Switzerland's Answer to Silicon Valley - <AUTHOR> https://www.credit-suisse.com/ch/en/news-and-expertise/publications/bulletin/editions/current-issue.article.html/article/pwp/news-and-expertise/2013/12/en/switzerlands-answer-to-silicon-valley.html <comment><USER2> > The Arc Knows No Borders

says the Swiss bank of Switzerland, the country that has closed its boarders. Last week's immigration referendum has certainly closed any hopes of Switzerland benefiting from a diversified, thriving tech industry. Europeans will go to London, Berlin, Paris, Madrid, Amsterdam, etc before going to Switzerland.

<comment><USER3> London is too expensive. Low budget start-ups contribute to thriving tech industry, and London not only excludes them but is increasingly expensive. It's experiencing something similar to SF, from what I read about SF, a hollowing out of the middle class who want some quality of life but can't compete with the multi-millionaires. A European country with sun, sea, sandy beaches, mountains, lots of space (Spain, I'm looking at you) would be attractive if it went out of its way to encourage start-ups. It would have to highlight a multilingual location so that people can fumble through beginner Spanish confident with a fall back, but I for one would race over. More foreign entrepreneurs attracted, more local jobs created.

<comment><USER4> I guess you are thinking in Mallorca. Sunny, better connected by flights with Europe than with the Iberian peninsula, lot´s of European expats living here, proportion of locals speaking at least English quite high compared to other parts of Spain... If only we could have some better entrepreneurship laws...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I moved from California to Lausanne and I highly recommend it. Quality of life is truly outstanding, and the high level of infrastructure development makes living here very convenient.

The biggest problem is, as the article gently suggests, housing, which is almost impossible for foreigners to find (even with asset sheets in the hundreds of thousands of USD). Affordable housing is essentially nonexistent. Every now and then voter initiatives crop up to change the situation (remove building restrictions, reduce bureaucracy, etc.), but the problem only seems to get worse.

Fortunately, an all-Switzerland unlimited travel card is only ~$4k/year for adults and ~$3k/year for <25yo's. Given the reliability and extensive reach of the public transport network here, it's definitely possible (and even fairly regular) to live in somewhat 'remote' villages and towns and still commute to work in <1hr. It's pretty cool to have the ability to live in, say, Saint- Maurice (with Bronze Age roots) and still be in the door at work within 1h15m.

This is made more palatable by the extensive fiber network available in Switzerland: multiple providers are now offering 1Gb/s connections in Lausanne proper, and the reach continues to expand. Some more-remote locations are still only served by the Swisscom state pseudomonopoly, but service is usually still reasonably cheap and line rates still reasonably high.

The mobile offerings here offer real competition, and along with the small size of the market, make cell service cheap and fast.

Finally, EPFL itself is highly ranked and has some top talent, not only in faculty (among others, includes Arjen Lenstra, Martin Odersky, Ed Bugnion, George Candea, and Katerina Argyraki), but also in PhD and MS students. EPFL also has regular workshops for entrepreneurship and actively encourages commercialization.

There's a lot of uncertainty about the new immigration mandate, which will almost certainly hurt Switzerland's attractiveness to entrepreneurs, but the ETH/EPF domain will probably not be affected; if you're a prospective graduate student interested in entrepreneurship, EPFL is definitely worth a look!

<comment><USER6> commute >1h is one of the main reasons most move away from the valley. I agree though, moving away from the US is a breath of fresh air on living standards when it comes to culture and public transport. But you can pick other cities and countries to get this. Cities that have comparable burgeoning tech scenes of their own. Berlin comes to mind. All the scrappy push of a high tech culture without all the fascist government baggage of say a US, CH or Israel.

<comment><USER5> That's fair, but it is still possible to find something closer.

And a 1hr commute is a lot different stuck in traffic on the 680 or 101 than working on your laptop in a train.

<comment><USER6> i'm just saying: the commuters paradox (described by two swiss) is known to have a high(est) negative effect on happiness: [http://brunofrey.com/articles/C_481_08.pdf](http://brunofrey.com/articles/C_481_08.pdf)

<comment><USER7> I am amazed that people are saying that < 1.15 hour is good for commuting, yet think fibre optic is great. How much time do you actually spend waiting for downloads?

I live ten minute cycle from work. Central Barcelona. OK, my apartment is small and expensive relative to wages, but I can't stand commuting. It really does seem like a waste of your life.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Brought to you by the same country whose people have chosen last week to limit the right of free movement of European citizens. This is not a good time to start a technology business in Switzerland.

