National Skills Registry - India - <AUTHOR>

For the past 4 years, I've worked remotely for an employer based in India (it's been a great experience). I'm on the IT Mailing List, so I often receive emails pertaining directly to Indian employees.  On 10/4, a disturbing email came across the wire from the VP of HR:
"National Skills Registry (NSR) is a NASSCOM initiative to have a robust and credible information repository of all employees working in the IT & ITES industry. This develops a trusted and permanent fact sheet of information about each professional along-with background check reports as and when required. This is a security best practice for the industry and assures identity security & industry acceptance of honest professionals.  This is used by the industry and its clients as a credible source of information about registered professionals who are employed by them or put on client assignments.
As [a Company] employee you will need to register with NSR prior to enrolling and then provide your credentials and bio-metrics at a scheduled enrolment desk that will be arranged at the office premises. We will follow up this communication when we schedule registration and enrolment campaigns soon.
Please keep in mind that your enrolment with NSR is not pertinent to [the Company] exclusively, this is a syndicated ID that will be linked to your professional profile indefinitely. Thus you will be required to bear the cost of this enrolment yourself. A sum of Rs.337 will be deducted from your salary in the month following your enrolment with NSR, again we will communicate in advance when this will occur."
Maybe this wouldn't be so bad if it were a voluntary registry, but the language used is that employees "will need to register" (at their own expense).
References: http://www.nasscom.in/initiatives/2202 https://www.nationalskillsregistry.com/ <comment><USER2> They are treating people like cattle. Herd em up, brand em, and profit.</comment>


Vivaldi 1.11 – Focus on accessibility - <AUTHOR> https://vivaldi.com/blog/focus-on-accessibility/ <comment><USER2> I love the added control, I hate the new icon. Still waiting for Opera12-like image properties ( [http://puu.sh/x6qDC/45742ccf61.png](http://puu.sh/x6qDC/45742ccf61.png) )

It's nice to watch the browser evolve nicely.

</comment><comment><USER3> Love the new reader mode options and setting for stopping loading of animated gifs.</comment>


Former google career coach shares a visual track what you want to do in life - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnbc.com/2016/12/21/former-google-career-coach-shares-a-useful-visual-trick.html?__source=Facebook <comment><USER2> So... mind-mapping...?</comment>


Who Else Wants 1,000 Options? - <AUTHOR> http://danielodio.com/who-else-wants-1000-options

<comment><USER2> This offer undermines the reason for having options (building loyalty among employees in lieu of high pay at a time when the company can't afford high salaries). To me, giving away options to non-employees is the sign on an inexperienced company.

<comment><AUTHOR> There's a cost to everything. One of those costs is hiring someone (or some company) to do testing -- something that's especially hard in mobile since it's not a mature technology.

Giving away options is just another way to pay that cost. For a small company with few employees, the ROI is pretty huge.

I'm not saying it's right or wrong, just that it's an innovative solution to a tough problem that works well within the constraints that a very young company has.

<comment><USER2> > There's a cost to everything.

My point is that when employees realize that strangers are being given options, it diminishes their value in attracting and holding onto employees. It undermines the loyalty factor, the incentive to be an employee.

<comment><AUTHOR> But that's my point exactly. There _are_ no other employees at this stage. Or if there are, it's a co-founder or other high-equity employee.

The whole reason to do this is to keep from having to hire an employee (yet) to handle this function.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


What ancient DNA tells us about humans and Neanderthals - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2017/10/9/16448412/neanderthal-stone-age-human-genes-dna-schizophrenia-cholesterol-hair-skin-loneliness <comment><USER2> In case you're wondering why so much research (and articles summarizing said research) emphasize the negatives of Neanderthal DNA, consider the case of Bruce Lahn, a Chinese-born American geneticist:

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

> His research on the microcephaly-associated gene, MCPH1, led to the > hypothesis that an archaic Homo sapiens lineage such as the Neanderthals > might have contributed to the recent development of the human brain.[2] His > research also suggested that newly arisen variants of two brain size genes, > ASPM and MCPH1, might have been favored by positive natural selection in the > recent human history.[3] This research provoked controversy due to the > finding that the positively selected variants of these genes had spread to > higher frequencies in some parts of the world than in others (for ASPM, it > is higher in Europe and surrounding regions than other parts of the world; > for MCPH1, it is higher outside sub-Saharan Africa than inside).[4] He has > advocated the moral position that human genetic diversity should be embraced > and celebrated as among humanity's great assets.[5]

Since Sub-Saharan Africans have no Neanderthal DNA, researching the potential cognitive or other benefits non-Sub-Saharan Africans enjoy from that 1-5% of their genome would be racist. Because we all know race is just a social construct, and human evolution--at least with respect to intelligence--stopped sixty thousand years ago, or else it continued identically everywhere--unlike the population-specific adaptations for lactose tolerance or rarefied air:

[https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/07/tibetans- inherited-h...](https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2014/07/tibetans-inherited- high-altitude-gene-ancient-human)

<comment><USER3> I love how even commenting on this topic requires the use of a throwaway account.

I will be brave and post in my own name. Yes different populations of humans around the world are genetically different, but we don't know if any are better or worse in any significant way. Tigers and lions are different species, can interbreed (Liger), but we would not say one was a better or worse - just different.

Of course on the flip side we don't know that the different human populations are not significantly different in some important feature. The bottom line is we have no good data one way or the other on this topic.</comment></comment>


Goodyear Hid Evidence of 'The Worst Tire in History' Linked to at Least 9 Deaths - <AUTHOR> https://jalopnik.com/how-goodyear-hid-evidence-of-the-worst-tire-made-in-his-1822200424 <comment><USER3> But... why? I will never understand the thinking that goes into doing stuff like this, especially within a mega-corp. It's the same as with diesel- emissions cheating: if you're successful with that product, you're basically guaranteed to get caught eventually. And if you start from the assumption that it's not going to be a successful product... why even bother?

<comment> Tuna-Fish As you have formulated it, this is a textbook example of the principal-agent problem. Given your assumptions:

For the company, these kinds of systemic failures are unquestionably bad.

For the specific employees making each decision, this might have been the utility-maximizing choice. All they need to do is to keep the wheels rolling (sorry) and profit coming in until they are out.

No amount of punishing the company can fix this. In order to fix the problem, prosecutors need to go after the individuals who made the calls.

<comment><USER4> Completely agree, but as with the VW case, I'd argue that many in management who knew and allowed it will not be punished.

<comment><USER5> Certainly, but justice is rarely carried out perfectly accurately. Hopefully getting close enough will send a warning of the consequences of such a decision to others in the industry.

As an aside: A good number of people in Europe will apparently prematurely die as a result of their actions, so if nothing else, it will be incredibly difficult for many of these guilty employees to justify their actions even to themselves.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Seems kind of crazy things can be sealed like this in cases regarding public safety.

<comment><USER7> There was a recent incident where an assault victim was forbidden from speaking at her attacker's sentencing (criminal!) hearing because of a non- disclosure agreement attached to a past civil settlement.

The US's approach to secrecy is... a mess.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Seems like a case where the cover-up is actually worse than the crime. From reading the article I did not see where Goodyear marketed the Tire as being suitable for use on RVs. If that is the case the worst they should be held liable for is failing to re-iterate the fact that they should not be used on RVs.

<comment><USER9> Goodyear was selling them directly to RV manufacturers as the OEM tire for popular models. It's hard to believe they either didn't know they were going to be used on RVs, or did but were upfront about the risks.

</comment></comment><comment> King-Aaron The issue with the tires aside - because that is appalling in itself - I have to wonder what safety standards RV's have to be built to? Because to me, they appear to be little more than a truck-style ladder chassis mated to a fibreglass caravan shell (in essence). Any level of accident in one seems like it would result in serious injury.

In the US, do passengers in them have to wear seat belts? And do the vehicles undergo crash testing to the same standards as conventional truck cabs?

<comment><USER10> RVs are not crash tested. Seat belt regulations vary by state, but in general, driver and passenger positions are required to wear seat belts.

