Ask HN: Anyone use Dart JS on a production app? - <AUTHOR>

I am very intrigued by Dart mainly the dart2js route, however I couldn't find a 'Who uses it' page. I always find it interesting to see other services that use a technology and what they were able to achieve with it. <comment><USER2> blossom.io uses it in production and there has been an interview on infoq.com lately: <http://www.infoq.com/news/2013/04/blossom-dart-switch></comment>


'Lies My Teacher Told Me' and America's Post-Truth Era - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/08/history-education-post-truth-america/566657/?single_page=true <comment><USER2> > We historians tend to make everything so nuanced that the idea of truth > almost disappears. People in graduate history programs have said things to > me like: Why should we privilege one narrative above others with the term > "true"? That kind of implies that all narratives are equal—or, at least, > that all narratives have some merit, that no narrative has all the merit.

This is happening a lot among more than just historians and it's a serious problem. Some things _are_ true and that has consequences. Ignored, reality will pass us by.

<comment><USER3> History _is_ extremely complex and nuanced, that is the problem. It literally encompasses everything that ever happened. So anything you can say about history is inherently an oversimplification with ignores a lot of possible angles and voices and narratives. Just deciding what goes into a textbook in inherently political, even if everything stated in the book are objective truths.

<comment><USER4> The scientific way of looking at the world has never been, and potentially will never be, absolutely true, as in a correct model that explains reality in all its facets. I do however disagree with your position in one decisive way: The scientific method demands that any stated fact is falsifiable, and that already falsified facts are not used again as a basis for further theories. Once it has been shown that flat earth is false, it cannot simply be said to be "a different opinion" and that we have no right to stop its further propagation. Nothing is provenly true, but we know what's false, anything else is still up for discussion. So, once it has been shown with reasonable documentation that things like Ausschwitz or Nanking or Japanese internment in the US happened, it is not up to "politics" to make it part of history or not. Sure, it can be rationalized and interpreted in different ways, but that doesn't change any of the facts, as long as there is not a solid disprove of these events that can deal with all the evidence that supports them.

Edit: The statement that contents are "political" is a classic unfalsifiable claim, thus is an invalid argument. Evidence demands counter-evidence.

<comment><USER3> We can agree that the earth is not flat, but I don't think this is really the issue. The article mentions the question whether the Japanese internement is treated in single sentence, or on multiple pages with pictures, personal accounts etc. Stating it is "a fact" does not really help you decide which approach is appropriate for an US history textbook.

Yeah we can agree that textbooks should not make objectively false statements, but that is not really the difficult part.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The Canadian writer Malcolm Gladwell has a podcast called "Revisionist History" [http://revisionisthistory.com/](http://revisionisthistory.com/) in which he drills into particular episodes of US history.

I find it interesting, even though I don't have the academic historical chops to independently assess its accuracy.

Example: In the episode called Miss Buchanan's Period of Adjustment, Gladwell explains that Brown v. Topeka Board of Education (the famous school integration case) had a severe consequence. It caused a large fraction of African American schoolteachers and educators to be thrown out of work. He points out that teaching was a major source of 1930s-1950s knowledge-work employment for African Americans was teaching in segregated schools. Quite a few Euro-American school boards obeyed the ruling admitting African American students, but did not employ the teachers from thew schools they left.

[http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/13-miss-buchanans- per...](http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/13-miss-buchanans-period-of- adjustment)

<comment><USER6> You have to be careful with Gladwell. His primary gift, is that is he is an incredible storyteller. Take him as entertainment not as a historian or scientist. He goes for surprising and unexpected simple reasons for everything, often by cherry-picking individual facts or annecdotes.

<comment><USER7> Do you have any particular instances of him getting it wrong. I often here this concern, but I'm yet to find someone that can point to a moment and say he got it wrong.

<comment><USER8> This article from the Columbia Journalism review is level headed but tough, and brings in a few specific examples: [https://archives.cjr.org/the_observatory/the_gladwellian_deb...](https://archives.cjr.org/the_observatory/the_gladwellian_debate.php)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think it's less likely to be intentional historical revisionism, and more likely that Hanlon's razor applies:

[http://machall.com/view.php?date=2005-04-06](http://machall.com/view.php?date=2005-04-06)

<comment><USER3> Hanlons Razor is often appropriate, but I'm not sure it is in the case of history teaching. Teachers don't teach an incorrect or skewed version of history because they are "dumb". They either do it because the want to impart certain ideas and values to the students, or because they genuinely believe this is a appropriate view of history, which just pushes the question one level back - because who then taught the teacher the skewed version of history?

<comment><USER10> Teachers teach the curriculum they are assigned, that is all. The only variation is in private schools that do not conform to State and Federal curriculum standards by default. In public schools, teachers do not decide what they teach. Standardized testing guarantees that teachers stick to the script also.

<comment><USER11> So far as I am aware, standardized testing does not apply to history and other non-core subjects. Like science also, unfortunately. Everything outside the three Rs (reading, writing, 'rithmetic) is slashed, because that's what the tests target.

<comment><USER12> You're wrong. Most states have some form of Standards of Learning (SOL) testing at each grade level. These cover the three Rs, plus history and science. Most of these were implemented as a result of the No Child Left Behind Act.

Here's a listing of the tests given in VA... [http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/released_tests/index...](http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/released_tests/index.shtml)

<comment><USER11> Interesting. I know that my state and the neighboring one only count the reading, writing and mathematics portions of whatever standardized testing they require. Although I believe that the state legislature just eliminated the whole very expensive set of standards that they had just put into place.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Brings to mind another related absurd pedagogical approach the "lies to children" approach of starting by saying that molecules are the smallest object possible. Then atoms. Instead of being truthful and mentioning quarks but saying they are so advanced and deep that even most physicists don't even do anything with them calculation related or otherwise.

<comment><USER14> "Lies to children" is a perfectly good pedagogic approach. Adding caveats to every concept sucks time and energy from learning the broad themes of the subject. When we teach people programming, we start with variables and loops and don't mention page faults and cache poisoning. The same goes for any field.

Demanding nuance of a _particular kind_ in history pedagogy, as you see often these days, is just a bad-faith "isolated demand for rigor" that has the effect of privileging the worldview of those demanding the selective nuance.

[http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/14/beware-isolated- demands...](http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/08/14/beware-isolated-demands-for- rigor/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've found it's true as well in France, regarding a lot of things, like the middle age, age of enlightenment, the French Revolution and colonisation.

<comment> saiya-jin Yeah, french people are very patriotic. There are some good reasons for that, be it past or present, beauty of the country etc, but as with other over- patriotic countries (I am looking at you US, but not only), a lot of people like simple world views so France/US/whatever becomes simply the best country ever, no real discussion allowed, critical view is ignored or simply attacked.

A bit more humble approach would do everybody much better, since every single country out there has done things to be ashamed of, or outright utterly horrible. Realizing you are not that much better than the other guy may bring some sense of equality that I don't see in current world (american life worth more than some other, modern colonialism done by former colonial powers including US, Russia and probably China, and so on and on).

<comment><USER15> Well, it not always in that direction, sure we got some patriotic chest- thumping but also some abhorence of past achievements/periods/characters.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> There is an excellent fun little book "1066 and All That", which parodies English history as people remember it from their education. It happens to have been written in 1930 but most of its jokes hold up, and the subset that people remember from that period hasn't changed quite so much.

