Ask HN: How Can I Improve the Mobile View of My Website? - <AUTHOR> http://www.warplife.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> I visit my own site mostly with Firefox on Mac OS X. While I do look at it on iOS and Android from time to time, not a whole lot, as I can't actually _work_ on my site from a mobile device.

The mobile view of my site, admittedly, sucks.

The main thing I do is hide the extensive vertical navigation bar on the right side of the desktop view, I hide the logo, then place a very compact navigation bar at the top.

I realized just yesterday that there are some styles in my desktop view that are not reflected in the mobile stylesheet, like "picture frames" around images. I can easily fix that.

What I'd like to know, is how to make my site not suck, for those with mobile gadgetry.

I use just one HTML document for each page of both the mobile and desktop view of my site, with a separate stylesheet for screens that are less than 481 pixels. Internet Explorer doesn't understand how that's done, so I have:

       <link media="only screen and (max-device-width: 480px)"
        href="/css/mobile-manual.css"
        type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" />

        <link media="screen and (min-device-width: 481px)"
         href="/quixotic.css"
         type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" />

        <!--[if IE]>
        <link media="screen" href="http://www.warplife.com/quixotic.css"
         type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" />
        <![endif]--></comment>


US gov tested facial recognition tech on thousands of Americans at DC airport - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-switch/wp/2015/06/18/the-government-tested-facial-recognition-tech-on-thousands-of-travelers-at-a-washington-area-airport/?postshare=8321434734506724

<comment><USER2> This article pays a little bit of lip service to "civil liberties" but is basically a "gee, whiz!" type of article.

That is, it doesn't deal with hard questions. Like: how many celebrities did it catch, and did the TSA agents go gawk at them? How many TSA agents used this system to gawk at stylishly-dressed young women? And how does it deal with spies, particularly those of US allies, like Israel, that are known to have weird relations to passports (see The Dubai Job, [http://www.gq.com/news- politics/big-issues/201101/the-dubai-...](http://www.gq.com/news-politics/big- issues/201101/the-dubai-job-mossad-assassination-hamas), for interesting details about how Israeli agents play fast and loose with passports and identities). This sort of thing could easily turn into a "herd the damn lower class rubbish like cows" and "treat the aristocrats (rightsholders or "cleared") with utmost courtesy" type of situation.</comment>


Google search breaks when searching for bash null - <AUTHOR> https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=bash+null&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8 <comment><AUTHOR> Fixed Now! Original Here: [http://tinypic.com/r/14dj8sy/9](http://tinypic.com/r/14dj8sy/9)

</comment><comment><USER2> What's meant to be broken? Looks fine to me.

<comment><AUTHOR> It was broken a couple minutes ago. I'll add a link to the picture I took in a bit.</comment></comment>


xkcd - Compiler Complaint - <AUTHOR> http://xkcd.com/371/ <comment><USER2> Too bad the compiler is not involved in a segmentation fault. Good try xkcd.

<comment><USER3> I think it's implied that he will run the compiled code.</comment></comment>


Dutch museum says van Gogh painting stolen in overnight raid - <AUTHOR> https://news.artnet.com/art-world/thieves-stolen-van-gogh-masterpiece-dutch-museum-1819743 <comment><USER3> I fully approve of art theft. There should be honor among thieves of course. You shouldn't _damage_ art. But if a painting isn't stolen now and then, well it wasn't worth painting in the first place. Really, what is art _for_ but to enliven the doldrums of the rich?

A moment or three of aesthetic pleasure, bragging at parties, but really most days it's just so much wallpaper. No, the true purpose of art is to be stolen. Then the chase begins, the drama, the mystery, the appreciation of the craft of skullduggery.

Eventually you track down the blighter who nabbed the splotchy-whatsit, buy him a beer and throw him back in the clink. That's where he'll meet his next crew, plan the next heist, and start the whole glorious affair over again.

So cheers to the cheeky beggars who grabbed the Gogh, let the fun begin!

<comment><USER4> Or the painting gets sold to someone shady overseas for a private collection and it's never seen again. It's not like in movies, there's no romance or drama to it. Stolen art doesn't benefit the common good.

<comment><USER5> Stolen art opens up the market for forgeries.

<comment><USER6> Dick's version of the Man in the High Castle has a good meditation on forgeries.

Mostly when people buy art, they're buying provenance, proof that a celebrity artist in history touched this particular object.

Forgers have gotten incredibly sophisticated, finding ways to duplicate the texture of historical paints and style of brush strokes of masters.

I think we'd do a lot of good for the world by commissioning as indistinguishable fakes as possible for all famous works, putting them in a room where the originals are all shuffled in, then sending them out into the world so any museum or private collector can have one, with some chance it's actually the real thing, but mostly the value would collapse to however sublime it is to actually look at the work.

<comment><USER7> The value of art is not just the 'celebrity' of an artist like he were an actor pimping out a cash-in film. Making a cultural contribution to the arts is a part of carrying your civilisation forward. The artist is valuable because they were the nexus point for many values and inspirations that speak highly to the culture that produced them. Cavemen don't make the Mona Lisa or michaenglo's David. These works (among many) stand as monuments to a time and place that produced a peak of artistic, scientific, technological and cultural success. Owning and safeguarding those art pieces connects you to the products of the success of that passed civilisation, you carry the memory and product of many people and imply a bright future for the sons and daughters of that culture by holding up their successes above the ravages of war and nature.

Making copies defeats the point and is basically copying someone else's homework and handing it in as your own. You stripped the point of doing the work to begin with for the sake of 'spreading the wealth'. You didn't make better artists that will produce new valuable works, you empowered lazy forgers who should be conservators of the past at best with that skill set.

The aesthetic value is only part of what took and a lot structure and skill to create. Art is not about appearance.

<comment><USER8> Disagree. I think GP is correct: most of the market value of paintings is in provenance of the physical object.

The "nexus point for many values and inspirations that speak highly to the culture that produced them" is fully encoded in the information content of the painting. With sufficiently good copying techniques, a physical painting can be copied or digitized while preserving all this. After all, whenever discussing "values and inspirations", you're usually not staring at an original, but at a cheap photocopy in some book or on a webpage - and yet the "values and inspirations" get communicated and discussed.

The aesthetic value is indeed only the part of a work - but again, contained within the information content. This includes provenance _of the information_. E.g. you derive joy from knowing this image was painted by Picasso, even though you're looking at a compressed digitization of a copy of a copy of the original painting.

GP's proposal would crash the art value to aesthetics + "values and inspirations", letting the culture partake in it better, and cutting out the scarcity.

<comment><USER7> If your criteria for appreciating art is merely looking at the image, the market is already "crashed". Google images has reproductions of nearly all paintings and art pieces ready to go. That hasn't happened.

There is more information in an artwork than what is presented as the final result. The techniques that go into constructing a painting are not reverse- engineer-able in every instance. You may produce the same brush strokes and end picture, but how you got there will be a different method, you won't be using the construction lines or dynamic symmetry of the masters that's passed down usually via oral tradition. Preserving those techniques enhances appreciation of the art and is a perspective worth preserving for it's own practical benefits.

Hatsheput's (female ancient egypt pharoah) funerary tomb was the first building to have outward facing columns that you could walk through. That style of outward facing columns became the standard style of ancient greek buildings, with steps leading up to outward facing columns. Columns you could walk through used to be confined to courtyards due to inferior architectural ability. None of that could be inferred simply by looking at the picture without prior education. The provenance of who built that or ordered it to be built in that manner is completely unknown to me, and does not change the fact that it is obviously a valuable building and an intriguing place to learn about what made the leap in architectural technology possible, how that culture was ahead of the game, how those people lived to make such a thing possible and to study the value of having outward facing colonnades among other ideas. All without knowing the author.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> What is the end goal for the thieves? Seeing as you obviously can't sell stolen artwork on the open market- how many insanely wealthy private collectors can there be out there, who are willing to risk substantial prison time to own a stolen painting? I think many or most people who have that much money probably made it legally and don't have that kind of risk tolerance. And I doubt many mob boss/Tony Soprano types really have an appreciation for fine art.... So what's the market like?

(And if there is a market for shady wealthy stolen art buyers, how do you get connected with them? Seems like every node in a web of underground connections is someone the police can potentially arrest & flip, etc.)

<comment><USER10> From what I've read it's stolen to order.

Super rich person really wants that particular painting to hang in a private room where they can enjoy it.