<comment><USER9> It is still a million times easier to establish a business and get residency in Switzerland than in the US for Europeans. So by that standard, it would be an even worse time to start a technology business in the US. And the limits that were voted last week are minimal and temporary.

<comment><USER8> In the United States, businesses have access to a workforce market of 340 million people educated to a high standard. In the European Union, businesses have access to a similar workforce of over 507 million people.

Without access to the EU workforce, Swiss businesses have access to a workforce market of 8 million people.

<comment><USER10> The overall technical/scientific ecosystem of Switzerland also looks like it will be at least somewhat damaged by this closure. US startups often start off as university spinoffs from NSF or DARPA-funded research (Sun Microsystems, Google, etc.), or as partnerships between universities and industry (a number of machine-learning/data-mining startups fit that category). The same is often true in Europe, just replace NSF/DARPA with the EU research framework (keeps changing names, but essentially the same). It gives large grants to multi- national consortia of universities and companies. Switzerland was part of the 2007-2013 "FP7" program, but they're being suspended from the 2014-2020 "Horizon 2020" program, at least for now. Existing funded projects will be allowed to complete (funding is usually for 3 years), but Swiss institutions and companies won't be allowed to be part of 2014 applications. That's causing a bit of turmoil around here (not Switzerland) right now because people had planned to submit proposals with Swiss partners who are suddenly ineligible.

It's possible Switzerland will cover some of the damage by pulling the money they would've contributed towards the EU research framework, and using it to increase domestic research funding instead. Will have to wait and see how that goes.

<comment><USER11> Too bad EU is playing that card since it's obviously a lose/lose situation.

"Switzerland's contribution to the total budget of Horizon 2020 of about EUR 81.6 billion sums up to around CHF 4.4 billion, over a seven-year period. The corresponding budget appropriation was approved by the Federal Assembly on 10 September 2013."

[http://www.sbfi.admin.ch/themen/01370/01683/index.html?lang=...](http://www.sbfi.admin.ch/themen/01370/01683/index.html?lang=en)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> A lot of hate for Switzerland, but honestly I don't blame the Swiss from wanting to keep the rest of Europe out (so to speak). I think Switzerland has the sanest government in the world, and the balanced budget to prove it.

<comment><USER7> They get a lot of their money from hiding corrupt people's money from everyone else. Not exactly the most honest way of achieving a balanced budget.

<comment> guard-of-terra Englishmen do that too (Post-soviet oligarchs) but it doesn't help them that much.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Maybe someone could do a startup to teach the Swiss how to paragraph break...</comment>


An old artifact kept in a vault outside Paris is no longer the standard kilogram - <AUTHOR> https://news.mit.edu/2019/kilo-standard-change-0516 <comment><USER2> And with that, I mourn the obsolescence of my last remaining "absolute unit" joke and will have to develop something equally satisfying based on dressed lumber to replace it.

<comment><USER3> What about the imperial units? Are those defined against metric as well?

<comment><USER4> A quick glance at Wikipedia seems to indicate so, but I didn't go over every base unit.

<comment><USER5> Yes, for example an inch is now defined as precisely 2.54 cm, so a foot exactly 30.48 cm, a mile is exactly 1609.344 m.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Definition of mole changes too.

 _One mole contains exactly 6.022 140 76×10²³ elementary entities_ (as opposed to the number of atoms in 12 grams of ¹²C). Effective 20 May 2019.

<comment><USER7> Eh? Straight 6.022*10^23 is what I learned in highschool chemistry in 2003..

<comment><USER8> The difference is more epistemological than practical. Before, 6.022x10^23 was the _measured_ value of the conversion factor between a gram (exactly 1/100 of the Prototype Kilogram) and a dalton (exactly 1/12 the mass of a carbon-12 atom). After the redefinition, a dalton is _defined_ as being 1/6.022x10^23th of a gram, and _measured_ to be approximately equal to 1/12 the mass of a carbon-12 atom. In essence, the dependency chain was reversed, so now it all flows from the kilogram outwards.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Defining a unit of weight in terms of a unit of time and a unit of length. Explain _that_ to your grandma! :)

<comment><USER10> Your grandma might be a physicist, and she'll explain it to you ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> For the next revision: remove the mole from the SI. It's completely pointless. A number is not a unit! Instead replace it by the bit, the fundamental unit of information.

