Higgs in ATLAS, maybe - <AUTHOR> http://resonaances.blogspot.com/2011/04/higgs-at-atlas-maybe.html

<comment><USER2> I can add this blog to the list of things to read when I want to feel stupid. Definitely cool if it turns out to be true.

<comment><USER3> I just chalk it up to the fact that I can't possibly know everything. As long as I'm good at programming and/or business, I'm ok with basking in the glory of science without being an active participant. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Someone care to translate?

<comment><USER5> The LHC's ATLAS detector is finding many pairs of photons with a total energy of 115 GeV. This is usually a sign that the collision produced a 115 GeV particle which decayed into a photon pair. There are suspicions that this particle is the long-predicted Higgs boson, because many models estimate the Higgs' mass at 115 GeV.

However, the percentage of collisions which result in this phenomenon isn't in agreement with any of our current models of how the Higgs boson behaves. It's not certain that the new 115 GeV particle is in fact the Higgs; if it is, the Higgs models will need more revising.

<comment><USER6> This result should be taken with a large chunk of NaCl until the analysis is internally approved by the collaboration and peer reviewed. Although it's been a while since I got my Ph.D. in experimental particle physics, I do remember that di-photon data sets are subject to significant sources of background from a variety of decay processes that produce one photon + a jet of hadrons, 2 jets, a Z boson decaying to electrons etc. Accurately filtering out and estimating the purity of the data sample is crucial, particularly when claiming the discovery of a new particle. My money is on a some combination of a statistical fluctuation, an inaccurately modeled background, or mis- estimated systematic uncertainty that is creating an artificial "bump." I look forward to being proven wrong and hope that ATLAS and CMS discover _something_ so that high-energy physics doesn't go down in the dustbin of history because it's gotten too bloated and expensive to sustain.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I was under the impression the LHC was down until 2012 while some changes were being made.

<comment><USER8> They are analyzing already-gathered data from 2010 and 2011.

<comment><USER6> Yes, but the LHC is actually running at this very moment and will be operational through the end of 2012. CERN opted to run at 7 TeV and put off the shutdown required to increase the energy to 14 TeV. In fact, the LHC just set a world record for beam intensity: [http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2011/PR...](http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2011/PR02.11E.html)</comment></comment></comment>


Timing your meals may help with weight loss. That's what it seems to do in mice - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/timing-your-meals-may-help-with-weight-loss-thats-what-it-seems-to-do-in-mice/2018/03/23/14672fc0-f718-11e7-a9e3-ab18ce41436a_story.html <comment><USER2> Wow there's a lot wrong with this article, but let's go with the low hanging fruit: They're reasoning from a correlated effect in mice to humans, and doing so without asking & then answering a very basic question: "Does human physiology respond the same way to a fast as a mouse's physiology?"

Yes, the mention the existence of studies where TFR had an impact in humans, but because it reduced calorie consumption, not necessarily a global impact on metabolic efficiency. That's throws the "timing" piece well out.

The problem isn't that it's a story about unproven research, the problem is that it's presented as the next weight-loss gimmick, because from the title to the intro, that's how the story is packaged.

This is how science that turns out to be incorrect winds up in the public consciousness, spurring on diet myths and urban legends, for years. Further, it erodes public trust in the scientific process: How many times has popular health media flip flopped on something like this, and a few years later the research is completed or something new comes along to say "Nope, actually egg yolks won't kill you". It undermines credibility of the process to up-sell the positive spin while only paying lip service to the "But we still don't really know" side of things.</comment>


The Power of 'I Don't Know' - <AUTHOR> http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/29/the-power-of-i-dont-know/

<comment><AUTHOR> "It's that implicit I don't know at the heart of Montaigne's essays — his frankness about being a foolish, flawed and biased human being — that she thinks has endeared him to centuries of readers and exasperated more plodding, systematic philosophers."</comment>


Why do Government and State's official websites suck? - <AUTHOR>

If the best coders work for governments, then what about the best designers? I have yet to run into a Government or State official website that looks decent and has a good search feature. <comment><USER2> An official's policy is more important than the way it is presented

</comment><comment><USER3> Who says the best coders work for governments?

</comment><comment><USER4> Three words: design by committee.</comment>


Show HN: Prevent email forgery in Gmail using a Blockchain-powered architecture - <AUTHOR> https://gmelius.com/email-blockchain/ <comment><USER2> What benefit does the anchoring give over just the signing part? Surely the signature is enough to prove that the email is from the expected sender? I feel like this is just an attempt to add Blockchain to an existing system for no benefit to the user.

EDIT: After looking around a bit more, the product appears to be your standard CRM tool (similar to Streak) but with "Blockchain" added to make it look different (but without adding any value).

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi vivan. Thanks for your comment. Besides the signature of an email using the robustness and persistence of the blockchain, what is different with "Email Stamping" and especially interesting for professionals who send sensitive emails (e.g., lawyers, insurers, brokers...) is that they have a way to show they sent an email with a specific content at a specific time.

A decisive challenge raised by today's email dominance in the workplace is that the latter means of communication does not offer a built-in function to prove the integrity and authenticity neither of its content nor of its origin. Knowing that emails are increasingly presented as legal evidence in courts worldwide, it becomes urgent to think of approaches that could palliate the inherent flaws of email.

EDIT: And yes, Gmelius offers a lightweight CRM targeting SMEs that covers all the stages of the modern communication flow: from the first interaction to the potential signature of a contract/quote. Besides, Gmelius offers a shared inbox making possible to follow-up on leads, stay in sync with your team.

<comment><USER3> How does that prove the email was sent, though? Couldn't one timestamp the email into the blockchain, without actually sending the email to the other party?

Edit: btw, I released something that utilizes bitcoin's blockchain for timestamping back in 2013: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5790382](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5790382) (the website is no longer available because better solutions came since, but its up on github[0] and the wayback machine[1])

This has some interesting use-cases, but people tend to overestimate what blockchain timestmaping actually gets you. You can prove that some piece of data existed at some point in time, but that's it. It doesn't prove this data is authentic, that this data was communicated to anyone, that no one else timestamped this data earlier, etc.

[0] [https://github.com/shesek/btproof](https://github.com/shesek/btproof)

[1] [http://web.archive.org/web/20140430152135/https://www.btproo...](http://web.archive.org/web/20140430152135/https://www.btproof.com/)

<comment><AUTHOR> The insertion is only done once we have received a response from Google servers that the email has been indeed sent (without bounce or other errors).

<comment><USER3> So you're acting as a trusted party to get delivery confirmations from Google? What if Google doesn't confirm delivery, but you decide to write to the blockchain anyway?

Also, won't Google servers return a cryptographically verifiable delivery confirmation? If so, couldn't this be used as the delivery proof directly instead?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, we integrate with Gmail and communicate via the official Gmail API.

We only receive response statuses and act accordingly. Moreover, we think it's important for this functionality to make sense to insert the hash corresponding to the integrity of the email, and so make possible for our customers to "prove" they have indeed sent an email with a specific body/subject/...

<comment><USER3> Well, doesn't that mean that the security model is based on you acting as trusted third party and relying on you to only write truthful data to the blockchain?

In other words, the delivery proof is not based on trusting the blockchain mechanics, its based on trusting Gmelius Ltd.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Big red flag:

> The hash of an email is computed using the SHA2-512 hashing algorithm and > signed with our own 512-bit private RSA key.

Why even bother signing it if your key is that weak?

Furthermore, they sign every message individually with the same key. This does not make sense to me: why not just sign the root of the Merkle tree?

Other fun stuff:

\- They both supply email tracking, and protect your privacy by blocking email tracking...

\- It doesn't prove that the email has been sent, it just proves that it has been submitted to Gmelius for signing.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for your comments.

"They both supply email tracking, and protect your privacy by blocking email tracking."

> This is mainly offered to prevent false positives for our own trackers. But > point taken :)

"It doesn't prove that the email has been sent, it just proves that it has been submitted to Gmelius for signing."

> The insertion is done when we have received a response from Google servers.

"SHA-512"

> Long debate but this was the most natural solution for a Merkle > architecture.