And they go through a couple connections for plausible deniability -- buying it from some kind of "dealer" they can "assume" is "legit", and the "dealer" then connects with actual criminals to steal it.

If ever caught (unlikely), the thieves and "dealer" take the fall, not the rich person. Also the rich person may be halfway around the world in a country where there's literally zero chance of being caught/extradited.

But the thieves and dealer are going to make a helluva lot of money, obviously, for the risk they're taking.

<comment><USER11> I don't think plausible deniability works on one-of-a-kind artwork. Even if you assume your dealer is legit, any cursory research will tell you it was stolen. It would be like buying the secret formula for Coca-Cola and claiming you didn't know it was stolen because it went through multiple middlemen.

<comment><USER12> You can always claim to have purchased a "professional-quality" reproduction from a "reputable" dealer.

<comment><USER13> happens all the time that you ask for a replica and the dealer secretly plants a multi million dollar artwork in your bedroom. Seems legit. :D

<comment><USER14> And you've just decided that the "replica" was so good that you paid stolen- art-on-the-black-market money for it, not "good replica painter" money for it...

<comment><USER15> The thing is your books say "good replica money" and only your crypto wallet or offshore account or shell company slush fund or pile of gold have the 'stolen-art-on-the-black-market' money removed from the balance sheet. Smart accountants are payed a lot of money to figure out exactly how to hide this from overworked and underpaid auditors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> For anyone wanting to have a wonderful 90s flashback featuring the theft of high-end art, you can't do worse during shelter in place than to watch the Thomas Crown Affair: [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0155267/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0155267/)

<comment><USER17> Thanks for the reminder. Rented it tonight via iTunes.

It really is an excellent movie.

<comment><USER16> Yeah we just watched it a few nights ago. Truly is excellent.

And so, so 90s.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The value (in terms of money) of art has always been confusing to me.

Art has monetary value because:

1 it is a famous, one-of-a-kind piece

2 it can be used for money laundering and/or illegal transactions

Pieces in museums are always in the #1 category. Any other piece with high monetary value is clearly in the #2 category.

This stolen van Gogh will probably end up in a private collection, but really, what's the point? Since it is now a known stolen piece it now has no value in both category #1 and #2.

I have a hard time believing that the new 'owner' had it stolen for the artistic value. Really, if he/she wanted to look at it, he/she could have just gone to the museum. (Well, not right now due to COVID19, but you get the point).

<comment><USER19> I can't find the source, but I remember reading about how there's a lifecycle to stolen art. The thief sells it to a sketchy art dealer at a huge discount. The sketchy art dealer then sells it to a more legitimate dealer at less of a discount. Then, it either goes to a legitimate private collector or museum. The length of time between each step can span decades, but it becomes more valuable at each transition.

<comment><USER20> For a van Gogh that would never work. No legitimate art dealer would touch it. Regardless of the amount of time in between.

<comment><USER21> Give it enough time, and will anyone even know who the rightful owner is supposed to be? I have a feeling van Gogh's fame will probably outlast the Netherlands, let alone a claim of legal ownership by one museum.

<comment><USER22> I don't think many people acquire stuff on the basis it might be easily resellable to people who aren't criminals around the point the Netherlands and its national museums cease to exist.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Photo of the artwork is missing from apnews. You can find one here - [https://news.artnet.com/art-world/thieves-stolen-van-gogh- ma...](https://news.artnet.com/art-world/thieves-stolen-van-gogh-masterpiece- dutch-museum-1819743)

<comment> w-m The muted greenish brown colouring, the strange wide aspect ratio, the generally dark tone and setting: if you'd try to sell this to me as a Van Gogh painting, I would have probably laughed at you. I'm far from being an art historian, but it looks quite out of character for a Van Gogh.

<comment> grey-area One of his most famous paintings matches 2 out of 3 of your criticisms, he only went wild with colour later. I agree the style change can seem abrupt but it happened over years.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Potato_Eaters](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Potato_Eaters)

<comment> w-m If you put "Van Gogh painting" in Google images, you have to scroll quite a bit to find anything in a similar style, except for a couple hits from current news pieces.

<comment> grey-area This is one of his best known early works, it is in no way obscure, neither is his change in style.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> > The thieves smashed a large glass door at the front of the museum to access > the building.

So let me get this straight. A fairly sized museum that holds, possibly, millions worth of art has absolutely no 24/7 security guards at the _front door_. Not even a single guard.

Come on.

<comment><USER25> Same reaction here. My company's unoccupied office has a glass door and I lie awake thinking about someone stealing the 10-year old PC off the receptionist's desk.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> > Thieves have taken advantage of the distraction provided by the public > health situation to steal a prize Vincent van Gogh painting from a museum in > the Netherlands

Here is the opposite effect: The number of spam phone calls I have received has dropped from two or three most days to zero! Looks like the spammers cannot work remotely, which is really odd!

</comment><comment><USER27> The gang leader was seen wearing a red hat and red trench coat...

Hit it Rockapella! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1EIUP8tvbE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1EIUP8tvbE)

</comment><comment><USER28> I'm surprised that, at this point, there are still originals in museums, especially for very desirable works as some replicas are hard to tell apart from the original. It can be done. If they hire professional 'replicators', this type of museum theft could be completely eradicated.

Another possibility is that maybe in this case a replica was stolen and the museum doesn't want to divulge that.

And want to add that this stolen work is almost un-sellable, everybody knows is missing and if it ever resurfaces it will be claimed back, thus nobody would want to own it. But what do I know..

<comment><USER29> One of the draws of going to a museum is to see the originals. If you know it's a fake then it takes away from the mystique.

<comment><USER30> > If you know it's a fake then it takes away from the mystique.

On the other hand, if you can only tell the difference between the real and the fake with a microscope, then "mystique" seems to be a simple placebo effect.

It's about time we stopped holding original-yet-mediocre works like the Mona Lisa on such a high pedestal just to create some kind of "mental high" that people are deriving from the placebo effect.

<comment><USER31> What do you think art is? It's all in the head. Otherwise it's just paint on a canvas. It's not like there's some sort of objective truth to it.

<comment><USER30> There are many reasons people like art, but I think the principle reason is (or should be) admiration of skill. It's the same reason we like watching great athletes or musicians - we can recognize the amount of time and talent required to produce the end result ("wow, I couldn't do that, even if I tried!").

It's also the same reason many people have a visceral negative reaction to "art" that seemingly requires little to no skill (4'33", Pollock, etc.) - <USER2> admire something you could easily imitate with little-to-no training?

<comment><USER32> It's great that you have this view of art, but really figuring out a single principal reason is not something you're going to succeed at because _people are different_. Evidently even more different than you expected.

<comment><USER30> People are different, yes, but also, people are the same. If you polled 1000 people about their views on art, I would wager >50% of them hold my view.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> tech-no-logical directly from the source :

[https://www.singerlaren.nl/en/nieuws/460/burglary_at_singer_...](https://www.singerlaren.nl/en/nieuws/460/burglary_at_singer_laren/)

</comment><comment><USER33> But, what if Jan Rudolph de Lorm, the museum director was actually moving it to a safer location and accidentally destroyed it. Jans quick-thinking jumped into play and he called up a few college historian friends and asked for some help.

Jan was able to disable the alarm so her friends could come in and smash the place up, leave evidence that it was stolen, then activated the alarm just at the right time.

Jan had become good friends with Andreas Blühm, the director of the Groninger Museum and finally convinced him to let the Singer Laren museum take it on loan. Jan was so distraught there was no way he could could let himself be seen as an incompetent museum director. He had to cover his tracks.

He convinced his old historian friends to keep quiet about the cover-up by cutting up the remains of the painting and giving them each a piece. A story to be kept in secrecy only handed down each generation.

But Jan forgot one thing.......

</comment><comment><USER34> For anyone who has time on their hands and wants a good read, The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt is a wonderful book that tells a story set in the world of art theft.

</comment><comment><USER35> COVID-19 is providing many opportunities for criminals. It's only a matter of time before articles come out with titles like "How identity thieves took my federal tax return AND coronabucks" given the delay in filing US tax returns this year.

<comment> tech-no-logical according to both the police and the museum, the security was as per usual. yes, the museum is closed now, but the burglary was at night.

<comment><USER35> Interesting. I had assumed that security was reduced.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I could've told you, Vincent. This world was never meant for one as beautiful as you.