RV construction varies quite a bit from truck chassis to motor coach conversions.

There are lots of accident scenarios, but when it comes to crashing with other vehicles, RVs do have mass on their side. Mine is 10 tons. Passenger cars don't scare me. I don't want to have a tire blowout. I don't want to roll it. I don't want to tangle with tractor trailers. These things would go poorly.

<comment> King-Aaron > I don't want to roll it.

Im surprised they don't have a rigid frame / internal roll bars etc. I suppose there's so much weight in the vehicle already it's just additional mass.

Your comment about passenger cars not scaring you made me laugh however... I drive a mx5/miata everywhere.. Literally every other vehicle on the road scares me, and I have a full roll cage :P

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Do they actually fail when not underinflated, not overloaded, and not driven above the speed limit?

0.2% of these tyres have failed. I can completely believe that far more than 0.2% of tyres are driven overspeed, underinflated or overloaded in their lifetime.

I can't really blame a tyre company for making a tyre which fails when used outside it's advertised specifications.

<comment><USER12> The issue is without a recall/advisory consumers won't know that their tires are potentially dangerous. When buying a vehicle (or any item really) the customer should be able to assume that the product isn't dangerously underspeced in some way. If the specs were well communicated to the manufacturers of the RVs (and possibly tire shops) then it's not Goodyear's fault that the tires were put on RVs where they were unfit for the purpose. What is their fault though is that when the problem came to light they moved to protect themselves and prevent the problem from coming to light through the terms of their settlements.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Im still trying to grapple with this one. Its not like Goodyear doesn't have other tires. If they know these things will cause accidents(or over the years learned this was happening) why did they not alter the design? I know it must come down to a cost vs benefit analysis but I cant see how they would come out ahead with a "deadly" tire.

<comment><USER9> Even if they made an entirely rational calculation of the risk and the expected costs, they likely wouldn't have anticipated an increase in highway speed limits. Whatever failure rate you assume would likely be tied to whatever typical highway driving speed you expected, and a 10 mph increase might really mess that up. Also, the real world is not like the lab - <USER2> may wear faster in real-life use than in tests.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> > the tires were designed to handle a sustained temperature of 194 degrees > Fahrenheit when traveling at highway speeds between 65-75 mph. In excess of > 200 degrees, the tire ran the risk of tread separations.

Doesn't seem like there was much margin in the design. How was this even allowed to be sold?

<comment><USER15> Because tires don't usually get that hot?

[https://www.caranddriver.com/columns/a-look-behind-the- tire-...](https://www.caranddriver.com/columns/a-look-behind-the-tire- hysteria)

>How hot does the tire get? Typical tires experience a temperature increase of roughly 50 degrees after running on the highway for a half-hour. If it's a 70-degree day, this suggests a tire temperature of about 120 degrees.

So even at 120 degree weather, you'd only expect the tires to reach 170 degrees. That's still far below the 194 that they're rated for.

<comment><USER16> In 100 degree weather, fairly common in the south, the road surface temperature would be significantly higher, upwards of 150 to 175.

<comment><USER17> I cannot find anywhere listing road temperatures nearing 175 F. Do you have a source?

Most I find are like this [1], which would allow a max road surface temp at 100F air temp at the equator with the sun directly overhead on a perfectly clear day to reach around 148F. (see equation 17 in the paper).

The rest of the literature I have found is similar. I doubt roads in the US south reach 175, and likely not even 150.

[1] [http://www.ijirae.com/volumes/Vol2/iss8/01.AUAE10083.pdf](http://www.ijirae.com/volumes/Vol2/iss8/01.AUAE10083.pdf)

<comment><USER18> On hot days I like to take my laser temp gun and shoot roads and other things, and I've never seen anything over 140F.

<comment><USER17> Out of curiosity, what is the hottest background temps you think you've checked in? Any around 100 F ambient?

<comment><USER19> Not parent:

>Dr Howard Robinson, chief executive of the Road Surface Treatments Association, says most roads in the UK that experience a reasonable amount of traffic will start softening at 50C.

>[...]

>And dark road material can absorb a lot of heat. The typical summer ground temperature is higher than air temperature. Robinson says roads "regularly" reach a temperature of 50C and above. ([http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23315384](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23315384)) //

50 deg C is 122F; but this is UK with air temps of ~30 deg C

<comment><USER17> Yeah, I read that too. 30C is 86 F. The OP above mentioned a 100 degree day, 14 degrees warmer, and the formula and paper I referenced above would put the surface temp of the road would also only rise 14 degrees, to 136 F on a 100 degree day.

The OP claimed 150-175 is common on a 100 degree day. No research I can find (except one single author) is anywhere near that amount.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> "The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration had accumulated reports of 61 deaths and more than 100 serious injuries linked to Firestone 500 blowouts."

[http://www.rubbernews.com/article/19960812/ISSUE/308129970/t...](http://www.rubbernews.com/article/19960812/ISSUE/308129970/the-14-million- firestone-500-radials-still-on-the-road-the-radial-was-prone-to-belt- separation-and-blowouts-and-contributed-to-61-fatal-auto-accidents-according- to-the-national-highway-traffic-safety-administration-500-tragedy-crushes- firestone)

I might have thought that the Firestone 500 was "The Worst Tire in History."

<comment><USER21> Had this tire been put on cars it would have been much worse. The total carnage was limited by its application in motor homes.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Goodyear certainly seems to have a big piece of the responsibility here. But I don't hold the RV manufacturers blameless -- they were the ones selecting and buying a low-speed commercial delivery vehicle tire for a passenger application.

Also I'm inclined to believe that many owners didn't inflate them properly. A high load range tire will have a much higher pressure than passenger car owners are accustomed to. Most people just inflate their tires to about 30PSI and that's generally fine for a passenger car.

Most consumer tire pumps or inflators would probably have difficulty getting to the proper pressure which can be twice that more than a normal passenger car tire.

<comment><USER23> Any decent track pump can easily get to an order of magnitude higher. I routinely pump bike tires to 125 psi. Back to the point, tires are the most important piece of kit in regards to driving/riding handling quality, and usually one of the most underestimated. I wish people in general paid more attention to the state and quality of their tires.

<comment><USER24> The problem isn't solely the level of pressure, it's also the time it takes to reach that pressure. If you are running a little electric pump to get a truck tire to 60 PSI, it's going to take a long time even if the pump doesn't overheat and burn out.

<comment><USER23> You just gave me a great idea. My car has a smat electric pump that I don't trust. I'm going to store in the car a compact track pump in case I have to use the patch kit. Thanks for the insight on the lateral thinking.

<comment><USER19> By a "compact track pump" do you mean a bicycle pump? It surely doesn't deliver the volume needed, a car tyre must be many times the volume of a bike tyre -- I see figures of 1.35 and 22 litres respectively.

So to shift the volume of air needed to get your car tyre to 60psi you're going to be looking at c. 10 times the duration of pumping as getting a bike tyre to 125psi. If it's a racing tyre and an SUV tyre the duration multiplier would probably be much higher.

<comment><USER23> My car runs on 2 bar, a little less than half of your example of 60 psi, completely feasible as a plan B.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This tire might have been rubbish, but it's not even close to being the worst tire of this decade, let alone the worst tire in history.

<comment><USER26> Care to elaborate? The article mentions it had over a ten fold increase in incidents compared to the well-known Firestone debacle. What other tires are dangerous?

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> In the US at least RV are interesting as far as safety regulations go. Its probably a good peek into what would happen if you removed a bunch of regulation for the normal car industry.

No crash testing, no air bags, questionable electrical wiring for a moving vehicle. Flexible propane gas line running into moving slide systems.

I have a modern class A which I love, but its built like a 70's automobile, some real head scratching engineering decisions, some of which I have fixed.

If you get into RVing especially the larger ones the tire issue is one you worry about and see talked about constantly.

The article touched on it some in talking about how Goodyear defended themselves in the suit, and some of it is valid.

