Crosswords don't make you clever - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/prospero/2013/08/quick-study-neuroscience <comment><USER2> I went to a conference on Multiple Sclerosis with a friend who has the disease, and one of the much-hyped research topics (this was a few years ago) was how more and more papers are finding a link between low levels of Vitamin D and severity of the disease. Essentially, vitamin D may lesson symptoms or even make you less susceptible to the disease.

This is a pretty good article about natural vs supplemental Vitamin D intake: [http://www.marksdailyapple.com/vitamin-d-sun-exposure- supple...](http://www.marksdailyapple.com/vitamin-d-sun-exposure- supplementation-and-doses/#axzz2cWFDNpxb)

<comment><USER3> An example: Calcium is required for good bone strength/density. However, Vitamin D deficiencies mean the body can't absorb enough calcium.

With regard to the "natural vs supplement" argument, some people are very pale and susceptible to skin cancer. It may not be safe for everyone to get enough Vitamin D through natural means alone.

<comment><USER4> Pale skin also means that you need less sun exposure to get enough D vitamins.

<comment><USER2> Source?

A very pale person may burn in 5 minutes. It doesn't make sense that your body would speed up the synthesis of cholesterol just because your skin has less melanin or is more sensitive to UV radiation. Also keep in mind that no matter how much is synthesized it's up to the liver and kidney to make it into a useful hormone.

<comment><USER5> Melanin blocks sunlight which reduces vitamin D synthesis

[http://essays.backintyme.com/item/4](http://essays.backintyme.com/item/4)

 _> The lightness adaptation enhances calciferol (vitamin D) synthesis. Too much epidermal melanin for the latitude blocks UV penetration essential to the dermal synthesis of calciferol or vitamin D._

If you have less melanin then more sunlight reaches the lower layers of skin which increases vit D synthesis.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm not sure I buy this. Wouldn't this suggest that natural athletes are better students? My limited sample size suggests that most of the best students I've known have not been athletes. Most have been musicians, though. I admit this could be correlation rather than causality.

I fully admit that teasing out correlation and causality is very difficult in situations like this.

<comment><USER7> Meaning if you want get better at math... practice math, not crosswords and not running. Crosswords make you better (primarily) at crosswords. Running - at running. But the idea is that math + physical activity suppose to make your better (at math inclusively) then math + crosswords.

<comment><USER6> I do buy this. It would be interesting to see them quantify math * 2 versus math + running.

<comment><USER8> It's been done, and math + running wins. Check out Tony Schwartz the Power of Full Engagement. In it he talks about how you can't just go go go at the thing you want to get good at, you have to take breaks and do completely unrelated things, like running. If you don't, you'll burn out.

<comment><USER9> way back in the dark ages, before the Playstation and XBox and Nintendo, I conducted my own empirical studies using coin-operated arcade games. I found that after a couple of hours, my reflexes plateaued, then degraded. I had to go do something else for a couple of hours before I could come back and do better.

<comment><USER10> Another really easy way: I have a simply memory game on my phone, 6x4 fields. If it is too late or if I am tired, I will make more mistakes and take longer to memorise things. On the other hand, I can turn and solve it much more quickly when I am fresh and well-rested. Also, if I play a number of them at a time, they start to run together, again resulting in worse results.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I 100% agree with this article in my own life. Went through a huge lifestyle change, and noticed my entire life and cognitive ability grow once I started exercising, getting out more, and really experiencing life with friends and family. If you want to be lazy that's fine, but after having my eyes open to a better, more energetic, more intelligent self, I would never go back to the couch and bon bons

</comment><comment><USER12> Edit: This is odd. The link currently leads to a different article than it initially did. Initially it was not Q & A with the author, but rather references to literature mostly behind paywalls and the gratuitous reference to female orgasms, none of which are in the current article. That being said, I still believe that the bulk of this research is bullshit, but it's a little unfair to switch the article, so my comment no longer makes sense

\</comment><comment>-

While the presence "neuroscience" should be enough to set off your bullshit detector, the fact the the author couldn't go two paragraphs without undermining his own point indicates that the title should really be "Nothing to see here". Luckily the author throws in a gratuitous and creepy reference to female orgasms to make sure readers won't feel ripped off having wasted 15 seconds reading this crap.

</comment><comment><USER13> A current book review of the newly published book _Brainwashed: The Seductive Appeal of Mindless Neuroscience_

[http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/brainwashed- neuroscience...](http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/brainwashed-neuroscience- and-its-perversions/)

goes into some additional detail about what we can know, and can't know, from current neuroscience research. The best of current neuroscience research helps us know what is flat wrong about earlier preliminary findings from neuroscience research, while the worst of current neuroscience research feeds on the hype hooks in the science news cycle

[http://www.phdcomics.com/comics.php?f=1174](http://www.phdcomics.com/comics.php?f=1174)

to tell us things we want to believe even if they aren't true. As always, we have to discern what's established fact and what's speculation in reports about new research findings.

[http://norvig.com/experiment-design.html](http://norvig.com/experiment- design.html)

</comment><comment><USER14> In my experience, there is time for gym workouts, sun bathing, crosswords and Mozart. What would be interesting would be studying how these four activities affect brain waves doing them in different sequences. For example, listen to Mozart, then workout, then crosswords, then sun bathe, reverse the order tomorrow and then continue to switch it up and see if you can optimize activities based on when you do them and what you were doing previous to the activity.

<comment><USER15> My guess is that the same principle applies to crosswords (for example) that applies to lifting weights: you have to keep ramping up the difficulty in order to realize the benefits. If you're just doing the easy/comfortable crossword puzzle every day, you're not challenging yourself. A cognitive task that is actually _challenging_ will probably yield a lot better results. Learning a new language, studying a new level of mathematics, taking up a new hobby, learning chess, etc. Every time a task becomes trivial, you need to increase the difficulty or find another task.

As for "listening to Mozart," that strikes me as an extremely passive (i.e., cognitively untaxing) activity. I've always been highly skeptical of the putative benefits of listening to music, because the brain is extremely good at "tuning out" ambient sounds. I'd be more inclined to believe there's some benefit if the listener actively attempts to listen _and_ perform another task simultaneously. Trying to keep attention focused on two very complex tasks at once is challenging; simply kicking back and letting music stream in the background is not. I'm sure there are creative benefits to listening to complex and stimulating music, but one needs to be actively engaged in the music.

<comment><USER16> _As for "listening to Mozart," that strikes me as an extremely passive activity._

My lay theorizing on this: certain types of music (and much of the classical repetoire) helps relax the mind. We spend far too much of our time being grossly _overstimulated_ , and I've found that a great many of the typical stimulations in a Western experience (advertising, technology, popular music, city streets, etc.) simply _wear_ at me. Nature, nonlinear landscapes, classical (or earlier) Western music (there is some awfully annoying non- western music, Indonesian gamelan being very high on the annoyance list for me) help immensely in this regard.

Just as strength training is stimulus for growth that comes during recovery, I suspect music may be part of the downtime which helps the brain and/or emotional / stress aspects of the body recover. Meditation or similar practices might operate similarly.

Total armchair theory here, but it's what I've got.

<comment><USER15> As armchair theory goes, it's not a bad one. Taking it one step further, I could see how classical music might activate / operate on some of the same brain patterns as certain sleep cycles. Sleep is well known to be our brain's equivalent of garbage collection and recovery.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> How does the content of this article justify the straight-up factual assertion in the headline? This is just a thing about some guy speculating about some stuff. The headline implies a conclusive clinical trial result. HNers should know better than to upvote this kind of shit.

EDIT: I wrote the above when the title was "Gym workouts and sunbathing do more for your brain than crosswords and Mozart" and the link was to a different URL.

<comment><USER18> Not mentioned in the article, but since you asked:

Cognitive training outperforms crossword puzzles: [http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjourna...](http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0061624)

Crossword puzzles aren't protective against cognitive decline: [http://portalsaudebrasil.com/artigospsb/idoso068.pdf](http://portalsaudebrasil.com/artigospsb/idoso068.pdf) [PDF link]

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> I am glad to finally find an article that has made it into the popular media, which will aid in debunking a lot of those false claims made by people/companies who just want to make money out of people's gullibility. There are commercials on TV for some website that claim their mind games will improve your brain, possibly knowing there is no science to back that up, but you have people spending their $$/time sitting at a computer playing games, rather than at the gym or exploring our world's beautiful outdoor spaces. The "funny" thing is that science is showing that the benefits of motherly nurturing, exercise, social interaction (not social networking online), exposure to sunlight, etc. are all things we all know too well from experience and yet, there are some people/companies still trying to sell us things/services to achieve things we can get for FREE.

</comment><comment><USER20> Crosswords indirectly affect my performance.

I don't think they make me clever either, but they do calm me down and help me settle into whatever area I'm in. That helps me take the edge off of what I'm about to say/present. It's not quite the same as staring at a flashlight (a la tablet/laptop).

The paper and pencil in my hands have a dramatic effect on my mood. Add a cup of coffee on the side and I'm a completely different person after a crossword. I'd say a noticeably more lucid (even without the added coffee), calm and collected individual.

</comment><comment><USER21> "Relevant": [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2Diy0RNe_c](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2Diy0RNe_c)

</comment><comment><USER22> I wouldn't say, though, these activities are mutually exclusive.