<comment> GuB-42 The reason the mole is in the SI puzzled me too.

It seems that the reason is that chemists don't care how many atoms there are in their reactions. It would be inconvenient: fractions of atoms don't make sense, and the numbers are far from human scale. They just want an agreement, so that even if they don't know the exact number of atoms in their test tube, they know they all have the same number. That's what units are for.

The definition of units are done in the most convenient and precise way possible. And they are updated as science progresses. For the kg, the artifact used to be the best we had, alternative methods weren't precise enough, they changed that to the Kibble balance because now, it is better. It may change again at a later time if we find something better.

Back to the mole, it used to be defined as the ratio between the kilogram and the mass of a 12C atom because it is the best we had. Now that we can count atoms with more precision, we decided to change it to just the Avogadro constant, which becomes fixed. Again it might change. What may happen (or may have happened, see Avogadro project) is that we can define the kilogram using the mole, making it fundamental.

<comment><USER12> That is what has happened, essentially. The mole is atomically precise, and will never change.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I've always been mildly irritated that the name of the SI mass base unit has a prefix. Second, liter, meter, Newton, kilogram. Were I emperor of the world I would slide the name scale up so the mass equal to 2.205lbs was called a gram.

<comment><USER14> If you were emperor of the world, I would implore you to finance a multibillion dollar project to measure the gravitational constant to higher percision so that we could move to units that actually make sense.

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

<comment><USER15> Shpx, gung'f n shpxvat terng vqrn.

<comment><USER16> V fcrag na rzoneenffvatyl ybat gvzr penpxvat guvf pbqr...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Reading about standard kilogram always reminds me 2014 movie "1001 grams" [0]. Not sure how accurate it reflects how the things are actually run there, but was interesting to watch it nevertheless.

[0] [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3346824/](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3346824/)

<comment><USER18> Directed by Bent Hammer

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Confused, so how do they measure 1 kilo of something now when they need to calibrate the most precise instruments? They count 10^40 photons? How? And how does that translate into a physical mass they want to carry around?

Edit: Seems I completely missed a paragraph somehow. Thanks!

<comment><USER20> The term of art is "realisation". The article mentions two realisations but does not elaborate: "In practice, there are currently two known methods for measuring such masses with great precision. These are known as the Kibble balance and the single-crystal silicon sphere". You should be able to google from that.

<comment><USER21> I never understood why a sphere was even in the discussion of a standardized atomic count.

Any rational fractions using pi = pi atoms or molecules. And that's absurd to have r=(3V/4pi)^1/3 . No matter how you mess with it, it's irrational to the extreme!

Now.. Face-centered or ody-centered cubic follows a nice quadratic expansion for integer based counting. We don't need no steenkin pi's!

<comment><USER22> It's not difficult to round to the nearest atom.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> >Despite the greatest of precautions, every time the standard kilo was handled — for example, to compare it to another unit that could then be used to calibrate instruments — it would shed some atoms and its mass would be slightly changed. Over its lifetime, that standard kilo is estimated to have lost about 50 micrograms.

Why did the standard kilo ever need to be handled? Just store it on a balance and only handle the comparison unit.

<comment> rough-sea The balance still would need to be balanced.

<comment><USER23> right...

<comment><USER24> and then left...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This article sounds like it got written by a scientist but got butchered through a PR department.

It talks about the "Mass of a photon" and weighing them directly, rather than the energy-equivalent mass, which is presumably what they are intending to talk about?

<comment><USER26> As the article correctly states, photons have a finite mass that could in principle be measured by putting an optical cavity on a scale.

<comment><USER27> I know that zero is a finite number, but since the photon is a massless particle, wouldn't it be impossible to get a kilogram worth of photons bouncing around in an optical cavity?

<comment><USER28> No, it's entirely possible in principle. If you build a perfect optical cavity, weigh it, pump a bunch of light in, and weigh it again, you'll find that the weight went up by ghf/c^2 summed over each photon added to the cavity. Divide by g and you get the sum of the masses of the photons. 1 kg of photons would be enough to destroy your lab and the rest of your city, so only a very advanced civilization would ever do the experiment on this scale.

Photons indeed have no _rest_ mass, but it's impossible to ever find a photon at rest unless you yourself have no rest mass, in which case you also have no ability to do experiments.

<comment><USER29> Actually, as a physicist with no rest mass, I'm perfectly capable of performing experiments. I just never seem to find the time...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> another-dave Physicists finally moving from SVN to Git.