RV's tend to sit for long periods of time unused, this causes all sorts of issues including the tires. RV tire almost always age out rather than wear out. You should be replacing them at 7 years and they will have plenty of tread when you do. Many RV's are traveling around with 10 year old tires that the owners wont replace because they are very expensive and the tread look fine. There is some debate on if the sitting flat spots them that also contributes to failure issues. They also also typically have sidewall cracking due to long term UV exposure and sitting without flexing.

Large RV tires are very sensitive to weight and inflation pressure, much more so than any car I have ever owned. Large vehicles seem to be generally closer to failure limits on all components involved. A under inflated tire seems to be a common cause of blowouts. Again due to sitting for long periods, many will go to take a trip and not bother to check the tire pressure before leaving. Also very few large RV's have TPMS systems, there is a large industry of after market TPMS for RV's that pretty much every recommends you should purchase one of. TPMS should be required by law as I believe they are on cars now. My RV requires at least 82 psi minimum, I run 90 and make sure its maintained.

The article mentions the G159's where only rated for 65 mph, a little low, most RV tires including mine are only rated for 70mph. I drive my RV at 65 and below and stay in the rightmost lane except in a very rare passing circumstance. Driving above 65 and especially 70 mph is a menace IMO and I have seen it plenty of times with a large class A passing everyone in the left lane towing a car. There was a video that was going around the RV site not long ago showing a bad blowout of someone doing that [1].

There is a whole aftermarket of parts designed to make RV's safer in a blowout, a popular one is safe-t-plus [2], because if you do have a front blowout like that video RV's are very difficult to control due to the weight shift forward. It is actually recommended to not hit your brake but accelerate slightly to stay in control and prevent the brake dive, then slowly come to a stop. Hard to remember in that situation.

RV overloading is pretty common too. Many people don't understand the gross weight ratings and many RV's are built with so many features and heavy materials that there have actually been cases of them being over the weight rating if you fill them with gas and have two people on board. My RV has 2500 lbs of carry capacity with a full fuel tank and 5000 lbs of towing. If I fill the water tank that's 600 lbs off the carry capacity, then people and gear. Its recommend to go on a scale and weigh after loaded up to make sure your within your limits. I tow a 4500 lbs Jeep, again many don't pay attention to tow rating and tow their full size pickup weighing 6000 lbs plus a 1000 lb golf cart in the bed.

Bottom line the Goodyear was under specced but RV's are not like cars but many people treat them the same, no training is required to drive one unlike a large semi or bus. They really need to be regulated for crash safety and tpms. More headroom is needed in design such as tire speed rating and chassis weight ratings or perhaps more training required to operate them.

1\. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LkLeljt4t0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LkLeljt4t0) 2\. [http://www.safe-t-plus.com/](http://www.safe-t-plus.com/)

</comment><comment><USER28> Depending on how many people used these tires, the "Worst Tire in History" only claiming nine (reported) lives is actually pretty good. Auto collisions being what they are I'm curious as to the actual numbers behind different tires.

<comment><USER29> From the article

> Those numbers are almost certainly higher in reality: in court, Goodyear > admitted it has received at least 98 injury and/or death claims over the > tire.</comment></comment>


Let Go of Your Expectations and Succeed - <AUTHOR> https://email@example.com/let-go-of-your-expectations-and-succeed-e2be046128d5 <comment><USER2> More importantly, don't let our lives be constrained by the expectations of other people.</comment>


Gifted Children as Hidden Persuaders in the Cold War (2019) - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbk.ac.uk/hiddenpersuaders/blog/gifted-children-as-hidden-persuaders-in-the-cold-war/ <comment><USER2> After reading the opening paragraph I instantly thought of Greta Thunberg (in a good way!), especially this part:

> or as dangerous future citizens who might use their unique talents to > subvert authority.

...where the authority being subverted is that of a certain country's dominant social class that _really_ doesn't like being told they're in the wrong...

\----

More cynically though: almost all of the certified G&T folks I knew in school - and equivalents at university - gave up on their idealism and got degrees to become a city quant.

Except for one... he got into UW at 16 and had a head for epidemiology but was also interested in global geopolitics so he tried to major in both subjects at undergrad (uh-oh...) - but being so young at university in a course where social-networking is important meant he simply couldn't attend important events because he was below the drinking age. Anywya long story short he's now a water treatment plant operator and he tells me he's never been happier.

<comment><USER3> I believe Greta Thunberg is someone put in place to EXERT authority.

If you go to the meetings of the financial elite of the world, they have in their agenda exactly what GT wants: Taxing C02, forcing people to eat insects, because meat and fish is unsustainable...

Greta is used to exert authority from those people in charge into the mass of the population. It is the reason media loves GT, because media is controlled by the big guys.

A dangerous person would be some environmentalist that actually knows what he is talking about, and who is popular.

Idealism is not a virtue per se(just dreaming about a better world without doing anything). I know quite a lot idealist that actually do all what they can to improve the world. They become realist because it is hard. It is one thing to say people should not abandon dogs and another thing creating a refuge for animals and expending all your money feeding and taking care of abandoned dogs, taking no vacations(because animals eat every day...)and so on.

Realism is what happens when idealists take responsibility, and do something. Reality has limits, it is always finite what you can do, dreams could be perfect.

Greta is just a kid that is angry(because she is ill) and is being manipulated from those in charge.

<comment><USER4> > If you go to the meetings of the financial elite of the world, they have in > their agenda exactly what GT wants: Taxing C02, forcing people to eat > insects, because meat and fish is unsustainable...

Taxing CO2 is literally the last thing "the financial elites" want - it's a policy that's been pushed by scientists and economists for decades but never gained political traction due to an intense lobbying campaign from the oil and gas industry.

That's also not what Thunberg advocates for. Thunberg primarily advocates for more aggressive national emissions reductions targets. She says that her drastic personal lifestyle changes (e.g. being vegan) are meant to raise awareness about environmentalism, but that they are not a practical solution and that the responsibility for eliminating pollution lies with the rich and powerful, not consumers.

<comment><USER5> > Taxing CO2 is literally the last thing "the financial elites" want - it's a > policy that's been pushed by scientists and economists for decades but never > gained political traction due to an intense lobbying campaign from the oil > and gas industry.

Simply not true. "Scientists" didn't come up with carbon tax. Bankers did and they hired economists to peddle the idea.

> That's also not what Thunberg advocates for. Thunberg primarily advocates > for more aggressive national emissions reductions targets. She says that her > drastic personal lifestyle changes (e.g. being vegan) are meant to raise > awareness about environmentalism,

Ah yes, lets take advice from a 15 year old who knows absolutely nothing about anything. Climate fanatics scream "listen to the experts". Then then bring up a manipulated teen with obvious mental and emotional problems as their champion.

You say "the rich and powerful" aren't backing them and yet every major organization from the UN to World Bank is pushing the "vegan" nonsense not to mention carbon tax.

Remember "taxation without representation"? A global carbon tax is the epitome of that. So who is king george now and who are the ones advocating for it?

If there is going to be a global tax, there should be a global government which has authority from the global population. Not just from greedy financiers who want another financial assets to leech money from the masses to line their pockets.

<comment><USER6> How do your propose we manage the negative externality of co2 and ensure a good future?

A carbon tax in one way of internalizing the costs of co2 that are currently not borne by any of the relevant market participants. It can also be done in a revenue neutral way with a matching "carbon dividend" that is given back to the citizens.

Is there another effective way?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> >their identification and management was fraught with legacies of bias, discrimination, and conflict. Following this, there was also a significant level of concern about their disruptive potential, and their powerful minds. This came to be negotiated by psychologists, families, schools, and in wider culture.

All the same fears and anxieties we have with AI now. Like the exact subject doesn't really matter as much as the process.

<comment><USER8> Good point about this sounding similar to AI fears.

The whole AI fear thing seems weird to me. Not impossible, but, just the level of hype around it combined with who is doing the hyping and now is strange. Kind of like the modern version of Victorian gentry prognosticating.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm surprised no one has chimed in with their own experience yet. I was in one of these programs (well, a moderate version of one, I didn't skip grades or go to college young) and I remember being told all the time that we were the future leaders of the world. I became good friends with many of these people and really, we all turned out really normal. Not much different from folks not in those programs. I think I'll do more research on the history of these programs because I had no idea that it was a relic of WWII and the Cold War. Really interesting to me.