</comment><comment><USER23> but it might help with alzheimers [http://puzzles.about.com/library/bl021108.htm](http://puzzles.about.com/library/bl021108.htm)

</comment><comment><USER24> it's too bad half the links cited in this article say (paywall) behind them. /rant

<comment><USER25> It's too bad on a site that exists for upstarts and tech minded folk looking for a way to monetize their projects people complain that good interesting content costs money. /rant

<comment><USER26> The links to research we are talking about (as opposed to journalists trying to summarize research for pop sci books) is stuff whose production is funded almost entirely by entities like governments and charities, and where the 'publisher' does not do much but enjoy exorbitant profit margins thanks to paywalls. If the publishers and their paywalls disappeared overnight, Open Access would pick up the slack pretty well. So no, monetizing is not really necessary here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> \- Unprotected exposure to sunlight also prematurely ages ones skin and increases the risk of skin cancer. I'm curious if there is some unique property with sunlight that makes you smarter, or if it is just the fact that you get D vitamins from sun exposure. If it is the latter, I can get D vitamins from my diet instead.

Personally I've lived 61 degrees north for most of my life and I don't think SAD has been a problem for me.

\- I've suspected and read from others that all the fuzz about classical music is mostly the result of some kind of high culture bias - I have a hard time believing that people have studied the effects of classical music to the same extent as something like rock or techno. I wouldn't be surprised if studies show that listening to your favourite music has overall more benefits compared to listening to classical music whether you like it or not.

<comment><USER27> The cited scientific study was actually performed on nocturnal animals (rats), and the scientists found that long exposure to _light_ caused the rats stress:

"...the brain of nocturnal rats generates a stress response to a long-day photoperiod, contributing to depression..."

Somebody must have extrapolated from this result that, since humans are diurnal, long periods of darkness would cause us stress and depression.

There is no direct mention of Vitamin K (or for that matter, any healthful benefits of the sun) in the cited study.</comment></comment>


OpenSSH Key Shielding - <AUTHOR> https://xorhash.gitlab.io/xhblog/0010.html <comment><USER2> This sounds like good news for automated cloud systems that connect via ssh (like jenkins agents), where holding SSH keys in memory is an undesirable but necessary compromise made in favor of usability.

Security conscious users should be using a gpg smartcard for authentication, in which case the private keys are never held in RAM and shouldn't be susceptible to this type of attack in the first place.

<comment><USER3> You may be glad to hear that OpenBSD has been working on supporting security keys natively in OpenSSH, which should hopefully obviate the need to depend on GPG for hardware token solutions. See for example [https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/094c80e0a523faf92a99f6...](https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/094c80e0a523faf92a99f63ea2e05353f5028597)

<comment><USER2> Oooh so we will eventually be able to use simple (and less expensive) U2F devices for SSH authentication? This is wonderful news!

<comment><USER4> There were security concerns voiced under [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21417182](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21417182) I don't know whether they got addressed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hate being the guy who complains about this. But this is very difficult to read on mobile. Reader mode is unable to comprehend the text either.

[https://imgur.com/a/iAJTBvl](https://imgur.com/a/iAJTBvl)

<comment> m-p-3 I curated and cleaned the article of double spaces and remade it in markdown

[https://gist.github.com/m-p-3/266d228113cd9eb5db0e14b338cbe5...](https://gist.github.com/m-p-3/266d228113cd9eb5db0e14b338cbe5ae)</comment></comment>


Migrating to the Twitter Streaming API: A Primer - <AUTHOR> http://blog.gnip.com/2010/02/15/migrating-to-the-twitter-streaming-api-a-primer/

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry for the self link, but I'm really interested in feedback from folks. It's at about draft three right now and there's plenty of room for changes and additions. Thx!</comment>


Ask HN: Why Are There So Many Dev Jobs and High Pay in the US? - <AUTHOR> Title says it all really, does anyone have any sources that attempt to explain this phenomenon? Maybe the question is off. Is it true that there are a lot of development jobs? Why does the US have higher pay than other countries for developers? Is this assumption true? <comment><USER2> The US has higher pay than peripheral or semi-peripheral countries like India, Brazil, etc. (Of course your purchasing power is different... Imported things are crazy expensive in Brazil, but it is cheap to go to a pizza restaurant and people will cut the slices for you)

I don't know if the situation is better in the US relative to other core countries such as Canada, UK, Germany, etc...

</comment><comment><USER3> I think you are mainly seeing the jobs in high cost areas reason for six figures in say the bay area/silicon valley area is you need that much to afford housing and other local expenses.

In other places the rates are lower. Though to get highly qualified skills companies may be more competitive with the high paying areas just because such talent are tempted by it.</comment>


American chief executives are not overpaid - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/node/21562189

<comment><USER2> I was going to read this, but the site had a stupid pop-over that I couldn't close on my mobile (well I could, then it would just immediately re-open). The irony was it was trying to get me to subscribe, though treating a non-customer to such an annoying experience is not going to get them to subscribe. Consistently writing good articles might, but it is hard to read them to determine quality with pop-over garbage.</comment>


Larry Page asks a Java question in 1996 - <AUTHOR> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/comp.lang.java/aSPAJO05LIU/ushhUIQQ-ogJ

<comment><USER2> Thank you Larry. For without Google, all of us would have to wait 2 days for a 'shot in the dark' response.</comment>


HTML5-based Windows 8 enrages .Net devs, alienates Linux and Mono - <AUTHOR> http://www.itworld.com/mobile-wireless/171285/parting-linux-and-mono

<comment><USER2> I made the following angry rant on reddit. I think that it also fits here.

The idea that .NET is going to be replaced by HTML5 and JavaScript is absolutely ridiculous. The only people who can make that claim are those who don't really know what .NET is. It is a desktop stack, a server stack, a runtime for many languages, those many languages themselves, and countless libraries that are being actively developed. HTML5 and JS is a minimalistic client side technology. One cannot replace the other. They are not analogous technologies.

The biggest changes that could happen are:

1\. HTML5 and JS become another presentation layer for .NET apps.

2\. HTML5 and JS get hooks to allow it to be used to write basic App Store style apps and gadgets. (Gadgets are currently written in html and js so there would be no change there.)

3\. HTML5 and JS become another dev platform for the Windows Phone.

4\. Silverlight gets slowly phased out.

That is, unless you believe that Microsoft secretly worked for 5 years to create a dev platform that is based on a technology that became popular just last year that can be used to replace every development technology like C++, .NET, etc., and that can be used to write anything from server side apps to games to database servers to operating system components. Do you really think that Microsoft is that good of a software company?

But of course, this is all speculation, just like all of these sensationalist articles and threads. And nothing of value can come out of this. I can't wait for the formal announcement to be made. The amount of retarded discourse that the Win 8 announcement made is absolutely depressing.

<comment><USER3> I think I'm on record pretty well for not being anti-MS, but let me play devil's advocate and tell you what really is happening ;-)

I'm going to phrase everything as fact, although purely speculation (an old parlor game, if you will). I have no insider knowledge.

* On the server it will stay .NET. I'll grant you that.

* On the client MS only supports HTML for the tile UI. Launching any other apps opens it in the explorer shell.

* Why? Windows doesn't believe in .NET.

* Why did MS push .NET on the client as recently as a couple of week ago? Because MS is not a monolith. Windows wants IE to be the rendering engine for Windows, while the dev tools group is pushing SL.

* Sinofsky is winning the internal battle. He owns Windows and what Windows ships. VS/CLR can ship new versions of the CLR, but they can't control what Sinofsky/Windows does.

* Ballmer doesn't have the internal power to face off against Sinofsky, but he can throttle STB.

* Everyone thought Muglia got ousted because of Cloud. That was just a part of it. It was because he didn't get inline with the HTML message. He tried to cause a ruckus by getting the message out there, but was shutdown. Everyone in STB now knows to keep their mouth shut.

* Guthrie was told that he's a shining star, but stars won't shine coming from SL. Get over to Azure, and you're still on track for President.

* WP7 uses SL because IE wasn't ready. The SL team took this as their chance to make a big impact and show that SL was indispensible and desired. Good effort, but at the end didn't matter. It will still be replaced.

* MS has no problem killing presentation layers. They killed probably the most popular desktop layer of all time, VB6. They killed WinForms. They let MFC rot slowly with no replacement. WPF was never given much chance to live.

* MS is thinking that iOS took off with Objective-C. A more difficult langauge to learn and with no real dev base prior to 2008. Windows feels that HTML is easier to learn and already has millions of devs. If MS builds a great platform with lots of eyeballs, the devs will show up.

<comment><USER4> Microsoft should kill unsuccessful tools; internal competition is not bad, but actually good.

WPF is an abomination that was bred to torture developers - basically the Java EE of the UI world.

Also, if you ask iOS devs, they'll tell you that it's the best platform for developers, ever - the UI layer has stylish widgets that work out-of-the-box, they can share code with OS X projects in C/C++, they get to use Cocoa, XCode and the development environment is a real Unix.

And I'm also going to mention Android - while not as stylish as iOS, the development model is so close to web apps it's actually beautiful. Also the dev tools, since they leverage Java, work on ANY OS.

Also, lots of devs create Javascript/HTML UIs (served from WebViews) on both platforms, while there's special glue that accesses low-level functionality.

Microsoft would be mad to ignore this trend. They are already on a serious decline in regards to developer mind-share and the environment they provide is really closed to the outside world.

Did you know that you can share code between Android and iOS through C++? Both can run C++, both have OpenGL ES. But there's no such thing on WinMo 7, it forces you to use dotNET with Silverlight and Direct3D. That's only one mistake in a whole series of mistakes they've done and I'm wondering how much are their heads stuck up their buts.

<comment><USER5>
      And I'm also going to mention Android - while not as
      stylish as iOS, the development model is so close to web
      apps it's actually beautiful.

Really? To be quite honest, I found Android's development model to be closer to Silverlight/WPF than true web development. The relation between the XML- based layout language and the Java code behind reminded me much more of the relation between XAML and C# than HTML and Javascript.

<comment><USER4> I'm not referring to the way UI is described with XML, although as I've mentioned there are people doing UI with HTML/Javascript (see <http://www.phonegap.com/> for starters).