History as remembered by the public is always going to be fragments made into a mythos. The problem is that some of that mythos defines the propaganda contours of the present, whether that's people saying the US civil war wasn't about slavery or whether it's Brexiteers saying that "no deal will be fine because we survived the second world war".

</comment><comment><USER17> This book was a breath of fresh air for me. I had taken a college level course in history not terribly long before this book came out, and I felt that much of the content was wrong or questionable. This book helped confirm my original suspicion something I struggled with for quite some time. I am glad to see the author is pushing forward with what he originally stated. He was right.

On another note, it is interesting to see the flag has the gold trim around it in this shot.

<comment><USER18> I also enjoyed this book. However, I find it strange you had that experience in a college level course. I took two terms of US history in college and the professor had zero qualms about calling out discrepancies and shining a light on how history was/is written through certain cultural standards and lenses. Despite not really being a "history person", they were some of my favorite courses because I felt like there was very little bullshit being presented as absolute truth.

<comment><USER19> Different professors are different. The person who taught my college general education literature class used it as an opportunity to unapologetically proselytize the good word of Jesus Christ. 90% of every quiz question or essay prompt was relating every book back to Christianity.

I found it offensive, but at this point in my college career the fight had been abraded out of me. I tried doing the assignments dispassionately, writing things like "Taking for granted that there is an omnipotent entity at the helm of the universe, I think the author contends that <rest of my answer>".

I'd get my paper back with every secular apologism scribbled out in red, and comments on the margins that were like "JESUS LIVES" and other such academically cool business. Also he was giving me D's. This was a state school, not a religious one.

Having fought 25% of my professors that ended up being lunatics no appetite remained in me to take this one to the tribunal. So, I salvaging my grade by feigning conversion. I started writing incomprehensibly unrelated answers to short essay questions. A question might read something like "In what way was Dostoevsky influenced by stoicism." I would answer "God is great!" My reward was A's.

I no longer find anything within a normal distribution of human arch-types strange.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> The sanitized version prevents people from comprehending the scope of the horror and abuse, bequeaths an air of normalcy, and leads to simplistic conclusions in modern generations.

At every given point minorities have faced huge resistance for the simplest of things and basic human equality and dignity - and I suspect every adult educated citizen knows this - and the effects of these continue to fester. It's not 'complexity' if you historically discriminate against people they will suffer and there will be far reaching multi generational consequences. This can't be wished away in denial, how can a problem remain unsolved after 200 years?

We hold others coming out of hundreds of years of colonialism to standards we often to do adhere to ourselves and which these societies lacking development, wealth and time have not had an opportunity to develop.

This becomes another way to not shine the torch on ourselves. Redlining, housing policies, access to education, employment, credit, segregated living and education and the police & justice system will not pass scrutiny. And this has so far escaped global attention and censure but at some point the USA as a whole will be held to account for the condition of the minorities. And at that point the depravity of Pioneer and Volker funded studies by people like Charles Murray - whose work continues to be used even on an educated forums like this regularly, revisionist history and blaming others will not hold because we do not accept these excuses from other countries we hold to account.

</comment><comment><USER21> I am from Europe and I find that this is true for _all_ European countries.

</comment><comment><USER10> I have reviewed most of the history my kids learned as they were growing up. Most of it is actually decent.

Often, uncomfortable truths are avoided where contemporary standards differ wildly from a historical context. This is unfortunate because students do not understand that "normal" changes over time. This is probably most pronounced wrt race relations (e.g. what passed as normal race relations in 1860 throughout the entire US would be considered outrageously racist now...or the idea that in 1943 Americans sympathized with imprisoned Japanese citizens, the normalcy of anti-Semitism throughout most of history etc).

Instead children are taught to view the past through the standards and tastes of the present, and history becomes a matter of making moral judgements and shaping present morality (a valuable function but not the point of history). But indeed even our study of history will one day make great history...what happens when history is written by people who have never had to kill to survive?

<comment><USER22> I've had this same conversation but concerning ages when normal things happen. Look at when people got married and had children in 1860 vs 1960 vs 2018. In this short amount of time people went from having children being normal from 12-14 to 18-30, to 25-40. Yes people still have children at young ages but it is more of a norm to do it later. Just look at all the HN articles talking about that the last couple years. Then listen to conversations when you hear about a 22 year old marrying a 16 year old, things get said like "pedophile" and "gross" and "thats just wrong." Even though not too long ago that was normal.

And that feedback is just from the States. Other countries and regions are different. Maybe here 18 is a magical age where you become an adult but in the far East its 16. In Amazonia it is 13. (I just made those numbers up, I do not know).

Makes you wonder, what is normal or moral to me that is just learned behavior and not really normal or moral?

<comment><USER16> These things aren't just arbitary changes, they're part of the consent revolution and the general post-Enlightentment search to have reasons why we do things rather than just the arbitary tyranny of ""normal"".

> 13

This stuff depends on place as well as time.

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1021569/Great-B...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1021569/Great- Balls-Scandal-How-Jerry-Lee-Lewis-marriage-13-year-old-wrecked-career.html)</comment></comment></comment>


Lessons from the Storm that Wasn't - <AUTHOR> http://www.historicalclimatology.com/blog/lessons-from-the-storm-that-wasnt <comment><USER2> > "most of Washington was built across the low-lying terrain of a former > swamp"

Not true.

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/08/29/...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/08/29/no- dc-isnt-really-built-on-a-swamp/)</comment>


Adapting to Windows as a Linux Developer - <AUTHOR> https://email@example.com/adapting-to-windows-as-a-linux-developer-80a6fe0ef6f4 <comment><USER2> I really like that old windows logo. Nostalgia, perhaps, but so much more appealing to me than the current logo.</comment>


Vernor Vinge predicts singularity by 2030 - <AUTHOR> http://hplusmagazine.com/articles/ai/singularity-101-vernor-vinge <comment><USER2> _questions like "what is the meaning of life?" will be practical engineering questions._

uh... I've heard that from another science fiction writer somewhere... now what happened with that?

I don't think we have been becoming better at "outsourcing our cognition" (though it's an inspiring goal). I've tried to do this as much as possible in my own life, and I've found I'm much more effective when I don't do it _at all_ (the most effective outsourcing is to try to articulate one's idea to someone else - but they don't need to actually do anything). This lack of gradual increase means there's no extrapolation to further increase, let alone an exponentially increasing acceleration into a singularity - not, at least, for _me_ :-(.

Mechanizing conceptual understanding remains difficult. Although we human beings are good at modularizing knowledge (it's what we constantly do), and it looks like it should be straightforward to automate, we haven't managed it, _at all_. So many times in history, people have thought they are on the verge of it...

Did you know that Mr Boolean originally called his algebra the "Rules of Thought"? What he did was very cool, and you can see what he meant, but... it's such an awfully long way from "thought".

I think it's possible to create human level intelligence (and probably faster and broader - but maybe not any deeper); we just have no idea how. And machines that are 16,000 times faster (21 Moore years) aren't going to help with that, in themselves.

But it would be awesome.

(My masters was on statistical inference of pattern, without predetermined patterns, and taking into account the complexity of the pattern sought. I chose this as the closest approach to automating thought. We are a _long_ way away, IMHO).