<comment><USER10> I didn't have any "gifted child" thing as a young kid (was homeschooled until high school, did quite well but not astronomically in high school).

However, thanks to scoring a 1510/1600 on the SAT and having good grades, I did get placed in a fairly prestigious cohort in college. My takeaway from that is that the person's natural talent is just one factor, and not even a particularly important one. It still takes a mix of actual work and capitalizing on good connections (in our case, we got hooked up with good connections thanks to being in this cohort) to get ahead. Maybe half of those kids that entered the cohort washed out or decided to go into other fields unrelated to the cohort (which I did). Some others got very normal jobs of no particular prestige. I know a handful that leveraged it into fairly prestigious jobs in our field.

My brother's another data point. He moved through grades in math at about 2x the rate of the rest of us, so clearly had a gift for it. He was tutoring college kids by high school and from then on has been making his living from math tutoring, including some gifted children of the early-college variety. What's a little strange to me is that he seems to have no natural ambition. It's like he's totally dialed into math tutoring to the exclusion of considering anything else. But if that's really his thing as it seems to be, then more power to him.

<comment><USER11> Also never been considered as gifted for my relatively normal IQ. However for a brief period during my teenage years, I suddenly became the top rank student in my school for an unknown reason that I still cannot comprehend. It was such an experience, as I was a normal student before that. I thought I was a genius who could ace any subject. I managed to enter top university with early admission for my good grades.

Too bad, I became 'normal' after that, discovered that a lot of people were smarter than me. It was a humbling experience of not being special anymore.

Nevertheless, I am still grateful for that brief experience. I have much more self confidence of my ability to solve any problem since then. Eventually I managed to subtitute my 'giftedness' with hard work.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Skipping a grade might seem like a good idea for a gifted child but then bullying appears. Not recommended.

<comment><USER13> I think, like many things, grade-skipping can either make sense or not make sense depending on the school, student, and classmates.

I skipped a grade in elementary school (joint decision between my parents, teacher, principal, and at least nominally myself!), and didn't suffer from any kind of bullying.

In my case, apparently I was actually creating trouble in my assigned grade, by being a chatterbox. I would finish my work early, and then proceed to hinder my friends' learnings by _talking_ with them (understandably, because I was bored! you can only twiddle your thumbs or doodle for so long). Instead of punishing me, my teacher recommended me for skipping.

Through my extended family and their friends, I know many kids who are in the same circumstances these days: straight-A "troublemakers", especially in elementary school. But nowadays, skipping grades is seen as "unfair" rather than as a valid solution to a legitimate problem.

Because of something as arbitrary as their birthday, children are restricted from participating in a sufficiently challenging environment. I think we as a society are potentially trending too-rigid, _especially_ in elementary school.

I have no comment on skipping 2 or more grades, though; I suspect the benefit of skipping grades drops off exponentially around 1 or 2 "skips", even for very gifted children.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> This article has an _Ender 's Game_ aura.

<comment><USER15> It remembers me "Time" by Stephen Baxter (1) with the brilliant kids, being influenced from the future to change present, and the fear reaction to them.

(1) - [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_(Baxter_novel)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_\(Baxter_novel\))

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> My brother was considered gifted. Several of my friends were also considered gifted. Almost all of them have done well enough but nothing really too out- sized or world changing. I know one that is now homeless and another that struggles to keep crappy jobs. From my perspective, the home environment and family values makes a bigger difference in your life later than your IQ when you are little.

</comment><comment><USER17> I was tested and told I was gifted at 11. (IQ152) I had hippy parents who let me do anything. I left home at 15. I retired at 35 to pursue my life's work of being in service of tearing down and re-imagining the Global West pro-slavery democracy. Currently working in The Undercommons (Moten/Harney).

</comment><comment><USER18> the secret purpose of reddit and videogames is to neutralize this threat

<comment><USER9> I don't know if that effect is intentional, but I do believe it is an effect felt by everyone, not just "G&T". Distraction from real life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Interesting that this mentions the short story The Veldt, which is also dramatized as one of the radio plays in X Minus one that was on the front page yesterday.

<comment><USER20> [https://archive.org/details/OTRR_X_Minus_One_Singles/XMinusO...](https://archive.org/details/OTRR_X_Minus_One_Singles/XMinusOne55-08-04012TheVeldt.mp3)

> Yet instead, the precocious children lock their parents into a virtual > reality room, where they allow them to be eaten by virtual – yet nonetheless > carnivorous – lions.

I remember seeing this as an 80s or 90s scifi episode. The children disabled the safeties on a holodeck like system and fed their parents to the lions.

It must have been "Ray Bradbury Theater", [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Veldt_(short_story)#Adapta...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Veldt_\(short_story\)#Adaptations)

double edit, it was. [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0683235/fullcredits](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0683235/fullcredits)</comment></comment>


Productivity And The Education Delusion - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2014/06/06/productivity-and-the-education-delusion/

<comment><USER2> I was quite surprised to read such a quality article from TechCrunch.

I think this article makes the case for giving people a minimum standard income over minimum wage. It certainly makes sense that as we automate more things, we require less work from our labor force. Rather than give them "bullshit" jobs and keep them working when automation can make everyone's lives easier, why not pay them to _not_ work the jobs that should be automated and let them live as they please? It seems like a compelling argument from my cursory knowledge of this topic, but I'm sure there are a whirlwind of counterarguments to this stance as well.</comment>


Fuzzy Mathematics with Python (FuzzPy, part 1) - <AUTHOR> http://blog.madpython.com/2010/10/17/fuzzy-mathematics-with-fuzzpy-part-1/

<comment><USER2> In what sense is a "fuzzy graph" different than a standard weighted graph?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weighted_graph#Weighted_graphs_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weighted_graph#Weighted_graphs_and_networks)

<comment><AUTHOR> Fuzzy graphs can also be weighted (that is supported in FuzzPy), but represent a set of fuzzy elements and their connections, so you are just dealing with a different type of member elements.

Also, since your graph elements are all members of a fuzzy set, you can also perform fuzzy set operations against your vertices or edges, whereas using weights for this type of work might often yield useless results.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Can anyone elaborate on some applications of fuzzy sets? I'm guessing something like strength of relationships in given social graphs as an example.

<comment><USER4> Fuzzy Sets can be used in a pretty wide variety of fields. Here are three books by the same author that cover a pretty big area:

[http://www.amazon.com/Modeling-Algorithms-Exploration- Kaufma...](http://www.amazon.com/Modeling-Algorithms-Exploration-Kaufmann- Management/dp/0121942759/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1287410719&sr=8-1)

[http://www.amazon.com/Fuzzy-Logic-Business-Industry- Windows/...](http://www.amazon.com/Fuzzy-Logic-Business-Industry- Windows/dp/1886801010/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1287410719&sr=8-3)

[http://www.amazon.com/Fuzzy-Systems-Handbook-Second- Practiti...](http://www.amazon.com/Fuzzy-Systems-Handbook-Second- Practitioners/dp/0121944557/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1287410719&sr=8-4)</comment></comment>


Reporter: Google successfully pressured me to take down critical story - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/09/reporter-google-successfully-pressured-me-to-take-down-critical-story/#p3 <comment><USER2> Yesterday's discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15145176](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15145176)

</comment><comment><USER3> " _[In 2011,] Hill was a cub reporter at Forbes, where she covered technology and privacy. At the time, Google was actively promoting Google Plus and was sending representatives to media organizations to encourage them to add "+1" buttons to their sites. Hill was pulled into one of these meetings, where the Google representative suggested that Forbes would be penalized in Google search results if it didn't add +1 buttons to the site._

" _Hill thought that seemed like a big story, so she contacted Google 's PR shop for confirmation. Google essentially confirmed the story, and so Hill ran with it under the headline: "Stick Google Plus Buttons On Your Pages, Or Your Search Traffic Suffers."_"

" _" I was told by my higher-ups at Forbes that Google representatives called them saying that the article was problematic and had to come down. The implication was that it might have consequences for Forbes, a troubling possibility given how much traffic came through Google searches and Google News."_"

Ugh. Google was reportedly throwing their _search traffic_ weight around.