<comment><USER37> My gold lies in a foreign land, buried deep beneath the sand.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> I will not be surprised when they were the same Lebanese gang from Berlin who also stole the big gold coin in Berlin, and most likely the Dresden green vault jewels. It's just too easy.

</comment><comment><USER39> (Unrelated with Van Gogh but, as we are talking about lost dutch girls, I wonder how vertex-four will be doing...)

</comment><comment><USER40> Warning: Really corny humor ahead...

So it could be said that the Van Gogh... Van Went... away... <g>

<comment><USER41> I take it from that that you pronounce "Gogh" like "go". A Dutchman once explained to me that both g's are pronounced with a strongly guttural h sound, like in _loch_ or _Bach_ , or like the Spanish _j_ but much stronger, like you're clearing your throat. And a short "o", like non-USA English "top" \- _not_ an "ah" sound. _CHhhoChhh_. Yes, pretty impossible for English-speakers, but anything would be closer than rhyming it with "go".

<comment><USER42> Basically, it rhymes with "cock" , except the 'k' sounds at the start and end are choking sounds from your throat, like that in _loch_.

Depending on your English dialect, people tend to take the _gh_ either from _though_ making it "van go", or the _gh_ from _cough_ , making it "van gof".

Now, for extra points, try the local liquor chain "Gall & Gall" :)

(Not a native Dutch speaker, just lived here for a few years now and spent quite some time trying to get my head and throat around the g sound.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> So somebody is making money off this.

</comment><comment><USER44> needs update [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stolen_paintings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stolen_paintings)</comment>


Build Powerful Internet of Things Applications in Minutes - <AUTHOR> https://temboo.com/conditions

<comment><USER2> Temboo is pretty slick - I've used it with Arduino Yún to make a little weather status appliance that lights up different symbols (and moves a servo- controlled arm) for various weather conditions. Temboo is kinda like Zapier for Arduino, for me.</comment>


North Texas citizens organize to monitor police with video cameras - <AUTHOR> http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/Arlington-Residents-Police-the-Police-267423681.html <comment><USER3> I have a hard time swallowing police department rhetoric in these situations. The officer has a gun, and the unfortunate power to make "extra-legal" killings with it. They're safe. If they irresponsibly use that gun in an unsafe manner, like all the drunken NYPD officers who shoot people[0], then it absolutely is our or someone's responsibility to take matters into our own hands and monitor ourselves until we see that accountability. Relying on internal affairs/review commissions to provide that is a broken model.

Also, I know folks doing this locally, and have watched officers request that filmers stand at a safe distance. It's interesting to me how often "safe distance" corresponds with a) somewhere with a shitty view far away and b) a position where the filmer is significantly further away than a number of pedestrians or gawkers whose "safety" presumably isn't in dispute. I have good friends who were arrested for nothing more than filming, and they were often given confusing and contradictory orders by an officer who obviously felt he had the immediate situation well enough in hand to direct most of his attention ordering the filmer around. It happened almost 2 years ago, no charges were filed, and if this was a legitimate concern then I'd really like to see some obstruction charges brought in the several local cases I've seen of citizens arrested for filming.

I do agree that some of these groups' strategies are a bit busted. I'm familiar with the Peaceful Streets Project here in Austin, and sometimes the ragey/personal rhetoric got a bit overpowering. Then again, cops kill people, often under suspicious circumstances, and get away with it. Perhaps it is time for a bit of rage, and to make it personal.

0\. [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/01/brendan-conin- nypd-...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/01/brendan-conin-nypd- shooting-pelham-drunk_n_5247504.htm)

<comment><USER4> I don't think reality is as clear cut as that. There is genuine complexity. Being a cop is legitimately dangerous, gun or no gun. A gun isn't an off switch. People can confront an armed cop and shooting doesn't always stop them.

There are also all sorts of rules that are learned on the job and aren't not in any manual. Ways for maintaining control and authority mostly. Many of these practices are unsanctioned and unofficial, but still essential for being able to do the job. Some things are both crucial and illegal.

Cops usually feel like when they get busted for being arrogant, bullying or outright violence that they are are victims of these situations. They do what everyone does, what has to be done for policing to be viable. Those pencil pushers with their removed perspective are making judgments about their irrelevant rules being broken.

They are under stress. Violence is a part of their days. Most of the people they deal with are lowlifes, lyres, cheaters. There is real stress. Real danger

That said, a lot of these practices aren't benign and they aren't inevitable. The police does genuinely attract many problematic people and it makes other. They get used to defending their authority and meet challenges to it with extreme responses. They develop a cops & robbers, us & them worldview that becomes their reality. More specifically cops, criminals and naive spectators, citizens & bureaucrats.

They develop a bullying mannerism.

Police manage to do their jobs without guns at all in many places. They deal with violent crime just like cops in the states. I'm not saying this should be adopted by US department, but is proof that there are other ways of doing things.

I think lights good for the paradigm. But, whatever that light reveals needs to be dealt with. Maybe police modus operandi needs to changed. But, maybe the rulebook needs to change too. It can be dangerous trying to enforce the official rulebook after long periods where it has only been enforced selectively. Maybe the official way of doing things doesn't work.

That said, this following cops around only plays to the problem paradigm. It's harassment, like what paparazzi do. It's belligerent. Maybe it's valuable as a protest, but it isn't as solution.

What I think should happen in law enforcement is that everything should be recorded. Every interrogation. Every arrest. Every time a cop pulls you over. This is all evidence and it should be part of every booking.

Hopefully that will make the need for this sort of thing go away.

<comment><USER5> _Being a cop is legitimately dangerous_

Not really, no. It's just not that dangerous. We imagine it must be dangerous, and so do cops themselves. But you're a lot more likely to be killed as a garbage collector or airline pilot, or a construction worker, or plenty of other jobs.

It's like with the "war on terror". The fear of danger is much more powerful than the danger itself. And like with terrorism, the fear is actively promoted for political reasons.

 _They do what everyone does, what has to be done for policing to be viable._

That seems like an argument against the department as a whole, not a justification for an individual's abuse.

 _Most of the people they deal with are lowlifes, lyres, cheaters._

Most of the people they deal with are ordinary innocent civilians whom they assume are "lowlifes" because they have been trained and conditioned to.

 _That said, this following cops around only plays to the problem paradigm. It 's harassment, like what paparazzi do. It's belligerent. Maybe it's valuable as a protest, but it isn't as solution._

It is belligerent, and it is harassment, and it is protest. And that's the point. People with power do not voluntarily stop abusing it. They continue until met with resistance - until they are forced to stop.

Unfortunately it's effectively suicide to physically force the cops to stop, but we should do everything we can short of that to stand up against them. Standing up against the cops sets an example for others that we don't need to fear them, that they don't deserve respect and deference, and that we can do something directly to stop their abuse.

<comment><USER6> Oh for pity's sake, follow a cop around some Saturday night downtown, before lecturing us on what a soft life a cop's job is. Deal with the belligerent drunks, entitled rich boys, teenagers with too much car and no sense. Enter a store that gave off a silent alarm, in the dark, all by yourself and tell me what a walk in the park it is.

"Stand up against them"? See how lovely a world it is without them - <USER2> comes next is very much worse than what you're complaining about.

Cops deserve respect and deference, if only because they stand for public order and that deserves it.

<comment><USER7> Pizza delivery guys have a far more dangerous job than police. Drive to a location chosen by a stranger who knows you will show up with cash, food, and a car which you will willingly exit. And all in 30 minutes or less. And they deal with the same types of obnoxious people as police, who you think deserve automatic respect for it.

Policing doesn't crack the top 10 BLS list of most dangerous jobs. [http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacquelynsmith/2013/08/22/americ...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacquelynsmith/2013/08/22/americas-10-deadliest- jobs-2/)

<comment><USER8> > 3\. Aircraft pilot and flight engineers This was very much unexpected.

<comment><USER7> [http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/17/opinion/The-Dangers-of- Pri...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/17/opinion/The-Dangers-of-Private- Planes.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&_r=0)

An op-ed I randomly came across today regarding the topic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Personally, I agree with what they are doing (fundamentally), but they could probably do with a better strategy for how they go about doing it. If they continue this pattern, and something horrible does happen, the department could say, "Well, this group has a history of endangering officers' safety" and a lot of people would swallow that pill without further examination, thus defeating the purpose of what they are doing.

<comment><USER10> I agree I am for what they are doing but they shouldn't do it in away that endangers the officer or themselves.