Android apps can have multiple entry points, just like web apps by means of URLs. From one app you can jump into another app while opening a specific screen. Android apps have a functional back-button that works by default (as in, the developer doesn't have to do anything to benefit from it). Android apps are very composable as normally they expose APIs that can be used by other apps (the environment encourages it by means of intents, services, broadcast receivers and the multiple entry points I mentioned above). Android apps give the impression of being always on, since you can't rely on an app to stay alive you have to implement life-cycle management (e.g. save the user's data and the app's state as soon as you can).

What I describe above is by no means unique to Android apps (iOS apps are usually as well behaved, or even more so), but Android makes it natural. On the other hand, Android apps in Google's market look like shit but the stock widgets are getting better so hopefully people will stop feeling compelled to color their buttons blue :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As I said here, <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2615797>, I strongly believe that the windows 8 UI we have seen so far is more or less just an improved widget/gadget shell, like a fullscreen Mac Dashboard.

I really think that real, full-fledged applications will still be written in whatever languages are available today. All of this fear is IMHO just plain FUD

<comment><USER7> I think the HTML5 and JS technology in Windows 8 is simply another software development framework and not meant to replace .net and friends. Perhaps Microsoft is looking to encourage the development of apps (in such a way that Apple has demonstrated with the App Store). .net will still be available for the larger and/or more involving programs. Remember, Windows is popular because of Microsoft's firm dedication to backwards compatibility (for better or worse).

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> As others have noted, this article does some fear mongering. But it does raise some issues:

1) WPF might potentially go away. I'm glad I didn't waste any time learning this so I can care less. People who bought into "WPF is the future" might be unhappy but learned a valuable lesson. I myself learned this lesson with the "Compact Framework is the future" hype. I learned to be skeptical of proprietary stacks from then on.

2) As other posters have mentioned, a lot of apps have front and backends. For shops that use MSFT tech, .net isn't going away from the backend by any means.

3) HTML 5 + JS do let you build apps that are a lot closer to the Desktop experience than previously. If you haven't already, check out these slides (link:<http://slides.html5rocks.com/#landing-slide>) and be prepared to be blown away. In fact, Google's Chrome initiative is betting that you can write most application front-ends in the browser now. If MSFT starts supporting these apps in a nice way, this might certainly make HTML5+JS the preferred way of building application front ends (I guess WinForm developers would be ticked off at this).

4) The Windows 8 HTML apps reminded me of the Vista sidebar widget in some ways. Wasn't there going to be a whole market place of apps? There was a lot of hype but it never happened. Thankfully, I had learned my lesson by the time I encountered the "sidebar gadget apps are the future" hype.

</comment><comment><USER9> I still remember the uproar when .NET was first announced, and how it was widely predicted it would utterly fail, and people who couldn't understand why anyone would use it.

IT evolves constantly, and you have to stay with it. Getting upset about it changing is pointless and being stuck on 1 technology will quickly see your business left behind.

<comment><USER10> Couldn't agree more. I was also in the thick of things when .NET came out. We had a large established base of apps on the pre-existing versions of Visual Studio. The whole migration nightmare/uproar to .NET is still fresh in my mind and I clearly remember how the .NET supporters fundamentally said "Time to move on". Small bit of irony that now (in some cases) time to move on applies to .NET itself. (though I wholeheartedly agree that most of this uproar is silly, .NET is much more robust and flexible than HTML5 and not in any danger of being "replaced")

Still brings a small smile to my face though when I see .NET developers upset about no viable migration path forward. This cycle will repeat again in X years, it's the nature of the biz. Most of our careers are going to span several major shifts in technology and you just roll with it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I've used .net nearly exclusively for the past 8 years in my career and still believe this is all some stunt to generate negative hype.

If this so-called uproar is caused by developers who are not willing to upgrade their skills, they shouldn't be in this business. The same event occured with VB6, which was replaced by .net, which will be replaced by something better, and everyone started reading their books again. Even if MS ends support for .net tomorrow (which it won't, i.e. WinXP tenure) too many companies are locked into .net technology and they'll still have work to come for years while they finally evolve to a new technology.

If you really dislike change and still want to call yourself a programmer, transition to embedded devices and stick to low level ASM or C which should be around for a while.

<comment><USER12> We continue to support a complex VB6 app (started development in 94). It is too expensive to port the entire app over, and now VB6 is left to languish. There are some problems with building some controls in 64 bit environment and we can't get support for it. Remember going from VB6 to .NET is a massive and risky investment. Why move if you think you are going to be abandoned again?

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> As an ASP.Net/C# developer, I saw these new HTML5/JS tiles as an opportunity for my skills to be applied in a new context. I'm actually pretty excited about that.

</comment><comment><USER14> Tabloid style shock/horror. Skip it.

<comment><USER15> Well I thought it was a decent article with a sensational headline. I don't know any real .NET developers who are "enraged" nor does the article say this.

<comment><USER12> I'm one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> .Net developer here, and im not enraged but feel satisfied with these events . i allready use javascript/JSON extensively because it has better integration with windows/.net/browser than Silverlight. There is advantage for silverlight in performance I believe but that is slowly changing now. because of browser competition.

Silverlight could have bought me if it was integrated in browser by default like Javascript/HTML. That seemed like logical step but they didn't do it for some reason (if im not mistakeing)

</comment><comment><USER17> Wasn't Silverlight $future_version going to be HTML5/JS/CSS based? It seems to me that means Windows 8 apps would be Silverlight $future_version-based.

I'm lucky enough to be within earshot of a number of world-notable .NET/Silverlight developers and they're far from enraged, in fact quite the opposite, they're cautiously optimistic.

This is probably a good thing, really. Let's not scathe Microsoft for moving towards openness.

<comment><USER18> Interestingly enough, it wasn't $future_version, but version 1.0, that didn't even support .NET and was scriptable only through JS. Silverlight is still scriptable through JS to this day. Given that Silverlight already supports a hybrid model I can image we could expect that to continue, with HTML as a possible alternative UI langauge to XAML.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Does HTML5 have an element that is similar to an scrollable editable grid, with column headers that don't scroll? I know a lot of people hate that UI idiom, but it's very common and as long as people like to use Excel, this idiom isn't going anywhere.

Doing grids are a breeze w/ .NET. I don't think "use jqgrid" is an acceptable solution here... I'm asking about native HTML, the stuff that everyone is bragging about.

<comment><USER20> There are at least dozens if not hundreds of such grids done with html and javascript.

<comment><USER21> I tried a few of the most popular ones last year, none were satisfactory.

<comment><USER22> ExtJS's set of grid panels was just about the most impressive one I've seen thus far (tree grids, group grids, paging grids, features for filtering/searching, sorting, hide/show columns, binding to xml/json/direct, etc). Though it would probably huge overkill to tie yourself into the whole framework just for one widget.

Examples: <http://www.sencha.com/products/extjs/examples/#sample-2>

<comment><USER23> yeah see also dojo's grid (grids I should say, there are several)

jquery.sheet

yui grid

not sure if Google's closure library has a grid control

and of course there are GWT, qooxdoo, etc.

Heres a table comparing javascript frameworks, and there's a row for which have a grid control.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4>
        Meanwhile, de Icaza has formed his own startup,
        Xamarin, which will keep working on Mono and
        commercial .NET stacks. But here's something
        interesting:the Xamarin home page highlights .NET
        development for iOS and Android, not Linux

Can yellow journalism get any worse than already is?

<comment><USER12> Actually, thank goodness for Xamarin and HTML (Windows 8). We will no longer be beholden to Microsoft with our future work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> HMMM Just thinking... what if Linux distros used HTML5/Javascript for a GUI Desktop Shell (Like Windows 8)? What if it became a true cross-platform development environment?

<comment><USER25> That's exactly why W8 will certainly have lots of proprietary objects you'll need to call in order to do anything useful.

<comment><USER26> For incompatibilities there would/will quickly rise frameworks that abstract you from them.

<comment><USER25> Fair enough. They'll have to devise a better strategy to prevent that

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> It seems killing Volta brings back the electricity at Microsoft.</comment>


Show HN: 3D Packing for 3D Printing - <AUTHOR> https://www.michaelfogleman.com/pack3d/ <comment><AUTHOR> A couple performance optimizations I made that weren't covered in the article:

\- When I profiled my initial implementation of the annealing, I found that it was spending a lot of time just rotating bounding boxes to test for intersection. So I precompute all possible rotations of the BVHs (24 rotations) and then only need to deal with translation when checking for intersection - way faster: [https://github.com/fogleman/pack3d/blob/master/pack3d/bvh.go...](https://github.com/fogleman/pack3d/blob/master/pack3d/bvh.go#L54-L64)

\- Even more interesting, for the bin packing code, I used a recursive algorithm with memoization, like you do. But I realized an improvement can be made. Say you search for the optimal packing for a box sized 10x10x10 and the optimal packing comes back, say, 9x8x9. Now I do another query for a box sized, say, 9x9x9. I should just reuse the result for my 10x10x10 query because 9x9x9 falls between 9x8x9 and 10x10x10. Basically instead of requiring an exact match in the memoization, I want to query a range. I implemented this using a spatial hash and it made things WAY faster. [https://github.com/fogleman/pack3d/blob/master/binpack/spati...](https://github.com/fogleman/pack3d/blob/master/binpack/spatial.go)

<comment><USER2> > So I precompute all possible rotations of the BVHs (24 rotations)

24 times faster, or, as we say in algorithm analysis, no times faster!

<comment><USER3> I read it as though the rotations were expensive, so they were memoized. In this case, it really could be much more than 24 times faster.