<comment><USER4> This is why I am scared to criticize Google. It knows who I am and it knows all the other businesses/websites that I own. It might try to damage/demonetize them subversively if it thinks that I am against it or its owners in any way. There will be no way I can prove it. It also shares it data with the US government.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q-Tel](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q- Tel)

[https://gizmodo.com/how-google-gives-your-information-to- the...](https://gizmodo.com/how-google-gives-your-information-to-the- nsa-512840958)

<comment><USER5> _This is why I am scared to criticize Google_

You just did, in what followed that comment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "Disclosure: My brother works at Google." We all know who is getting fired today. _grabs popcorn_ Edit: Dupe already! Man do googlers on HN work fast.

</comment><comment><USER7> Threatening to retaliate against the press is another thing (after the no- poaching agreement) Google should not have copied from Apple.

<comment><USER8> Not doubting you, but what instances were there of Apple threatening to retaliate against the press? Nothing is coming to mind when I try to recall such incidents and I imagine you have some specific ones you could point to.

<comment><USER7> [http://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little- secret/](http://www.zdnet.com/article/apple-prs-dirty-little-secret/)

[https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist- manipu...](https://www.cultofmac.com/255618/how-apples-blacklist-manipulates- the-press/)

<comment><USER8> Thanks for the links, I think I'd read the ZDNet article once before.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Hill thought that seemed like a big story

It is a big story still. It sounds illegal.

</comment><comment><USER10> To me this article feels like bandwagoning and hearsay. I am all for the critical attention aimed at Google, but there is simply no teeth to this story at all.

Edit: Thanks guys for the criticism about using the word hearsay in this context. I'll never use it that way again, pinky promise.

<comment><USER11> Hearsay is a legal term to prevent court cases from proceeding on information gleaned from witnesses who are not present. So, if you refuse to go to court as a witness, your coworker who overheard you talk about the case cannot sit in your place.

When someone writes a story about someone else's experience, that's not "hearsay," that's just "journalism." You may not think this story sounds credible, but if so you should come up with a different reason than "this is a story about someone else's experience therefore it's unreliable."

And anyway, you can just read the original article written by the person who experienced this, if you want to circumvent the "hearsay" thing: [http://gizmodo.com/yes-google-uses-its-power-to-quash- ideas-...](http://gizmodo.com/yes-google-uses-its-power-to-quash-ideas-it- doesn-t-li-1798646437)

<comment><USER10> Pardon me for using hearsay colloquially. Since we are not in a courtroom, I didn't think anyone would presume I'm using legalese, but I digress.

The issue I have with the article, referring my toothless remark, is this part

>told me that I needed to unpublish the story because the meeting had been confidential, and the information discussed there had been subject to a non- disclosure agreement between Google and Forbes. (I had signed no such agreement, hadn't been told the meeting was confidential, and had identified myself as a journalist.)

So no one told you that the meeting was confidential, it was, and they asked you to take it down.

Ok, yawn.

Then from the article you posted:

>Somehow, very quickly, search results stopped showing the original story at all.

Pics or it didn't happen.

Then you follow through to see no proof anywhere. "Bandwagoning" as I said previously, on how this other group lost funding for criticizing Google. Then an email confirming the NDA and that Forbes willingly took down the article.

The whole time this person has no evidence or proof of these things actually occurring. Saying things like "it stopped showing up in search" "I couldn't find it in the cache" "no one told me there was an NDA" "I heard Google say the +1 button helped your rank" all lack any ability to verify.

Journalists love to journal, though. So let's continue with this gossip.

<comment><USER11> I totally get it, I would like to see more evidence also, so this story shouldn't be taken as gospel truth. However, it should also not be discounted as false. Google needs to respond to these accusations and make it clear what their stance is on this sort of behavior. Not because the accusations themselves are super credible, but because the accusations speak to a deep concern many of Google's customers have about the power they wield.

<comment><USER10> >I totally get it, I would like to see more evidence also

Right, me too. I can't find Google doing anything wrong here. The article was under NDA so Forbes and Google took it down willingly.

No proof of the +1 statement. No proof of Google censoring the article. We have no story here.

Unprovable accusations don't help your side of the fight, though. Even if they hint at something that is true.

<comment><USER11> It's totally provable though. Whether or not it will be proved is another matter. Other witnesses were presumably around so they might chime in. Certainly Google can step in and tell their side. The thing about these sorts of situations is corporations are very hesitant to come out and blatantly lie because it can come back to bite them in a huge way later on. So if Google comes out and refutes these claims, that will suggest they are PROBABLY not true, or at least very different than what we are being told. Not a perfect barometer for the truth, as they certainly can lie and get away with it, but it's better than nothing.

<comment><USER10> Google did chime in. Clearly you didn't read the article you linked to me.

<comment><USER11> You misunderstand, I was referring to WHY these sorts of articles have value, which seemed to me to be the topic of our exchange. Google would not have released a statement on this topic without this article. Likewise, if others have additional information (such as witnesses or journalists at other companies) they are more likely to come out with it.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Circumventing the D Garbage Collector - <AUTHOR> http://pointersgonewild.wordpress.com/2014/10/26/circumventing-the-d-garbage-collector/ <comment><USER2> Freelisting objects to reduce load on the GC has a long history. The Lisp Machines had a feature called "resources" to support this.

While I think the best modern collectors, such as the JVM collector, are good enough to make manual freelisting unnecessary, it is still a massive amount of effort to develop a collector of this quality.

[0] [http://common- lisp.net/project/bknr/static/lmman/resour.xml#...](http://common- lisp.net/project/bknr/static/lmman/resour.xml#resource)</comment>


Study shows chocolate reduces blood pressure and risk of heart disease   - <AUTHOR> http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-03/esoc-ssc032910.php

<comment><USER2> Was it belgian, swiss or german? Because american INCREASES risk of heart disease. Why? Hersheys uses trans fats for their bars.</comment>


UniFi-Video Products End of Life Announcement - <AUTHOR> https://community.ui.com/questions/UniFi-Video-Products-End-of-Life-Announcement/dc529d39-0e58-43cc-96f0-8f0eed0d002c <comment><USER2> What's going on here is Ubiquiti want to sell you a hardware+software combination (Unifi-Protect) rather than provide a free software NVR (Unifi- Video) which could run via a container on 3rd party hardware/cloud/etc.

This is part of a trend towards a higher TCO for their products. _However_ as a long-time owner of Ubiquiti network and security camera equipment I have to say I welcome the move as it has resulted in higher quality products. On the security camera front, Unifi-Protect still represents the best one-time Cap-Ex rather option rather than Op-Ex options such as Ring and Google Nest who charge monthly for camera cloud storage, etc.

<comment><USER3> I completely disagree. Their code quality has gone down the tubes. The new UDM/UXG routers have 1/10th the functionality of the previous generation USG and have been buggy from the get-go including such basic functionality as not hard-locking when utilizing an SFP for your WAN ports.

The Unifi Protect software isn't even close to feature parity with Video and there's not even a hint that it will get there before they EOL Video. Their largest "hardware" option supports a whopping 4 hard drives and forces you to use RAID-5 across them.

No AI functionality to detect humans/animals/cars, it barely even qualifies as an NVR.

Blue Iris runs absolute circles around Protect and actually has a full feature set for less money and no hardware tie-in. Ubiquiti has been trying their hardest to jump the shark in 2020 and I'm getting closer to dropping them from my network entirely.

<comment><USER4> > _I 'm getting closer to dropping them from my network entirely._

What are the best alternatives right now? Planning to do a whole house in the next few months and have been planning on Ubiquiti. I've heard some complaints lately but haven't heard of anything that makes for a good replacement.

My number one requirement is mesh APs with fast handoff. Close second is ease of admining multiple networks and ease of setting up segregated VLANs for IoT stuff.