Now if only we could get people to follow around our Senators and Congress men and catalog everything they are doing that would be great.

<comment><USER9> I had an idea along these lines... maybe I'll submit it to HN ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Maybe the police are more concerned about being filmed napping in the back of a parking lot (while ostensibly radar gunning for speeders) and less concerned about being filmed brutalizing and shooting innocent people.

While both of these types of events occur sometimes, the second type is probably fairly rare and the first type probably much more common.

Maybe the idea is that if police think they are being watched they will act in a more accountable fashion. I don't see this being a bad thing at all.

</comment><comment><USER12> Too bad the PD won't have their officers wear cameras while on duty. That would resolve the issue without the distraction of somebody following the office around all day.

<comment><USER13> Not really, because then the police have the control over the cameras. This officer in Albuquerque [1] was wearing a lapel cam in 3 separate serious incidents, after two of which he was accused of using excessive force and during the third incident he shot and killed a 19-year-old girl. During all three incidents his camera "died" before anything serious started happening.

They just learn where the wires are that keeps it running and they pull them out, then reconnect them when they're doing normal stuff. The same thing keeps coming up with dashcams, too. The dashcam footage gets "lost", etc. Maybe one day we'll have technologies and policies that don't allow officers to mess with them, but for the foreseeable future we're the ones who have to be vigilant.

<comment><USER14> Easily addressable — make officers personally liable (as private citizens) for any actions that are not recorded, and cameras will suddenly become a whole lot more reliable.

<comment><USER13> I would love that _so much_ , but public choice theory makes it clear that that is anything but the easy solution. I'm fully and 100% in favor of that idea though.

<comment><USER15> " _I 'm fully and 100% in favor of that idea though._" Good, then vote on it! I'm sure a drop in the media-influenced pond will make a difference...

Biggest, lie, ever told.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> If you are interested in this sort of thing, you might want to look up _CopBlock_ or _Photography Is Not A Crime_. If you can tolerate the foil- hattery, this sort of effort also appears periodically on _Prison Planet_. And if you ever watched the television show COPS and wondered what it would look like if the footage were filmed from the suspect's perspective, just hit _LiveLeak_ , _Vimeo_ , or _YouTube_ and search for _" checkpoint videos"_.

The increasing prevalence of cameras in mobile phones, wearable action cameras such as _GoPro_ brand devices, and over-the-air footage-uploading services such as _Bambuser_ have really jolted this new niche of police brutality porn. Further court rulings, such as _Glik v. Cunniffe_ , that reinforced a person's right to record police in public while performing their official duties, have only emboldened crusaders against the corruption behind the thin blue line.

</comment><comment><USER17> It seems the police is having trust issues from the people there; with stories of cops beating up people, I'm not surprised either. This is a good initiative, but to be honest I think it should come from the police precincts themselves. I've read that some police forces use helmet cams, that's a good move - as long as they're mandatory and all footage is checked by an internal affairs department. If someone turns off the camera, that's suspicious.

tl;dr, police should work at regaining trust and respect themselves. Them not beating up people following them with a camera is a good first step.

</comment><comment><USER18> So finally we found a use for google glass.

<comment><USER19> Absolutely. Police should have a lapel camera or a Glass like camera rolling at all times. Prevents brutality and (more prevalent) false claims of thereof.

<comment><USER20> Some departments do already. I think there's a technical glitch though: they seem to malfunction or delete their data whenever the cop does something illegal.

<comment><USER21> Perhaps police department payroll/funding systems should also malfunction during periods video recorders do.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> How come everybody in north Texas is totally reasonable all of a sudden? People want to film the police but don't hate them, and the police is totally fine with it, but asks them to do so from a safe distance without distracting the police officers.

<comment><USER23> As long as the people doing the recording are non-threatening white hipsters, this policy works fine. But I guarantee some poor black or hispanic kid is going to get shot because a jumpy cop thinks the camera is a gun, and will likely get off with a minor suspension because the justice system views officers as above the law.

<comment><USER24> You immediately had to make it racial despite the fact that one of the guys recording is hispanic (Jose)?

<comment><USER23> Latent racism (e.g. white cops being nervous around black teenagers) is a huge problem in police work. Combine that with the kind of outright racism, the good old boy networks you see in rural Texas and the sense of "respect mah authoritah" many cops give off and I can easily see how someone would get shot.

<comment><USER25> > the good old boy networks you see in rural Texas

Arlington, a city of 370k smack between Dallas and Fort Worth is rural?

So the cops will get jumpy and start shooting once a hispanic kid shows up (which, one of them was) because they're good old boys from rural Texas (which Arlington isn't) should we keep digging or would you like to admit that your suppositions don't really have a foundation here?

<comment><USER23> Arlington isn't exactly "rural", but most of the town is definitely not what most people would call "urban". Dallas has a lot of suburbs that are similar; they're basically subdivisions full of 5,000 sq ft houses built on cheap farm land. Also, being Texas, there's a pretty good chance that anyone you encounter is armed, which makes the cops a lot more cautious.

I'm not saying people shouldn't videotape the cops, but that they should continue to do so at their own risk.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> When I first read the title I wouldn't have thought people were actually going around following officers. I understand their point, but I also agree that isn't the right way to do it. You shouldn't be looking for trouble, you should just film it if it happens near you. Assuming you get enough people to do something like this then there would be enough people on the road to not have to follow cops around.

If the same number of people in the US had dashcams as people do in Russia due to insurance scams I think there would be enough people recording to catch these kinds of things at random encounters.

</comment><comment><USER27> WtF?!? This reduces reasons to have a police to absurdity. And at best it will make some of the symptoms go away but not fix the root problem.

</comment><comment><USER28> sousveillance to maintain the balance

</comment><comment><USER29> They need a branding program, because Cop Block sounds way too much like Cock Block.

Just what we need, vigilante justice.

<comment><USER30> When taking pictures of something becomes "vigilante justice" then we're in the world of newspeak.

Reminds me of when, in the wake of 9/11, the Justice Department released a list of domestic terror organizations that included environmental activists who had never hurt anyone.</comment></comment>


Tips from a Pro: An Introduction to Microscopic Photography (2015) - <AUTHOR> http://www.popphoto.com/tips-pro-microscopic-photography <comment><USER2> There is a startup nearby me working in this field [https://macroscopicsolutions.com/](https://macroscopicsolutions.com/)

<comment><USER3> I got a malware warning (using chrome) from that site 3 clicks in. I won't post a direct link but it was site -> products -> starter packages -> any starter kit

<comment><USER4> I'm getting the same warning with Firefox (which isn't too surprising, considering they use the same database for this).

<comment><USER5> On Chrome, I am getting the same message on any product that I select. :(</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: A series of free, online courses to learn full stack web development - <AUTHOR> https://www.bento.io/tracks

<comment><AUTHOR> Founder here - would love HN's feedback on the curriculum. Happy to also answer any questions about pedagogy or design.

</comment><comment><USER2> I've been using bento for a while now to find free coding resources online.</comment>


Apply HN: Synaptitude – Remote Mental Health Monitoring and Treatment - <AUTHOR> Synaptitude: http://synaptitude.me
Problem:
According to the CDC, one in five American adults deals with a mental health issue. However, only 44% of adults with diagnosable mental health problems and less than 20% of adolescents receive treatment. That leaves the majority of people with mental health issues untreated. We believe these low treatment percentages are due to a mixture of expensive treatments, the taboo nature of mental health, and the inherent ailments that come with a mental disease.
Description:
We are making a system using an EEG (measures brain activity) and webcam that allows real-time mental health tracking and treatment in the home. This information is then made viewable to patients and to mental health specialists via our app. Specialists can then track patients remotely and test the effectiveness of different therapies and drugs outside an office.
Over time, we will apply machine learning to collected data and use therapists' and psychologists' notes as tags. This allows us to improve various offline techniques/activities, notify specialists about critical patients, and automate many aspects of mental health treatment.
We will also provide patients with activities centered around therapy techniques, such as neurofeedback. This will help patients practice self-regulation techniques in their home, as opposed to expensive trips to a therapist or clinic.
Product URL: https://thinksuite.io/
Demo URL: https://youtu.be/6kB-T9Uz65Y
Our YC App Video: https://youtu.be/EOHfLdtHXag <comment><USER2> (1) How established is the science on EEG data effectively diagnosing mental health problems? Could you link me to some relevant literature?