<comment><USER4> "The insertion is done when we have received a response from Google servers"

But GMelius is a client-side application, right? According to your whitepaper, the insertion is done when the _client_ receives the response, I don't see anything about validation from the GMelius servers to GMail.

"SHA-512"

It's not the SHA part which is the problem, it's the RSA part. 512-bit RSA is well-known to be broken and there have already been multiple exploits. 2048 bits is the bare minimum anyone should use nowadays.

<comment><AUTHOR> All the logic happens at the back-end level via our API communicating with Gmail's one. Nothing is done on the client-side (i.e., extension) besides the integration of our buttons/features within Gmail's UI.

The RSA key is just used to show that what has been inserted was through our service. Note that the final hash resulting from the mixer is done without any RSA.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Yes, because the killer feature missing from SPF + DKIM + DMARC is "blockchain". <rolls eyes>

Every time I see some new "<reliable tech>, now with Blockchain!" announcement, it just convinces me a little bit more that "blockchain" is still a solution (that very few actually need) searching for a viable problem.</comment>


Woman dies after being hit by electric bike in London - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/sep/12/woman-dies-after-hit-and-run-involving-electric-bike-in-london <comment><USER3> This is clearly a tragedy for the woman and her family. Our thoughts are of course with them first.

reading the article I am wondering why it is news that it is an e-bike and not "just" a bike. This feels like a Telegraph style move for the Guardian, and an odd move (I would have thought ebikes were Gruniads thing)

It would be worth waiting for the coroners report to see if the e-bike made a difference (weight of batteries, collided with the motor instead of 150 lb of cyclist)

For some balance worth looking at figures for deaths by cycle and car - <USER2> below:

(3 pedestrian killed by cycles, 300+ by cars)

That's one a day. Holy moly we should put concrete walls up instead of kerbs.

[https://www.cyclinguk.org/campaigning/views-and- briefings/pe...](https://www.cyclinguk.org/campaigning/views-and- briefings/pedestrians)

</comment><comment><USER4> And previously, a woman was killed by a man on a fixed-gear bicycle: [https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/sep/18/cyclist...](https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/sep/18/cyclist- charlie-alliston-jailed-for-18-months-over-death-of-pedestrian)

And let's not forget that death by automobile is so common as to be a statistic rather than an individual tragedy.</comment>


Patreon can't solve its porn pirate problem - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/patreon-cant-solve-its-porn-pirate-problem/ <comment><USER2> The reality is that there are vile people in the world. When I got into tech, machines were open, and we could do amazing things. That all stopped when the jerks arrived.

We cant's change human nature, and while most people are fine, some are irretrievably bad.

If you create a platform, be prepared for scum to do everything they can to rip you off and stop if from working, just for the lolz.

<comment><USER3> >... some are irretrievably bad.

I wonder sometimes if we're not doomed as a species because of this.</comment></comment>


German Bundeswehr cooperates more closely with European Allies - <AUTHOR> https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/05/22/germany-is-quietly-building-a-european-army-under-its-command/ <comment><USER2> I don't know why anybody would be surprised about this. The threat of Russia to Eastern Europe, the fact that one Western European country has already voted to leave the EU, and having a United States that doesn't seem like a country you can count on is going to lead smaller countries to come closer to Germany as the strongest nation in the region.

<comment><USER3> > having a United States that doesn't seem like a country you can count on

In what way? A Russian attack on Germany or a NATO ally is something the US would definitely go to war over. I know it's popular now to freak out because Trump is president, but nothing has changed in this regard.

<comment><USER4> It could be argued that the US's (lack of) reaction to Russian occupation of Crimea and its lack of involvement in the situation between Russia and Turkey has eroded the guarantee that NATO is supposed to provide.

<comment><USER5> Neither the Ukraine nor Turkey are NATO members and have no bearing on the NATO guarantee.

<comment><USER6> Turkey is very definitely a NATO member, and has been since 1952.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > "Gaps" in the Bundeswehr is an understatement. In 1989, the West German > government spent 2.7 percent of GDP on defense, but by 2000 spending had > dropped to 1.4 percent

One man's gap is another's peace dividend. 0% should be the standard to judge against, and the unfortunate necessity to go above that shouldn't be mistaken for anything but a giant drain of productivity that could be spent on almost anything else with better results.

I also don't get how military spending is indexed to GDP. Surely what matters first is the actual power of an alliance's militaries compared to realistic threats. Only then could GDP be a useful yardstick to distribute the burdens among the members of that alliance.

In the specific case, it's a completely rational decision to lower investments in Europe considering the US continues to fund its military at levels that can only be explained by some sort of chauvinist fascination with guns, bombs, and golden toilet seats. It's even beneficial for the US if Europe instead invests in soft-power resources, something that has actually happened since 1990.

<comment><USER8> It's easy to hate on the military industrial complex, but it's hard to deny the positive technologies borne from military r&d. Microwave ovens, space ships, the internet, Tor, GPS, canned food...

<comment><USER7> You'd be hard pressed to spend $600,000,000,000 per year, or $1,200,000,000,000,000 since WW2, and not come up with a few ideas in the process.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think in 10-20 years we could see something like an European Union army. Some countries will opt-out (Ireland? Sweden? Austria?) but the main internal opposition (the UK) is not an issue anymore.

<comment><USER10> I wonder if this will make countries more or less likely to stay in the EU. I would lean towards "more" because they probably wouldn't want to be on EU's bad side in the future. Tough luck for UK, I suppose.

<comment><USER4> It wouldn't be the first time the UK has stood alone against a Europe united.

It would be interesting to see the UK build a closer relationship with the Commonwealth, instead of doing so with the EU.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> So the article says: "For every federalist in Brussels who thinks a common defense force is what Europe needs to boost its standing in the world, there are those in London and elsewhere who recoil at the notion of a potential NATO rival."

The question I have is if 'elsewhere' is as irrelevant to a EU politician as London is?

<comment><USER7> Since only NATO countries seem to be in a position to "recoil at the notion of a potential NATO rival", the "elsewhere" probably does include a fair number of EU politicians, including Germans. I believe "rival" isn't meant in the sense of a potential armed conflict between the EU and NATO (which would be ridiculous), but simply as competition for mindshare and organisational resources.

<comment><USER11> I guess my interpretations was -

For every federalist with a say in what the EU needs to do about a common defense force there is a federalist without any say in that or a federalist from somewhere unnamed who may or may not have a say in that.

I mean I understand that the somewhere unnamed federalist may in fact be someone who has a say in the matter in some way, but if that is what one is trying to say why lead off with an example named federalist that doesn't have any say.

Also a non NATO member might recoil at a potential NATO rival if they feel they can exploit some weakness in NATO and fear the rival would not have the same weakness.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> An European army, especially nowadays, won't work without finalizing all the rules. If a far-right government wins in a EU country, will the army be used to bring the country under liberal control?

</comment><comment><USER13> Interesting to read this on a non-german page as a german... o_0

<comment><USER14> Why?

<comment><USER15> It wasn't really in the news here in Germany. But I think it's a great step towards a more unified Europe.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Title sounds a bit too clickbaity IMO, but I guess who would want to read an article titled "German Bundeswehr cooperates more closely with European Allies".

<comment><USER17> Let's try it.</comment></comment>


Distilling the Wisdom of the Crowds into App Store Success - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/user-camp/distilling-the-wisdom-of-the-crowds-into-app-store-success-e96962271849 <comment><USER2> Missing context - apparently the guy being interviewed sold all his Windows apps, including this WiFi thing, to the people who are interviewing him. With whooping 17 reviews in Windows Store I'm not sure this is anywhere as notable as they are trying to make it look like.

[https://mobile.twitter.com/HelgeKeck/status/9444279856203571...](https://mobile.twitter.com/HelgeKeck/status/944427985620357120)

<comment><USER3> It was a nice read but the developer specifically says he works by "feeling", and that makes the headline irrelevant.