<comment><USER5> I've been thinking of Aruba APs and a FortiGate 61F. It'll be more manual setup, but should work fine.

I've got a nice UniFi setup at home (CloudKey G2, USG, 8-port switch, wired AP, mesh'd AP) and it works well, but it's lacking in some frustrating ways.

For example, it advertises DPI, but it doesn't provide data that can guide decisions. It'll group things into buckets, but you can't look at it over any timeframe (doesn't even say when you reset the counters) much less trigger on if anything exeptional happens.

There's also this nifty power widget which you can connect to a cable modem (between it and mains power) and when the internet connection fails, it'll power cycle the modem... not a bad thing for some iffy ISPs. It works, but it doesn't log to the otherwise-reasonably-extensive system logs. So, you never know if it actually DID anything.

The setup here at home works well. The APs are solid, as is the security gateway. But it just seems to lack in some advertised ways; enough so to make me question sticking with them when it next becomes time to upgrade.

<comment><USER6> So I installed the UniFi smart power plug and it does log. Not much detail, and there are server post in the forms asking for more details on the settings (timeout settings, how long it waits, what it pings, etc.) that have gone unanswered, but it does log. The message in my log is:

{ap} outlet 0 has been power cycled

Running latest GA on CloudKey2.

<comment><USER5> Really? Thanks! Maybe that changed with an update since I got mine... That's excellent. I'll make a power cycle happen later and affirm things here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Pretty torn on this one. Really wish I could host Unifi-Protect on prem with my own hardware. Most of their dedicated hardware doesn't even offer raid or decent backup solutions.

It's really a shame because everything else UBNT does is pretty awesome but this one feels pretty shitty.

<comment><USER8> The combination of video streaming, bring-your-own-hardware, and closed source is just really difficult to get right. For every customer who has a good experience, there are three others who have some kind of persistent issue. There's just no way to deliver appliance-like reliability for a video server without controlling the hardware and OS.

<comment><USER7> Isn't that what cloudkey/dream machine covers though? The people who provision the types of systems we're talking about are the same that are familiar with how to spec server hardware.

I had no problem with unifi-video, in fact I had _better_ reliability via ZFS zraid then what the dream machine supports with a single disk.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The actual title of the article is "UniFi-Video Products End of Life Announcement". That's very different from this headline. Ubiquiti is very much still in the video business. They're just deprecating the previous generation, which has been a long time coming.

<comment><USER9> You definition of "long time" and mine are very different. Security camera life cycle is measured in manymany years (min of 5 if not 10+). This move is very sudden for people that have invested thousands of dollars into a security platform only to be told you have 5 months before we leave out out in the cold

Not a good look for UI. I was thinking about using UI protect for myself. But their treatment of UI video customers has me rethinking that

<comment><USER10> They have been saying the older Video products are deprecated for over a year now, and it's not like they'll suddenly stop working either. The nice thing about those cameras is the self-hosting. Nothing changes there, so what's the problem?

<comment><USER9> They have been talking out of both sides of their mouth to to ensure UniFi Video NVR customers would keep buying camera's

They have been saying the UniFi Video NVR would be supported for security released until Protect provided the same feature set, then they would give amble notice to transition

Protect does not have the same feature set, nor is 5mos ample time for transition

As far as "nothing stops working" Well things will stop working, remote access for example

Further as one person on the Ubnt site asks "How long will the keep the mobile app in the app stores" if they remove it from the iPhone store and a user upgrades their phone they will have no way to install the app again.

That is just 2 of the huge list of issues that this move brings

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> The most frustrating part of protect to me isn't that it only runs on their hardware, but that there's no way of making the system even a little bit redundant. You can't back up the system, you can't stream motion events over the internet etc. It's very annoying. The only way to get video out of the system is to save clips to a PC with the web app. I know there was some effort to RE the proprietary video storage format, but I don't know where it went. Otherwise it's fantastic...

<comment><USER12> You can get RTSP feeds off the cameras.

<comment><USER9> If I have to set RTSP and a secdonry dvr to get off-site backup why would I pay for their overpriced camera's and lose many features

<comment><USER12> I don't know. Is this a rhetorical question?

Lots of people on the internet like to talk about problems and not give any solutions. I like to focus on the solutions and leave the evangelism and griping to others.

<comment><USER9> RTSP Streaming is not a "solution" to any of the problems mentioned in the Grandparent's comment about the shortcoming of UniFi protect

it is simply a way to use the UniFi Camera's with another DVR platform in a limited (very Limited) way over a standard like ONVIF which is supported by lots of camera vendors but not Unifi

So if you want to talk about solutions, great but your comment is not really a solution to anything

<comment><USER12> I have Unifi cameras. It's a workaround to avoid buying all new cameras before you expected to.

Don't project your anger at Ubnt onto me. Sick of the negativity and 'Well actually'isms on this site.

My comment adds a lot more than any of yours have, which is just to dogpile on with more 'I'm mad!' and 'this sucks' bullshit and tears to fill the seemingly bottomless social media reservoirs.

Have some basic respect for others and don't be rude out of the gate talking to complete strangers.

<comment><USER13> I appreciate you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I love Ubiquiti, but that's because I'm a home user. I'd never deploy them for a customer.

It was obvious Protect was going to be the only solution going forward as soon as they announced it years ago. I can't fathom the surprise by anyone in that thread, because this is what they do with all of their products.

They announce the replacement, lie about not phasing out the current product, and then two years later phase it out anyways. This happens every single time and should not be a shock when it happens.

Next up is probably EdgeOS. That _might_ be different just because a lot of ISPs use it, but they keep pushing UNMS and some of their new products require it (see their EA store).

<comment><USER9> Home user also. I will no longer be buying or recommending UI products.

Looks like I am off to find a new networking vendor. Maybe mikrotik

<comment><USER15> Mikrotik is pretty good for ISP-style stuff - CPEs, routers with OSPF, etc. They are rock stable and get long-term support. Great value for the money but don't expect state of the art tech or best performance.

For "better wifi", TP-LINK EAP line of APs is pretty good - they sell controller separately but it works without. Cisco WAP line was good as well, but it was discontinued I think.

But a lot of people are happy with "better" consumer routers, like better Asus (say RT-AX88) with custom firmware - or the ultimate geeky toy, Turris Omnia (I have that one).

None of that will give you the slick UI of ubnt. But it would give you more stability and less planned obsolescence and unnecessary cloud integration.

<comment><USER9> flashy UI was not the selling point for UI to me, the ability to manage multiple AP's in a single interface and add new AP's to the network seamlessly were the 2 main driving points for me.

If you only have a single AP it is over kill for sure, but if you need multiple AP's then it is a great system

TP-Link EAP systems looks integrating I will have to look into that more. Thanks for the suggestions

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I invested in a UniFi video system (NVR + 3 cameras) in mid-2018.

It feels quite disheartening that these are considered legacy (unsupported & abandoned) products already..

<comment><USER17> The title was a little misleading earlier. They are only discontinuing their Unifi Video product, but all the camera hardware is still supported.

I have a Protect and several cameras deployed and I originally ran Unifi Video. I think the Protect product is much better but migrating from Unifi Video blows -- you can't move over your video archives.

<comment><USER16> Yeah I got that actually (but thanks for clarifying). It's just a pain that the NVR is going to be left to die..

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> It's interesting to read down the comments on that announcement page. Sounds like a lot of service providers feel like they're getting burned on this move, as their customer are using the services that are about to be deprecated.

Another example, if one were needed, about not building your business on someone else's platform, as it can be removed at any time.

</comment><comment><USER19> I own 1 camera from them and self-host on my own network behind a VPN, I want no cloud stuff near something as sensitive as cameras in my home.

Ubiquiti have for me always felt like a hardware company that tried to do software, I'm sad I have to find other options than their NVR, but maybe that is the way forward.

</comment><comment><USER20> Disappointing from Ubiquiti. While I don't use their video products, I was a user of their networking gear, but given this and the lack of quality / bugs in recent releases, the key features that are still missing or barely functional, I will be looking to migrate.