<comment><USER4> O(cn) = O(n) I believe is what parent was getting at

<comment><USER2> Yep, I was making a (bad) joke on this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> >Note that pack3d runs until stopped, writing its output to disk whenever a new best is found.

I wish more software operated like this. It makes it convenient because your concrete constraint is usually time, instead of number of iterations, which is an abstract value.

<comment><AUTHOR> Somehow it seems less polished of a command line tool that way, but it was perfect for my needs. I actually ran it over night to pack a model of a deer, packing 8 of them together. It produced this histogram of scores: [http://i.imgur.com/VENTeIa.png](http://i.imgur.com/VENTeIa.png) So it could easily find arrangements that scored around 65% while the best it found was like 52% (lower is better and basically anything under 100% is better than naive packing).

<comment><AUTHOR> Here are the 8 deer by the way: [http://i.imgur.com/RDwzbD8.png](http://i.imgur.com/RDwzbD8.png)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Great write-up on a really interesting topic!

Last year I needed the same thing for packing 2-dimensional shapes on a piece of plywood (for CNC.) You would think it's fairly simple and common but I failed to find any FOSS tools.

Any pointers for a good 2d shape-packing algorithm?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks!

Have you seen this? [http://svgnest.com/](http://svgnest.com/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Very cool!

This is a bit of a naive optimization, though. Thermal properties have to be considered when planning SLS builds. Very dense cross sections will result in long laser scan times, and the quality of those benchies will suffer significantly.

<comment><AUTHOR> I had a feeling there might be physical limitations!

<comment><USER8> Could this be optimized for the SLA Form2? I.e. No flat sides oriented horizontal?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm sure Shapeways [1] already optimizes the heck out of its own printing, but if not you should consult for them.

They print using laser sintering and I'd imagine a 37% improvement in efficiency would be pretty nice for their bottom line.

[1] [https://www.shapeways.com](https://www.shapeways.com)

<comment><USER9> My understanding is Shapeways uses an advanced/custom version of Netfabb for their 3D packing. Yes they have some insane optimizations/automation already, and I believe they also use human input for certain requirements/limitations

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Love the visualizations and the explanations

Question: Is this more of an unbounded multi-dimensional knapsack problem? With bin packing, you have multiple bins and you're minimizing the bins used. With knapsack, you're maximizing the value (in this case, count) of the objects fit into the finite knapsack.

<comment><AUTHOR> I guess it isn't exactly bin packing or knapsack. Usually knapsack doesn't deal with dimensions but just a cost/weight. Consider it a variant.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I came here for the visuals and the visual explanation and OP delivered.

Disclaimer: OP is a friend of mine.

</comment><comment><USER11> This looks really cool but I have a naive question...

I've heard desktop printers are prone to failure. Like the print becoming detached from the plate. Would this increase the units / material you lose if there is an error? Or do the errors happen early enough in the print you can catch them before much damage is done.

<comment><USER12> You are referring to FDM printers. The OP is talking about SLS printers which don't have this issue.

<comment><USER13> This demo/ad? from Tested does a great job explaining how this printer works. It really is amazing for the price-point.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrFYt3uUdrI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrFYt3uUdrI)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Can anyone explain how the STL manipulation works? I never really understood how the program reads a STL file and how it processes the geometry. Is there something similar in Python as well?

<comment><AUTHOR> An STL file is literally just a list of triangles. Each triangle has three vertices, each vertex has X, Y, Z floating point coordinates.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> While packing problems are pretty cool in general, I'm afraid I don't understand why this is useful for 3D printing. Does this increase printer throughput?

<comment><USER6> To a certain extent, yes it increases printer throughput. With selective laser sintering there's a fixed overhead time required to remove the last print from the machine, clean up the workspace, and reset it.

See: [https://youtu.be/9E5MfBAV_tA?t=50](https://youtu.be/9E5MfBAV_tA?t=50)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Wheres the print?

<comment><USER17> It's a ten thousand dollar printer and isn't out yet. The OP probably doesn't have access to one.

<comment><USER18> Or possibly OP has access via his employer Kitware?

Kitware could be doing software consultancy for Formlabs. They already have expertise in 3D slicing [1][2][3], which is just what you need for 3D printing.

This is pure uninformed speculation:

Formlabs look like they have great hardware.

On the other hand they could be under competitive pressure on the software front.

Firstly there's Autodesk who launched Ember as an "Open" design [4] in roughly the same market as Formlabs Form 1/2.

This is straight out of the Joel Spolysky playbook [5] "Smart companies try to commoditize their products' complements." Autodesk's (MCAD) product is Inventor now transitioning to Fusion 360. 3D printing is the complement. That's why Ember's "electronics are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license, the same license under which we've shared Ember's resin and mechanical designs; the firmware is licensed under GNU GPL (see the source code itself for the full details)." [4]. You can bet that it will be a cold day in hell before Autodesk releases Inventor and/or Fusion 360's source code under any sort of FOSS license.

Secondly, there's Stratasys that bought GrabCAD mainly to acquire there MCAD software team, several of whom are ex Solidworks / Siemens PLM (Unigraphics/Parasolid/D-Cubed). Expect in the next few years for slicing of STL to be replaced by slicing of native MCAD file formats. That's a step up in development effort and probably needs Modeling kernel (Parasolid, Acis ...).

Thirdly, there's 3D Systemes who decided to compete with lawyers rather than software developers - but eventually that got settled [6].

Possibly strategies for Formlabs:

Either, invest heavily in their software. That's wny they might contract Kitware. Maybe they license a modeling kernel.

Or, get acquired by one of the other (not Autodesk) big three MCAD vendors: (1) Dassault, (2) Siemens PLM, (3) PTC.

[1] [https://www.kitware.com/platforms/#3d-slicer](https://www.kitware.com/platforms/#3d-slicer)

[2] [https://www.slicer.org](https://www.slicer.org)

[3] [https://github.com/Slicer/Slicer/](https://github.com/Slicer/Slicer/)

[4] [http://learn.ember.autodesk.com/blog/ember-open-source- elect...](http://learn.ember.autodesk.com/blog/ember-open-source-electronics- and-firmware)

[5] [https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy- letter-v/](https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/)

[6] [http://jolt.law.harvard.edu/digest/3d-systems-and- formlabs-s...](http://jolt.law.harvard.edu/digest/3d-systems-and-formlabs- settled-two-year-patent-dispute)

<comment><USER18> Think I was probably completely off-base and the OP doesn't have the printer ...

Anyway, I forgot to say the write up and project on Github is very nice. I ended up buying the OP's Primitive for MacOS [1], [2] which is very nice too!

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12958445](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12958445)

[2] [https://primitive.lol](https://primitive.lol)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Has Apple's new iPhone hit the limits of industrial design? - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/id/2251322/pagenum/all/

<comment><USER2> I really hope not: "The touch-screen is a fixed element of its design; for at least the next decade, you can expect the front of every new model to be dominated by a flat sheet of glass, the same as on every previous model."

I disagree. I can understand why it is easy to make that assertion, but there is no imagination in that statement nor due respect for progress and advancement in technology or industrial design.

For instance, as silly as this may seem right now, who is to say that for at least the next decade there will assuredly be a "front" on the device? Is it not possible /likely that within a decade front/back won't matter just like how portrait/landscape/upside-down/right-side-up do not today on iPhone and iPad?

Just a thought...

<comment><USER3> Generally speaking Glass is uncomfortable to rest against your bare skin while talking. It's one of the things I miss about my flip phone, that it had some air in there.

Earpieces are a bit better, but I can't stand dealing with a second battery and the battery hit you take from Bluetooth. It's really a shame you can't plug in a normal headset to these things.

<comment><USER4> You can plug in a normal wired headset into an iPhone.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Have a look at this Titanium PowerBook[1]. And now take a look at Apple's current MacBook Pro[2]. Do you notice anything? They look remarkably similar! It's immediately obvious that Apple is now in its ninth year of selling essentially a laptop with the same design.

That's not bad. That doesn't show that they reached the limits of industrial design. It shows a relentless dedication to perfection.

Good design is timeless. Good design has to be timeless, especially when you are technology company. How else could you perfect the design of something in a industry where you have to update your product every year?

The iPhone is still a bit confused (what with the flashy chrome bezel and all) but I'm pretty confident that it will settle in sooner or later. The leaked design seems a step in the right direction (something timeless you can perfect), some details are off, though (seams?).

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PowerBook_redjar.jpg>

[2] <http://www.apple.com/macbookpro/>

<comment><USER6> While I like the looks of the new MacBooks (not the looks of the older models), they are still a matter of taste. In that sense I don't think they have reached the limits of industrial design yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you think about innovation over time, you see big, quick jumps separated by long, shallow periods of improvement. Apple can't blow your mind all the time; they can't innovate exponentially.

</comment><comment><USER8> I think that industrial designers have reached a limit within our current technological and manufacturing capacity.

There are many concepts that are great examples of "form meets function" that we cannot produce due to these limitations.

</comment><comment><USER9> This seems a little silly to me. Any hardware features Apple adds and new technologies will force them to rethink their industrial design, and I'm sure there will be new additions in the next decade. (front-facing camera is one addition)

If you put it that way, flip phones should have hit the limits of industrial design a long time ago, but phones like the RAZR changed things pretty substantially.

It is also Apple's choice to maintain one consistent look for a product line for several years (think iPod, iMac, MBPs...)

Also, I wouldn't say that the original iPhone and the 3G/3GS looked the same at all...

</comment><comment><USER10> I really enjoyed this bit from the Jhonatan Ive: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0fe800C2CU#t=1m49s> (1:49-2:25)

</comment><comment><USER11> There's still plenty of room to innovate in phone design post-iPhone, just as there has been plenty of room to innovate in PC design post Xerox Alto (<http://www.davidstringfellow.com/parcimg/GUI.jpg>). The problem is not innovation, it's that platforms exert a conservative effect on hardware.

