survey runners ask them to give their best guess.

And if they don't guess, and move onto the next question, then they're eliminated from the aggregated results.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Is that news to anyone?

</comment><comment><USER27> What I don't quite understand is the article is arguing that left and right can't even agree on the facts and both are wrong. But when I look at the examples they are both wrong, but way "to the right" on the facts.

</comment><comment><USER28> I suppose you could turn it round and ask: why are certain groups so obsessed with forcing immigration on people that don't want it? Don't those people have a right not to have their minds changed by people with an agenda? Who decides what opinions are palatable or otherwise, and why are they seeking to subvert commonly held beliefs for their own benefit?

<comment><USER29> >certain groups so obsessed with forcing immigration on people that don't want it?

Are you referring to human traffickers?

<comment><USER28> I was thinking more the ideologues prevalent throughout virtually every major global institution and goverment. But there does seem to be evidence of NGOs and traffickers collaborating in the Mediterranean for example.</comment></comment></comment>


Curated design and development resources - <AUTHOR> http://oozled.com

<comment><USER2> This is awesome!

In these days when information is a plenty, curation is more important than ever.

If you ever start a "math" category, it would be awesome if you can add my book: [http://minireference.com/](http://minireference.com/) It's not on amazon yet, but if you prod me I can figure out some other referral program...

</comment><comment><USER3> Nice.</comment>


Jordan revolution begins as protestors take to the streets - <AUTHOR> http://jordandemocracy.wordpress.com

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm in Jordan, and things this started up out of nowhere. There have been failed attempts each and every Friday for 2.5 months now to start true protests/revolutions, but with no effect. Yesterday people started camping out on a square near a main road, and today shit hit the fan as pro-government supporters stormed the square and the gendarmerie hosed down protestors and unleashed crowd control to try to bring things to and end.

There's a confirmed death from last night as the pro-government supporters stoned the protesters, and unconfirmed reports of another death today. Confirmed reports of many in critical condition after today's stampede though.

</comment><comment><USER2> At least based on the Wikipedia article on Jordan, it looks like it is one of the better Arab countries when it comes to things like freedom of expression, women's rights, religious tolerance, and so on. Sure, not up to what we expect in a Western country, but pretty good by regional standards.

That's probably going to make it hard to have a revolution, since a lot of people will be happy with things the way they are.

<comment><AUTHOR> In 2010 a new law was passed that greatly restricted freedom of speech online.

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/21/jordon-c...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/aug/21/jordon- cyber-law-press-freedom-online)

 _In May, the state security court banned news media from covering corruption allegations involving the Jordan Petroleum Refinery Company and several national figures.

This ruling coincided with what many described as a "government-backed media campaign" against news websites, whose criticism of government policies and increasing influence among Jordanians seemed to have become intolerable among thin-skinned, high-ranking officials._

The law makes it a punishable offense to post anything to a website, blog, chat, or otherwise publish via digital means anything that will "inspire lack of confidence" in Jordan, it's economy, or the King. It is so vaguely worded that people have been imprisoned on it from posting political activism to simply swearing at the King.

The thing about Jordan is that it's suffering from a combination of factors that make it seem like paradise. Western Media is heavily relied on to make that things are nice, the King is considered to be a "kindred soul who once acted on Star Trek" (when he was considered to be the black sheep prince and not even a remote candidate for the throne). Jordan is a very important strategic ally for the USA in the region, and only the second country Middle East nation to acknowledge Israel - perhaps even more important than Egypt because it plays host to a 60% Palestinian population.

In Jordan, the average monthly income is about 350 USD. Gas is $4.50 a gallon though, and anything other than traditional falafel (some sort of vegetable burger) or shawarmah (gyros) is much more expensive than in the States. Sales tax has been raised to 28% on any electronics or telecommunication, cars are taxed at 80%, income tax is at 16% and general sales tax another 16%. Does that change the public perception?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I would have thought their government would have been intelligent enough to go for a slow changes over lots of time and no killing protesters. I guess not. I wonder if the king will survive and/or throw the rest of the government under the buss in an attempt to survive?