(2) Who is your target customer? Are you planning on selling these through therapists/psychologists as a way for them to follow-up with and monitor their already-diagnosed patients? Or is it a direct-to-consumer product that lets an average person diagnose themselves and seek help? I think that the latter approach could have an insanely high adoption barrier.

<comment><AUTHOR> (1) It is not very well established, but there is evidence supporting it[1]. The problem is EEGs previously were tens of thousands of dollars. We intend to do a study as soon as we have any sort of funding, and we already have people willing to participate, a facility, and a University of Illinois professor advising us [2].

(2) We plan to initially target therapists/psychologists as a way to monitor patients remotely. We will also sell direct-to-customer, and possibly connect them to a therapist/psychologist remotely, or they can use our software without the therapists (this is a less likely route, but we are already receiving emails about it).

Believe it or not, the adoption barrier isn't that high, because people are already trying things such as yoga, meditation, therapy, etc. This is essentially the same _form_ of treatment, just in a different medium. We already have people signed up to pay for our trial, and have people email us regularly.

With a study to back it up, we believe we should have customers. However, we don't know if we wish to go this route. The end goal is to use the therapists initially and eventually automate the entire mental health pipeline.

[1] [http://synaptitude.me/blog/literature-overview-of-using- neur...](http://synaptitude.me/blog/literature-overview-of-using- neurofeedback/)

[2] [https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Eut- aii72ch7nySpB_oGDLiJx_X...](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Eut- aii72ch7nySpB_oGDLiJx_XcgQoNLIYRoOKDucM/viewform?c=0&w=1)

<comment><USER2> Thanks for your response! The references cited in your literature overview seems to focus on neuro feedback for ADHD, which is a great market. I remember reading recently that pediatric ADHD is on the rise and that it's super underdiagnosed - I'd imagine an effective diagnosis+management solution in this specific space to be extremely lucrative.

Also, I don't know if you'll get this from others, but simply saying "mental health" made me immediately think of depression and related issues. My suggestion would be to refine your problem and solution statement to narrowly talk about your initial target segment (ADHD, autism, etc.) of the broader mental health space.

Good luck to your team!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for the suggestion, I definitely agree!

Also, ADHD is usually considered one of the most over diagnosed and under diagnosed diseases. That is to say, you have a high false-positive rate and a high false-negative rate.

That's actually one of the largest issues with mental health today, it's basically a psychologist just saying, "well you probably have this," it's not really scientific. Where are the measurements, why is it so mystical? We wanted hard analytics and that's why we are building this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Is there actual proof of an EEG recording being useful for diagnosing and tracking treatment of a mental health problem?

<comment><AUTHOR> EEGs have already been used to diagnose mental health conditions for decades. As for treatment, that has only appeared in the last 15 years or so, with treatments for ADHD, anxiety, depression, and epilepsy[1], using something called neurofeedback [2].

Further, with the advent of consumer EEGs flooding the market it is become increasingly possible to do this at scale. However, these consumer EEGs have a much lower accuracy (85% for consumer EEGs vs 95-98% medical EEGs), and being done in the home is difficult because EEGs are very sensitive to movement.

That's where our companies niche is, we developed an error correction method that works to increase accuracy and remove errors due to movement[3].

[1] [http://synaptitude.me/blog/literature-overview-of-using- neur...](http://synaptitude.me/blog/literature-overview-of-using- neurofeedback/)

[2] [http://synaptitude.me/blog/neurofeedback- in-200-words/](http://synaptitude.me/blog/neurofeedback-in-200-words/)

[3] [http://synaptitude.me/blog/using-computer-vision-to- improve-...](http://synaptitude.me/blog/using-computer-vision-to-improve-eeg- signals/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> The barrier for most health startups are clinical trials and the Fda. How do you plan to manage that ? and does continuous improvement, like you hint in your pitch, even fit with way the Fda views the world?

<comment><AUTHOR> Two things:

(1) Our first step is to provide analytics regarding patients focus, cognitive acuity, etc. Currently, this does not require FDA approval, however we will measure accuracy.

(2) Technically, we are providing an alternative treatment and do not need to get it approved with the FDA. In fact, you can already get the treatment we plan to provide (albeit at 10x the cost).

That being said, we are getting setup to run medical trials and already have people signed up[1], we have a facility, and a professor at the University of Illinois to help us with the process. We just need some financing to get it going.

[1] [https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Eut- aii72ch7nySpB_oGDLiJx_X...](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Eut- aii72ch7nySpB_oGDLiJx_XcgQoNLIYRoOKDucM/viewform?c=0&w=1)</comment></comment>


I Did a Terrible Thing. How Can I Apologize? - <AUTHOR> https://nytimes.com/2018/06/30/opinion/sunday/apologizing-apologies.html <comment><USER2> I have to admit if a spouse left me while i was fighting cancer for someone else ...I would likely just want them out of my life as much as possible.

</comment><comment><USER3> I don't know what is worse; the abandonment or the enabling by the therapist.

Shitty people all around. And the entire article comes off as selfish, this guy didn't deserve the forgiveness he longed for.

</comment><comment><USER4> Ok I'll resist. Percent Christian in the US is now down to 70% and dropping rapidly according to Pew. In another 10 years we'll thankfully be able to say this is not a Christian nation.

<comment><USER5> It never was (or at least was never intended to be).

[https://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-schweitzer/founding- fath...](https://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-schweitzer/founding-fathers-we- are-n_b_6761840.html)

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

<comment><USER6> There's a difference between stating a statistical fact and making a claim of foundation. GP is talking about the stats, not making a statement about any kind of official establishment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There's a reason Dante reserved the worst circle of hell for betrayers. I'm glad that she took the time to apologize to her ex-wife. It's better than nothing.

That said, the woman is promoting her new book on empathy, the implied claim being that she is now an expert.

No. You don't get to profit off of your redemptive journey (which I truly hope she doesn't think is complete). It boils the blood. I initially had a lot more expletives in this part of my comment draft.

<comment><USER8> It's a she. [http://www.crisbeam.com/about](http://www.crisbeam.com/about)

<comment><USER7> Thank you, edited.</comment></comment></comment>


SaaS: What does "on-prem" really mean? - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/p/87afd4c3bc06

<comment><USER2> With a title like that, I'd hope that somewhere along the way terms would be defined. Maybe ... write out the term the first time used? Call the Fortune 500 by the full name?

There's some interesting bits, but not generally useful due to the assumed context.</comment>


Study exposes major flaw in classic artificial intelligence test - <AUTHOR> http://techxplore.com/news/2016-07-exposes-major-flaw-classic-artificial.html <comment><AUTHOR> Link to the study _" Taking the fifth amendment in Turing's imitation game"_: [http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0952813X.2015.113...](http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0952813X.2015.1132273)</comment>


The origin of "99%" of DDoS against residential users is Call of Duty - <AUTHOR> ... and games rage
http://mailman.nanog.org/pipermail/nanog/2015-September/079152.html
Maybe UPnP is not a good idea after all? <comment><AUTHOR> > How does he/she become target? How does IP address gets exposed?

Call of Duty.

No I am not kidding.

The majority of the DDOS attacks we see targeted at Residential customers, are because said Customer was running their mouth / being an A __Hole in Call of Duty, and they pissed off someone with access to a botnet, etc.. The other is people gambling for real money and they start to win, so someone else knocks they offline so they won 't lose. As for how they get their IP, not really sure as I suck as those games, but I've heard it is pretty trivial to do so.

-Patrick</comment>


Alphabet-owned Verily suspended spot bonuses to fund diversity initiatives - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2020/6/30/21309306/alphabet-verily-suspended-employee-bonuses-diversity-initiatives-project-baseline <comment><USER3> So apparently they're spending from "spot bonuses" rather than the annual one, which is different than what the headline suggests, but still... With that much revenue, I find it hard to believe they couldn't allocate separate funds for this -- funds that (as the employees point out) would be recurring.

<comment><USER4> Yeah, it's a manufactured controversy tying together unrelated line items in the budget. "We can't afford mustard because we spent all that money on postage".

<comment><USER5> It doesn't seem manufactured. The company spokeswoman explicitly said this is what happened:

> "At this time, we think it's important we put our money where our mouth is, > and direct some of our discretionary funds — such as those typically used to > fund a spot bonus program (which is separate and distinct of our annual > bonus program) — to bolster our efforts to ensure our products and services > are accessible to the people who need them," she said.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Employee _spot_ bonuses.