</comment><comment><USER21> It's long been a bit strange that they had two products. I needed to upgrade onto Unifi Protect as I literally couldn't get the Video app to load, it would just instantly crash.

Protect is nicer, however the app is also fairly buggy. It let's down the quality found elsewhere in their product suites.

Since upgrading to Protect, and rolling out new hardware at a new home, I still need to manually kill the app every time I've used it on iOS. Otherwise it says it can't connect to my system. It'll always work the first time, it'll never work a second.

It's frustrating, and hopefully moving from building two sub-par products, to focusing on one, will improve the experience for everyone.

<comment><USER6> I have the same issue on IOS. It's really annoying. I know okay, kill the app and restart it, but trying to get the non-tech family to do that is painful. The concept of closing an app on IOS just does not register (which overall is not a bad thing expect around issues like this).

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> In my experience, Ubiquiti's software leaves something to be desired. Rather than move to their hardware I'll move to other software. I'll still use their gear, just not the NVR.

</comment><comment><USER23> I'm totally confused... so it's not the cameras themselves? They just aren't offering cloud managed cameras, correct?

<comment><USER24> Protect is their 'hybrid cloud' product. Authentication and remote access are managed by their servers, but the videos are stored locally.

My guess is they managed to re-implement enough features in Protect that, after years of neglect, they could officially kill Video.

It's still not feature complete :-/

<comment><USER25> From what I've heard, the biggest drawback is that if you have more than a handful of cameras that you want to record in reasonably high definition, then none of Ubiquiti's hardware can keep up.

<comment><USER24> Their solution before they had bigger/faster devices was to run multiple appliances.

The other pretty big problems are no backup solution, video exports limited to 10 minute clips, cloud account and Internet mandatory (at least for initial setup). What drives me bonkers is no support for valid SSL certificates because they don't want you to have to worry about that or something. It breaks the protect app when you don't use their snakeoil default.

I'd still be using Unifi Video, but they broke the iOS app for like a whole year so it was use protect or switch over to something that took in RTSP from the cams.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> This was to be expected, when they talked about deprecating Unifi Video about a year ago they explicitly said that it's not going to be updated so it was just a matter of time until the final EOL-ing.

</comment><comment><USER27> I've been planning to install cameras at home and was considering Ubiquiti or Synology. What do you folks recommend? I'm looking for something with local storage but still has a slick app.

<comment><USER3> If you want something that "just works" I would venture down the synology path but be prepared to spend $$$ on camera licenses for any sizeable installation. If you don't mind rolling your own, Blue Iris is probably the most extensible with the downside that it requires far more manual configuration.

<comment><USER28> I bought a 2nd hand hp i5 to run Blue Iris, poe switch and a couple of dahua cams. The set up was pretty straightforward, there is info on the insanely toxic ipcamtalk site on recommended Blue Iris settings. Basically you need an Intel CPU to support hardware encoding and use less power, and specific setting to save the vids without reencoding.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: best low-latency desktop sharing application - <AUTHOR>

I am looking for a desktop sharing application. Sometimes I just need to show the other guy what I am looking at and vice versa. I need something that is as low latency as possible. Free is preferred but will pay if the product is worth it.
The sharing is between windows and mac osx.
An acceptable solution would be something that limits shared space to a portion of the window for efficiency.
The #1 goal is low latency. <comment><USER2> I don't know if it is what you want, but for quick & dirty shares I use: <http://join.me>

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, but unfortunately we already have a quick and dirty solution. Problem is latency, and its a huge problem.</comment></comment>


Mario Game ported in BuckleScript: 7K generated Js, 0.5s to build - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/bobzhang/MariOCaml <comment><USER2> direct link to demo for lazy people

[https://zhanghongbo.me/MariOCaml/](https://zhanghongbo.me/MariOCaml/)

controls work only on desktop, no mobile version</comment>


Apple moves to store iCloud keys in China, raising human rights fears - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-apple-icloud-insight-idUSKCN1G8060 <comment><USER2> Headline is somewhat misleading - this applies to Chinese iCloud accounts, not all iCloud accounts.

<comment><USER3> The headline is not misleading at all, they are doing exactly what I expected

<comment><USER4> The headline is ambiguous.

<comment><USER5> Ambiguous != misleading - the latter implies intent

<comment><USER6> No, it doesn't.

Ambiguous and Misleading is an _effect_ or _consequence_ of a statement. Neither indicate any intent behind the statement. In other words, a statement can be misleading despite of benevolent intention.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is from a year ago, headline should say 2018

</comment><comment><USER8> My first (knee jerk) thought is "I guess this is what happens when you're under pressure to perform better in China"; but I think there is more to the story than we know.

I would be surprised Apple if caved on this without having a mitigation strategy in place.

<comment><USER9> The "more to the story" is that this is required by Chinese law, as explained by the article:

> _In a statement, Apple said it had to comply with recently introduced > Chinese laws that require cloud services offered to Chinese citizens be > operated by Chinese companies and that the data be stored in China. It said > that while the company's values don't change in different parts of the > world, it is subject to each country's laws._

<comment><USER10> Replace the word "China" with "Sweden" and it starts sounding like reasonable policy.

<comment><USER11> No it does not. Sweden probably is less likely to horribly abuse the data to incarcerate and execute citizens for disagreeing with the government, but the goal of the policy would be the same - to make all data about the person subject to the state's control. Swedish government might not be abusing this control right now, but nobody can guarantee it won't in 15 years.

<comment><USER12> > the goal of the policy would be the same - to make all data about the person > subject to the state's control.

The real goal is just as likely to be economic - a way to protect local businesses without actually calling it protectionism.

<comment><USER11> It's probably both. But experience shows control is much more important to the state than the well-being of any businesses.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I wish for an AirPort iOS Time Capsule. One with a 2.5" 1TB HDD, with a Sub $199 pricing.

For $3 Dollar a month, you get 200GB iCloud, Most people don't need that, As your iOS, Apps, Music, doesn't need to be backed up. Those takes up in between 15GB+. So if you have an 64GB iPhone, that chances are 55GB iCloud ( 50 + 5GB Free ) is enough. That is $0.99 / month, $12 a Year, $24 for two years.

Surely a $199 iOS Time Capsule makes a much better business case than $12 a year backup plan?

Those who don't want their government spying on them, could have use this instead.

</comment><comment><USER14> Will the user experience be degraded if the user sets their region to Hong Kong or Macau?

</comment><comment><USER15> There is no cloud but other people's computers. Don't store personal data on other people's computers.

</comment><comment><USER10> The question is, by pulling out of China as some sort of business virtue signal, is the outcome an improvement? China doesn't need Apple and not complying with China without pulling out isn't an option.

Let's say some major Chinese company pulled out of the U.S. market because of the Iraq War, would the reaction of U.S. citizens, even those opposing the war, be positive? Wouldn't politicians use it as an instrument?

Make no mistake, scary stuff is going on in China, but the solution has to come from within China. In fact, by explicitly supporting the opposition in China, any accusation of "evil foreign influence" is substantiated.

</comment><comment><USER16> One more reason to dump Apple.

<comment><USER17> And go to who?

<comment><USER11> About 1000 other phone models not manufactured by Apple? Is it some kind of trick question that assumes Apple holds monopoly in the business of mobile/cloud and we're not aware of it? Or there's some other point here?

<comment><USER9> Everybody who operates cloud services in China is subject to these same laws. If you dump Apple over this, every other choice you have is guaranteed to be no better (and likely a hell of a lot worse) on the privacy front.

<comment><USER11> Maybe the point is to choose provider that operates cloud services _outside of China_?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> If it increases the share price, sales, maximizes shareholder value, without backlash in home market, it's okay. /s

</comment><comment><USER19> > they fear the authorities

authorities <\- its their country not yours not ours. Do bad things happen there? Yeah probably, but so do bad things happen in whatever country people are reading this post from.

Clearly countries have come about because people have different ways of thinking of how things should or should not be done. Because of this I always find it weird when people from one country are very concerned about another countries citizens.