 _For important decisions, I wait for one of those moments where you forget everything else around you, and I wait until i have a good feeling about it. Sometimes this happens when I'm in a cafe or restaurant, sitting in front of my laptop, not moving for a very long time. It must be very funny, or irritating, for other people to see that._

So, not much to learn here for me how to succeed in the microsoft app store. One guy with feelings about important decisions. Good for him!</comment></comment>


Why are stoves flat? - <AUTHOR> http://lukeqsee.posterous.com/why-are-stoves-flat

<comment><USER2> This guy evidently has never cleaned an oven; it would be a nightmare to clean the "holes" he suggests.

</comment><comment><USER3> I do like the idea of a pan fitted to it's heating coils. If these two things were designed together, you actually could get the same temperature everywhere.

</comment><comment><USER4> Or, switch to inductive heating.</comment>


Swedish Pirate Party Fails To Enter Parliament - <AUTHOR> http://torrentfreak.com/swedish-pirate-party-fails-to-enter-parliament-100919

<comment><USER2> The Pirate Party lost my vote because they focused more on antics than politics; i.e. that they would host the piratebay and wikileaks from within the parliament.

The Pirate Party has alienated those who supported them not because they want to legalize filesharing, but because they had a strong stance on personal integrity, privacy and so forth.

They've lost their focus, and with it their credibility, I'm sorry to say.

</comment><comment><USER3> While at first sight it would suggest less people support the party now compared to last year, you've got to remember that fringe groups like the Pirate Party often do better in EU elections than they do in national elections, which has a substantially higher turnout of mainstream voters.

</comment><comment><USER4> Sadly enough they didn't while the xenophobic party did...

<comment><USER5> The party has a very clear highly racist agenda and yet they received upwards of 20% in some regions. It's quite depressing that people would give up their privacy in favor of "not having that foreigner in the neighborhood".

<comment><USER6> The interesting thing is that the places where they got a lot of votes hardly have any immigrants at all - it's a splendid example of being afraid of the unknown and how that fear is used by extremists.

<comment><USER7> The same was true in the Netherlands, the party of Geert Wilders (with an unrealistic, but popular, national/socialist program, with elements from both far-right and far-left) received the most votes in places with the most homogeneous population, where there are almost no immigrants. In places with the most immigrants the socialists and progressives won. Interesting fact: The day _after_ the elections Wilders dropped most of the left side of his election program.

This makes me wonder if "voting" is actually any good, is it really "democratic"? Maybe if a vote was actually an informed choice, but most people just go with whomever is the most popular or promises them the moon on a stick. Realism, reason, legality, etc does not matter. Perhaps "voting" is not democratic at all if the people are basically ignorant, shortsighted, easily swayed by (the illusion of) popularity, fearful, during times of uncertainty and with many doubts about the future; We already see a kind of political aristocracy in most western democracies, the sons of presidents becoming presidents. Maybe that a demarchy would have been a better idea?

[demarchy]: Democracy without voting, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demarchy></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Computational Fairy Tales - <AUTHOR> http://computationaltales.blogspot.com/p/posts-by-topic.html <comment><USER2> Some of these stories are really enjoyable. They remind me of the tales told by the Young Lady's Primer in Neal Stephenson's "The Diamond Age". I wonder how plausible it would be to write an entire book with a long and colourful tale of wizards and dragons, only to end, "and now you're a computer scientist!"

<comment><USER3> My thoughts immediately went to Stephenson. Quite a good job by the blogger. Nell, in the primer, is able to eventually delve deeper into more technically dry and intensive material. In your FAQ you mention the site is only meant to cover topics at a higher level of understanding. In the long term it would be interesting (although undoubtedly difficult, and perhaps even against the writer's intent) to try this story telling at a more technically intense level.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nothing about recursion? :(.

"Gödel, Escher, Bach" has some nice stories about it.</comment>


The Best Custom Entries to Use in Your Contest for Huge Growth - <AUTHOR> http://vyper.io/blog/best-custom-entries-use-contest-huge-growth/ <comment><AUTHOR> Good project.</comment>


Atari Is Jumping on the Crypto Bandwagon - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-02-15/pac-man-video-game-maker-atari-is-now-a-cryptocurrency-play <comment><USER2> So, reasonably honest question (i.e., save the generic blockchain sarcasm for the many other posts that will presumably be made here), does anyone know what the game plan is for these companies? They have tokens, OK, great, but then what? Are we supposed to buy them? Are we supposed to accumulate them in some manner and trade them for something else? Are we supposed to accumulate them in some manner and sell them? So Kodak is starting a blockchain to "pay photographers", but does anyone have any details beyond that? If someone's buying them, who, and why? How do I get a blockchain entry for a photograph? How does that do anything?

I'm not asking for the really obvious sarcasm, so please only post "they have no idea" if you've got decent evidence that they really do have no idea. I presume they have _some_ sort of vision as to how these are going to do something. If they merely have a bad or stupid plan, I'm asking for the bad or stupid plan, not sarcasm. (I'm honestly just sort of assuming that none of these plans will do anything that wouldn't work better with a centralized non- blockchain-based infrastructure, but I'm at a loss as to what they even plan to do with their probably-unnecessary blockchain.)

I've done at least a bit of poking at a couple of these things but I can never find a concrete plan. (Including probably at least 15 minutes with Google trying to figure out what Kodak was talking about when they first announced it. Perhaps tech details have emerged since then?)

<comment><USER3> 1.) Get publicity

2.) Sell coins for USD

3.) Hope the SEC doesn't mind

4.) Sell stock (via a secondary offering) for USD

5.) Give USD to executives

6.) Build a cheap MVP to pay photographers or whatever

7.) Give more USD to executives

8.) "We're shutting down photopay because we couldn't get traction. Your coins still exist. Let's pretend they aren't worthless."

9.) Give still more USD to executives to pursue machine learning for squirrels

<comment><USER4> 10.) First squirrel in history gets promoted to Head Of Deep Blockchain Diversity Learning for publicity

11.) Repeat

<comment><USER5> Red or grey?

<comment><USER6> slight OT, but visiting Europe for vacation I found black squirrel to be most beautiful:

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

<comment><USER7> I was visiting Mozart's grave in a Viennese graveyard (also the resting place of Strauss) and managed to see a Red, Gray, and Black squirrel all within the space of an hour.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This article stumbles right out of the gate. "Atari SA -- perhaps best known for 1980s video-games 'Pac-Man' and 'Space Invaders' \-- is now jumping on the cryptocurrency bandwagon." Those games were created Namco and Taito, respectively. They were household titles well before Atari ported them to the 2600.

<comment><USER9> To be fair, Atari SA isn't known for anything either. They just bought a well known brand name. Even if they had listed actual Atari titles, you could make the same criticism. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I wish journalists would publish headlines like this and Kodak's recent adventure as "The company that currently has the rights to the name [Whatever Past Beloved Consumer Brand] is [Doing Whatever]"

It would be a lot clearer.

</comment><comment><USER11> I wonder what the throughput is on an Atari 2600 trying to mine Bitcoin. Probably going to need the Supercharger cart.

<comment><USER8> I'll take your question seriously and provide this story of an 1985 NES attempting to mine. ([http://retrominer.com/](http://retrominer.com/))

<comment><USER12> > For the portions of computing that do not happen on the NES, I've got a > raspberry pi housed in a Makerbot Replicator2 3D printed case.

Shenanigans.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> If you treat each token issued by companies, the total number of them to equal the stock market that is the multitude of stocks available. Then it do not appear too strange. Already more than 1000 tokens in the market now according to [http://coinmarketcap.com](http://coinmarketcap.com) and [https://www.coingecko.com/en](https://www.coingecko.com/en) at current pace we are going we will see 20000 tokens or coins, with people trading back fourth with some value put to them

</comment><comment><USER14> Considering Atari seems really into making free to play in app purchase style apps these days that completely ruin a great franchise (see roller coaster tycoon), using coins as an in game currency does make sense.

</comment><comment><USER15> Time to short Atari?