</comment><comment><USER3> I wonder whether super human intelligence is a super set of human intelligence or something entirely different. I find it rather plausible that machine intelligence will very soon be capable of doing things we humans cannot do. In fact, that's already the case to some degree (and I don't mean just doing things faster).

However, I believe the day when machines will be able to do everything we can do, only better, is very far out. 2030 is in about 20 years. Looking at things like anaphora resolution and how far we have progressed in the last 20 years, I'm not optimistic we'll make the deadline.

And then of course, the singularity would not be a program that does anaphora resolution, but a program that writes programs to solve any new problem and determine worthy goals in the first place, because these are all things we humans can do.

<comment><USER4> "Looking at things like anaphora resolution and how far we have progressed in the last 20 years, I'm not optimistic we'll make the deadline."

It may just take a new perspective on the problem. Just look at the changes in the internet over the last decade. IMHO, there's been an obvious rate increase in dissemination and cross-pollenization of ideas. Blogs and sites like this only decrease the generation time even further.

It's the ever increasing second derivative that makes the idea of the singularity plausible (with all due respect to the S-curve believers (I think they are right, but what's the point if the top of the S is so significantly higher than where we are now)).

<comment><USER3> Sure, breakthroughs are always possible, and more pieces of information are linked to each other and so on. I'm not saying it's not possible that someone has a good idea tomorrow that changes everything.

But no, ideas don't cross pollinate. It's individuals who cross pollinate ideas in their heads and there's a limit to how much information a person can possibly juggle in her head.

It's that creative process that we don't really understand yet which is the bottleneck. No amount of linked information will be able to somehow supercharge our coginitive capacity. Sometimes just having time to think without interruption is more important than more information.

I think the likelyhood for breakthrough ideas is largely a function of the number of people working on hard problems. I'm not sure how fast that rate rises. Not very fast I would think. And the second derivative may very well be zero.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> More facts, less handwaving:

[http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/juan_enriquez_shares_mind...](http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/juan_enriquez_shares_mindboggling_new_science.html)

<comment><USER6> Absolutely stunning talk. The real fun begins 8:00 in.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Kurzweil also predicts the Singularity to occur by 2030. My personal thoughts are that even if the AI doesn't emerge, we're already close enough to Singularity that the exponential progress of the next 20 years will still be pretty damn mind boggling. The internet alone is a Singularity of sorts.

<comment><USER7> All exponential growth comes to an end eventually.

In the real world there are no "hockey-stick" curves, only S-shaped curves because the real world doesn't deal with infinity.

I wrote a better explanation here: [http://www.maximise.dk/blog/2008/11/why- singularity-may-neve...](http://www.maximise.dk/blog/2008/11/why-singularity- may-never-arrive.html)

<comment><USER8> Kurzweil suggested in the "Singularity is Near" that the believed speed limit imposed by the speed of light would be a barrier limiting the available resources to those in the solar system. Thus, limiting the exponential growth of technology and leading to the flattening of the growth curve suggested in your article. He also, gave a date of mid next century when this would occur.

<comment><USER9> I didn't like Kurzweil's expansionist idea so much. Instead I imagine that the Singularity will hole-up, and become disinterested in the outside universe. There might be lots of real estate - read computing resource - there under all those turtles.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The best part about the singularity is that it's always 20 years away!

</comment><comment><USER11> I rather believe in cybernetic immortality (<http://pcp.vub.ac.be/CYBIMM.html>), Vinge's singularity is too vague, some kind of pop science.

In every metasystem transformation (such as singularity would like to be) a new form of control arises over the existing reigning control mechanism.

To put in our terms, the next metasystem transformation will be the control of the culture (humans are culture beings).

And usually this is not about some higher intelligence as Vinge states, it is about the apparition of new senses which opens a totally new universe / dimension.

</comment><comment><USER12> I'm not sure if I voiced my particular distaste for the term "singularity" before, but it's something that really does get on my nerves. I'm reminded of Pasternak denouncing the phrase "We the people's" in Dr. Zhivago. It's a word that the community that use it most often are utterly stripping bear and bastardising. As far as I'm concerned there are only two (with a possible third) definitive singularities - those of the "black holes and baby universes".

I really can't see the useful application of the metaphor here. It's not a singularity... a wave, certainly. This gives us the idea of the "seventh wave" which concentrates the potency of the waveform. Or how about a renaissance? It will get to the point where software development, especially in AI, reaches a functional plateau. Branching out and diversifying into many stylistic forms. Or (my personal favourite) a "Babel Event", where we construct a universal medium, shattering the old converging paradigms and multiplying our complexities by an order of magnitude.
 Surely these are far more "useful metaphors" than the idea of a singularity - the point at which the rules change, or the classical conventions are destroyed? I think this is insidiously vague (and might be why the "singularity meme" has spread so far/fast?)

<comment><USER13> Also it is quite an inconveniently long word. If you strongly agree you are a 'singularitarian' which is a bit of a tongue twister.

<comment><USER14> It may be long, but this song makes up for it: <http://www.transhumanism.org/index.php/WTA/more/kamsingsong/>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've got trouble with the notion of singularity : why is it supposed to be an event that happens suddenly instead of gradually ?

<comment><USER16> I think you are thinking of hard take off vs soft take off.

Come back and ask me in 25 years and I will tell you which happened. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I don't know if singularity is ever going to occur, but it's definitely not going to happen that soon. Our computer technology -- AI in particular -- is currently at the goldfish level.

<comment><USER18> Compare the Apple I to today's PCs. Compare dialup to mainframes to scaling out thousands of severs automatically in the cloud.

These aren't linear changes. If we're at goldfish level today, and we were at bacterium level yesterday, tomorrow could be a monkey, and the next day more intelligence than the whole human race combined.

I'm not saying it's going to happen, just that you can apply linear growth analysis to areas growing exponentially.

<comment><USER19> Our rate of development is limited by how quickly we can make good decisions.

Any decision support or "cognitive outsourcing" that is invasive will have to go through the usual approval processes before becoming widespread. It may eventually transform those same processes, but that will lag far behind the initial adoption.

I can have a super-mondo-uber tool, but I still need to know what to build. If I need more than one person for my project, then I also need to be able to scale high-bandwidth human to human collaboration.

None of these things seem impossible, it's just that closing the circle and applying these tools to ourselves slows things down tremendously.

<comment><USER16> Fortunately, though, there are a lot of people making decisions about what to do. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> How convenient, since Mr. Vinge, at 85 years old, will hopefully still be alive!

BTW Vernor Vinge is a great author. I heard he's working on a third book in the Fire Upon the Deep & A Deepness in the Sky series. Looking forward to it!</comment>


That Wasn't Mark Twain: How a Misquotation Is Born - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/26/books/famous-misquotations.html <comment><USER2> Quote Investigator has basically trained me to reflexively assume that if a quote is pithy and timeless, then it probably didn't originate from someone famous.

One of my favorite quote investigations: whether Stalin said, _" A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic."_

[http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/21/death- statistic/](http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/21/death-statistic/)

<comment><USER3> My metric is—if that quote sounds fancy or profound only because a famous name is tagged to it, it probably did originate from that name.

Quotes that sound nice irrespective of the origina are probably apocryphal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> "It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so."

This is my favorite Mark Twain misquote because it's self-referential.