<comment><USER4> I recently heard on Israeli news that he sacked most/all of the cabinet after the revolution in Egypt, but that it's almost an annual event in Jordan so it's not necessarily a direct result of the recent Arab spring of nations

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep. And to rub salt in the wounds, he appointed a PM that had already served during a previous period of unprecedented corruption and bad economy :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Additionally, protests also in neighboring Syria: [http://www.haaretz.com/news/international/at- least-23-said-k...](http://www.haaretz.com/news/international/at- least-23-said-killed-as-protesters-in-syria-clash-with-security- forces-1.351815)</comment>


What is a convertible bridge note with a price cap? - <AUTHOR> http://www.startupcompanylawyer.com/2010/01/11/what-is-a-convertible-bridge-note-with-a-price-cap/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+StartupCompanyLawyer+%28Startup+Company+Lawyer%29&utm_content=Google+Reader <comment><USER2> Excellent piece from a highly informed source but I think the negative economic effects of the bridge note are highly exaggerated by the use of artificial examples (how many Series A rounds have you heard of that go for $50M at $100M valuations?).

In practice, bridge investors who put up $500K will typically get their 10% or so of the company when the $4M-$5M Series A round is done and they will then tend to benefit as indicated in the second example given in this piece when the larger B round comes.

I don't disagree that the economics of bridge notes clearly favor the company. I just don't think it is as extreme as here indicated and, for this reason, such notes tend to be widely used in the startup world (they do have their clear advantages as well - some of which are discussed here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=761767>).

<comment><USER3> As an angel investor, I despise convertible notes. Mostly for the same reasons. I am taking my bet now, so I would like to invest at the valuation now, too. I suppose this is mainly just the perception of risk after the check has been written. So caps are necessary, if they are reasonable (I just imagine that that is the price at which I am buying the equity.)

Things I've seen that also bother me: Notes with embedded Preferred terms, in case there is no conversion event (now I have to negotiate preferred terms; the point was to avoid doing this now) and notes that allow early repayment without recourse (you buy out some early investors before a funding round.)

<comment><USER2> Very good points.

Many of the companies I represent face this same resistance to such notes from early-stage investors, and for the reasons you note, and in such cases I tell them just to do a Series AA if they want to keep it simple while still accommodating investor concerns.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Best British telco/wireless company? - <AUTHOR> I'll be moving to the UK in a few months so I'm considering various options.<p>Just wanted to know what your thoughts are on the various companies? <comment><USER2> Expat in NorthEast Lancanshire. FreedomPop has excellent prices and different plans. O2 and Vodaphone are a bunch of thieves, the first thing they will do is to sell your emails addresses to spammers. Also their plans are rubbish.

<comment><AUTHOR> I see. How's O2 and Vodafone's network service, customer service, etc.? Do they have a US/Canadian equivalent?

<comment><USER2> Network is quite good everywhere for all UK telcos (except maybe in remote areas or little islands). On the other hand customer service (O2, vodafone) is really bad and unprofessional.</comment></comment></comment>


Human-sheep hybrids pave way for diabetes cure and mass organ transplants - <AUTHOR> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/02/17/worlds-first-human-sheep-hybrids-pave-way-diabetes-cure-mass/ <comment><USER2> Other than the 'yuck' factor, what's the real objection to all this? Have folks read too much Science Fiction where it all goes terribly wrong? Maybe it'll be fine. Grow organs in sheep, use them on ill people, folks get better, have a mutton dinner to celebrate!

Seriously, we wear sheep's wool and skin, crack chicken embryos into our batter to make it bake up nice and firm, rub animal oils into our skin and armpits to smell and look better. But use them for real medicine and suddenly "Whoa there! Lets think about this some more?"