<comment><USER16> Seriously, companies have had "buy X coins for $Y" since, well, forever. But the most blatant one is arcades. Making the tokens digital and on a decentralized trustless ledger? for some reason is not innovative at all, and I highly doubt Atari is interested in developing a decentralized minable gaming token cryptocurrency. They are just using a buzzword that makes people with money shit their pants to implement something that has existed since before currency itself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Plan to buy some.

</comment><comment><USER18> Can we return the word "crypto" to its proper usage, for encryption? Then we can come up with a new term for cryptocurrencies.

I suggest "tulips."

<comment><USER19> I am totally with you on this, but I'm afraid that ship has sailed. Languages are dynamic, blah, blah, blah. I'm just going to go back to ranting about the proper use of "couldn't care less".

<comment><USER20> The word "crypto" has been literally decimated, and I could care less.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How to break into banking with CS? - <AUTHOR>

	Background: I'm a Junior in pursuing a B.S. in CS @ a top CS school. I've previously interned at a startup in SV and also a large well-known company in SV. This year, I interviewed for two top investment banks but only for technology internship positions (software development basically). To me, the startup culture is becoming rather mundane - the banking lifestyle seems appealing (thought it always has). I've been investing for a number of years, and have written some automated trading algorithms, and I've realized that I might want to make a career out of this. I'm confident I have the skills and dedication to make it in business.<p>So, to any engineers/people in finance: how did/do you break into banking as a CS major? (And yes, I know how much HN hates bankers.) <comment><USER2> Do bulge bracket banks recruit at your school? If yes, then obviously through your school recruiting system is the best way. At Yale, 90% of my friends are going into banking. I'm sticking with tech (though I did interview with some banks), but my roommate's dad is a career advisor at the management school, so I know about this. For us, the way it works is that all the big banks have info sessions. You go to those, talk to the presenters during the "networking session," secure a business card, send a follow up email, and then probably get an interview. At that point it's up to you to impress them with your interview prep.

If they don't recruit at your school, it's going to be much tougher for you from what I've heard. Definitely get in touch with a recruiter. The key is to give them a reason to pull your résumé off the stack. "I know this guy! He emailed me!" will usually help.

Email me for recruiting contacts. (See profile)

p.s. I assume this is for a Summer Internship. If so, you're asking at the perfect time, as recruiting is happening now (résumé drop deadline Jan 15) and interviews in January (shortly after Jan 15). If this is for full time, you're probably screwed because all the big banks have filled their entry level positions for this cycle.

p.p.s. Guy who posted below me is hellbanned, but yeah, definitely check out wallstreetoasis.com if you haven't already. But honestly that place seems littered with the same kind of dregs of the social ladder that infest college confidential...

</comment><comment><USER3> Talk to a recruiter. Banks are large and slow-moving, and have procedures and policies; someone with experience sending candidates to the same bank will do better than you could on your own.

It's probably also much easier to get a position aligned with your degree initially, and then move horizontally within that bank, than to get a position you're less qualified for off the bat.

<comment><AUTHOR> Any idea how easy it is to transfer positions within a i-bank?

It seems that the path for an analyst is pretty set, from summer internship to analyst to b-school to associate and onwards. Call me naive, but have I missed out by not studying humanities/finance-related majors?</comment></comment>


Cracking the problem of online identification - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-29323352

<comment><USER2> Has anyone heard of [https://keybase.io](https://keybase.io) ? In my perception it does the same thing...</comment>


Benefit of Microbiota Transfer Therapy on autism symptoms and gut microbiota - <AUTHOR> https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-42183-0 <comment><USER3> (1) This isn't Nature, it's SciRep. Don't get distracted by the URL.

(2) Nature is an extremely high impact factor journal. However, it's ... not really a medical journal. Nor a psych journal. Nor a developmental peds journal. It's a basic sciences journal. What I mean to say is, even if this were Nature, it'd be a super high-impact journal that isn't actually read by clinicians who would be best positioned to criticize the study.

(2a) For instance, their bowel transfer prep involved a clean-out with a two week course of vanco. The only bowel bugs it's used for are c. diff colitis and staph aureus enterocolitis. The reason it's really only used for that is because it really doesn't touch any other common bowel inhabitants. It's useful for those because it doesn't absorbed very effectively, so if you've got C Diff sitting in the bowel lumen, great, send a wash of vanco down the pipe. But, uh, for any other bugs in the gut? It's not even second line. So, how weird that it would be used to knock out pre-existing gut flora and "suppress pathogenic bacteria." C Diff and MRSA are not the leading pathogenic gut bacteria. The pre-existing flora are predominantly anaerobes.

(3) An unblinded, uncontrolled trial of a disease whose symptoms are highly subjective in measure? Excellent. I'm sure they took measures to ensure they weren't influenced in their subjective analys-

(3a) Oh. The senior author has a bunch of patents out trying to commercialize probiotics for autism.

(3b) Oh, they used the PGI3, CARS, SRS, and ABC scores. I guess if you fill out enough bubbles you can overcome the fact that those are still subjective enough that they're shit for an open-label trial. Whoops.

I don't mean to be overly dismissive. It's a fine pilot. The results are interesting enough that I'd want to see a real study tackle this. My comments are mostly aimed at the prevailing sentiment here taking this at face value.

<comment><USER4> (0) There's no control group. This isn't science.

<comment><USER5> Perhaps this paper is the 'observation of a phenomenon' which may lead (or has lead) to the formulation of a hypothesis.

Thus, this paper is saying what the scientific method should test next.

<comment><USER6> That was my impression as well. The tone seemed to be "we turned over a couple rocks and we think we noticed a couple things. We want to share that hike in the Autism woods."

The number of subjects was small. They even added: "We note that due to the open-label nature of this initial trial, all of the assessments are subject to placebo effect..."

<comment><USER7> The problem is that this kind of studies should be discussed only inside medical centers where the next more reliable studies are designed. The discussion with general public degenerates because most people don't understand the difference between a preliminary study and a good clinical study. You will see in a few days a press article in a major newspaper with the title " _Fecal transplant cure definitively autism forever, scientist say_ " and I will cry.

<comment><USER4> This has already happened, and quack doctors are already using this to peddle fecal transplant cures on local autism groups.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I have a very mild form of autism but I would say that I suffer from autism. I'm very sensitive to which environment I can be productive in and I need very clear protocols for human interaction. It's fine for engineering but I want to work more with people too (that's generally how you advance career-wise) and I have big problems knowing when to keep quiet in meetings and what topics for discussion are poor choices, even though I'm close to 30 years old now. If I could just be "normal" I think my life would improve immensely.

I say "I think" because I'm not sure if I would like losing the things that make me "me". A friday night just reading all kinds of odd books to learn new things is totally fine by me right now and even though I have problems regulating my emotions I can now, after decades of coping, channel them into passion to get stuff done. I do however think my childhood would've been much easier if I was somehow treated as a young child; the years of being bullied and not making friends have taken its toll on me, something I struggle with to this day in business settings when I have to deal with unfamiliar people.

<comment><USER9> My story is pretty much the same as yours, but I have an extra ten years on you. I've been able to get it under control (my career is really taking off now at the age of 39) by practicing it like any other skill. Mostly it's the art of omission; I consciously suppress my impulse to interrupt people in meetings and conversation by preparing a response in my head until they finish. This has the effect of making people think of me as a good listener, and also gives me time to cut their argument to shreds if they are spewing nonsense (the old maxim "don't interrupt your enemy while they are making a mistake"). Also, it's good to be thought of as the quiet smart guy. On the topic of inappropriate topics, I just don't say anything that isn't related to work in public conversations. Once you start getting close to people in a company you can usually talk about anything in private. All the "acting normal" can take a toll on you, though.

<comment><USER8> I know I have to get it under control like you, but it's super hard and it looks so effortless for other people. They can just sit there, take in all the nonsense people are spewing with a straight face and then send an email to the appropriate people about it. It takes me all the efforts in the world to do something like that, and it would exhaust me for hours afterwards.