<comment><USER5> Some background about the mis-quote parent is talking about: [https://newrepublic.com/minutes/126677/it-aint-dont-know- get...](https://newrepublic.com/minutes/126677/it-aint-dont-know-gets-trouble- must-big-short-opens-fake-mark-twain-quote)

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> A previous analysis in Slate: [http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2014/05/quote_...](http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2014/05/quote_websites_are_frequently_inaccurate_but_we_use_them_anyway.html)

</comment><comment><USER7> One of the most famous fake Twain quotes is: "The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco."

Or in other words: "The most famous sentence Mark Twain ever put to paper was written by anonymous."

</comment><comment><USER8> People attribute quotes to famous people because that gives the quote more weight.

<comment><USER9> Yes, and people want to be listened to and attributing what you are saying to someone with better credentials is essentially a way of increasing the power of what you are saying.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is a great book on such quotes: [https://www.amazon.com/They-Never-Said- Misleading-Attributio...](https://www.amazon.com/They-Never-Said-Misleading- Attributions/dp/0195064690)</comment>


Any Remote data entry jobs - <AUTHOR> Where can one find a remote Job on data entry? The kids in my street I'm trying to get out from crime will really appreciate this until I can find/create something useful for them to work on. <comment><USER2> Check craigslist.</comment>


The US Budget Explained As a Family's Household Budget - <AUTHOR> http://www.catholicvote.org/discuss/index.php?p=21034

<comment><USER2> One problem with this chart is that it presents a snapshot in time and so you can't see how the various portions of the budget have changed.

So here is Jared Bernstein( * ), former member of President Obama's economic team explaining how the "Family Budget Not Equal to Government Budget" ([http://jaredbernsteinblog.com/family-budget-not-equal-to- gov...](http://jaredbernsteinblog.com/family-budget-not-equal-to-government- budget/))

 _Heading into work the other day, I heard a Congresswoman on the radio using a common argument that always sticks in my craw—or it would if I knew what a 'craw' was.

Here's the gist: "The federal budget is just like a family budget, and we in government must tight our belts and live within our means just like families do."

There are similarities which I'll note below, but it's almost always used as an argument for cutting everything to the bone right away, and in that sense it's wrong.

First of all, it's bass-akwards: when families are tightening their belts, the federal government is the one institution that can actually help the economy—and these belt-tightening families—by loosening its belt and running a deficit.

That deficit should be temporary and should come down when the private economy climbs up off the mat—which again tweaks the analogy: when families start to loosen, gov't should eventually start to tighten ("eventually" because these transitions can be fragile and if gov't tightens too soon, it can reverse the early gains–see UK).

But there's another fundamental way in which this family budget analogy gets misused. Families borrow to make investments and to get over rough patches. They run deficits too. I went into pretty deep debt to finance college and grad school and I'm glad I did.

The whole credit system is based on the fact that if we had to pay cash-as-we- go for everything, we'd seriously underinvest. And that's true for families and governments—and yes, you can overdo the borrowing thing. But to flip too far the other way is equally dangerous.

So, while it sounds good and has some merit, I'd use the "gov't budget=family budget" argument with care and I'd discount those who want to use it as a hammer to insist on instant cuts. _

( * ) _Jared Bernstein joined the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in May 2011 as a Senior Fellow. From 2009 to 2011, Bernstein was the Chief Economist and Economic Adviser to Vice President Joe Biden, executive director of the White House Task Force on the Middle Class, and a member of President Obama's economic team.

Bernstein's areas of expertise include federal and state economic and fiscal policies, income inequality and mobility, trends in employment and earnings, international comparisons, and the analysis of financial and housing markets.

Prior to joining the Obama administration, Bernstein was a senior economist and the director of the Living Standards Program at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C.

Between 1995 and 1996, he held the post of deputy chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor._

<comment><USER3> A couple things here...

1\. The argument is used to create a mental model of the situation. Some might use that model to make an argument for cutting but that doesn't mean their argument is inherent in the model and as such it doesn't invalidate the model.

2\. Families also can spend money that, in theory, can help their personal economy. Education, moving to an area with better jobs, etc... So the argument isn't "bass-akwards" as the site contends.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Although I detest pie charts, these numbers do probably give us some perspective on just _how_ unbalanced our spending currently is.

Big numbers out of the scope or our everyday lives are difficult to fathom. Perhaps it would have been nicer to adjust the "income" to $40k or so, which is the US median household income.

<comment><USER5>
      Annual Family Income:				$ 40,000
      Money the family spent: 			$ 70,415
      New debt on the credit card: 			$ 30,415
      Outstanding balance on the credit card:	$263,060
      Budget cuts: 					$    709.67

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'd be more interested to see national budgets compared to other national budgets than to family budgets.

Nobody expects a family to pay for military R&D, and many expect their government to. We abide the state precisely because it takes on these responsibilities.

</comment><comment><USER7> Very "tea party" centric pie chart. Who the hell sends over 60% of their income to taxes?! Talk about scare tactic. It should be closer to 0-25%, especially given how many people celebrate the annual April jackpot (aka. refund checks)

</comment><comment><USER8> I look forward to "War on Terror explained as a pissing contest on primary school playground" and other nonsensical childish bullshit in support of utterly disproven ideas.

</comment><comment><USER3> The one thing I'd add is The amount of revenue generated by the Top 10% of income earners. Using the household budget model it would be $6,835. (individual income tax is about 45% of federal revenue and the top 10% pay 70% of that). Too many people think we can solve all our problems with a modest increase on "the rich" when the truth is our hole is much deeper than that

(the top 10% is anyone over $113,000 which is why I put "the rich" in quotes)

</comment><comment><USER9> More realistically, it's not "outstanding balance on the credit card", but "outstanding balance on the mortgage", or even less bad -- the interest rates paid by the federal government to borrow are absurdly low, largely due to the US Dollar's status as the global reserve currency.

If I could borrow an infinite amount for 1-4%, I could think of a lot of things which would produce vastly greater returns. Genuinely needed infrastructure, technical education (from infancy to technician, engineer, or scientist level) for anyone capable, science, ...

Now, the US doesn't actually spend borrowed money on that kind of stuff...

<comment><USER3> I don't agree with that. Much of our debt comes from bonds which need to be repaid in a few years. So we're constantly having to reborrow on our debt much like someone jumping from credit card to credit card.

If anything the current debt is like the credit card and the unfunded liabilities are the mortgage.

<comment><USER9> The average maturity of US debt is 5+ years. And, can be rolled over -- at worst, rolled over at historically prevailing interest rates.

Off balance sheet liabilities are more of a concern than the official debt. The declining ability of the US to repay debt is a major concern (due to declining competitiveness). The actual level of official debt right now isn't itself a huge concern.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Popcorn Time in your browser - <AUTHOR> https://browserpopcorn.xyz/ <comment><USER2> Works here, clicked it for a laugh not expecting it to work because streaming here is crap, only site that works is YouTube. Bought Vimeo won't even cast to TV. This though, just works, from Chrome on my phone too, nice job.

</comment><comment><USER3> Looks nice, but I'm getting two audio tracks playing at the same time (Chrome on Windows and watching Horrible Bosses 2).