I'm all for continuing until there's a problem, which probably won't ever happen.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm equal parts fascinated and concerned about this sort of thing. It's incredible what science is capable of while, at the same time, I wonder if there are adequate limits on such advances. These researchers seem to be responsible (limiting the growth to a certain number of days, applying for permission to extend that limit in the future etc.) but I have a feeling that somewhere there is a scientist whose professional ethics are a little less robust.

<comment><USER4> What are your ethical concerns about this experiment? I don't think sheep with a human pancreas need to be treated differently from sheep with a normal pancreas, ethically speaking. We're not talking about fiddling with the sheep's brains.

<comment><USER3> I guess it is more a feeling that it'll start with a pancreas and then we'll figure out a way to make other organs, and maybe some human life after that. Perhaps it shouldn't concern me - if I would be fine with a pancreas or a kidney grown in an animal, why not (eventually) a human life in an animal? - but it is still a worry for me right now.

<comment><USER5> It would be amazing to generate entirely new organs that don't exist, to give humans capabilities they never had. I'm all for it.

<comment><USER6> Building hardware is the easy part. Making it play nice with the firmware (and, um, writing the firmware) is the hard part - we haven't been able to do that well with silicon, so far.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There exists a future where you could conceivably eat a delicious lamb shank, while wearing a supple lambskin jacket, while your implanted pancreas and kidney process the meal, and all are sourced from the same animal.

<comment><USER8> The same _individual_ animal? Because that seems kind of weird for reasons I can't quite put my finger on.

I guess it would be less wasteful though. If you're going to butcher a man-pig to steal his pancreas you might as well use the leftovers. Would save hospitals money on catering too.

You know what, I've thought about it and I'm all for it

<comment><USER9> Even today, very little is wasted when animals are slaughtered. And products made from animals find their way into a surprising number of end products. Here's some indication of whats going on from the Daily Mail (2009): [http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1217794/From-...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1217794/From- bullets-bread-beer-tambourines-toothpaste--plus-180-things-pig.html)

<comment><USER8> I was joking, but joking aside, please don't use the daily mail as a source of data. People in the US might not realise it but The Daily Mail is like a tabloid version of fox news but with more racism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Wondering... and if the cells also replace the brain and create a human-like intelligent sheep..

<comment><USER6> We've had talk of _sheeple_ for decades now. Nothing new, methinks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I just can't help but think of the MaddAddam trilogy [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MaddAddam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MaddAddam)

<comment><USER12> Sheepoons.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Chimeras rather than hybrids, surely?

</comment><comment><USER14> You know, or just start eating Whole Foods and plant based. Mayb a little cardio too.

<comment><USER15> Type 1 diabetes is a genetic, autoimmune disease in which the the pancreas' ability to produce insulin is destroyed. Sadly, a little cardio won't help.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Wake up Sheeple (Sorry, I had to)

<comment><USER17> OHGODOHGODOHGOD _why did you do that?_

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> swap your carbs for fat and see what happens when you're diabetic already :|</comment>


Fast inverse square root - <AUTHOR> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_inverse_square_root

<comment><AUTHOR> Not very new but still interesting. Read also about the origin of it here:

* <http://www.beyond3d.com/content/articles/8/>

* <http://www.beyond3d.com/content/articles/15/>

</comment><comment><USER2> I dare say this is what the sperm whale in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" was referring to when it thought "Oh no, not again."

<comment><AUTHOR> With nice pictures this time. :)</comment></comment>


Show HN: Modern Calendar Embed for Google Calendar - <AUTHOR> https://gra0007.github.io/modern-cal-embed/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hey, I made this tool that displays a nice lookin' embed based on any ics file url, because if you're not already aware, Google Calendar's embed is straight out of the 1940s. I'm still actively working on it, and accepting issues on the Github repo if y'all find any. Thanks for checking it out, I put a lot of work into it!</comment>


Hackers claim $10,000 prize for breaking into StrongWebmail - <AUTHOR> http://www.thestandard.com/news/2009/06/04/hackers-claim-10-000-prize-breaking-strongwebmail <comment><USER2> Wow, this is ridiculous:

[http://www2.telesign.com/login.php?loginerror=yes&user=\\...](http://www2.telesign.com/login.php?loginerror=yes&user=\\%22%3Cscript%3Ealert%28%27youre%20kidding%27%29%3C/script%3E)

Pathetic. (Telesign is behind StrongWebmail)

<comment><USER3> IE 8 notices the XSS attack and tries to safeguard the user.