We(you) anybody can't be the police of the world. If you want to operate in another country then you should probably follow their local laws. Any attempt to do so will probably result in the hero (those who wish to police) to turn in to a tyrant much worse than that we have today.

<comment><USER20> > I always find it weird when people from one country are very concerned about > another countries citizens.

I find it strange when people from one country _aren't_ concerned with other countries' citizens. That may or may not justify "intervention", but we're all human beings on the same planet here.

<comment><USER19> Well put, and I do long for a day we are all simply just "human". But there is enough bad in this world that the only sane way to combat it is based of locality.

Just as I am not concerned so much with what is happening in a home one street over, I am also not concerned about neighboring cities, states and then finally countries. Each of these groups surly has their own set of problems to solve before chasing after the problems of the next. So I chose to start with my self first, then my family and move out from there.

<comment><USER21> I'm very tempted towards being snarky. This also is a logical fallacy. You can work on your families problems and opt not to support companies caving to evil dictatorships as well.

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

Based on this fallacy we should never ever address any problem larger than what to have for dinner tonight because piddling issues are ever present.

<comment><USER19> I can't agree that what I stated is a false dilemma. I am simply stating for sake of efficiency locality matters.

I am also arguing that they are their own people. And while not all of them agree to be governed in this manner, some large percent probably does. It is silly to medal in the affairs of such.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Startup Fever: The Board Game - <AUTHOR> http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/meetpoint/startup-fever-the-board-game-0

<comment><USER2> I love Kickstarter. Such a pity it won't work for Europe :-(

How difficult/expensive is it for a European to get a US bank account such that I could create a Kickstarter project?

</comment><comment><USER3> Also, check out Burn Rate: <http://www.cool-studio.net/></comment>


Graph QL - <AUTHOR> Any tips, tricks, insights or thoughts on Graph QL? <comment><USER2> There are probably thousands of web pages on it. You'll need to be more specific here, I think.

<comment><AUTHOR> Ahh cool - was just looking for something high level really</comment></comment>


Hosting Survey - <AUTHOR>

A question to the community, do you  host your small projects / personal sites yourself or do you use a hosting company, if the latter - who do you use? What kind of things draw you to a certain hosting company?
Joe <comment><USER2> I use Dreamhost, cos all my stuff is non-mission-critical (that said, I think I've had maybe 2 long-term outages with them)

</comment><comment><USER3> I have used Gazzin's(<http://www.gazzin.com/>) Reseller account in the past and it worked without any issues. However, the interface was clunky and not your ideal Web 2.0 but this was back in 2003.

Currently, I am using Dreamhost and as it has been mentioned before it does have outages but my blog and other simple sites do not have a lot of traffic to deal with so it is ok for the time being.

For any sort of professional deployment, I am using slicehost's VPS. Linode is also a good one. However, with slicehost I built the entire server myself so it gives you a fine grained control which I miss with dreamhost.

</comment><comment><USER4> I gave up on shared hosting a couple of years ago. Switched to a VPS and couldn't be happier.

* better security (hundreds of random customers can't write a PHP script to read my db config settings)

* better uptime (if one of those hundreds (thousands?) of websites gets slammed with traffic, my sites don't go down.)

* i can run as many websites as I want - same price

* it's handy to use ssh/rsync as a dropbox for distributing large files

* I get my own IP address, so if one of those hundred other customers sends spam or is hacked, my IP address isn't blacklisted.

</comment><comment><USER5> 1 - dreamhost for blogs and random stuff to help out friends.

2 - dedicated server managed by a small hosting company in a solid IDC for my money focused projects. Since I bought the server 4 years ago, I'll stick with it until it dies. Then maybe rent from a linode or slicehost, etc...

</comment><comment><USER6> For trial projects, I host my own projects within my own network so that I have extremely fast speeds. When I publish them for beta-testing, I use kvchosting.com - they offer unlimited webspace and bandwidth for 2.99/month if you get the two year package.

</comment><comment><USER3> Sorry, I did not answer your question completely. I would only go for a hosting site that gives me complete SSH access to my account.</comment>


Tacocopter: The Coolest Airborne Taco Delivery System That's Completely Fake - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/03/qa-with-tacocopter/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29&utm_content=My+Yahoo

<comment><USER2> I'm disappointed in Wired for repeating the nonsense that Star was arrested for a "hoax explosive device". She had a shirt with blinking lights on it.

EDIT: On second read, Wired's statement is technically true; that's the justification the police gave for arresting her. But as written, it implies that Star intended such a hoax.

<comment><USER3> Assuming the author of this article only has the previous Boston Globe article to go on that is what appears to be the case. I looked around and the response from Star seems to conflict a lot with the article, so either the police lied (seems most likely) or she did, either way I don't think you can criticise the author of this article for what they said or their tone as the Boston Globe presents it in exactly the same way.

Interview here: <http://boingboing.net/2008/09/22/star-simpson-one-yea.html>

<comment><USER2> It's Wired. They purport to be a magazine that knows something about technology and the people that make it. The quality of the mag has gone up and down over the years, but I think it's fair to say they shouldn't be relying on Boston.com to do the legwork on a story like this.

And even so, reporting the claims of the police without qualification is something even a rookie reporter isn't supposed to do. The fact that the judge gave her a path to dismiss the charges, after sentencing her to a trivial amount of community service, is also pretty relevant. If you mention one fact the other ought to follow.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> When I saw the Tacocopter post yesterday I had a little chuckle ... and then was completely floored by people arguing about it and going off into side- rants about the FAA getting in the way of progress.

When you read this headline it should sound like a tautology.

</comment><comment><USER5> Seemed fake but I really wanted to get some Tacocopter... So I guess with this and Kid Icarus Wing Man we are starting April Fools as early at March 20th now?

</comment><comment><USER6> Wow--we can't be serious with this people. I fly these things--not very well-- but I build and fly these things. We are so far from this tech being able to deliver anything autonomously it's not even funny.

I think this is a joke--if it's not, the founders are jokes because they have no idea what they are talking about and clearly no idea where this technology actually stands. Spend some time on rcgroups.com, fpvlab.com and the other multirotor forums and you'll realize just how serious those people are how quickly "Tacocopter" would get laughed out of the room.

<comment><USER7> You are attacking a straw man. You may want to read the article.

<comment><USER8> Or the title.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Anyone making more than $300 monthly from side project? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> You mean per hour, per day, per project, or what?

<comment><AUTHOR> Per month

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Yea with machine learnt algorithm trading. More profitable than a full time job... (for now)</comment>


Ask HN: Any ideas about giving a graphical representation of an inverse problem? - <AUTHOR>

I would like to start my thesis with that. Thank you very much. <comment><USER2> You probably need to be more specific than that. What sort of inverse problem do you have in mind? Does your thesis deal with solving inverse problems, or with visualization, or with monte carlo simulation using forward models? If it's problem-based, what particular problems do you consider? Are there graphical representations of the forward problem? Do you intend to actually solve the inverse problem and show its solution, or just make a drawing of what you think the solution would be?

In my field, a typical inverse problem involves source term estimation. Imagine you have a forward model of atmospheric transport. That is, given a source of some gas or radiological particle, the model predicts its concentration in the surrounding area, over time. A graphical representation of that forward problem might be, for example, a contour map of 24-hour exposures.

For such a situation, an inverse problem is to estimate, based on a few sensor readings, the strength and location of a source. A graphical representation of that inverse problem might be a contour map of probabilities that the source is in a given location.

<comment><AUTHOR> First of all, thank you very much for the detailed reply. I was thinking about something general, i.e. for an intro slide in a presentation where people can look at and have an immediate visualization of the main feature of an inverse problem, in particular the fact that it is inverse and hence related to a path going from data to model. Anyway I appreciated your exaustive examples. Thank you again.

<comment><USER2> I don't know whether this fits your definition of an inverse problem, but maybe cruise over to the USGS website and find a picture or a screenshot of locating an earthquake based on seismic readings. Most people have heard of or can relate to that, I think.

Good luck with your presentation.</comment></comment></comment>