Our PCs today still looks _recognizably_ similar to the Xerox Alto in 1973, the reason is every piece of software is written with the assumption of a screen, keyboard & mouse. Any attempts to deviate from this, the microsoft tablet for example, has tended to fail because of the sub-optimal experience of using a pen for software designed for mouse & keyboard.

We're used to phones looking different all the time because nobody has ever built a true app platform for the phone. Now that we have, we should be seeing about the same amount of innovation in phone design in the next 37 years as PC design since the Alto.

I wrote a blog post about this a while back: [http://blog.bumblebeelabs.com/technological-progress- happens...](http://blog.bumblebeelabs.com/technological-progress-happens-via- simulated-annealing/)

</comment><comment><USER12> I think the Nintendo DS shows that there are always other possibilities.

</comment><comment><USER13> I'd say the only limiting factor is what designers can imagine.</comment>


Tell HN: Happy to test out your product but fix your emails - <AUTHOR>

Email me without a 1-click unsubscribe, long enough after I tried out your product to forget it (6 to 8 weeks), or an email that I absolutely cannot read without downloading the images, and I'm going to mark it as spam.<p>Don't cut corners here. <comment><USER2> Also, remind me again what your product does and why I'd want to use it.

If it's been 6 to 8 weeks then I definitely forgot about your product and have no idea why I was interested in the first place. Remind me.

</comment><comment><USER3> Also, please do not transfer your past product's mailing list to your new app's mailing list unless it's directly in line with or an add-on to the type of service I originally wanted to know more about.

I recently had this happen and even though I was actually very interested in their new product, I was put off enough that I unsubscribed from both. My email address is not your launchpad unless I'm subbed to your company's newsletter.

</comment><comment><USER4> I have noticed a lot of companies waiting a few weeks and then surreptitiously adding me to their newsletter. I assume that the idea is that I will not remember that I did not subscribe to it, and am more likely to re-visit the website.</comment>


The Police in America Are Becoming Illegitimate - <AUTHOR> http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-police-in-america-are-becoming-illegitimate-20141205

<comment><USER2> i was in court to clear a minor ticket yesterday in SF and noticed the demographic of folks in there.

the demographic of the traffic court was mostly minorities and poor folks, completely out of whack with SF general population and what you expect traffic case tickets to reflect. Imagine the criminal cases.

this skew is even after accounting for pre filtering that happens before someone walks into the courtroom (who is ticketed by police, who pays early, who appears etc). Felt I was seeing the results of a system not working right.

<comment><USER3> Would the system be working well if only there were the correct ratios of demographic groups being oppressed by it?

Minorities have become the face of this issue because they are more likely to get caught up in the system in the first place. But the issue affects us all - perfectly non-racist cops would still run roughshod over plenty of people. What we need to repair is eventually-consistent justice so the murderers end up in jail (criminal) and wrongfully-harmed people are compensated for their losses directly from operating budgets (civil).

The injustice system has been allowed to degrade to its present state because most innocent people simply _will not_ be harmed by it. It's only by getting the majority to see that injustice _could have_ happened to them will you ever make them feel affected. Framing the issue around racism is ultimately self defeating - it turns the issue into one of those longstanding happens-to- other-people problems that people from the dominant group care about just enough to fit in/get laid/assuage conscience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Anyone else notice that Hacker News has been systematically keeping articles about Police, Michael Brown, or Eric Garner from reaching the front page? This reminds of a post some months ago showing that any post with "NSA" in the headline got a 50% handicap to its points ranking. I wounder what the handicap is for this article.

<comment><USER5> Good point. This is clearly of interest to many people, with 22 points right now. I generally dislike Matt Taibbi but this piece is thoughtful and even- handed rather than inflammatory.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> As an aside: I don't understand how selling "loosies" can be a tax violation. Presumably the excise tax was paid when the packet of cigarettes was purchased in the first place!

<comment><USER7> The cigarettes are typically purchased in a low-tax state, transported to a high-tax one, and sold there.

[http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-25/cigarette- smuggling...](http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-03-25/cigarette-smuggling- increase-prompts-crackdown-by-states.html)</comment></comment>


SSL/TLS Has Been Broken By New Attack - <AUTHOR> http://www.h-online.com/security/news/item/BEAST-creators-develop-new-SSL-attack-1702136.html

<comment><AUTHOR> There are a few more details in the threatpost article:

[http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/new-attack-uses-ssltls- inf...](http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/new-attack-uses-ssltls-information- leak-hijack-https-sessions-090512)

But I haven't found any information on mitigation measures.

</comment><comment><USER2> Umm, "broken" isn't what the title says.

Nor is it what the content of the article implies.</comment>


FBI snatches Google Glass off the face of innocent movie-goer - <AUTHOR> http://phandroid.com/2014/01/20/fbi-google-glass-movie/

<comment><USER2> So does this mean that if you cross in at a border they can confiscate your google glasses, which may be prescription, for an indefinite period?

And what happens when google's diabetes blood sugar monitoring contact lenses increase their capability, and glass gets merged into those?</comment>


Breaching a "carbon threshold" could lead to mass extinction - <AUTHOR> http://news.mit.edu/2019/carbon-threshold-mass-extinction-0708 <comment><USER2> This is the key of the article:

 _Rothman looked through these geologic records and observed that over the last 540 million years, the ocean's store of carbon changed abruptly, then recovered, dozens of times in a fashion similar to the abrupt nature of a neuron spike. This "excitation" of the carbon cycle occurred most dramatically near the time of four of the five great mass extinctions in Earth's history._

I'm not an expert but the term "near" in geological times is not so "near" in life span times, I think the article is not so objective...

However, that we're creating a problem is obvious.

</comment><comment><USER3> I wonder how much longer it will take before humanity will make a stand and change habits.

<comment><USER4> It is already too late. The extinction already started. Right now it is insects, frogs and fishes that has got to go. Our time , together with the rest of vertebrates, will come in 60-70 years.

<comment><USER5> This is my feeling too. I feel that even the scientists doing these studies are not considering all of the positive feedback loops. If we could somehow account for everything we'd see that we are already past the point of no return and things are going to change for the worse much faster than anticipated.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I find it funny that people blame other people for climate change. facts are, most of the pollution comes from industries, and only the powerful CEO s and country leaders have the power to stop the incoming disaster, while everyone else is powerless.

</comment><comment><USER7> Changing the economy is too slow. Need to engineer the planet at this point. It's and end user hack, but what are the other options?

<comment><USER8> I agree. We've been engineering the atmosphere for hundreds of years by burning fossil fuels. We have to continue engineering it by blocking heat energy or radiating it away from the planet somehow. We'll still have to then sequester the carbon we'll continue to emit in various niche industries, and sequester the massive amount of historical emissions.

I was thinking with the cheapened cost of space flight in the next couple of decades, couldn't we lift a huge solar reflector sail in between our planet's poles and the sun? Just block 1% of the heat energy or so, would that be possible?

<comment><USER9> Shading 1% of the area of Earth would mean an 'umbrella' of the size of roughly 1.5 million square kilometers. A mylar foil at 10g/m² would weigh 12 million metric tons. With SpaceX' Starship's proposed >100t to low earth orbit, that would mean over 100,000 launches. That's difficult.

<comment><USER7> There are small scale tests being performed to spray chemicals into the atmosphere that would reflect heat. I hope it works and they can verify there won't be any negative consequences.

I get laughed at when I say this, but I'd dump billions into DARPA for researching this. Since its DARPA, you can call it defense spending to appease the elephants. I'd charge them with finding a way to "scoop" the CO2 out of the atmosphere. Somehow splitting it into carbon and oxygen. I envision thousands of solar powered flyers destroying CO2 some day.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> All is not lost, yet. It is not said that we have yet passed this "critical threshold". We are seeing rapid adoption of renewable energy now, and new leadership in the United States might bring about an even more rapid shift to renewable energy. I just ask that people VOTE VOTE VOTE VOTE (just once, but definitively).

<comment><USER8> It'll make a big difference if the USA has a Democratic president, but the Senate will still be GOP most likely, and the supreme court is majority conservative AKA GOP, and unlikely to help. Therefore, we need massive pushes on the innovation/cost front, we need blue states to pull us forward (thank you NY, CA, and MA), and we need a lot of individual effort towards greening our transport, homes, diet, etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> When meritocrats and technocrats fail to seize power, extinction ensues.

We are extinguishing the prospect of the only intelligent life we know of in the universe by not caring for the environment, although one could argue that only a small fraction are sufficiently intelligent.

The oligarchs of the world have more than enough money to fix all the climate issues, but since they derive their wealth from exploiting the climate, there is no hope for a fix from them.

<comment><USER12> > When meritocrats and technocrats fail to seize power, extinction ensues.

That's not the problem. The problem is that the meritocrats and the technocrats have failed to grasp the real problem. The real problem is that at the end of the day the dynamics of living systems are determined by Darwinian evolution, and Darwinian evolution has no foresight. It optimizes for solutions that reproduce well (relative to competitors) in the short term. So, for example, genes that build brains that have an instinctive revulsion against things like abortion and birth control will reproduce better than genes that build brains that think it's perfectly OK to choose not to have kids. As a result, the world becomes populated by the former sort of brain, along with all of the ancillary effects that building such brains has, such as having a resistance to certain kinds of objective facts, like the long-term consequences of overpopulation.

The fact of the matter is that there is only one environmental problem here on earth, and that is an overabundance of humans. But saying that is taboo, even here on HN. I try to make this point here on occasion and every single time I do I am downvoted into oblivion, not because I'm wrong, but because the world is full of brains with an instinctive revulsion towards the idea that there are, or even could be, too many of us, because the genes that build that kind of brain reproduce better than the genes that build brains that think it's perfectly OK, even necessary, to have fewer people.