<comment><AUTHOR> Hmm, that's weird. I don't know why it happens but it does. I think that's an issue with VideoJS, you may want to open an issue with them. I'm sorry for the inconvenience. It doesn't happen on other movies, as far as I know.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What about DMCA? Im just curious.. Love the project though

<comment><USER5> Yeah, this is good work, but I don't see it as being remotely legal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Like the idea, just keep getting media loading errors.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry about that, the servers are overloaded. I'm setting up more servers to handle the load. Try to clear your DNS cache and CTRL + F5 the page to see the new server list.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Your opinion on Kickstarter as a source of initial funding? - <AUTHOR> My brother and I are currently working on a browser-based MMORPG and today he turned my attention to Kickstarter (http://www.kickstarter.com/). I was wondering how the VC/startup folks feel about that approach, assuming the initial capital needs are relatively small and growth is expected to be as organic as possible. Anyone on HN have experience with Kickstarter? Can you share your thoughts? <comment><USER2> Kickstarter can work, but think of it as a tool for hosting campaigns, not a community you can tap. Unless they decide to feature your campaign it won't even be visible on their site... Not even on the pages for more specialized tags.

It's a good way to gather donations, but go into it assuming you'll bring every single referral to your campaign.

And ask for the minimum amount you could get started with. We had to leave thousands of dollars on the table because we didn't reach our goal.

<comment><USER3> I'm not too familiar with how Kickstarter operates, but since anyone can "back" a project, why didn't you pay the difference to yourself? Kickstarter doesn't keep a cut, and you could've used those thousands of dollars to start your project even though you set your goal too high.

<comment><USER4> Kickstarter takes 5% of successful projects: "If a project is successfully funded, Kickstarter will apply a 5% fee to the funds raised. If funding isn't successful, there are no charges."

<http://www.kickstarter.com/help/faq#WhatFeesDoesKickChar>

That said, it can still make sense to "pay the difference" if the fee you pay (5% of the remaining amount) still leaves with enough money after rewards to successfully complete the project!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Friends of mine raised $26 thou for expanding and porting a really cool Flash game:

[http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1296948465/no-time-to- ex...](http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1296948465/no-time-to-explain- indie-game)

But, I think it's more of a lottery than anything else ... if you browse down the newest projects a while there's a small chance of reaching your goal, and a pretty good chance of not getting enough or not getting anything.

<comment><USER6> ^Typo: from the link, it's $26,000 (!), not $26.

<comment><USER7> I was thrown off too, but on reading it again I noticed "$26 _thou_ "

<comment><USER8> Huh. I saw the thou and just mapped it to old english 'thou'/'though' and read on, till i saw the comment..

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Give it a try. Raising money via Kickstarter will require you to generate some awareness and excitement around your project - being able to do so in a meaningful way could be proof to future investors (and more importantly yourself, too!) that you're actually able to not only build, but also market your product in an organic way.

As an aside, Kickstarter itself received quite some VC funding: [http://allthingsd.com/20110317/kickstarter-fesses-up-the- cro...](http://allthingsd.com/20110317/kickstarter-fesses-up-the-crowd- sourced-funding-startup-has-funding-too/)

EDIT: grammar

</comment><comment><USER10> Since they added the Games section, Kickstarter has been flooded with game projects. A small portion of them are successfully funded.

It seems that Kickstarter alone isn't enough to get funding - putting your project on Kickstarter and then leveraging some other form of publicity has a much higher change of success.

As a side note:

My company builds html5 multiplayer game technology. I'd love to talk about your project - you can reach me at email@example.com

</comment><comment><USER11> I personally think it's an amazing platform. Having said that, it seems more common for hardware hacks to be successful on kickstarter more than software, especially those that acts as preorders for the hardware. While some software companies have been successful, it's generally more rare from my own observations. Nonetheless, you could try.

</comment><comment><USER12> My problem with Kickstarter is the approval process, which doesn't cater very well to idea people. I'm also not a fan of giving all of my SEO away to another website, especially if I'm in charge of driving traffic to my campaign.

That being said, it's hard to argue with the success of their model. My problem was that I wanted a way to self-host my own campaigns, as often as I wanted. We're building <http://ignitiondeck.com> to fulfill our own needs. Who knows, maybe it'll help someone else too. Still a long way to go though.

Profounder looked nice at first glance, but then I realized I had to hit up my friends and family. Last thing I want to do is MLM the people I hang out with on a daily basis.

<comment><USER13> I definitely agree with nhangen. Also, I would add the process of payment. I believe Amazon Payments isn't the best way to earn payments. PayPal would work better for most people, since a lot of people use PayPal, and this would attract more people to Create their own projects.

But the most crucial thing is the approval process, they are hand approved and take days or a week to get them approved or denied, it's very slow, and very demanding since Kickstarter is getting more users attracted.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I was frustrated to find that Kickstarter is US only if you want to use it to raise funds, though they happily accept money from people outside the US.

No personal experience myself, but the Diaspora team would have some experience with it.

</comment><comment><USER15> It depends on the project. They declined our website and my friends paper- picture-flower making project. It seems the majority of their projects are in the arts (music, movies, art, etc)

<comment><USER16> I agree.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Be careful about giving equity via kickstarter -- there are rules about investment solicitation, accredited investors, etc. for private companies.

<comment><USER18> Because the law is complex Kickstarter's TOS disallow equity as a reward anyway.

ProFounder was set up to cover this case, and gives you guidelines to stay in the clear legally. <https://www.profounder.com/>

<comment><USER19> I have been playing in that space since 2008. ProFounder is doing it wrong because technically, people can only invest if they have a pre-existing relationship with the founders, which by definition exludes anyone found through the site. Not good.

<comment><USER20> No, ProFounder requires users to send non-transferrable email invitations to their friends and family (or "community"), i.e. pre-existing relationships. Afaik they don't provide a way to meet investors on the site, like you're suggesting.

For how they address other potential legal issues, go here: [http://www.quora.com/Is-ProFounder-in-violation-of-any- secur...](http://www.quora.com/Is-ProFounder-in-violation-of-any-securities- laws-with-their-crowdsourced-model-for-funding-startups?q=profounder)

<comment><USER12> That's the problem - nobody wants to hit up friends and family members. I think Angel.co does a better job than profounder.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> It's actually really hard to get visibility of people for your Kickstarter project.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Thank you everyone for the responses and information! We'll be looking at Kickstarter for sure and I'll try to report back here with our experience, if any.

Thanks again.

</comment><comment><USER22> i've been working on the same thing. if you want to compare notes or share progress, send me an email: firstname.lastname@example.com

</comment><comment><USER23> Try it then tell us.</comment>


A Degree of Concern: Why Global Temperatures Matter - <AUTHOR> https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2878/a-degree-of-concern-why-global-temperatures-matter/ <comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately considering climate lag[1][2], feedbacks[3], and the fact that aerosols are actually cooling the atmosphere[4] it's safe to say that +2ºC is a given.

[1] [https://theconversation.com/if-we-stopped-emitting- greenhous...](https://theconversation.com/if-we-stopped-emitting-greenhouse- gases-right-now-would-we-stop-climate-change-78882)

[2] [https://skepticalscience.com/Climate-Change-The-40-Year- Dela...](https://skepticalscience.com/Climate-Change-The-40-Year-Delay- Between-Cause-and-Effect.html)

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

[4] [https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/aerosols-a...](https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/aerosols- and-their-relation-to-global-climate-102215345)

<comment> radford-neal That's not true according to the latest IPCC report, which estimates "equilibrium climate sensitivity" to a doubling of CO2 (which hasn't happened so far) to be between 1.5 and 4.5 degrees C.

Incidentally, the 1.5 to 4.5 degree C uncertainty range is unchanged for decades, illustrating the lack of progress in this field of science.