It is easier doing it now at 29 than it was at 19, though. Maybe 10 more years of practice is all I need.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Prior to the study, 83 percent of participants had "severe" autism. Now, only 17 percent are rated as severe, 39 percent as mild or moderate, and incredibly, 44 percent are below the cut-off for mild ASD. [https://newatlas.com/fecal-transplants-autism-symptoms- reduc...](https://newatlas.com/fecal-transplants-autism-symptoms- reduction/59278/)

<comment><USER3> Prior to the 18 patient study of rapidly growing teenagers, with subjective rating scales performed by unblinded investigators, 83 percent of participants had "severe" autism. Now, only 17 percent are rated as severe, 39 percent as mild or moderate, and incredibly, 44 percent are below the cut-off for mild ASD.

Just adding context.

<comment><USER11> How many would have been expected to get cured without any action at all ? (because Autism does mostly resolve itself, either "for real" or because the patients learn to mask it well enough to "not have symptoms")

<comment><USER12> > Autism does mostly resolve itself, either "for real" or because the patients > learn to mask it well enough to "not have symptoms"

Having worked with autistic youth before, that's simply not true. First, autism is not a disorder that can be cured but worked with. Second, it doesn't do it by itself, but _can_ get better, with different approaches, and most of them involve hard and persistent education work. Lastly, the part of the spectrum that can look as if they were "normal" is a rather small proportion of the whole ASD.

<comment><USER11> Ah come on, be fair. Every psychiatric disorder has a pretty high chance of getting resolved without any action from outside. Very few people actually succumb to them.

Furthermore, especially with psychiatric disorders, there is a high percentage of patients that aren't helped, but exactly the opposite, by treatment. That systematically get worse because of treatment.

(I do _not_ claim this is easy or pleasant for the patient, merely that it happens. Furthermore in the more common cases where treatment makes the patient worse it is also _incredibly_ unpleasant, unfair and entirely terrible for the patient)

(and of course you could correctly claim that this is even true for cancer, and it is. However for cancer the percentage of patients that get better without treatment is something like 0.2% up to 4% depending on the cancer, whereas for psychiatric disorders the amount of people that recover without treatment is easily > 90%)

<comment><USER13> Source for any of this? 90% is a number you should be getting from somewhere, and it sounds unbelievably high.

<comment><USER14> I would go even further and call it "dismissively" high.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Gut microbiome diversity has been declining for years in the general population.

Could this be an additional factor (next to better diagnostics) in the increasing prevalence of ASD?

</comment><comment><USER16> when i read this i saw no mention of a control group?

<comment><USER17> But the results are very strong. In the treatment group, almost 1 in 5 patients went from severe autistic symptoms to normal (clear). And almost 2 in 5 patients went from severe to mild.

This begs the question, is any other treatment known to produce such strong results?

<comment><USER16> Given the method of measuring the results I'm not sure we can know anything about how strong the results are without a control group. It seems there is a deal of subjectivity in interpreting the results, and when this is the case crazy stuff can and does happen, regularly.

<comment><USER17> Can you clarify what you are saying about the method of measuring results?

<comment><USER18> The study evaluated the severity of autism symptoms (using subjective questionnaires) before and after the treatment, but didn't compare those results to a control group of people who weren't treated the same way.

It's like finding a couple dozen people with the flu, feeding them chicken soup, and then reporting that a month later they feel healthier, so the soup must have helped. Maybe it did, maybe it didn't, but _you didn 't measure that so you don't know._

<comment><USER17> I asked as an aside to the matter of control group - what is considered "given" about "the method of measurement" ?

According to this professional medical trial, the recorded ASD scores are "based on the Childhood Autism Rating Scale (CARS) rated by a professional evaluator"

You should have specific knowledge of that evaluation in order to criticize it as relying on "subjective questionnaires" and shouldn't introduce doubt by simply stating something as "given".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Maybe offtopic, but reinforces the gut-brain connection: The purported benefits of the ketogenic diet [1] to some epilepsy patients seems to be mediated by the gut bacteria [2].

[1] [https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/treating-seizures-and- epileps...](https://www.epilepsy.com/learn/treating-seizures-and- epilepsy/dietary-therapies/ketogenic-diet)

[2] [https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(18)30520-8](https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674\(18\)30520-8)

<comment><USER15> Also, schizophrenia : [https://bigthink.com/surprising-science/schizophrenias- link-...](https://bigthink.com/surprising-science/schizophrenias-link-to-the- gut)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> I wonder if there's any relation to taking oral antibiotics at a particular age, or mothers taking antibiotics?

<comment><USER21> I very much wonder that too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> I can't help but eyeroll at that dumb trope of people unwilling to accept the genetic link as someone actually autistic but it brings to mind a socratically trolling joke.

"Doesn't this imply that being neurotypical is the actual disease and we have the means to deploy a cure for it?" Not a serious position but one to hopefully get people thinking about norms.

<comment><USER20> > the genetic link

Don't jump to conclusions so quickly.

Things that appear genetic could be related to family traditions that children follow when parents, environmental issues that are common along family lines, bacteria shared among parents and their children, ect.

<comment><USER22> It is more something highlighted by the psychology of popular "theories". There ino consistency in blaming autism on "refrigerator mothers", heavy metals, vaccines, and diet except for what they are not - <USER2> instead of genetic. It is reaching and in a frenzied, hysterical denial like Continuum Magazine ending after all involved died of AIDS complications.

That sort of behavior suggests that they already know the answer is more likely than not genetic but they refuse to accept it because they don't like the implications. There are many things which should have broken said links but haven't - otherwise they would have played out already.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> As my autistic SO said:

> Can't wait to see hysterical autism moms doing home enemas with feces, > hopefully some anti-vaxxers stories as well trying to mitigate having to get > their kid vaccinated for kindergarden.

Not fun for the children, but any case like this would bring it over the top and hopefully create a bigger uproar.

<comment><USER24> It's an improvement on bleach enemas

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> All they needed was some good shit.

Jokes aside there has been plenty of research around insulin spike and how it is dependent on the gut bacteria and food you eat.

</comment><comment><USER26> I've been pondering that the term "anally retentive" to describe a pattern of behaviour (totally unconnected to Autism) associated with strong disgust reflexes might itself be a symptom which happens due to poo retention, orderliness and extreme clensiness which reduces the diversity in gut bacteria.

<comment><USER27> I always figured this was to do with stress levels. More stress = higher muscle tone, more retention and less bowel motion. But yeah, you could be right, I see there could be a feedback there.</comment></comment>


Encrypted database case #1 - <AUTHOR> http://yurichev.com/blog/encrypted_DB_case_1/

<comment><USER2> For those following along at home

        $ echo "yjmxhXUbhB/5MV45chPsXZWAJwIh1S0aD9lFn3XuJMSxJ3/E+UE3hsnH" \
        | openssl enc -d -a -aes-128-cfb -iv 01000000FFFFFFFF79C1690B67C1047D \
        -K CDC57EAD285F6DE1CE8FCC29B121888E | xxd

        0000000: 0d00 fffe 4600 5200 4100 4e00 4b00 4900  ....F.R.A.N.K.I.
        0000010: 4500 2000 4a00 4f00 4800 4e00 5300 0000  E. .J.O.H.N.S...
        0000020: 0000 0020 6640 d407 0601                 ... f@....

</comment><comment><USER3> Really cool writeup, thanks!

I think one key point is a bit shaded in the long discussion -- if you have the key, you've decrypted the message. The rest is just details from a crypto perspective (but again, don't get me wrong, the practice is different and this is a great walk through).

On the IV I also think the description is a bit unclear. IV must be a nonce (i.e. number used only once), and it is public (i.e. known to the attacker in security proofs). It is usually random just because it's likely to expect that many random numbers will always be different.

</comment><comment><USER4> He has a very nice book

[http://beginners.re/](http://beginners.re/)

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm the average coder with no crypto skill that would have copy pasted the Crypto++ example.

I superficially understood what was being done in the article.

What I'm wondering is how hard it is to do that and is this skill-set common ? When I encrypt something I'm only sure that it will (hopefully) stop a script kiddie and be trivial for the NSA, but what about the other possible attackers ?

<comment><USER6> Any attacker above a script kiddie (where they can/want to make money off you) will have someone not as good as Dennis, but with the skill to do what's demonstrated here.