<comment><USER30> More like from JPG to SVG

<comment><USER31> Not JPG, a physical picture that cannot be copied perfectly.

<comment><USER32> If you consider re-encoding a JPG perhaps the initial comparison holds.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Veritasium has a video back in 2017 explaining kibble balance [https://youtu.be/Oo0jm1PPRuo](https://youtu.be/Oo0jm1PPRuo)

</comment><comment><USER34> I wonder if there is a process that has to be gone through to now update the pound avoirdupois. It is defined as 453.59237 grams but given the formal definition of the gram has changed could there be a need for a formal acknowledgement, or does the law encompass changes in methods so it just happens automagically?

<comment><USER20> I don't know about US, but this does need formal amendment to Weights and Measures Act 1985 (current UK standard in force) Schedule 1 Part V, see [http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1985/72/schedule/1/part/...](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1985/72/schedule/1/part/V).

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Change is scheduled for 20 May 2019.

 _checks date_

fake news... the artifact is still the official reference for the standard kilogram for another 72 hours... ;)

<comment><USER36> Yeah, jokes aside I think _technically_ the post title should be changed. (Even the article's title is wrong. Though, it wouldn't be the first time NH's title is more accurate than that of the article it points to.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Is there a reason why this took so long?

<comment><USER37> Don't know why this was downvoted.

But here is the answer [1]: "The new definition only became possible when instruments were devised to measure the Planck constant with sufficient accuracy based on the IPK definition of the kilogram."

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

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Le Grand K is dead! Long live Le Grand K!

</comment><comment><USER39> The new reference kilogram is an engineering marvel, but I've always wondered this: why didn't they just build a reference gram instead? Seems like that would be at least a thousand times easier to pull off.

<comment><USER40> Basically, it's part of the lie of the mythology of the metric system.

The metric system did some great things (eliminated the use of measures that depended on the substance being measured, dry pints vs wet pints, bushel of wheat versus bushel of oats; simple relationship between units of length, area and volume), some things that were already common at the time (eliminated regional definitions of units; related the volume and mass of water), and some stupid things (metric prefixes).

But at the end of the day, the size of the meter and kilogram were chosen to be very nearly 3 Parisian feet and 2 Parisian pounds, because that made it easier to adopt.

<comment><USER41> This reply doesn't seem to address the comment it's replying to at all...

<comment><USER40> The answer to the question "why is the unit weight the kilogram instead of the gram" is "because the kilogram is about 2 Parisian pounds, which is what everyone at the time actually cared about".</comment></comment></comment></comment>


An American thanks Australia for its gun laws - <AUTHOR> http://www.theage.com.au/comment/thank-you-australia-20160615-gpjn0r.html <comment><USER2> Not everyone is going to be happy everywhere. I'm glad this guy has found a place where he fits in.</comment>


President Clinton's Daily Schedule for December 2000 · Clinton Digital Library - <AUTHOR> https://clinton.presidentiallibraries.us/items/show/12733 <comment><USER2> In briefly skimming this, the things that standout to me are:

1\. Almost every single moment is accounted for. There is very little slack or break times baked into the schedule.

2\. It seems like there is a high percentage of time spent on ceremonial activities and photo shoots. Perhaps this is to be expected.

3\. It might be an interesting ML project to try to classify time of presidential schedules and compare how that allocation various across presidents, during recessions versus expansions, during wartime versus peacetime, etc.</comment>


BP Removed from Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes - <AUTHOR> http://inspiredeconomist.com/2010/06/02/bp-removed-from-dow-jones-sustainability-indexes/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+inspiredeconomist/com+(The+Inspired+Economist)&utm_content=Seesmic

<comment><USER2> A few years ago I researched a tiny little bit available index funds. The so called ethical and sustainable funds looked as scams. Most were full of banks and investment firms. Now a sustainable index including one of the big oil corps. They are masters of doublespeak.</comment>


Reducing friction as a standard operating method - <AUTHOR> http://ayende.com/Blog/archive/2009/11/18/reducing-friction-as-a-standard-operating-method.aspx?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AyendeRahien+%28Ayende+%40+Rahien%29&utm_content=Google+Reader <comment><USER2> Similar story: shaving a 5 second build/run down to 200ms. It took 2-3 days to implement. I couldn't justify it in terms of time saved; nor did it _seem_ I could use the article's justification that I'd tend to avoid compiling because it was too painful.