<comment><AUTHOR> Not only the IPCC is extremely cautious and conservative but since it works by committee it takes years to reach an agreement. Their reports are always full of outdated data.

One example, the IPCC has ignored feedbacks in its latest reports something which has been frequently criticized.

> _Mario Molina, who shared the Nobel prize in chemistry in 1995 for his work > on depletion of the ozone layer, said: "The IPCC report demonstrates that it > is still possible to keep the climate relatively safe, provided we muster an > unprecedented level of cooperation, extraordinary speed and heroic scale of > action. But even with its description of the increasing impacts that lie > ahead, the IPCC understates a key risk: that self-reinforcing feedback loops > could push the climate system into chaos before we have time to tame our > energy system, and the other sources of climate pollution."_

[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/09/tipping-...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/09/tipping- points-could-exacerbate-climate-crisis-scientists-fear)

Edit: "ignored" was probably a too strong word. "Understated" would have been closer to reality.

Edit 2:

Here's what the founder of 350.org said about the last report:

> _This is the scariest thing about the IPCC Report — it's the watered down, > consensus version. The latest science is much, much, much more terrifying._

[https://twitter.com/Agent350/status/1049717120697753601](https://twitter.com/Agent350/status/1049717120697753601)

<comment> radford-neal It's only by accounting for possible positive feedbacks that the IPCC gets up to the 1.5 to 4.5 degrees C range. It's widely accepted that if there were no positive feedbacks, the increase from doubling CO2 would be about 1 degree C.

So you're saying that after decades of not being able to decide how big the net feedback is, scientists have suddenly established that it's "safe to say" that for even less than a doubling of CO2, an increase of at least 2 degrees C is "a given"?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a fact the IPCC has not considered feedbacks seriously. I have no qualifications to declare this, but many high profile scientists have stated it.

Also, the new models which will be presented in the 2021 report will show how warming is occurring much faster than previously stated.

> _In earlier models, doubling atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) over > preindustrial levels led models to predict somewhere between 2°C and 4.5°C > of warming once the planet came into balance. But in at least eight of the > next-generation models, produced by leading centers in the United States, > the United Kingdom, Canada, and France, that "equilibrium climate > sensitivity" has come in at 5°C or warmer. Modelers are struggling to > identify which of their refinements explain this heightened sensitivity > before the next assessment from the United Nations's Intergovernmental Panel > on Climate Change (IPCC). But the trend "is definitely real. There's no > question," says Reto Knutti, a climate scientist at ETH Zurich in > Switzerland. "Is that realistic or not? At this point, we don't know."_

[https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/04/new-climate- models-p...](https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2019/04/new-climate-models- predict-warming-surge)

Also, I've said from my first comment that there is more to it than feedbacks.

For example NASA said in 2010:

> _Scientists believe the cooling from sulfates and other reflective aerosols > overwhelms the warming effect of black carbon and other absorbing aerosols > over the planet. Models estimate that aerosols have had a cooling effect > that has counteracted about half of the warming caused by the build-up of > greenhouse gases since the 1880s._

[https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/features/Aerosols/page3.ph...](https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/features/Aerosols/page3.php)

A more recent paper from 2019 used a new method to determine how much cooling is happening from aerosols and determined it to be about double over previous estimations.

[https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/01/190122104611.h...](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/01/190122104611.htm)

[https://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6427/eaav0566](https://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6427/eaav0566)

So this means that while the official observations indicate we are at 1ºC above baseline, we may very well be actually much closer to 2ºC even ignoring feedbacks and climate lag.

And then there is this whole business of how the IPCC defined what preindustrial baseline is. So even the official 1ºC of current warming might be wrong and we could be close to 1.2ºC.

See this twitter thread: [https://twitter.com/MichaelEMann/status/1049702520984141824](https://twitter.com/MichaelEMann/status/1049702520984141824)

And finally you have to consider climate lag. Current warming has not yet been affected by GHG emissions from the past 3-4 decades, and we have emitted more GHG during that time than the previous 150 years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER2> Lost interest in the article as soon as the globe locked on screen on the smartphone.

Break it into paragraphs and pictures please. I don't have the desire to learn how to interact with your piece of macromedia flash.</comment>


Democrats turn on Nate Silver - <AUTHOR> http://thehill.com/homenews/news/201595-democrats-turn-on-nate-silver

<comment><USER2> Most of the concerns I've seen focus on Nate Silver's surprising willingness to give a platform to well-known deniers of global warming:

[http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/03/23/tarnished- silver...](http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/03/23/tarnished-silver/)

Those are legitimate concerns being raised about the rigor with which Nate Silver is doing his data analysis.

</comment><comment><USER3> When he picks your people, he is a soothsayer. When he picks the other side, he is an idiot and wrong. What else is new?

If the best they've got is the North Dakota and Montana polls, then I think they may be barking up the wrong tree. Both states are really hard to predict based on new population and extreme drop in home telephone lines. I would expect the polling folks to be much better this time around.

</comment><comment><USER4> Prepare for unpopular opinion: the hill is the only place worse than the valley in terms of being in an out of touch bubble</comment>


SHOW HK: Changed phone can't login my gmail account ever again. Any help? - <AUTHOR> Just trying to log in my old gmail account with correct email and password and they ask me to verify my old phone number and the date I created that account.
Without this information, the account is completely lost forever. Thank you Google!
What can I do? <comment><USER2> Nothing can be done. It's Google's stupid policy.

In my case, I knew the username, password, the date when it was created plus I have access to the backup email id (non-Google), but no phone access. Still, Google refused access.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh crap. I really need to move on from them, I can't accept this anymore from them.

<comment><USER3> Take a look at ProtonMail.com

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Yeah, lost my account this way, even though it would have been blindingly obvious who I was. Even had a Googler buddy go to bat. No dice.

If it absolutely, positively has to work, don't do it with a Google account.

</comment><comment><USER5> contact them. If you get it wrong there's usually a link to contact support.

<comment><AUTHOR> Last I heard, Google has no support. Can you please provide me a link to a support page/email/phone number? Thank you

<comment><USER6> Not OP but Google does offer support for their paid products. With something like gmail, you might be extremely limited to getting help if you can reach a Googler. Worse case you can purchase one of their paid products in an attempt to reach a human being but I don't know if that will help at all. Probably not.</comment></comment></comment>


Implementing a Secure "Remember Me" (Long-Term Authentication) Feature - <AUTHOR> https://paragonie.com/blog/2015/04/secure-authentication-php-with-long-term-persistence#title.2.1 <comment><USER2> The timing attack described here is really interesting to me but I'm not totally convinced it's feasible. That said, that's what a lot of people thought about other timing attacks over networks and they turned out to be totally feasible!

Does anyone have a second opinion on this?</comment>


Is Spelling Reform, Ten Years Old, a Success? (1916) - <AUTHOR> http://sundaymagazine.org/2016/08/is-spelling-reform-ten-years-old-a-success/ <comment><USER2> Language changes, as does spelling, both through drift and deliberate action. Even the morphology of letters changes - see "ye", where "y" is actually "th", and the old "s" which looks to modern eyes like an "f". An interesting one is the distinction between yay and yes and nay and no (negatory vs affirmative), which has utterly vanished at this point.