It's not that different from lots of DRM breaks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Here "cracking" should be understood as deciphering while having access to code that deciphers the database.

<comment><USER8> Not only has he the access to the code but he can even run it successfully over the encrypted data he "cracks" which means even without any "cracking," just by starting the program, he regularly produces the "uncracked" data.

Which means he doesn't even need to know how the "decryption" is performed, he just has to intercept the program results at the moment the data are in the decrypted form.

That means that it is effectively irrelevant which algorithm the developer used.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Just a small comment on this: "To my surprise, during decryption, AESENC is executed, while AESDEC is not".

Cipher modes like CTR, CFB use the underlying block cipher as a state update function for a keystream generator. The actual encipher, decipher is done separately. This means that the block cipher is used in the same way for both encipher and decipher.

<comment><USER6> like he says in the next paragraph, yes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> typo: "CFB mode is also use"

<comment><USER11> Thanks, fixed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm guessing this was not written by a native English speaker, so a bit hard to understand in some key ways. Not really being a crypto guy myself, that's just enough to make this hard to follow.

Just to confirm that I'm getting this... basically this is describing steps that might reverse engineer a C#/.net program that uses an embedded encryption key? Yes, a heavily obfuscated program, but the real weakness is that the key that encrypts the data exists within the code?</comment>


Microsoft removed Tor from machines as malware - <AUTHOR> http://business-technology.co.uk/2014/01/microsoft-removed-tor-from-machines-to-stop-botnet/

<comment><USER2> According to Microsoft's own blog post ([http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/01/09/tackling-...](http://blogs.technet.com/b/mmpc/archive/2014/01/09/tackling- the-sefnit-botnet-tor-hazard.aspx)), they specifically removed a non-self- updating version of Tor, which was installed by the Sefnit malware. This version of Tor contained a number of security vulnerabilities which would otherwise be left on the victim's computer. They also consulted Tor developers to plan the cleanup.

</comment><comment><USER3> Other legitimate software often removed or marked as malware:

Port scanners, IRC clients, VNC servers...</comment>


Whatsapp hits one billion users - <AUTHOR> https://blog.whatsapp.com/616/One-billion <comment><USER2> I wonder when WhatsApp will be finally morphed with FB Messenger. I figured it would be about now or soon since it's been growing expoentially

</comment><comment><USER3> accounts != users</comment>


NyanTube - Synchronized video player for you and your friends - <AUTHOR> http://nyan.no.de/

<comment><AUTHOR> I did this small app, just to make my life easier. And I thought that maybe others would need it too.

Sometimes I need to comment some videos with my friends and be sure that we're talking about the same moment - and this is the reason why it was created. But right now we use it on almost every video that we need to watch together - <USER2> it's probably because it's easier to chat in the same window... and synchronization is just an added value.</comment>


You Say Blue, I Say Cerulean - <AUTHOR> http://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/2014/06/10/you-say-blue-i-say-cerulean/chronicles/who-we-were

<comment><USER2> A delightful article. I would also recomend this article:

[http://www.wired.com/2012/06/the-crayola-fication-of-the- wor...](http://www.wired.com/2012/06/the-crayola-fication-of-the-world-how-we- gave-colors-names-and-it-messed-with-our-brains-part-i/)

The crayola-fication of the world: How we gave colors names, and it messed with our brains, Aatish Bhatia, 6/5/12

It is a fascinating discussion of the origins of color words and how our perceptions are, well, colored by them. It also touches on the XKCD color map (search for "XCKD Color Survey Results"), another lovely insight into color names and perceptions.

<comment><USER3> Woohoo! They're using the image I rendered a few years ago of the world color survey chart ([http://www.empiricalzeal.com/wp- content/uploads/2012/06/wcs-...](http://www.empiricalzeal.com/wp- content/uploads/2012/06/wcs-chart-4x.png)), instead of the old photograph everyone used to use ([http://www1.icsi.berkeley.edu/wcs/grid.jpg](http://www1.icsi.berkeley.edu/wcs/grid.jpg)), which was extremely misleading.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Interesting this comes up now, there was a talk at my lab a couple of days ago by Jim Bell of ASU - he is/was responsible for the Pancam payload on MER, i.e. the main stereo cameras. The talk was about colour calibration used on these rovers.

Essentially as Spirit and Opportunity were only designed for a 90 day jaunt, the calibration target wasn't designed to be in use for very long. Over 3000 days later it's covered in dust. However, there's also a white/grey patch that has a ring magnet underneath it. The centre of the magnet is totally clear of dust (which is largely magnetic, lots of Iron on Mars), and is pretty much the cleanest part of the rover as a result. Turns out it's quite useful because as more dust accumulates, we can better simulate the Martian atmosphere. You can see the magnet in the top right, note the centre is still white!

[http://www.hour25online.com/pix/Spirit_dust- comparison_feb05...](http://www.hour25online.com/pix/Spirit_dust- comparison_feb05a_02a.jpg)

MSL Curiosity uses the flight spare from the MER project. It's the thing that looks a bit like a joystick.

[https://planetary.s3.amazonaws.com/assets/images/z_changeove...](https://planetary.s3.amazonaws.com/assets/images/z_changeover/marsdial_msl_sol3_animation_ugordan.gif)

The six rings on the surface are where the new 'sweep' magnets are, you can see some small debris has gotten stuck to them. It looks like they upgraded it a bit and put them on all the colour targets.

This approach is also used for other sensors onboard (UV photodiodes in this case):

[http://www.spaceflight101.com/uploads/6/4/0/6/6406961/977765...](http://www.spaceflight101.com/uploads/6/4/0/6/6406961/9777658_orig.gif)

</comment><comment><USER5> I can't find the article but somewhere I read that a boy was intentionally never told what "color" the sky was. He could see color normally but when asked what color the sky was, he said "Clear."

<comment><USER6> This was probably in the Radiolab episode "colors".

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm amused that the author chose a centuries old color name that's been in relatively frequent written use all that time for the title. The article centers on the history behind huge catalogs number of obscure color names, but he chose one that's not at all obscure. OTOH it's kind of a win because cerulean isn't the generic "blue" most people would think of, so it nicely illustrates the use of distinguishing color names.

<comment><USER8> There was a US TV commercial which tangentially mentioned cerulean blue, intending to characterize a speaker as discriminating or picky. So even though I will now have to consult a reference to know what color it is, the name is burned into my memory.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Worth a mention of xkcd's color survey [1] results [2] with two different shades of cerulean.

[1] [http://blog.xkcd.com/2010/05/03/color-survey- results/](http://blog.xkcd.com/2010/05/03/color-survey-results/)

[2][http://xkcd.com/color/rgb/](http://xkcd.com/color/rgb/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Perhaps a little off topic, but I wonder if the author knew that "Orchid" (alas, minus the subterranean) was indeed an obscure (and amazing) punk rock band?

</comment><comment><USER11> The minute I've heard Cerulean all I can think of was Trillian instant messenger.

<comment><USER12> I think that marks you as a youngster? For me, the word "cerulean" immediately triggers memories of this: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pusher_(The_X- Files)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pusher_\(The_X-Files\))

<comment><USER13> Or, surely, Hennessy Youngman on Poststructuralism...</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: I want to teach computer science. How do I accomplish that? - <AUTHOR>

Hi, I'm Michael Fine, a junior in high school. I program in Haskell, Ruby, and Javascript. I've built a few web applications, and am also working on research into game theory. I really enjoy programming, CS, and teaching others. But I find the computer science education I've received has been horrendous. So, I would like to get my foot in the door of teaching.<p>Should I start as a TA and try to work up in middle/high school classrooms? Try to be a private tutor? Start writing tutorials on basic CS concepts, and hope I learn something from them or they catch on? I have this summer free, as well as space for a 3 hour internship (possibly in a school) during the day next year, and I may take a gap year. What is the best way to accomplish this goal? <comment><USER3> What do you want?

The prestige of being an accredited professor, helping those who really want to learn, a resume bullet or two (had to mention that, please do not take it personally)? Something else?