This is a very hard problem to solve. It's not at all clear that it even has a solution. It could even be the answer to Fermi's paradox. I hope not, but it's starting to look like a real possibility.

<comment><USER13> > The fact of the matter is that there is only one environmental problem here > on earth, and that is an overabundance of humans.

How does your argument deal with the fact as nations becomes more developed, birthrates plummet? If it were not for immigration, populations would already have started declining in the western world. And even with it included, almost all rich countries are facing an aging population.

Yet despite that, the richest countries produce far more greenhouse gases, not just per capita but often on an absolute scale, than countries with tremendously higher population and fertility. E.g., Canada produces more than 2x more CO2 than Nigeria despite being 5x less populous.

Fewer humans != more pollution. Even in rich countries, a single wealthy businessman with a private plane, or luxury cruise ship, pollutes far more than an average worker with a petrol-powered car.

I can certainly envisage a scenario where with increased automation and lack of environmental consciousness, you could somehow reduce the population of Earth tenfold, yet keep on polluting the same. Why bother with efficient engines when petrol is cheap? Would you rather have a million people each with an automated personal helicopter, a pleasure barge and a gas-guzzling SUV, or ten million people using public transport and bicycles?

That's not going into the details how you would go about reducing the human population. You even made the argument yourself, those who refuse to go along with the anti-nativity plan would eventually outbreed those who do. So unless you want to carry out global campaigns of forced mass sterilization, the best solution is still focusing on making our current technology more environmentally friendly.

<comment><USER14> Apologies, but I am not sure about what you're trying to say. Yes, pollution is not evenly distributed across countries and populations, but that does not mean that the original idea is wrong.

The truth is that overpopulation is a huge issue, but it is politically incorrect to bring this up. Given that our economy is really a Ponzi scheme, nobody wants to touch this topic. Everybody talks about declining fertility rates like a huge catastrophe, when in fact, that's some really good news.

<comment><USER13> And how do you plan on solving overpopulation? Rich countries already have birthrates below replacement threshold. Do you think that reducing them in India, Nigeria and other developing countries is the most effective and feasible way of combating CO2 emissions?

I think not. While the number of humans certainly contributes to the total amount of pollution, it is not, in my opinion, the "only environmental problem".

<comment><USER14> Apologies for being blunt, but you are heavily strawmanning. I don't think anyone said that it is "the only environmental problem" anywhere in this thread, and especially not me.

I did not say it is the only environmental problem, but I am saying it is among the big ones. It is completely illogical to say that it is not. If you agree with the fact that consumption leads to pollution, then you agree with my premise whether you like it or not, it's simply a logical conclusion.

> Do you think that reducing them in India, Nigeria and other developing > countries is the most effective and feasible way of combating CO2 emissions?

Again, kind of strawmanning here. I never said it is _the most efficient way_ to tackle it, but we need to realise that if our population keeps going up, the problem will become more and more exacerbated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The single best thing as an individual you can do for yourself[1] and the planet[2][3] is adopt a vegan diet. we could reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 24% simply by abstaining from meat and dairy products.

[Edit]Other key insights from J.Poole's study _addressing climate change thru food_ [1]

>Eating vegetable products - even the highest emitting products, will still have a better impact on the environment than selecting only low emitting meat products

>Food responsible for 31% of global GHG

>High impact beef producing 5000% more emissions than low impact beef

>Agriculture sits at heart of all environmental problems

>Population size highly correlated with global c02

1\. [https://www.drcarney.com/blog/health-issues/diet-linked- to-h...](https://www.drcarney.com/blog/health-issues/diet-linked-to-heart- disease-reduction-during-war)

2\. [https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:b0b53649-5e93-4415-bf07-6b...](https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:b0b53649-5e93-4415-bf07-6b0b1227172f/download_file?file_format=pdf&safe_filename=Reducing_foods_environment_impacts_Science%2B360%2B6392%2B987%2B-%2BAccepted%2BManuscript.pdf&type_of_work=Journal+article)

<comment><USER16> How is that possible when animal agriculture only accounts for ~3% of greenhouse emissions? Even if you take into account the entire agriculture sector it's only 9%.

Let's not use this as a grandstand for pushing political agendas. There are much larger contributors that can be addressed. It just dilutes the entire climate change message by pushing a vegan agenda.

[https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas- emis...](https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas-emissions)

<comment><USER15> I challenge you to commit to a vegan diet for 3 weeks and let me know how your body feels. Personally, I'm much more energized and more productive than when I was 4 weeks ago eating meat everyday. I breathe easier, my sleep has improved, I dont feel bloated. And to top it off I'm reducing my carbon footprint.

<comment><USER17> This is completely departing from the original claim that going vegan is "the single best thing an individual can do" for the planet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Real question: why isn't some billionaire using subversive techniques to manipulate the population into doing something? If it can work for Russia to put Trump into the Whitehouse, can it not work in support of carbon reduction?

<comment><USER19> If I became a billionaire I would mine, crush and spread olivine rocks in the ocean:

[http://www.innovationconcepts.eu/res/literatuurSchuiling/oli...](http://www.innovationconcepts.eu/res/literatuurSchuiling/olivineagainstclimatechange23.pdf)

Weathering is exactly how the earth brought itself back into equilibrium over millions of years after the mass extinction events. We just have to advance that process dramatically, and specifically target beaches and critical places in the ocean where ocean acidification would devastate ecosystems.

Edit: Also this is an affordable plan. It costs about $12 per metric ton of carbon removed compared to other carbon sequestration technologies which usually cost $100+/ton.

<comment><USER20> Don't need a billionaire, just need a kickstarter or indiegogo to make that happen.

<comment><USER19> Luckily someone else is already doing that and I've already donated to it: [https://projectvesta.org/](https://projectvesta.org/)

If we want to offset a huge chunk of human emissions we still need billionaire or government backing.

<comment><USER21> Olivine weathering seems very hopeful! Some links:

Same folks as Vesta, I think: [https://climitigation.org/olivine-can-reverse- climate-change...](https://climitigation.org/olivine-can-reverse-climate- change-and-ocean-acidificaiton/)

Some general information: [https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/07/olivine- weathering-...](https://arctic-news.blogspot.com/2016/07/olivine-weathering- to-capture-co2-and-counter-climate-change.html)

Another research group, I think: [https://olivoa.eu/](https://olivoa.eu/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Yeah, it's 150ppm. Anything less than that and we're definitely heading towards mass extinction, as proven by history. Anything on the upper bound is theoretical and based on shaky models, whereas the lower bound is proven based on historical examples.

Edit: Bring on the downvotes, but it won't change the science.</comment>


Ask HN: I've invented / patented something powerful. Now what? - <AUTHOR> This is a throwaway account. My main account is over 6 years old with 5000+ karma. I've also sold a company before for a small amount. I only bring this up because I know how this might sound.
I've invented something powerful. It's software related, but nothing like what the patent trolls bandy about. I filed the provisional some months ago, but I'm having trouble making any progress with the business side of things.
I've noticed a common pattern:
1. I'll get someone I know and trust (like an investor, or business guy with a history of helping people sell companies) to agree not to share the idea
2. I'll explain how it works
3. They'll get really excited, some have even given me small amounts of cash to stop me from seeing anyone else "while we hammer out the agreement"
4. They'll _completely_ flake out. Their main business might have a couple fires, or they'll have a first day as a CEO of a company they took over, or they're just busy flying around the world giving speeches, whatever.
Frustrated with the lack of progress, I decided to try just warm / cold emailing a couple dozen VCs / angels and this is the pattern that emerges:
1. I contact them.
2. Nothing happens.
What am I doing wrong here? I'm 100% certain that Google or Facebook wants this and I'm 100% certain that they don't have it. In my head the only question is what price they'll pay and who I should get introduced to. I was hoping a connected angel or VC would help with introductions and negotiations for a cut of the sale but I can't seem to get past people's spam filters.
Has anyone here done something similar before? If so could you please tell me what I'm doing wrong? <comment><USER2> From reading your post, I feel the biggest issue you are facing is that there is nothing differentiating you from the common "wacko" inventor who thinks they have the next great thing. We'd get nowhere if we followed each perpetual motion machine, infinitely scalable database, and alternative theory of quantum physics. So the system is good at identifying those patterns and churning through them.

Your idea is good. Let's just say that.

What you have to do next is to differentiate yourself from the crazies. That means some of the following:

* Tech demo you can show someone in 30 seconds * A "shiny" frontend that the layperson can understand * A concrete value proposition, other than that it can be acquired

You don't want to be stuck in the following pattern, which makes you no different from the rest:

* Secrecy * Promises * Vagueness

</comment><comment><USER3> Maybe what you invented is not that so "powerful".

Keep calm. At some point, if you want to get introduced to Google / Facebook executives and get them to buy your technology.

You will have to convince them it is a real game-changer. People are not willing to toss everything just because you're "100% sure" of something.

Write a plan, if you want to show how interesting is your technology, I think that you have to write some proof of concepts and MVPs to show off.

Maybe, it'll take a whole complete product for Google and Facebook to notice how interesting this technology of yours is.

Anyway, what you are doing wrong is that you are assuming that you can convince someone just by telling him how it works. I think it is reasonable to ignore someone who wants you to believe in something based on how it works.

As a software developer, when we have to scale, we don't do guesses or explain how it would work. We measure everything. So measure your powerful invention and check / validate with the reality.

</comment><comment><USER4> If it's patented, then why not just tell us what it is?