However, it _did_ change my workflow, in that now I try things out quickly, and even using code like a config file, to test ideas instantly. Perhaps more importantly for me, every time I compile now I get a little feeling of delight, and a data-point suggesting that _all problems have solutions_.

details: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=939523>

<comment><USER3> Linus also talked about how instant commits in git are changing the behavior. I generalize this to "all things you make often must be effortless and instant", ranging from reaction time to a finger-tap in the iPhone app and to my own build process.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I like the notion of expanding from a narrow cost/benefit analysis to a broader "opportunities lost cost" - the set of potential new things you can't do because you decided not to reduce friction in your current set of activities.</comment>


The Zuckerberg Files - All public utterances of Mark Zuckerberg - <AUTHOR> http://zuckerbergfiles.org/ <comment><USER2> "The Zuckerberg Files is an open-access public archive" ... "Scholars wishing to gain access to the full archive should email email@example.com with their name, affiliation, and a brief description of the research project or purpose for which the materials will be put."

Open-ish.

<comment><USER3> > Open-ish.

Aka closed :)

<comment><USER4> It's like a box on a shelf you can't reach. It's not locked. It's not even closed. If you squint, you can guess what's inside.

But it's in a box. And it's up there. And you have to wait for someone to bring a ladder.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'll be waiting for the "Screw you guys, this should be open, here's HTTP link and torrent for free download. Long live Aaron Schwartz"

</comment><comment><USER6> To everyone complaining about the password-protected login, there is something you need to understand: this is about copyright, not the library being fake- open. This repository apparently consists of copyrighted works, and by the Fair Use provisions of US Copyright, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee have collected these works together even though they presumably do not have rights to all the works.

You, too, could pull all these works together without arranging the rights, and you could probably make a fair use argument for it. However, I guess they're saying that they aren't going to re-transmit the archive in bulk. It is insinuated that it might run astray of fair use to do so.

</comment><comment><USER7> Where is Obama files? In fact this seems like a good idea for a huge website for all high level political figures.

<comment><USER8> Well, nearly every public speech from members of Congress and the executive office and the judicial branch is recorded, with some notable exceptions like national security, but even then, eventually that information enters the public record by law.

The problem is that much of it is difficult to collate. [http://thomas.loc.gov/home/thomas.php](http://thomas.loc.gov/home/thomas.php) is a good start for the Congressional record online, but presidential records and judicial records often end up all over the place.

Ideally the LOC would provide a better online toolkit for this stuff, but you know, good enough for government work.

<comment><USER9> RapGenius for politics!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> While they don't ask upfront for money, they make a commendable effort of actually keeping people away from those files by asking people to email them with a stated research goal. Casually interested normal folks need not apply.

It doesn't help either that their text files are in PDF instead of a format that can actually be programmatically processed.

<comment><USER11> It certainly would be useful to do some sort of programmatic analysis of speeches mapped over time. Sentiment analysis. Repeated phrases. Cross- reference with others' phrases to see who's saying the same things at the same times.

Oh well. I guess you can print it out really nicely. And it's "portable"!

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Looking forward to the torrent. Tragic that this is what we are reduced to as a society.

<comment><USER13> How is this different than an editor compiling commonly known knowledge into an encyclopedia and selling it to the public?

<comment><USER14> It isn't, which explains wikipedia.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Interesting, a invitation for scrutiny with concern for privacy.. and on other hand, disallowing people to anonymously get public information collected by them. Interesting!

I wait for this to be hosted somewhere else ;/

</comment><comment><USER11> Am I the only one that thinks this should absolutely be put up in some open- source version-control-based way? If it's public, it's public. If I have to email you and you get to decide whether or not I'm a scholar, doesn't that defeat the purpose of making something available for learning, sharing, and accountability? Should I really have to have a research project or composed purpose to view "open" things?

Self undermining, that is.

</comment><comment><USER16> I wish this was easier to browse. For whatever reason, PDFs feel like a barrier, even though it's just an additional click.

</comment><comment><USER17> >By gaining a better understanding of how Facebook's founder and CEO conceives of his own company's role in the policy and ethical debates surrounding social networking [...]

Sure, knowing how the CEO thinks is a good judge to know where Facebook is going, but it's a bit odd to think that Zuckerberg doesn't take note of what the Board say.

Why aren't they logging what Sandberg, Thiel and Graham say/do?

</comment><comment><USER18> "The dominance of social networking sites, such as Facebook, in contemporary life" ... I find it funny when people make such dramatic statements about facebook. I've reduced my usage to once per week and feel no dominance. I can just as easily log off completely.