If I were you, I'd go after the critical age (7th, 8th grade) where life changing learning experiences can happen. Reach out and contact technology teachers or math/science teachers who teach in those grades in your relative geographic area. Tell them you want to help teach - maybe an after school program, maybe private tutoring, leave it open.

I think by just getting out there and teaching you will burst some of the romantic notions of what you think teaching will be like and be left with the salient aspects.

Maybe you have a gift, maybe you will meet a future technical co-founder, good luck!

Don't get hung up on credentialing. And like another poster said - <USER2> to give talks to peers who may be more experienced than you.

Be bold and ask people for help, give!

</comment><comment><USER4> Hi! I'm also in high school with some similar goals to you on teaching people CS. I'm going through my school directly, trying to set up introductory classes, but I imagine that could be pretty different from school to school. Mine's private so they have functionally unlimited discretion on how to arrange their curriculum, particularly their non-core ones.

Also, a big obstacle I've faced with my proposals is the AP Computer Science course. The course is taught in Java which is not great, but the curriculum is definitely not the best even for Java. Being a junior, you may or may not have taken that yet, but that might be a thing to think about.

</comment><comment><USER5> If you want to teach professionally in a formal school setting you are going to need a degree and the appropriate teaching credentials.

There is a lot you can do to start spreading knowledge today. Start with presenting at your local user group. There is always a need for high quality screencasts.

</comment><comment><USER6> Reach out to area colleges, contact the professors and tell them you're interested in offering help. Most profs have office hours where students come in to ask questions, so they might be able to use you to help students.

</comment><comment><USER7> You might try following the lead of Salman Khan: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Khan_(educator)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salman_Khan_\(educator\))

</comment><comment><USER8> I own a startup in menlo park, looking for a web developer. Would love your help! email me, firstname.lastname@example.com for info.

thanks

</comment><comment><USER9> Do you want to teach programming or CS? They are quite different in terms of what they encompass.

</comment><comment><USER10> You will need a teaching degree and a degree in CS to be considered. Have that planned out now.

Private tutoring in any subject will help immensely.</comment>


Ask HN: What skill gave you the most ROI? - <AUTHOR> Hi there HNers!
Summer break is around the corner in the UK. This year, I will have six months of holidays and I want to put the energy to learn specific skill. What skill did you learn that gave you the most ROI over the years and how did you learn it?
Thank you and have a good day! <comment><USER2> Going to go slightly tangential and say cooking. It is a skill which will save you money, help you be in control of your health, and is useful on a daily basis.

</comment><comment><USER3> The soft skills: sales, marketing, persuasion, public speaking and/or charisma in general.

Get a sales job. Shadow a CEO. Become a bartender. Learn about people and what makes them tick.

<comment><AUTHOR> How did you learn about marketing?

Also, how did you get the opportunities to shadow a CEO? I am not sure how can I provide value to the CEO as a student.

<comment><USER4> I think he is saying he shadowed a CEO by working as her personal bartender.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Meta learning. Follow Barbara Oakley and other's work to understand the process of learning. Try practising these on some new concepts you are tackling at the moment.

<comment><AUTHOR> I have finished her course two years ago and it's the best course I've ever taken!

<comment><USER5> Yes, it is a great course. I also keep myself updated with her newsletters and book recommendations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Reading about systems theory. I read Niklas Luhmann (e.g. Trust and Power) in undergrad and it made strong impressions on me. Throughout my PhD (sciences), I tried to view every problem I tackled, every collaboration from the lens of understanding the social system of the research scene, the problems tackled, the conversation happening within that community etc.

I believe systems theory can provide a real edge when competing with people who few most things at work as intellectual d*ck measurement contests, including career advancement based on naive notions of being just more clever, or just working harder to advance. Especially in academic settings, focusing on the social dynamics of your research community is key.

N.b.: This is under the consideration that you are already good/constantly improving your main professional skill, be it coding, writing, selling.

<comment><AUTHOR> This is something I have never heard of. I study Politics and Economics in university, minoring in Data Analaysis. I will dig deeper into systems theory and see how it can be applied to Politics. Thank you for sharing!

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Saying no. You have limited amounts of time and must be judicious as to what you spend it on.

</comment><comment><USER8> Not really a skill per se but sticking to an intense, daily workout/running routine. Nothing has increased my productivity more than being active for 60 minutes every morning.

</comment><comment><USER9> Being able to write succinctly and effectively.

<comment><AUTHOR> Could you tell more avout writing? How did you learn it and how did the skill help you?

<comment><USER9> Good general education. Identifying it as a valuable skill. Consciously working at it.

If I send an email to my team (30 people) I spend time crafting it. Making it shorter and clearer. The combined time they spend reading it costs money. Plus they will actually do what I'm asking.

Most people just write the email and hit send.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> c++,

it allows me to learn any other language quickly.

I learned it by writing 3D graphics apps/games.

</comment><comment><USER11> get really good at leetcode, unfortunately, the highest paying software engineering jobs go to whoever has studied it the most.

<comment><AUTHOR> If I have to choose between being really good in Leetcode and doing more projects, which one should I prioritize?

I agree with your point that the highest paying works go to people who has studied the most.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> negotiation :D

<comment><AUTHOR> I have read Chris Voss's book, Never Split the Difference and it has really changed the way I see human interactions. The worst negotiation is one where you do not realize about it.

<comment><USER12> that's one of my favorite books too

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> accurate touch tpying :-)</comment>


New Phishing Attack Spreading On Facebook. This Time From FBstarter - <AUTHOR> http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/04/30/new-phishing-attack-spreading-on-facebook-this-time-from-fbstarter/

<comment><AUTHOR> just got one of these emails...not cool</comment>


I'm done here - <AUTHOR> http://www.whattofix.com/blog/archives/2010/11/im-done-here.php

<comment><USER2> Yea it's interesting. When human organizations grow big they usually opt for dictatorial control. Rome got an emperor because the senate became dysfunctional as the empire grew. China was unified under one kingdom, one emperor.

It must have something to do with information overload. In huge groups there are many special interests vying for control, ultimately decisions have to be made but those groups put out so much information its impossible to base decisions on it.</comment>


Ask HN: Is working for Google still worth it? - <AUTHOR> For the past 12 months, Google has been courting me into joining.
As an oldie (35+), I always thought of working for Google was an achievement. A company that makes very cool products for an extremely large audience.
The last few years the shine has come off the company, but you can't deny that one would be working on problems you wouldn't see anywhere else.
Google reaching out with a SRE Manager position. From what I understand, this is working on the core products. Is working for Google still worth the experience?
Something to keep in mind, right now I am working as an Engineering  Director. I report directly to the CTO and manage 30 engineers and a dozen products. The company is well established and very stable. I assume that moving to Google would be a step down/back/sideways, at least in the beginning. <comment><USER2> In this model, there is a vertical asymptote at x = 3 and a flat asymptote at y = 1. ) How to Find Vertical Asymptotes  The bends approach these asymptotes however never cross them. To locate the vertical asymptote(s) of a sane capacity, essentially set the denominator equivalent to 0 and tackle for x.

The new website ](https://dailynewsscoop.com/">) Dailynewsscoop  is a boomer! By publishing articles over all the topics from eduation to religion it has gained popularity faster than any other websited of thier niche.</comment>


Sentiment Analysis of #RoyalWedding on Twitter - <AUTHOR> http://twittersentiment.appspot.com/search?query=%23RoyalWedding Not very accurate but an interesting start. <comment><USER2> This misses the (in my opinion) most significant sentiment, and by far the most prevalent: "So fucking what?"</comment>


Job description written in Ruby - <AUTHOR> http://jobs.37signals.com/jobs/5572

<comment><USER2>
        class Applicant < ActiveEngineer
          require 'mad_skills'

is an odd way to express it, because it doesn't actually say that Applicant has MadSkills. Presumably they mean:

        require 'mad_skills'

        class Applicant < ActiveEngineer
          include MadSkills

<comment><USER3> Also, ActiveRecord? No thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Am I the only one who doesn't find these things cute?