</comment><comment><USER5> 1\. Social proof. Can you find an independent party with a name/reputation to vouch for the value of your invention? It would be great to say: here's so- and-so, who works at X or teaches at Y, who looked into my solution and is happy to answer questions about it. Have like 2 or 3 people like that, people who have some reputation/name. That might help.

2\. You might be better off turning this into a startup first, and then getting sold/acqui-hired. Does that apply to your idea?

</comment><comment><USER6> Assuming that you have only filed for a provisoional, the problem is that you have nothing that is of value.

The most valuable IP is a patent which has been successfully defended. Less valuable is an issued patent that has been licensed. Less valuable than that is an issued patent. Less valuable than that is a patent application. The quality of the patent is also major factor of the patent's value. Having a realized implementation is also a major factor in the patent's value.

A provisional patent (N.B., this is not an issued patent nor a patent pending) establishes a priority date, but there's a very long and treacherous road ahead. It's not fait accompli that your patent will be issued, nor that your preferred claims will survive prosecution.

</comment><comment><USER7> You sound like you're being flaky yourself. Realize you have the idea. If you sit down and establish a timeline with someone like that, it'll be more successful. If not, you should just go to market yourself. Don't let your idea flop because you couldn't find the right person to pursue you, make them regret they flaked.

</comment><comment><USER8> This is how Masayoshi Son's (Softbank) handled and sold his first patent. (book 'aiming high')

He approached many companies - most gave him a cold shoulder. So he found a patent lawyer/engineer who once worked for Sharp after meticulous search (he was interested in selling to electronics company). So after getting hold of patent person - he got an appointment with Sharp director of research. Demoed it. Nailed it. Rest is raise of Masa. Good luck.

</comment><comment><USER9> > I decided to try just warm / cold emailing a couple dozen VCs / angels...

Your messaging might be subpar. These guys get approached everyday with 'powerful' opportunities.

Turns out there is a sequence to pitch a Big Idea to Croc Brains. On this subject, Oren Klaff is masterful > [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=US0kkw6v5Zo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=US0kkw6v5Zo)

</comment><comment><USER10> What evidence do you have to demonstrate the power of your invention? Is it usable, can you build a business around it and sell it?

I've got a lot of experience w/ the technology stacks used by big tech companies - a lot of time the value of things is not the idea but the execution and implementation.

</comment><comment><USER11> I can assure you that what you have invented is not as powerful or as useful as you think. If you had something that provided value, people would desire that value.

<comment><USER12> Often times with new products people don't understand the value until they start using it. Just because a product hasn't gotten attention yet doesn't necessarily mean the product is not desirable.

<comment><USER13> Indeed a product often has value, but an idea without execution is an untested gamble.

<comment><USER14> If so, then promote the idea as an untested gamble, while scrutinizing the potential gamblers for an individual who is actually more of a wise investor than a risk-taker at heart.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> If its patented then tell us what it is.

</comment><comment><USER16> Well how do you know that Facebook and Google doesn't have what you made? Companies keep things secret until they properly develop it maybe these companies are already up to it.

Also there is nothing called super awesome idea that no one hasn't come across at least someone somewhere must have had the idea you had just that they never pushed it to production or made it and never sold it or at least tried to make it.

I guess the best way is to share the idea with the community not in detail in how you do it but an idea in what you made so other can talk and comment on it. Only after that you will realize it is a grand idea that you think it is.

But on the other hand there are great inventions that went un noticed for a long time before getting traction. Look no further the mp3 Technology that we used today was not used because the bad mp2 technology was backed by big companies. Only after a decade or so with slow traction mp3 got popular. The developers gave up the idea of mp3 and even decided to stop developing it.

This is from a book called "How Music Got Free". I suggest you guys read it :)

<comment><AUTHOR> > Well how do you know that Facebook and Google doesn't have what you made? > Companies keep things secret until they properly develop it maybe these > companies are already up to it.

Because it is detectable. Although I admit that although I cannot find prior art, it could be out there.

<comment><USER16> I too have felt I had such ideas but when I look further I came across many more people have done it or have tried to do it :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Where are you located? Maybe you should add a throwaway email to your profile so people can contact you. It might also help if you mention the area that the invention relates to. If someone with an interest in that area happens on this post, it will make it more likely that they will reach out.

Also, if you're trying to contact VCs, you need a warm intro from someone they know, so tap your network.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm in the North East, but I can fly to California if I need to. It spans a couple areas of Data Science, but all that Google / Facebook would be interested in.

I added an email to my profile. Thanks for the suggestion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I haven't had a patent but a while ago I developed a pretty useful software for some industries. I wasn't able to get much traction when I talked potential customers myself. A friend of mine is an experienced sales guy so I asked him to help. He was much better at talking to people and keeping things moving. So my advice would be to partner with somebody who has a proven sales record and let him make some phone calls. It's a very specific skill set a lot of engineers don't have.

</comment><comment><USER19> If it is radically different, you need some solid proof that it really works. Promises of huge jumps in efficiency are typically a whole lot of hot air. So, if you have something truly that powerful, it will inherently by difficult to sell people on the idea. You may need to downplay how awesome it is to get listened to at all.

As others are saying: One possibility is to build a business on it, then get bought out.

</comment><comment><USER20> Isn't the entire point behind patenting something so that you can discuss it without worry of someone stealing it?

Cough up the goods or nobody will take you seriously. Every experienced techie has had at least one person with a "great idea" and that are "100% certain" their idea is the next big thing.

</comment><comment><USER21> You seem to want a payout on too short of a timeframe. If it's that great of an idea, buy _Four Steps to the Epiphany_ , follow the instructions therein, and build a business to extract the value.

Business is fairly easy to learn for an engineer in my experience. And congrats on the breakthrough!

</comment><comment><USER22> Contact me[0] and I can put you in touch with someone who can help.

[0] my email is on foundrs.com

</comment><comment><USER23> I don't have the expertise to help you with this specific situation, however I would love to know the approach that you took and the outcome of this endeavor. Please share it when you are ready.

</comment><comment><USER24> Are you asking everyone to sign an NDA upfront?

<comment><AUTHOR> My patent lawyer told me to, but generally no. If I know the person ahead of time I just ask them to keep it to themselves. Plus I know VCs wont sign NDAs, but I would get someone to agree verbally to keep it to themselves.

<comment><USER25> Wouldn't it be better strategy to be as public as possible with this? To start a competitive situation where prospective acquirers would want to get to the tech first before their competitors?

Like Oculus did and got bought by FB.

<comment><USER26> Second this. Spend some time getting a quality demo up and running, hire a designer to help if needed.

Companies aren't interested in ideas, they want something they can drop in or can see using in 6 months.

* I have over a dozen patents. Learned this the hard way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Apply to YC?

</comment><comment><USER28> Maybe you need to start by questioning the series of assumptions that have led you to have "100%" certainty in something? Presumably if you were correct, then you would be having a different experience by now.

<comment><AUTHOR> Well I'm not certain in anyway about the process of selling patents. I'm a computer scientist though and I've consulted enough trusted colleagues to validate that the technology is valuable and works to solve problems real businesses need.

It's kinda like inventing a battery that is twice as efficient, and the same or better in every other way. You can be 100% sure Tesla or Toyota would buy the technology, without even being 3% sure where to start.

<comment><USER28> Got it, that make sense. In that case, I wish you the best of luck, and hope someone here can help!</comment></comment></comment>


The media's hit piece on Richard Stallman - <AUTHOR> https://libreledger.net/2019/09/17/the-medias-hit-piece-on-richard-stallman/ <comment><USER2> This specific point was discussed to death in several threads yesterday. And why does the title call out "the media" instead of VICE? Or even just Edward Ongweso Jr.? It's trying to frame this as two sides in a fight where one side is lying. It dismisses the decades of Stallman's abuse of his positions at FSF and MIT which are the real reason he should have been removed.

<comment><USER3> Because it's the absolute laziness of other media companies that see articles posted on other journalism sites and blindly copy-paste it instead of doing their own investigation. It ends up most of the time causing witchhunts and it turns out we're making mountains out of mole hills.

<comment><USER4> Just saw a TechCrunch article with a title saying Richard was defending Epstein.

edit: what's up with the downvotes

<comment><USER5> Exactly - this why 'media' is being called out here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > Stallman's second argument, points out the inconsistencies regarding the age > of consent, as the victim was 17, many countries and states within the U.S. > have an age of consent ranging from 16 to 18. Stallman is merely pointing > out how the same act can be legal or illegal in a span of a few miles.

"is merely pointing out"? No. That is completely inaccurate.

He's saying it is "morally absurd" to have such a law:

> I think it is morally absurd to define "rape" in a way that depends on minor > details such as which country it was in or whether the victim was 18 years > old or 17.

<comment><USER7> My impression was that Stallman wasn't making a clear distinction between what was _legal_ and what was _moral_ ; and that he was primarily focused on people's _moral outrage_. He seems less concerned with whether what Minsky did was a crime, and more concerned with Minsky's portrayal as a sexual predator.

In countries such as France or Germany -- hardly barbaric backwaters -- it seems it's perfectly legal to have consensual sex with 15-year-olds[1]. So maybe he does think that America's laws are "absurdly" strict; in which case most of Europe would agree with him. Or maybe he's just making the point that this is an area where many reasonable people come to different conclusions, and so it's absurd to be so outraged about it.

I mean, I have a hard time understanding how anyone could think a 15-year-old can possibly be considered to consent to have sex with someone in their 20's. But obviously a lot of Europe thinks differently; if you're going to cut off ties with Stallman for his view on the matter, you'd better cut off ties with all of Europe too.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_Europe)

edit: Forgot the reference

<comment><USER8> Minsky didn't have consensual sex. She was coerced.

Age of sexual consent isn't relevant here. We need to legal age for prostitution. Does any US state or any EU country set that below 18?