<comment><USER19> The real question is, can you delete it completely? :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> My mind immediately flashed back to "Being John Malkovich."

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6Fuxkinhug](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6Fuxkinhug)

I'd bet the same kind of scene would work really well with "Zuckerberg."

</comment><comment><USER21> So I go to the website, and I can't see any "files"... Oh I have to login? Pff, whatever. Don't waste my time. Bye.

</comment><comment><USER22> This has the quality of one of those things that's actually a pretty good idea but seems like a practical joke.

</comment><comment><USER23> Someone should just grab the content and upload to rapgenius.

</comment><comment><USER24> Sites like this will become oboslete... One day "www.lmgtfy.com?q=all public utterances of Mark Zuckerberg" will trigger something a little more interesting than Page Rank...

</comment><comment><USER25> Kinda of scary that people are collecting X founder's profile. Although these data are publicly available, this is still kind of scary.

<comment><USER26> Why is it scary? The other side to our society rewarding you with billions of dollars is that you are now a public figure.

Not only that but he's the CEO of a transnational corporation: their public pronouncements are always examined for any sort of securities edge.

<comment><USER27> And the CEO of Facebook of all people. If one non-public person in the entire world deserves scrutiny, it's Zuckerberg.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> I wish there was one for PG. Truly.

</comment><comment><USER29> seriously? why do you need Zuckerberg Files for research?</comment>


How I Launched an Email Course to 500+ People - <AUTHOR> http://brandonhilkert.com/blog/how-i-launched-an-email-course/?utm_source=hn&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=course-recap

<comment><USER2> How did you market using Rubyweekly? Isn't it a curated email newsletter? Did you advertise or were you lucky to be picked up by them?

</comment><comment><USER3> Love how hypothesis testing is spreading like wildfire. Books are products, too.</comment>


The magnetic universe begins to come into view - <AUTHOR> https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-hidden-magnetic-universe-begins-to-come-into-view-20200702/ <comment><USER2> If magnetism pervades space, can interaction with these fields generate force for propulsion? These fields are weak but what about extremely powerful superconducting magnets? Even if the force is small it could add up over long periods, and since no mass is needed it would be a "massless" drive that does not violate any physical laws.

<comment><USER3> Way back in another life I did some calculations similar to that.

I don't remember details anymore, but there were some observations that some (deep space) astronomical object somewhere was accelerating and there were no models at the time that would explain that. I tried to explain it by a magnetic dipole in an non-homogeneous interstellar magnetic field.

If you know the gradients and the dipole moment you can calculate the force on the dipole.

I think it required a magnetar-level dipole to get some non-trivial forces out of the interstellar field. Anyway, I don't know if that theory ever got anywhere. Probably not. I never got any calls back from the people I presented that work to.

A spaceship would have a much lower mass than a star or whatever I was calculating that for, so I guess the requirements would be lower. Still, my gut feeling would be a magnet much beyond what you can do with today's superconductors. It would also only allow a one-way travel along the local field gradient. No round trips.

<comment><USER4> > _It would also only allow a one-way travel along the local field gradient. > No round trips._

Turn the magnet around?

<comment><USER5> As with the compass, the orientation of your magnetic dipole against the field is unstable, so now you need a second propulsion system for maintaining the unstable orientation of the dipole.

<comment><USER4> You don't need a second propulsion system, you could use reaction wheels[0].

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

<comment><USER5> Reaction wheels saturate and are therefore more suited for precise attitude control than as a source of sustained torque. Once they saturate you need to unload the accumulated momentum via some other mechanism. Thus, you do need a second propulsion system such as thrusters, light sail etc.

<comment><USER4> You can take the momentum back out of the wheels by rolling the magnet to the other side of the unstable equilibrium so that the wheels have to accelerate in the opposite direction to keep it steady.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Bit of a tangent, but I was curious about the circle lake in that picture of LOFAR[1]. That can't be naturally occurring can it? It looks like a moat, and I see lots of irrigation channels nearby. But maybe it was carved by a glacier. There's another LOFAR location[2] next to a park that has a lot of glacial lakes in it.

[1] [https://firstname.lastname@example.com...](https://email@example.com,6.8687104,1358m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1)

[2] [https://www.google.com/maps/place/National+park+Dwingelderve...](https://email@example.com,6.3909835,2561m/data=!3m1!1e3)

<comment><USER7> Not naturally occurring. Was shaped sometime between 2006 and 2007, give or take a year. The interface is a bit jerky.