<comment><USER5> It got them to the front page of Hacker News -- a "normal" ad would not have. I'm guessing that there are at least some of us that would look past (or not mind) the ad if the job looked good.

<comment><USER6> All that and they don't bother to mention salary. Seriously, they want someone "super-smart, motivated", blah, blah. They want to suck you dry so millions of women can shop better and for what in return? To piss away your super-smart, highly motivated existence programming Rails? Vision care? yeah, they do apparently have a health policy that through no fault of their own, you can't keep after they suck you dry. So what can you keep? Well, I'm sure the stock option contract is 20 pages of pure "screw you". If it wasn't, why not publish the options contract? They drop the hint several times that this may be a good job for a perv that wants to collect data on millions of women!! What genius thought dropping the "women, hint, hint!" line several times was a good idea.

No, the only thing you walk away from most any job with is $$$cash$$$....they leave that part out!!!

The ad is well written. And cute. But here's my message to companies: Tell us HOW MUCH!!!

wow, I sure woke up on the crabby side of the bed, today ;).

<comment><USER7> Just include a salary expectation with your resume and cover letter. Then if they follow up, you know they're willing to negotiate around that number. That's not so hard, right? Everyone knows if you're not a founder, you aren't getting stock that's worth working for peanuts.

<comment><USER6> "Everyone knows if you're not a founder, you aren't getting stock that's worth working for peanuts."

Which is precisely why parading it as a perk makes the ad bad. A great startup should publish their stock option agreements. Let people see how great it is. "psst, I'm gonna show this secret agreement, don't tell anyone else what it says..."

After all this time of so many thousands of startups, we've finally gotten to a point of having a library of startup contracts, investment contracts, etc... You should be able to say "We use Law Firm X's published stock agreement. Its well vetted and easy to understand."

If you want to attract great talent, show them the money!!!

Transparency Rules!!!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> brown9-2

         require 'mad_skills'

this is where I stopped reading.

<comment><USER8> I stopped reading at "Job description written in Ruby", heh.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> There's a substitution cipher at the end. Spoiler alert:

zllh://ooo.kzghallgew.uge/yggvbgt

<http://www.shopittome.com/goodjob>

<comment><USER10> this simple rot-8 approach feels too simple for a puzzle like this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I wonder if it would be a good idea to actually include _real_ code in a job description, such as few choice code snippets from the company's source code.

<comment><USER12> Like something that could be hairy, but isn't. Too show off how pleasant your code is?

<comment><USER11> Yes; something a few lines long that demonstrates a particularly pleasent piece of code from your source tree. Obviously there are limits as to what you can infer from such a small slice of code, but I think it would provide more information about how the company develops software than most job descriptions do.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Here's what a start-up ad for a programmers should look like:

* mycomapny.com [link to google maps]

* tech skill required: x, y, z

* [full-time || contract] && [local || remote]

* growth or biz model [link to mycompany.com/biz_model]

* investment [link to mycompany.com/investment]

* salary range $x to $y depending on experience

* benefits - health care, etc [link to mystartup.com/employee/benefits]

* employee rules [link to meycompany.com/employee/handbook]

* stock options [link to mycompany/com/employee/options]

If you want more high quality applicants, provide these details up front...Transparency Rules!!!

Skip the multi-paragraph fluff. You don't want to read it in the resumes, and job searchers don't want to read through it the job ads. Also, skip the puzzles. Puzzles limit your pipeline to those that have loads of time on their hands to solve your captcha. Do you want an applicant that has loads of time on their hands or the applicant that has the skills and right attitude?

</comment><comment><USER13> Can someone explain why this position would require a bachelor's degree? Did anyone actually learn any Ruby in school?

</comment><comment><USER14> Someone really oughta code up a resume in Ruby and submit it. I think they wouldn't have any choice but to hire you.

<comment><USER15> I had this idea months ago... but I have a job. I still call dibs on it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Wouldn't work for this company. They clearly don't test their code.

</comment><comment><USER17> Wow. A company with the balls to outsource their HR and management to a Ruby script. Manfred Macx would be proud.

</comment><comment><USER18> I'm surprised no one has mentioned the bugs caused by unforeseen interaction of a) turning < and > into HTML entities and then b) stuffing them in a pre tag.

</comment><comment><USER19> i used math notations <for intro> when i applied to grad school

something like ... there exist <my-name> such that bla <insert math mumbo- jumbo describing me as a unique subset of engineers>

result? i got in and studied there

</comment><comment><USER20> Unsurprisingly, ubercool job ad is for a site that uses table layouts riddled with inline CSS.

</comment><comment><USER21> I do not find this code too nice.

</comment><comment><USER22> why don't the boolean methods have ?s in the names?

why did they put an english description too? either the ruby one is good or it isn't. make up your minds.</comment>


Show HN: ksoundsgood.com - What's going on this weekend? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> EDIT: After posting my initial comment below, I thought what the heck, I should try and be more constructive. So I signed up with my Facebook.

And this is what I got:

"You're in! We're working hard to gather the events you should know about and will be in touch soon. Please recommend us to your friends."

You've got to be kidding me. This is really bad form. Deleted. Goodbye.

</comment><comment>=

Since you're posting an Ask HN type post, you should add a description of your app. Or post it as a direct url link. This is the worst of both worlds: people can't directly click through to see what the app is and they can't read your description either.

The idea sounds good(!) but there have been many such apps. So you might have to tell us a bit more to convince us why yours is better.

Given the recent hatred for Facebook, making it FB-connect only will probably not fly here. It will probably work fine for non-HN people, but I've been surprised recently by my completely non-techie friends who refuse to sign up to any apps with FB connect because of trust issues.

If you can do a demo video or at least some examples of the types of events you suggest, then you might get more useful feedback. And I might actually use it because I am often looking for things to do.

Direct link - <http://ksoundsgood.com>

<comment><USER3> I disagree about removing FB-connect as the only auth method. There's nothing wrong with it, despite the current perception around privacy issues. You did say that us techie-types are more aware of the cookie issue but you can't extrapolate some of your non-techie friends to the rest of what would be the OP's target audience.

<comment> mike-cardwell This policy of "only cater for Facebook users, and only Facebook users who don't care about privacy" prevents me from using the service, and prevents me from recommending it to friends and family.

That doesn't sound like "nothing wrong" to me. The vast majority of websites let anybody with an email address sign up. This site doesn't.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Best code hosting / CI / project management tool for one - <AUTHOR> If you were to be sole dev for a company what would you use to host your code and manage your projects. <comment><USER2> I use GitLab for CI and issue tracking. Master builds are automatically deployed to Heroku.</comment>


Seed funding for biotech? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><AUTHOR> No one does Y Combinator style funding for biotech because startup costs are so much higher than for Web 2.0. My biotech company is more like a Web 2.0 startup because I could take a company to profitability on $25,000.

I've applied to the local biotech incubator. Anyone have any other ideas for getting funding and mentoring? Do small business loans to buy capital hold the individual accountable for repayment?

</comment><comment><USER2> rms - be interested to find out about your biotech project as i'm a biochemist/infectious disease PhD by training (but internet entrepreneur by experience). Email me.</comment>


Ur/Web: The Ur Programming Language Family - <AUTHOR> http://www.impredicative.com/ur/

<comment><USER2> I though "Nostratic" was the posited ancestor.</comment>


Every VC admits there's too much seed investing. Still, it surged in Q1 - <AUTHOR> http://pandodaily.com/2013/04/10/every-vc-admits-theres-too-much-seed-investing-still-it-surged-in-the-first-quarter/

<comment><USER2> Interesting... what in the market makes it so that VCs can agree this is a problem but keep perpetuating it?

Efficient or inefficient, there must be some market force at play here.

Is it that that's where the largest amount of fund-seeking companies are at - seed stage - and so money is being put into that stage because the deals are there and then it's already committed so more companies seek it and around and around?</comment>


Berry Blocks - your rack in your colors (Kickstarter) - <AUTHOR> http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/asianops/berry-blocks-a-wine-and-glass-rack-that-fits-your/

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi HN, thanks for taking time to look at my project!</comment>