In terms of deliberate modifications, the most recent I'm aware of is French, which has seen a rapid anglicisation over the past decades (Le weekend, Le ice tea, l'office de tourisme), and had a spelling update last year - [http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35496893](http://www.bbc.com/news/world- europe-35496893).

As with then, plenty of purists get their pantaloons in a knotte when they zyxt phantastique new words and spellings, but time ultimately makes the change whether they like it or not.

Notable is that the words in the article which _have_ changed are the commonly used ones. "Woe" isn't in common parlance so hasn't drifted or annealed.

<comment><USER3> > the old "s" which looks to modern eyes like an "f"

I always thought they looked like that because before modern dentistry, everyone spoke with a lisp.

<comment><USER4> ftupid fhithead.

It's a Futurama (Suturama?) joke that I absolutely love.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There's been recent controversy about President Obama's executive orders, so I found it interesting that this article describes the impact of an executive order by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906 (which was subsequently overturned by Congress).

I hadn't known that executive orders began with George Washington:

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

And President Obama has issued relatively few executive orders compared with his predecessors.

</comment><comment><USER6> I find it fascinating that the US could change colour to color which seems a completely useless and trivial change but still hasn't managed to adopt the international system of units.

I suspect both the spelling change and resistance to unit changes have far more to do with protectionism than anything. Both isolate the US and stop them from importing books, particularly textbooks. Someone has probably made a lot of money from that.

</comment><comment><USER7> From the 1916 article:

"These teachers knew better than any one else how much valuable time was wasted in getting by heart long lists of words."

This is perhaps an interesting argument for simplifying spelling. Namely to give en-US children a competitive edge on the world education scale by increasing the amount of time that is able to be devoted to other subjects.

<comment><USER8> It's not clear that it would give much of an advantage nowadays. English has become the de facto international language for now, and so currently the difficulties of learning English, such as spelling, are also being inflicted on students around the world.

For most of them English is a second language and thus they have to deal with the spelling on top of the difficulty of dealing with a foreign language. I think that makes it so English spelling is a bigger hinderance for them than it is for students where English is their first language (such as the majority of the US), and so spelling reform would help them more than it would help US students. In terms of competitive edges, spelling reform would lessen the edge of US students.

Of course, that doesn't mean that would be bad. As you note, less time on spelling is more time for other subjects. If spelling reform led to US students getting, say, 1% better in science or math, and led to foreign students getting 2% better, yes that worsens the US position relative to the foreign students, but looked at another way _everybody_ improves.

<comment><USER9> I think a bigger problem than spelling is people using the wrong words. They'll use defiantly instead of definitely, heal instead of heel, too instead of to, and a number of similar mistakes.

<comment><USER10> Indeed. But also strategy instead of tactic, culture instead of way of working, engineer, architect and many other have a ambiguous meaning these days, so if you want to precise, it is better to use something else.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> A century on, the National Education Association is getting their wish: we're spelling it as 'tho' instead of 'though'. Linguistic engineering is fascinating.

</comment><comment><USER11> I see the logic in this but am frustrated that the web uses American color not the colour I was taught in school.</comment>


Scholarpedia, the Peer-Reviewed Open-Access Encyclopedia - <AUTHOR> http://www.scholarpedia.org

<comment><USER2> Why not contribute to better Wikipedia articles instead? The articles on advanced science topics are basically like scholarpedia already: only edited by experts in the field.</comment>


Seattle Restaurant Boots Google Glass-Wearing Patron - <AUTHOR> http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2427804,00.asp

<comment><USER2> The restaurant is well within its rights as pointed out to eject patrons wearing Google Glass. It's perfectly acceptable and allowable, if you don't like it, don't eat there. I can see why the restaurant would take issue with Google Glass, at present, it's a new technology and somewhat a bit creepy if you ask me. Eventually it'll be normal to wear the likes of Google Glass out and about, but for now it's a new technology that comes with new territory and boundaries to be set.

If clubs, bars and restaurants are allowed to enforce dress codes (certain shoes, button up shirts, etc) then I don't see why a restaurant can't enforce a no Google Glass policy, especially if it's a more higher class venue to eat at. I can see why some people could take issue with Google Glass. I've been kicked out of bars before because I wasn't wearing a collared shirt and dress pants, but you won't read about it in the news.

<comment><USER3> Quoted from this article [1] :

"I inform (the employee) that I am well aware of the policy at The 5 Point Cafe but asked to see where it was policy for Glass to be disallowed at Lost Lake. She said she couldn't provide any and when asked to speak with management she stated she was the night manager. I again inform her that the two venues are different and have different policies. She refuses and I leave," he wrote. "As we are leaving, Brian (his partner) points out that on the menu they state "Post photos on our website via Instagram by using #LostLake." So how is an establishment which is REQUESTING photos be taken, not allow me to bring a device which takes photos and can post to Instagram? I would love an explanation, apology, clarification, and if the staff member was in the wrong and lost the owner money last night and also future income as well, that this income be deducted from her pay or her termination."

It seems rather legitimate to request to see an official policy.

[1] [http://blogs.seattletimes.com/allyoucaneat/2013/11/26/diner-...](http://blogs.seattletimes.com/allyoucaneat/2013/11/26/diner- using-google-glass-asked-to-leave-restaurant/)

<comment><USER2> Definitely legitimate to request an official policy, but it's not like he was being ejected on religious or race though. Maybe the policy is so new they've yet to print it out for patrons to read, especially more difficult if it requires printing out new menus on particular stock material.

It's like going over a friends house and they ask you to leave without an explanation. It's private property at the end of the day and as long as you're not literally picking someone up and throwing them out, there are no civil rights being violated here. The owner and management staff at the time reserve the right to eject patrons for whatever reason they seem fitting, obviously ejecting a patron means lost revenue, so they wouldn't just go ejecting people for no good reason.

I get it sucks for the patron kicked out, but lets be honest here, the situation is being blown way out of proportion. You're kicked out of a restaurant because you refuse to comply with the requests of the restaurant to remove your device from your head? How hard is it to remove your glasses? Would the person in question have responded the same if he was wearing a hat and was asked to remove it as well?

Calling for the employee who felt as though they were doing the right thing to be fired is just horrible and waters down the argument of the patron in question if you ask me.

It reminds me of the time I was at a restaurant and someone started an argument with 3 of the restaurant staff because they were charged for two bottles of sparkling water at $10 a pop. They claimed they weren't told of the cost even though the menu had the cost, they were yelling to the point the manager just said they would remove the water from the bill and leave it at that. Restaurant staff have to put up with a lot of crap for a minimum wage. The patron involved needs to have some compassion, especially if the employee was only just briefed on the new policy themselves.

I swear some people deliberately try and test the boundaries in these situations. The patron in question acted very decently, but should have just removed the glasses and there wouldn't have been a problem.

<comment><USER3> True, if there was an unambiguous sign on the window "No Google Glass," I doubt any of this would've happened.

However, with regards to the religion or race part, it's very likely that someone ejecting on this basis will pick some other arbitrary reason rather than saying "we don't serve x people here."

I agree with you that it's likely that neither party was completely clean, especially considering the guy knew the policy at a different but related establishment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I would object if the guy at the next table over pulled out a camera and started snapping pictures while my wife and I are eating. I would feel violated. What is different about Glass? If I were at this restaurant I would ask the owner to ask him to take off and turn off that device. And if that didn't happen I wouldn't come back. If you were the owner, what would you do?