Hit play button at the very bottom: [https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse#v=52.91525,6.86982,...](https://earthengine.google.com/timelapse#v=52.91525,6.86982,10.974,latLng&t=1.1&ps=100&bt=19840101&et=20181231&startDwell=0&endDwell=0)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> >"One method, pioneered by the English scientist Michael Faraday back in 1845,

 _detects a magnetic field from the way it rotates the polarization direction of light passing through it_.

The amount of "Faraday rotation" depends on the strength of the magnetic field and the frequency of the light. So by measuring the polarization at different frequencies, you can infer the strength of magnetism along the line of sight. "If you do it from different places you can make a 3D map," said Enßlin."

</comment><comment><USER9> The "cosmic web" rendering ([https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-hidden- magnetic-universe-...](https://www.quantamagazine.org/the-hidden-magnetic- universe-begins-to-come-into-view-20200702/)) reminds me of neurons ([https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/cache/file/52B19...](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/cache/file/52B19135-A87E-4900-8787C55A19925989_source.jpg?w=590&h=800&4482D8A9-1F12-45E6-8466C64DBDD4C9C3))

Is it possible that the universe is some sort of neural computation device? What could it be modelling?

<comment><USER10> I'm sorry, but I have to do it...

Clearly it's calculating the ultimate question to the ultimate answer to life, the universe, and everything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> This has been a popular fringe scientific theory for many years under the title Electric Universe Theory. Fringe for sure, but its lead proponents tend to be real scientists referencing real, peer-reviewed literature.

<comment><USER12> >This has been a popular fringe scientific theory for many years under the title Electric Universe Theory.

They're not at all related.

>but its lead proponents tend to be real scientists referencing real, peer- reviewed literature.

They have real PhDs, some of them from respectable universities, but it's an incestuous group that has people not participate in studies so they can all peer review each other in "journals" with no real standing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> If this explains expansion, then it also eliminates dark energy, no?

<comment><USER14> If I read it correctly, it only eliminates the conflict between a couple different ways to measure the rate of expansion in the early universe. Dark energy is about the rate accelerating over time, which is a different thing. I do wish they had addressed it explicitly.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> "These force fields — the same entities that emanate from fridge magnets"

Not a lot of people know that :]

<comment><USER16> Well, not a lot of people understand magnetism anyway.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Seems alot more interesting than yet another failed searched for "dark matter"</comment>


Generating and styling video thumbnails with HTML5's canvas - <AUTHOR> http://theblog.blip.tv/post/2828126011/a-better-way-to-choose-a-thumbnail

<comment><USER2> Crummy thumbnails are the bane of web video. If people actually use this, I'll be a very happy man.

</comment><comment><USER3> Pretty cool stuff.

</comment><comment><USER4> go go thumbnails! -rick</comment>


We Sleep by Matthew Walker: Summary and Notes - <AUTHOR> https://www.grahammann.net/book-notes/why-we-sleep-matthew-walker <comment><AUTHOR> I really wanted to read this book after so many recommendations, but after repeated tries both reading and listening to it on Audible just found it too boring. So I'm quite grateful I now stumbled upon these notes that gave me the gist of what I now agree is a very important book.

<comment><USER2> There are also some decent interviews with him on Joe Rogan, Rhonda Patrick and a talk at Google. They are all on Youtube.</comment></comment>


Will Node.js Forever Be the Sluggish Golang? - <AUTHOR> https://levelup.gitconnected.com/will-node-js-forever-be-the-sluggish-golang-f632130e5c7a <comment><USER2> > Highly optimized C++ or C library with javascript wrapper beats golang hurr > durrr

At what point is it C++ beats golang vs javascript beats golang? IMO these kinds of benchmarks are disingenuous at best.

The benefit of go here is that i don't have to write c++ or c if i need to submit a bug fix, and I don't have layers of abstraction around libraries written in a different language. The last thing I want to is to try and debug the underlying c or c++ libraries when things go wrong. At least with go, pprof and other go tools make debugging low level things straight forward

<comment><USER3> There are a few other notable things about Go: 1\. Compiler and toolchain is all written in Go. Compare this to g++ or JRE/JDK has a lot of code in other languages which can be problematic when you need to audit the code or fix some low level bug. 2\. Language spec is shorter than any other language.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This announcement is more interesting than the title might suggest.