But also, it doesn't matter. US federal law makes it a crime to travel abroad to have sex with people under 18.

[https://www.justice.gov/criminal-ceos/citizens-guide-us- fede...](https://www.justice.gov/criminal-ceos/citizens-guide-us-federal-law- extraterritorial-sexual-exploitation-children)

<comment><USER7> We're not talking about Minsky; we're talking about a hit piece on Richard Stallman, which brings up his opinion on the _morality_ of sleeping with 17-year-olds as a reason to revile him.

The age of consent in Finland is apparently 16. Should we ask Linus Torvalds what his opinions on the matter are, and force him to step down if he disagrees? The age of consent in Italy is apparently 14 (!). I know a number of Italians prominently involved in the kernel community; shall we ask them what their opinions are?

It's important that we distinguish exactly what it is that we're accusing someone of, and make sure that each individual element is true, for two reasons.

One is just plain justice sake: it's not right to railroad someone and force them to step down from the organization they founded based on bad logic and twisted facts.

The second is, Stallman is not the only target here: everyone else is looking at this and deciding how they need to act in response. If what the average guy sees is "he expressed a minority viewpoint and he was lynched", then they'll learn to simply not express minority viewpoints; they won't see what was really problematic about either the current behavior, or Stallman's history.

His "but is it really assault" defense of Minsky is definitely problematic given his position and the situation. And apparently he's had a long history of "creepy" behavior, along with a long history of people telling him he needs to change. Those are good reasons to ask him to step down.

But it is _not_ true that Richard Stallman said the girl was "entirely willing"; that is just a lie, and covers up the real problems Stallman had. And regarding his question about whether a 17-year-old can give consent -- be consistent: either drop this issue, or take it up with every European in our community.

<comment><USER8> We are talking about Minsky, because it's Stallman's comments about Minsky that are the problem.

> The age of consent in Finland is apparently 16.

1) Not for Americans visiting Finland.

2) Not for prostitutes in Finland.

> But it is not true that Richard Stallman said the girl was "entirely > willing";

I haven't said this. I'm focussing on the things that Stallman actually said. You yourself agree that these are enough to ask Stallman to step down.

> he second is, Stallman is not the only target here: everyone else is looking > at this and deciding how they need to act in response. If what the average > guy sees is "he expressed a minority viewpoint and he was lynched", then > they'll learn to simply not express minority viewpoints; they won't see what > was really problematic about either the current behavior, or Stallman's > history.

Yes, this is entirely the point. We don't want powerful men to make public comments saying that fucking children is fine so long as those children have been brutalised into looking willing. We don't want powerful men saying that "voluntary" child sexual abuse isn't harmful for those children.

<comment><USER9> > is fine so long as those children have been brutalised into looking willing

Stallman never said "it's fine", He called Epstein a rapist - i.e. indicated it was whoever did the brutalising who is to blame. Also, it was a 17 year old, not a child.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I wonder, why Stallman just won't sue Vice for the hatchet job they did? Defamation suits are a thing, and it would be a high profile one.

He has access to some very good lawyers and can allege both lots of income and reputation, with damages.

<comment><USER11> Is there some kind of nonfree software he needs to use in order to sue someone? If not I'd assume he's already in the process of doing it

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> If you can't see the problem with making such arguments, you don't belong in a leadership position, period.

<comment><USER13> Is someone who follows the herd or is afraid to state an unpopular opinion on a contentious topic your idea of a leader? I don't think so, in fact I think they're the exact opposite. This world needs people who are willing to go to the mat for their contentious ideas, regardless of how misguided they may appear to be so long as there's evidence of _reasoning._ Otherwise how do we progress? A lot of today's mainstream thought was once contentious, even illegal. I really don't understand this attitude at all.

<comment><USER8> But here the reasoning was weak.

He tried to say that assault shouldn't be called assault if it didn't involve force, because assault requires force.

That's a definition of assault that is incorrect in English usage and incorrect in law. Assault does not require use of force.

30 seconds of web searching, or reading a dictionary, would have told him this.

If this was the only time he'd said something fucking idiotic about sexual violence maybe he'd have got away with it, but it isn't, is it? He keeps on saying stupid shit about abuse of children.

When it comes to sexual abuse against women and children he doesn't know what he's talking about; he knows he doesn't know what he's talking about; but he keeps doing it.

<comment><USER13> Except he wasn't talking about Jeffrey Epstein, he was talking about Marvin Minsky. He was trying to portray a scenario where Jeffrey Epstein would have been committing a crime while Marvin Minsky was not. Minsky's presumed guilt is predicated on two things:

1\. His knowing what Epstein was doing, i.e. knowing these were sex slaves

2\. The girl was under age

RMS defended Minsky against (2) by stating it's morally absurd having a law differing in different jurisdictions by age. There are many places in the civilized world where (2) wouldn't apply due to the girl's age.

With regards to (1) all RMS mused was what if the girl presented herself willingly? How do we know Minsky knew Epstein was committing a crime and thus making himself complicit in that crime? Does Minsky not have plausible deniability? Too bad he's dead and can't defend himself.

In the end RMS was painting a picture where Epstein is a monster, the girl was a victim, and Minsky was innocent. The media completely misrepresented this portraiture.

<comment><USER8> Where did I say he was talking about Epstein?

There's a bunch of people across these threads saying "he wasn't talking about Epstein" as if that excuses what he was saying.

> How do we know Minsky knew Epstein was committing a crime and thus making > himself complicit in that crime? Does Minsky not have plausible deniability?

If you're a 70 year old man you should understand that a 17 year old girl is not going to want to have sex with you. He was at the minimum hugely reckless.

> In the end RMS was painting a picture where [...] Minsky was innocent.

Yes, I know, and this is enough for most people to realise that RMS is not a suitable figurehead for any project.

<comment><USER13> The presumption is Minsky wouldn't have known she was 17 and with regards to your other point - you know many men have been having affairs with girls 40 to 50 years their junior. Pablo Picasso was the first to come to mind. There have been many others. I presume they feel flattered rather than suspicious.

<comment><USER14> We still don't know exactly if she was 17 or already 18 at that time. Someone found out that she actually was 18 already, but it's unclear yet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I'm as much a RMS booster as you'll find, but he dug his own grave here. At a point in history when we're finally realizing that the kind of deeply sexist culture among our elites (i.e. one where male billionaire sex peddlers drive opinions among exclusively male elites by trading their harem of more-or-less- plausibly-consenting-maybe nubile girls) is toxic, Stallman walked right in with a "well, you know, this wasn't technically sexual assault".

I mean, he's not wrong. But he's missing the point, ethically. And given that his whole schtick is an ethical position... I dunno. It's time to step aside. Free Software can find better evangelists.

<comment><USER16> You are missing the point here. It was a targeted attack on Stallman through mass media, social media.

<comment><USER2> He's being "attacked" by FSF board members and employees, other free software foundations, and FLOSS advocates.

<comment><USER17> >He's being "attacked" by FSF board members and employees, other free software foundations, and FLOSS advocates.

Source on this? The only articles/blogs I've seen on this are from Vice, Selam G. (MIT alumni, unclear what her other affiliations are), and the Gnome foundation.

<comment><USER2> Former board member [https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html](https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/52587.html) & [https://twitter.com/mjg59/status/1172293871109320704](https://twitter.com/mjg59/status/1172293871109320704)

Founder of FSF's GPL Compliance Labs [https://twitter.com/NovalisDMT/status/1172573166956437505](https://twitter.com/NovalisDMT/status/1172573166956437505)

Former FSF staff [https://twitter.com/georgialyle/status/1173788445732462593](https://twitter.com/georgialyle/status/1173788445732462593)

FSF member since 2004 [https://twitter.com/downey/status/1172328679889756162](https://twitter.com/downey/status/1172328679889756162) Other members [https://twitter.com/dustyweb/status/1173690170090168320](https://twitter.com/dustyweb/status/1173690170090168320) & [https://twitter.com/j00bar/status/1172309099410669568](https://twitter.com/j00bar/status/1172309099410669568)

Free Software Conservancy [https://sfconservancy.org/news/2019/sep/16/rms- does-not-spea...](https://sfconservancy.org/news/2019/sep/16/rms-does-not- speak-for-us/)

Senior staff technologist at EFF [https://twitter.com/cooperq/status/1173789555993956352](https://twitter.com/cooperq/status/1173789555993956352)

Forbes writer and "FOSS advocate" [https://twitter.com/killyourfm/status/1173014344973598722](https://twitter.com/killyourfm/status/1173014344973598722)

Director of community for DIAL Community (part of the Open Source Center at the UN Foundation) [https://twitter.com/cooperq/status/1173789555993956352](https://twitter.com/cooperq/status/1173789555993956352)

Tech author [https://twitter.com/mwlauthor/status/1173690259277848576](https://twitter.com/mwlauthor/status/1173690259277848576)

[Not sure how to describe Sarah Jeong briefly] [https://twitter.com/sarahjeong/status/561785170538553344](https://twitter.com/sarahjeong/status/561785170538553344)

<comment><USER17> thanks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Just because the law is different somewhere else doesn't mean the law here is invalid. Stallman lives in the US, and should be help to US standards.

People use the 'legal in europe' reasoning to justify many things. My parents used it to give me alcohol as a child. Did that make it right? No, it didn't. Should europe change? That's up to them. We are all still evolving. Some do it at a different pace.

</comment><comment><USER19> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sealioning)

<comment><USER20> Did they really provoke RMS into saying anything? Seems like he put his own foot into his mouth?

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Confirmed also from FSF: [https://twitter.com/fsf/status/1173780935910797312](https://twitter.com/fsf/status/1173780935910797312)</comment>