<http://imgur.com/FzN1f.png>

I verified that the latest version of Chrome and Firefox doesn't prevent the XSS attack.

<comment><USER4> Firefox+NoScript does

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> IIRC the telephone authentication is not used if the machine has already been used to log into the account. Since the company gave away the username and password, all that would remain is to steal the cookie used to identify a machine that has already logged in.

That could be done with an XSS attack using JavaScript to access the cookie and divert it.

I considered doing this but would have needed to sign up for an account and that required giving a credit card which I didn't want to do. Well done to the people who made it work.

</comment><comment><USER6> _Hackers love a challenge. And more than that, they love cash._

Strike that, reverse it.

</comment><comment><USER7> It doesn't matter how good the lock on your front door is if the hinges are on the outside.

</comment><comment><USER8> FTA:

 _The IDG attack did not work initially, but succeeded when security software called NoScript was disabled on the Firefox browser, running on a Windows XP machine._

Oh my.

<comment><USER9> Since NoScript just lets you block javascript, I'm guessing their powerful security system was nothing more than a few lines of javascript code?

<comment><USER10> I'm guessing they used XSS to perform the man-in-the-middle attack and snatch the username+password+security code, but initially it didn't work on the journalist's computer because he had NoScript installed.

<comment><USER8> On my first read, I thought it was just shoddy editing, but I think you're definitely on the right track with this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> They claim it was to bring more attention to the issue, but you know they did it show off. Well THAT backfired, didn't it?

</comment><comment><USER10> So many people think they know security, so few people do.

<comment><USER12> it's like any discipline, the best ones appreciate how little they truly know.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I am really amused by how the 1337 h4x0r attack on Palin's e-mail always comes up in these security articles

</comment><comment><USER14> Since everyone is venturing a guess, here's mine:

They used XSS (cross site scripting) to send a mail to the target. When the email is viewed a CSRF (cross site request forgery) is executed to add a new device (phone) to the authenticated devices list. Next they log in, receive the SMS on their phone that is now in the list...bam!

[Edit: I didn't mean XSS to send the email, I meant inject an XSS attack into the email and send it. I'm thinking something like psuedo: location.replace(/link/to/add/device/?phone=555-1212 ]

<comment><USER15> As jgrahamc pointed out: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=642280>

They probably sent the mail like you said, only used the CSRF to jack the cookie, which would be easier than adding a phone to the list.

<comment><USER16> Can you explain what the CSRF attack you're thinking of is? Maybe I'm not reading you carefully enough (long day), but that doesn't sound like a CSRF to me.

<comment><USER15> Well my thoughts were something like:

Victim logs in using two-factor auth, gets a cookie which lets them back in without phone in future.

Attacker sends email to victim with some kind of script embedded.

Victim views email, javascript runs and sends cookie info to attacker.

Attacker uses cookie to impersonate victim.

Of course, it's been a long day here too, and I'm so far from an expert on this stuff it's entirely probable that what I just described doesn't make sense/isn't possible.

Edit: Yeah, guess what I described is more XSS than CSRF

<comment><USER17> I suspect your on the right lines: but from the XSSExploits tweets I imagine that what they _might_ well have done is ecxecute some JS to add a new authorised phone number to the list (i.e. by just posting the new details).

That said they say they also needed a strongwebmail account for it to work so I could be wrong - perhaps they just hijacked their authed session ID into the ceo's (possibly??)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I wonder if they have a viable business after this. Seems like this could be a deathblow right off the bat.