<comment><USER5> _I would object if the guy at the next table over pulled out a camera and started snapping pictures while my wife and I are eating. I would feel violated._

Same here. In other HN discussions about expectations of privacy while in public with regards, say, license plate scanning or facial recognition there always seems to be at least one or two people claiming there is no reasonable expectation or right to privacy when out in public. I tend to disagree with them but often they make a plausible argument.

Having a remote camera record the passing of your car feels less in-your-face invasive, and I wonder if that allows more people to let it slide.

Perhaps the more overt creepiness of Glass will lead to more stringent privacy laws that (hopefully) are then equally applicable to the more stealthy forms of surveillance and recording.

At the every least, if I can't come into your place of business with a ubiquitous recording device then your place of business cannot subject me to ubiquitous recording either.

I'm less optimistic about similar restrains against data capture under the guise of "security."

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> There was a discussion on Slashdot before the guy's Twitter account 404'd. This comment [1] caught my eye.

Since the tweet is gone, I can't verify the quote for myself. But, if it's accurate, it looks like the customer has very poor conflict resolution skills when it comes to anything getting between him and Google Glass.

[1] [http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4504895&cid=45564881](http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=4504895&cid=45564881)

</comment><comment><USER7> I hadn't seen the pejorative "glassholes" until I read a comment on the FB page. God bless the Internet for its ability to teach us new things every day.

</comment><comment><USER8> I'm somewhat sure that these restauranteurs instituted this policy so they could milk the inevitable media coverage they would get for their restaurants. The stated privacy reasons are flimsy at best.</comment>


The unique ecology of human predators - <AUTHOR> http://www.sciencemag.org/content/349/6250/858.full <comment><USER2> So, "too small, throw it back" may be wrong...

Paper mentions fisher preference for larger prey ("ornamental"); I think another factor, not mentioned, may be our innate protectiveness towards juveniles (children, babies).

Implied but not mentioned is that the evolutionary pressure of predation on juveniles should act more quickly than on adults (because more time needs to have passed to reach adulthood; slower iteration).

<comment><USER3> Hmmm, I haven't read the whole study but in the beginning it says " _We focus on adult prey because hunters and fishers overwhelmingly target adults (18)._ " I mostly speak about my family's patterns, inculcated by my father, but we practice "too small, throw it back" or for hunting where you can see the target first don't shoot it. If for no other reason than there's diminishing gains from dressing smaller and smaller fish or game. Not to mention the law.

Protectiveness towards juveniles ... eh, fish aren't "cute". But we certainly think goslings, kits and fawns are, not that we hunt any of these when mature (deer taste awful, my mother put her foot down a very long time ago and my father switched to much more tasty elk and moose).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I dont like 'predator' connection. We have quotas, planning, protection areas... It is basically farming and agriculture.

<comment><USER5> Animal ag is environmentally devastating.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> _Given this competitive dominance, impacts on predators, and other unique predatory behavior, we suggest that humans function as an unsustainable "super predator," which—unless additionally constrained by managers—will continue to alter ecological and evolutionary processes globally._

I am a super predator.

But seriously, are there possibly any other species impacts the planet as much as we do?

<comment><USER7> A variety of bacterial species have had enormous impacts on Earth. To name just one, cyanobacteria are responsible for the current multiplicity of oxygen breathing life on the planet. Their production of oxygen directly lead to one of the greatest extinction events in Earth's history. Here is a wiki link on the Great Oxygenation Event: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxygenation_Event](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Oxygenation_Event)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How many new visitors website gets by being on front page of HN? - <AUTHOR> As you probably all know some websites which appear on the front page of HN ended up being down.<p>I wonder what is scale of that: 1K visitors/second? 100 visitors/minute? <comment><USER2> I wrote and article that got to the front page, once ([https://foorious.com/articles/life-without-a-cell- phone/](https://foorious.com/articles/life-without-a-cell-phone/)).

I got about 50,000 visits within 4 days: 30,000 on day 1, 10,000 the second day, and then 5,000 on day 3 and 4.

Also interesting that the "story" got picked up by a lot of other magazines—which I guess follow HN to hunt for news—and they even talked about it on podcasts and radio shows.

If it was some kind of service, I guess I would've gotten something out of it.

As for your question, mine was (and is) a regular WordPress site, although on a dedicated VPS. At its peak of 300 people at the same time browsing the site, I didn't notice any difference from a performance point of view/server usage. Of course, it all depends on the service. An untested app getting thousands of users might have problems, WordPress is pretty battle-tested.

<comment><USER3> how many cores and how much memory do you have on that VPS?</comment></comment>


I'm 18 and I Like it - <AUTHOR> http://handshakez.com/im-18-and-i-like-it/

<comment><USER2> That sounds awesome, you seem like you are enjoying yourself!

One word of take-it-or-leave-it advice. Please pick up some programming/other skills while you are actually there (whatever is actually in line with your interests, if you're into accounting, go bug the accounting the department and see what they do, learn how to make T chart, do excel shit, whatever).

Put a little more on your resume than "managed social media".

Also, school will seem very trivial and pointless once you leave that "real- life" job, but I still think it's worth sticking to it (Especially if your tuition isn't too expensive, and you use your free time well).

<comment><USER3> @hardwaresofton

Thanks for the encouragement! I really am enjoying myself, and things will only continue to improve the longer that I'm at Handshakez.

I've heard that advice before actually, funny you should mention it. I'm lucky, in that one of my colleagues is also close to my age, and he is a prodigious programming talent. I plan on talking with him, and our other developers, so that I will begin to gain some modicum of familiarity with the technical aspect of the company.

I am planning on returning to Georgetown after this year: it's an outstanding school, and I'm very grateful to be going there. My hope in taking this gap year was not for it to be an alternative to college, but rather for it to add perspective to what I'll eventually study.

Again, thanks for the reply!</comment></comment>


Java's drawn-out death - <AUTHOR> http://motherboard.vice.com/read/know-your-language-the-slow-flickering-star-death-of-java-part-one <comment><USER2> I don't feel like this article does a good job making its case. Java won't live or die with Oracle. Along with the language spec and non-Oracle implementations being available, there are other (arguably more influential) companies still putting huge amounts of money behind Java tech; e.g., Google and IBM.

</comment><comment><USER3> BS - Java 9 is well on it's way. Java will live long.

</comment><comment><USER4> LOL:ed, and stopped reading after this statement:

"Running a Java program is slower because it has this whole extra step."

Seriously?

<comment><AUTHOR> The articles are simplified for a general audience. I think Motherboard tries hard to keep things digestible so as to let people dip their toes into the deep, cold pool of nerdom.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> I read the whole thing and didn't catch any explanation of _how and why_ Java is about to die.

What did I miss?

<comment><USER6> Every tenth article posted is about the death of something-or-other. Its a clickbait way of getting attention by poking sticks at a big name and claiming "the emperor has no cloths" or whatnot.

You didn't miss anything.</comment></comment>


The Sad Lie of Mediocrity - <AUTHOR> http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/11/the-sad-lie-of.html

<comment><USER2> This would only be true in scalable professions like software.

It's interesting he uses a chef as an example because I think its an example that proves his point incorrect. You will still be an extremely profitable restaurant if you have a chef 96% as good as the best chef in the area. That's because chefs and restaurants aren't scalable. The best chef can't service everyone unlike, say, the best software provider.</comment>