The headline deliberately makes it sound like they suspended the annual bonuses that a lot of employees expect and budget around, which is not the case. This is a weasel headline designed to induce outrage where none (or at least nowhere near as much) is warranted.

Given the topic, you could even make the argument that this headline is designed to incite anger along racial lines, which IMHO has no place here or anywhere.

The HN title should be changed immediately.

</comment><comment><USER7> They suspended spot bonuses, not your yearly bonus. These are sometimes given out at the end of a long project, they might be worth ~2k.

Still really annoying, but also kinda click-baity title.

</comment><comment><USER6> In case there was any doubt - this article was flagged because of the inexcusably misleading headline.

There may be something worth discussing here, but there's basically zero chance of reasonable discourse unless the title is changed.

</comment><comment><USER8> I cannot help to grin the veil suspicion that this intends to be an one stop measure to say "we did all we can do, but you guys don't support it".

</comment><comment><USER9> No company is worth working weekends for. Whatever the bonus is, if you even get one, it's never what you wanted when you were doing the work

</comment><comment><USER10> We should be really skeptical of this headline.

If it reflects reality, these executives are too stupid to remember to breath, because a diversity "investment" that robs the people you compensate is about as brave as an instagram posting.

Maybe the employees started saying Verily should spend more on diversity. Maybe this is a reaction to entitled staff demanding that the company spend money that wasn't allocated for this year on diversity initiatives. This story, as written makes no sense.

</comment><comment><USER11> Couldn't the employees decide what they wanted to do with their money?

<comment><USER12> Silence is consent. And not a single person at Verily would be foolish enough to voice their disagreement on this issue. I hope yearly bonuses are next. Putting your money where you mouth is, as it were. The hypocrisy of Google with its 4% black workforce seems pretty staggering to me.

<comment><USER11> With highly skilled workers they are likely to just leave. I would prefer to help the causes that are close to me

<comment><USER12> > I don't buy into equal outcome, only equal opportunity

This phrase could doom your entire career in today's corporate America, if uttered publicly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> How generous to sacrifice the employees' overtime pay!

</comment><comment><USER14> If the employees actually cared they'd ask the company to match the money.

</comment><comment><USER15> The ultimate aim of these diversity projects is to lower labor costs - <USER2> by psychologically manipulating people into accepting lower wages, by focusing on conflict and alignment along racial lines instead of class lines, or simply to expand the available pool of workers.

<comment><USER16> Very hot take. I couldn't disagree more. The ultimate aim of these diversity projects is to help members of disenfranchised communities find meaningful employment at good companies. This both strengthens the product and makes the company more attractive - implemented correctly, it can be come a powerful flywheel of benefits. Implemented incorrectly, and it can sink morale without actually empowering, supporting, or helping anyone.

<comment><USER17> How does increasing the pool of labor not decrease the price of labor?

This is economics 101.

<comment><USER18> If diversity caused lower wages then we'd see a proactive push among corporations to create inclusive cultures to invite that situation. But we don't, because it doesn't.

<comment><USER19> >we'd see a proactive push among corporations to create inclusive cultures to invite that situation. But we don't

Wait, are you saying there has _not_ been a push among corporations to increase diversity?

>In 2003, MIT professor Thomas Kochan noted that companies were spending an estimated $8 billion a year on diversity efforts. But since Trump's election, and with the emergence of movements like #MeToo and Black Lives Matter, the industry has exploded. A 2019 survey of 234 companies in the S&P 500 found that 63% of the diversity professionals had been appointed or promoted to their roles during the past three years. In March 2018, the job site Indeed reported that postings for diversity and inclusion professionals had risen 35% in the previous two years.

[https://time.com/5696943/diversity- business/](https://time.com/5696943/diversity-business/)

<comment><USER20> watch the hands not the mouth - take a gander at the demographics of microsoft/facebook/google and you'll see how much they actually support diversity initiatives

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> >At this time, we think it's important we put our money where our mouth is, and direct some of our discretionary funds — such as those typically used to fund a spot bonus program (which is separate and distinct of our annual bonus program) — to bolster our efforts to ensure our products and services are accessible to the people who need them," she said. "This requires making a few small sacrifices, but why wouldn't we do that?

You're a Nazi if you want to get paid.

<comment><USER21> Ok, that's enough. We've banned this account for doing flamewar on HN and ignoring our requests to stop.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)</comment></comment>


Show HN: Create your own 2015 Year in Review - <AUTHOR> https://myyear.co/ <comment><USER2> The website is a bit broken on my iPhone 6S running Safari. Congrats for your project it is cool.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks Richard. Mobile has a couple of unexpected issues, thanks for the heads up we'll look into this for the next release :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Are there any examples that we can take a look at?

<comment><USER4> Feel free to take a look at mine - [https://myyear.co/@mikeaag/2015](https://myyear.co/@mikeaag/2015) :D</comment></comment>


Why Microsoft should concentrate on the post touch devices? - <AUTHOR> http://microreviews.org/why-microsoft-should-concentrate-on-the-post-touch-devices/

<comment><USER2> Interesting read. Is Microsoft listening? Is this writer the next Robert Scoble.

<comment><USER3> nice.. Post touch devices. Now that adds a new dimension.

<comment><USER4> I am not sure if people with move away from touch for random gestures. Touch seems more controllable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Microsoft will soon screw. Don't worry mate.</comment>


Middle name initials enhance evaluations of intellectual performance (2014) - <AUTHOR> https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ejsp.2026 <comment><USER2> My grandfather, born with no middle name, was urged by his colleagues to fabricate one because he needed a middle initial for appearance's sake in his field. Everyone used their middle initial in communications. And besides, you couldn't have a monogram without three initials.

His first name was Alexander, and being a modest man, he settled on a middle initial of "G," which he joked stood for "the Great." Apparently it worked for him. I'm not sure if it was a legal name change but he used it for the rest of his life.

<comment><USER3> In the US, generally speaking, you are free to just start using a new name. I did the opposite, dropping my middle name wherever possible and it has only come up once. I even got my current passport issued without my middle name by accident. (I forgot to put my middle name on the application and it was never questioned.)

<comment><USER4> I've been asked about why my boarding pass didn't have the same name as my passport once, back when I didn't put a middle name. I'm from France where we traditionally have 3 first names: <actual first name> <godmother|father's first name> <grandmother|father's first name> (at least that's how I was named). For paperwork purposes in the US I had to make up a middle name so I use my second and third names. Say Albert Bernard Charles Dupont would be: "Albert" "Bernard Charles" "Dupont". This way it's also consistent with my passport.

I also don't put my name's accent in most computer systems in the US (é). I have it on Linkedin though, and it trips a surprising amount of automated recruiting emails.

<comment><USER5> > I'm from France where we traditionally have 3 first names: <actual first > name> <godmother|father's first name> <grandmother|father's first name> (at > least that's how I was named).

as a french... euh quoi ?

<comment><USER6> Having multiple middle names is common in France. It doesn't mean that all French do it, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> When I read the names of the authors - "Wijnand A. P. van Tilburg Eric R. Igou" \- I was immediately impressed.

<comment><USER8> People who criticize the study because it's based on students in one university don't understand that the study is also a meta level demonstration of the effect. They passed the peer review.

I'm in awe.

Other study from them:

Igou, E. R., & Van Tilburg, W. A. P. (2015). Ahead of others in the authorship order: Names with middle initials appear earlier in author lists of academic articles in psychology. Frontiers in Psychology, 6. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00469

[https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.0046...](https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.00469/full)

<comment><USER9> There's a simple confounding reason for this. The earlier authors are in the author list, the more likely they are to be actively contributing. If there's a sparse contributor who doesn't respond, who has many papers already, or who is not actively involved in the final read-throughs, they will likely be somewhere in the middle of the author list and may miss that their middle initial is not correct. In contrast, if you are a first author, you will make damned sure your exact precise name is there, as your impact factor and future success hinges on the total number of papers you have.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The ultimate smartguy does first initial, middle name, especially when the middle name is obscure. You also avoid sounding like a serial killer in the wrong context.

J. Ulyssses Smith is obviously much smarter than a run of the mill John Smith. John U. Smith sounds like a guy who is "quiet and keeps to himself".

<comment><USER11> J. Ulyssses Smith doesn't "look" quite as smart as J. Ulysses Smith however...