<comment><USER19> Did they have a viable business to begin with? At least personally, I don't spend too much time worrying that hackers are going to raid my gmail.

<comment><USER18> I've dealt with several companies, mostly banks, that use web based "secure e-mail" systems (mostly they're just file storage systems). They won't e-mail important documents to you since most people's e-mail clients use plain text and/or people use weak passwords, etc...

In fact I recently received a four inch thick stack of documentation, APIs, etc... via FedEx from a bank because they didn't trust my e-mail and I wasn't on "the list" for their "secure e-mail" site (pay per account thing).

So yes, reasonable or not, secure or not, there is a business supplying "secure" communications for businesses.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I believe they probably found a way to inject some data that wasn't properly escaped.

When the CEO (or anyone else) would receive the alerts that someone was trying to break into their accounts, the XSS or javascript (or whatever) would be included in the alert and executed ... That's probably how they broke into it and why it didn't work with noscript enabled.

</comment><comment><USER21> glad to see the advertising program on HN working as planned

<comment><USER22> Advertising that their application is incredibly insecure?

Even if they fix this, I wouldn't trust a company that claims their product is very secure, offers a $10k reward for hacking it, then gets exploited in less than a day by (most likely) the simple XSS vulnerability mentioned in another comment.

<comment><USER23> _"Advertising that their application is incredibly insecure?"_

No, weegee is referring to this story which was deleted as spam apparently:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=638494></comment></comment></comment>


Welcome to the Library of Technomadics - <AUTHOR> http://microship.com/ <comment><USER2> I remember those days...

The article on the link can be read in the original on page 254 of

[https://archive.org/details/80_Micro_1983-12_1001001_US](https://archive.org/details/80_Micro_1983-12_1001001_US)

Page 255 is a single person software company selling $20 applications before "office software" existed.

Page 257 has ads for basically TRS80 GDB debugger for $40, a bible grep command for $50 or $200 sold using an Apple II picture in a TRS-80 magazine (WTF, guys?) and Radio Shack (may god rest their souls) sold computers with tin/lead corrosion connectors and this aftermarket gold connectors could be soldered on. Personally I never needed any of it.

Page 258 talks about the AppleII vs Franklin copyright loss. This was years before the PC Clone era, and AppleII clones were not legal.

Look at the silver bullet on page 262. Some things never change.

On page 264 notice how people have been complaining about display technology and trying to sell a profitable magic solution for roughly 30+ years now. Also check out the prices on page 265.

Check out page 314. My dad bought a floppy drive upgrade from those guys; worked perfectly. Those numbers are not inflation adjusted BTW and thats vaguely what he was paying for the mortgage back in those days.

There's some nice modems on page 316.

Come to think of it, the most interesting artifact of this era was 322 page long computer magazines. Think about that pagecount for a second. It truly was a different era.

<comment><USER3> Including seriously long and detailed code and algorithms and discussions about sam. I got a really nice byte based lookup table method for computing CRC16s (any feedback points) from a Byte mag in 1976. Don't see these today.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I gave him the SPARCbook back in the day.

[http://microship.com/update-kentucky-rainstorm/](http://microship.com/update- kentucky-rainstorm/)

</comment><comment><USER5> The BEHEMOTH cycle is just something else. A Mac in the front of a bicycle with head-mounted controls and a keyboard in the handlebars is just the tip of the iceberg.

Mr. Roberts' projects are seriously cool. Just think of all the dozens of different technologies that this guy understands intimately, from the highest to lowest levels.

</comment><comment><USER3> And he did that trip twice, with two generations of original systems - Wonnebago and Behemoth.

Yes, Steve is indeed really cool. No contest.</comment>


New Da Vinci Xi Surgical Robot Enhances Minimally Invasive Surgery - <AUTHOR> http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/new-da-vinci-xi-surgical-robot-enhances-minimally-invasive-surgery-1443099

<comment><AUTHOR> Should have used a picture of Vader's bot. It desperately needs to be robin's egg blue for anyone to trust it.</comment>