<comment><USER10> Nice catch! Then again, spelling names wrong is trendy!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Standout claim from the paper:

> Moreover, people with initials carrying a positive meaning (e.g., H. U. G.) > _live_ longer compared with those with initials carrying a negative meaning > (e.g., M. A. D.; Christenfeld, Phillips, & Glynn, 1999).

(Emphasis the authors)

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10576473](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10576473)

<comment><USER13> My initials are N.A., where does that leave me?

<comment><USER14> in the gaming community, the NA zone is pretty cancer

<comment><USER15> So are the gaming community's memes, especially outside the gaming community.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> How about people with non-breaking spaces in their name, how do they fare in life?

Tech support: "Was that John Doe?"

JD: "No, I said John Doe!"

<comment><USER17> Irish surnames with apostrophes are beloved by databases everywhere.

Here in Uruguay there are countless examples of immigrants that had to change their first or last name due to them being hard to write for immigration officials.

My grandparent went from Hermann to "German". We surprisingly kept the last name intact (most were botched on the translation to Spanish).

<comment><USER18> > Irish surnames with apostrophes are beloved by databases everywhere.

One of my co-devs changed his name on the internal system like that, just so he'd break anything he was working on before a client did.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> yoz-y They should add "in tests conducted exclusively on university students" in there.

</comment><comment><USER19> so like Wile E. Coyote, Genius?

Also can't ignore that this is on a domain wiley.com hahaha

</comment><comment><USER20> It has me wondering immediately about specific possiblecounter examples. Would it have that "prestige" effect for more unusual names like say Moon U. Zappa. Obviously fake or unfortunate names probably wouldn't benefit like Isaac P. Daily.

</comment><comment><USER21> Does it increase with more middle names? Like Charles P. A. George?

</comment><comment><USER22> The five studies they base their conclusions on were conducted on students at the University of Limerick, the University of Limerick, the University of Limerick, the University of Limerick and the University of Limerick.

We conclude that middle name initials are a big deal around the University of Limerick campus.

<comment><USER23> So, a slightly narrower scope than the usual psychology study.

<comment><USER24> This actually seems more comprehensive than most. They tested multiple times!

There is a pretty decent episode of Freakonomics Radio around how reproducible (or not) many psychological studies are. I know this is an issue for most studies, but Psychology seems to be in a league of their own with the "reproduction rate".

<comment><USER25> > how reproducible (or not) many psychological studies are.

Combine small effect size with a complete lack of understanding of statistics and you can be fairly sure that most psychological studies' conclusions are borderline junk level.

<comment><USER26> It has little to do with statistical understanding.

All psych students are required to study stats, and review the study design before starting.

It has everything to with a more systemic problem - publish or perish.

Students and professors alike are basically forced to run new studies. Conducting psych studies takes a lot of money and time because you're dealing with people. And that money and time isn't always available - so your standards drop a lot so you can just graduate or keep researching.

<comment><USER27> This.

And so far my experience is that most (but definitely not all) psych student are usually choosing psych over STEM due to their repulsion of math, physics and 'anything number'.

They see stats as an 'unfortunate exam they need to get through to pass' so they aim for a barley passing grade in order to focus on other areas they are more interested in. When they are pressured into publishing something the stats part is once again seen as "the impossibly complex part they need help with to be able to publish their interesting findings".

They have guidelines such as "p must be <= 0.05" so they try to mess with the data until they reach that point. Usually, most of the paper (including the conclusion) is already written so stats are considered to be the last administrative bruden to get trough to be able to publish.

<comment><USER28> I think this is an unfair stereotype. Psychology is really hard, the system you are studying is many times more complex than many other fields. I am going to have to ask for the source on that last paragraph too, that's basically slandering the whole field as not doing actual science.

<comment><USER29> > Psychology is really hard, the system you are studying is many times more > complex than many other fields.

If that's true though, then the mathematical rigor that should be demanded from its students must be higher than in other fields in order to achieve the same level of reliability. I doubt that is the case today.

<comment><USER28> The gp is basically saying psychologists can't get the math right because most don't like math and are just playing house to get publications. I am saying many do appreciate good statistics and go to bed worrying about it at night, and the lack of general reproducibility has more to do with the complexity of the field.

In most cases you have to find and convince a statistically representative sample to participate, and that's so expensive and hard enough to often not be done completely, without having to consider that a statistically representative sample of individuals for many psychological phenomena is an impossible task.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> That's great, now I need a middle name. Any good suggestions?

<comment><USER31> Just take an initial letter, as in Rembrandt Q Einstein, or Homer J Simpson.

I use my middle initial (see my username) because there are plenty of Andrew Martins in these circles.

<comment><USER32> Be honest: you're just hunting for a little more Irish cred.

<comment><USER33> For more Irish cred, one can of course include an apostrophe as well as the other means mentioned elsewhere in this discussion. Verilog is quite useful in this regard, because of the way that one writes hexadecimal constants.

John 003'hdeadface Smith. Known as "six" to his friends.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> So is it JUST the initials? Or would the actual middle name serve the same effect I wonder.

<comment><USER35> I'm half joking half serious with this: that might subconsciously cause people to associate you with serial killers. For whatever reason, serial killers are frequently referred to by their complete name.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I commonly use my middle initial, not to be pretentious, but because there are so many people who have the same first and last name as me. I expect within a smaller pool of names (a culturally distinct region), or in the global space, that's why most people use them.

</comment><comment><USER37> Authors: Wijnand A. P. van Tilburg & Eric R. Igou

</comment><comment><USER38> Good thing I have a first name, a middle name and two surnames. That makes me a prodigy.

<comment><USER16> That depends on how you contract your name in research papers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> About a year ago, I read this and added my initial to linkedin. You won't believe what happened next.

</comment><comment><USER40> Middle names (and initials) are ubiquitous in North America. Not so in the British Isles, OZ and NZ.

</comment><comment><USER41> Alfred E. Newman, my hero!</comment>


Op-Ed from 2011: In defense of plastic bags - <AUTHOR> https://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2011/12/22/defense-plastic-bag <comment><AUTHOR> Posted this because it brought up an interesting math question. It alleges "To ensure that they have lower global warming potential than conventional HDPE plastic bags" the following re-usable bags need to be reused x number of times:

-Paper bags: 3 times -LDPE (low density poly ethelyene) bags: 4 times -Non-woven PP (poly proplyene) bags: 11 times -Cotton bags: 131 times

The op-ed says that number has to be multiplied for every time a plastic bag is re-used for say, picking up dog crap, or as a bathroom trash bag.

Thoughts?</comment>


HopFS: Scaling hierarchical file system metadata using NewSQL databases - <AUTHOR> https://blog.acolyer.org/2017/03/06/hopfs-scaling-hierarchical-file-system-metadata-using-newsql-databases/ <comment> rwx</comment><comment> Interesting approach. Google colossus file system also stores the metadata in a high performance key value store.

<comment><USER2> But their key-value store is not transactional. Afaik, they don't define the semantics of operations like 'mv' across cells. Higher level frameworks like Spanner/BigTable work around that limitation - but are forced to present data in tabular format. HopsFS allows to to treat them as files.

Disclaimer: i'm a co-author.</comment></comment>


Standing on the outside looking in: X-rays through glass - <AUTHOR> https://physicsworld.com/a/standing-on-the-outside-looking-in-x-rays-through-glass/ <comment><USER2> Would most hospital doors/windows be using actual glass, or probably plexiglass/polycarbonate?

Interesting that they said the intensity was reduced by half, but the beam energy was increased.

By the way, I know dental x-rays (bite wing?) are now often done with USB- connected CCDs in plastic encapsulation, so the dentist can see the image immediately. Are full body / large x-rays still film? I would guess the digital sensor still can't get that big.

<comment><USER3> From personal experience, most large x-rays are now digital. It's faster than developing film, and it's easier to transmit to different doctors (ex: x-ray in an ER, and the analysis is done by a specialist in a different hospital). Here's a Wiki article that covers the sensors: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat- panel_detector](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat-panel_detector)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > _By the way, in case you are curious about the origin of the first part of > the headline for this article, it comes from Cold Chisel's song "Standing on > the outside", which appears in the Australian band's 1980 album called > East._

The moment I saw this title I thought there must be an Australian connection; this is one of the most iconic Australian rock songs of all, and is instantly recognisable by that opening lyric.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAUpuYBoeso](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DAUpuYBoeso)</comment>


Dutch spies helped Britain's GCHQ break Argentine crypto during Falklands War - <AUTHOR> https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/05/18/maximator_euro_spy_alliance_falklands_war/ <comment><USER2> The Dutch have an absolutely amazing intelligence apparatus.

In 2014 AIVD hacked the office network of Russia's APT29, and maintained access at least through the 2016 DNC hack. The best part was they also had access to the security cameras and were able to watch the attacks in real time.

<comment><USER3> They can't be that good if you happen to know this and be writing about it on the internet.

<comment><USER4> In general, in the spyworld you do not talk about your tricks. But if you've already been found out, and your tricks no longer work, there is still political advantage to be had (damage your adversary, obtain credit from partners, obtain funding, easier recrutement).

[https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2018/01/dutch...](https://arstechnica.com/information- technology/2018/01/dutch-intelligence-hacked-video-cameras-in-office-of- russians-who-hacked-dnc/)

<comment><USER5> Or if you just want to claim it to damage your adversary, whether they have the unit you supposedly hacked and it does what you say it does, or not...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> As a citizen, I am not okay with this degree of intra-sovereign surveillance. If I am to live in, pay taxes, and otherwise contribute to a society, I want to be free of surveillance and subterfuge within that society - my states laws, designed to protect me from thugs and mafia (a very real threat), should not be thwarted by military industrial mafia hell-bent on exerting control over sovereign states, in spite of my desires as a citizen.

The trouble is, I see no way forward for citizens of the 5-eyes states to address this issue, other than either a) revolution to uncover and dissolve the control networks that have been covertly put in place, or b) sedition - leaving the state, and not contributing (taxes) to its continued economic development.

As we have seen with Wikileaks and Julian Assange, its not enough to just reveal the covert secrets that underpin this inner state-within-a-state - there have to be actual repercussions for those involved, and this isn't happening at any rate near well enough for my needs.

So, it appears that sedition is the only option - and indeed, that is what I have done: I no longer participate in the economies of any of the 5-eyes states, directly, and I"m about to give up my citizenship in my birth nation over the issue.

But we know this isn't a solution. Do we have to start a brain-drain revolution which moves the economic power of an intelligent class from state to state? Or, do we just let mother nature do its thing, and 'hope' that things will 'change' in the 5-eyes super-state somehow? Too many people I trust and respect in the crypto-anarchist sphere are responding to this appeal with "well, covid-19 will sort it out" for my liking .. but what other options are there, really? Journalism is utterly dead and decrepit in the West, this is not an avenue. Violent revolution makes no sense whatsoever. So, brain- drain it is ...

<comment><USER7> I don't follow. The article is about one state spying on the internal communications of another state, while they were at war.

<comment><USER6> The subtext is one state using another states spying activities in order to gain an advantage in its own war against a third state, and is presented in a way that seems designed to popularise the idea of surveillance economies exchanging with one another, without civilian oversight.

I don't think this is a good thing. We have seen that the USA has, essentially, co=opted the intelligence-gathering communities of the peer states in its coalition - and only seems to be 'acceptable' because its being done by 'our side'. But I think the state issue is such a large problem that such circumstances can only lead to further catastrophes in the future, when these extra-sovereign entities, not bounded by any local state laws, decide that they need to justify their continued existence by exerting that covert power in order to create conditions conducive to the prosperity of the secret apparatus, itself.

Are Australians okay with not being spied on by their own intelligence agencies, while being spied on by the CIA, which then shares that information with Australian spy agencies as an extra-sovereign economic exchange? Perhaps they are - but I hope this is not the case elsewhere in the 5-eyes world.

What it indicates to me is that we civilians will always have to work hard to get ahead of the military sovereign and lessen the dependencies they put in place to continually justify their existence - i.e. we need to make peace faster than they can make war. Would that we had another Lennon around to assist that process...

<comment><USER8> Argentina invaded the Falklands here.

<comment><USER9> Yes, this was no clear cut case of war. Argentina got invaded.

<comment><USER10> Er, no - Argentina invaded first; the islands were British from colonization onwards.

<comment><USER11> First the Dutch, then the Spanish, who got kicked out by the British around the Argentine independence.

Most of the time that the islands were inhabited the people that lived there were British.

While the Spanish hold no colonies in South America anymore, the British do.

The Argentines would have been the logical successors to the Spanish and Britain invaded Argentina as well.

It's hard to find the good guys in this story but it would be really hard to the people that currently live on the islands to become part of Argentina

<comment><USER12> If the island were heavily populated prior to colonization, or even filled with Argentinians, it would make sense. But it was uninhabited before colonization, and they voted 96% in favor remaining a colony in 1986. The UK actually attempted to transfer the island to Argentina twice in the 20th century, but stopped because the Falkland islanders themselves _hated_ the idea.

I think it's pretty hard to argue that Argentina did anything but invade here, not liberate, given the disposition of the actual people who live there.

<comment><USER11> > But it was uninhabited before colonization

It was uninhabited before the French and Brits settled there, but soon the French and later the Brits were replaced with Spanish settlers. It had been a Spanish colony for decades before the British invaded and kicked the Spanish settlers out. Of course replacing the original inhabitants with you own works, it's the oldest trick in the book.

> the Falkland islanders themselves hated the idea.

Well apart from nationalism and resentment after the invasion joining Argentina is also a bad move in economic terms because it has a severe crisis every other decade.

I don't think you can ask them to join a country that does such a poor job managing itself and Argentina should focus on economic and legal stability before talking about it again.

It's not easy, just take a look at Hong Kong.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Link to the actual source:

Maximator: European signals intelligence cooperation, from a Dutch perspective

[https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02684527.2020.1...](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02684527.2020.1743538)

</comment><comment><USER14> Argentina did not have air refueling nor night vision equipment. They sent conscripts to fight gurkhas. Their exocet missiles where sabotaged by the military contractors servicing them. Their neighbors monitored them via radar and notified movements the British.

Many countries were helping with intelligence. Norway helped by stealing Soviet satellite imagery.

And by attacking first they could not invoke the Rio Pact.

<comment><USER15> You're not wrong, but you're somewhat off.

Argentina did have an air to air refuelling capability, and its availability or not was crucial in a number of instances. Likewise, the Gurkhas went out at battalion strength near the end of the war. The exocets weren't so much sabotaged as much as all the French simply returning home leaving the kit unfitted and unconfigured. The stuff that had been set up already was used to great effect.

You're right though that they did not set themselves up for success when they did not make the most of their first mover advantage and build up the island with supplies, equipment, and well trained soldiers rather than conscripts.

At the time, they hoped that domestic events meant that the UK simply wouldn't care is all. They didn't come for a fight.

<comment><USER16> Indeed, I think they just assumed that the UK hadn't the strength nor the will to start a war on the other side of the world just to fight over a barren island.

Ironically, if they had not attacked the Falklands might be Argentinian or under joint sovereignty now because, indeed, no-one really cared about the Falklands. But their actions ended up guaranteeing that the UK would never even discuss the issue for at least a century...

<comment><USER17> The argentinian public didn't care much about Malvinas before 1982 (as we call the falklands here).

Was a desperate last move from the Military Junta to get some approval.

The Argentinian attack worked fine for M. Thatcher popularity, but not so good for them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> "a) revolution to uncover and dissolve the control networks that have been covertly put in place, or b) sedition - leaving the state, and not contributing (taxes) to its continued economic development."

Many have enough power to leverage a) or b), but very few choose to do so. Why?

Because if you somehow manage to disolve the current status quo, you'd need to rebuild a similar status quo, probably with your group deeply plugged into the newest surveillance / society control system.

> ultimatelly you would probably have accomplished very few changes, though > you could obtain more power / money, but

If you're capable / resourceful enough to make happen a) or b), you probably already have lots of power / money.

Therefore, the current status quo works quite well for you, and there are easier ways to change some things (not all of them though), than going right to a revolution.

That's something you can see in most empires through history: very few were intentionally brough down by internal players. Most players just wanted to get in charge (by any means), but they were not fundamentally changing anything in the current social order.

Going against the state was (and it is), almost certainly not the best path of action.

</comment><comment><USER19> Would it have been possible for Argentina to use public encryption algorithms back then, instead of crypto machines weakened by US intelligence? No idea what was available back in the 80s.

<comment><USER20> Take into account that Ultra (breaking of enigma) was only made public in 1970s (or 1960s if you count information about Polish intelligence breaking enigma before WWII). NSA only stopped using similar rotor-based designs in 1980s.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I for one am relieved that after the Bitcoin bubble the "crypto" in headings means cryptography again.</comment>