<comment><USER5> Usually the reverse is true. This really should be retitled to underscore that this is a working example of Node.js outperforming Golang and Rust by a long shot.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> > It is possible to outperform, in some regards, Golang's Gorilla WebSockets > on an SSL vs. non-SSL basis. That is, your JS code on SSL can message faster > than Golang can without SSL (in some regards). I think that's pretty cool.

Really impressive, sounds like a highly performance optimized api compatibile alternative c++ backend for node.

</comment><comment><USER7> dang / sctb: suggested change in title

"uWebSockets.js: significantly faster websocket performance for node.js"

This isn't the original title, but less clickbaity.

</comment><comment><USER8> The library may be fast but is useless if it does not provide the client IP. Also, there's no info about how to broadcast in a performant way..... imagine you need to send the very same json to many clients.... it does perform good? it does notice we talking about the same data? or will do useless process over the same data again and again for each client?

</comment><comment><USER9> This is great! I'm bootstrapping an app now and I think I will give this a try. I hope the pub sub support gets added soon.

</comment><comment><USER10> What about security? Writing protocol implementations in a chainsaw-juggling language is notoriously error-prone.

</comment><comment><USER11> One of the actually positive things that came out of the cryptocurrency ecosystem is the amount of effort put into libraries like these. I think it's great.</comment>


How thermometer and satellite data is adjusted and why it must be done - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/01/thorough-not-thoroughly-fabricated-the-truth-about-global-temperature-data <comment><USER3> It wasn't really mentioned but there is a program where weather enthusiasts can submit readings from their automated weather stations to a service, which provides them (in bulk) to various data consumers. Some of the consumers produce consumer weather sites (Weather Underground, for example) and others are scientific users who aggregate the data and do statistical analysis. In most towns, there's at least one enthusiast submitting data, so when you average all of these thousands of collectors, it can cancel out the effects of the methodology changes described in the article above.

On a side note, I have a weather station in my back yard and I wrote my own software in Go to collect and graph data from it. The station is a Davis Instruments Vantage Pro 2, which is a decent "pro-sumer" level station like you might find on the roof of a fire department or ski patrol building.

My software is called gopherwx. It doesn't have CWOP support yet or any documentation but you can check it out here:

[https://github.com/chrissnell/gopherwx](https://github.com/chrissnell/gopherwx)

I have the data feeding into InfluxDB and graphing via Rickshaw on my site, which updates the readings in real-time every three seconds:

[https://mhkweather.com/](https://mhkweather.com/)

<comment><USER4> Off topic but it sounds like you know your weather stations, are there any cheaper than the Davis you would recommend?

<comment><USER3> My dad has the Accurite that's sold at Costco and Amazon. He loves it. It's decently accurate--enough for a home user--and not expensive at all.

He was supposedly going to send me one and I was going to extend gopherwx to support it but he hasn't yet. I can't imagine that the protocol will be difficult. Davis's protocol was designed in the early 90s for serial lines and is binary to optimize for space and speed on early PCs. It was kind of a pain in the ass to implement a driver for it.

<comment><USER4> Awesome, thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The real fight isn't proving that the data is there, it's proving that people should even look at the data. Climate Change Denial doesn't come from a scientific place and it doesn't have a scientific answer really.

<comment><USER6> and what about skeptics who think the current explanations are deeply flawed and being propped up for continued funding ?

this happens outside climate science, why should it be different because Climate ?

See the physics lady critical of the Higgs boson project: [http://backreaction.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/the-lhc- nightmare...](http://backreaction.blogspot.co.uk/2016/08/the-lhc-nightmare- scenario-has-come-true.html?m=1)

"I hope that this latest null result will send a clear message that you can't trust the judgement of scientists whose future funding depends on their continued optimism."

in this case translate optimisim for Climate Pessimism

<comment><USER7> Factor in the cost of being wrong. That's the chilling part. "We're all going to die!" "Ha ha, I doubt it, lets just continue on down the same path because maybe we won't die."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Wow this graph (from the comments) is really scary

[http://www.realclimate.org/images//Marcott.png](http://www.realclimate.org/images//Marcott.png)

<comment><USER9> An even scarier way of looking at the same reality:

[https://xkcd.com/1732/](https://xkcd.com/1732/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> See also GHCN v3 Great Dying of Thermometers [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h95uvT67bNg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h95uvT67bNg)

Historically, humans have not measured and recorded temperature according to some over-arching research plan with well designed criteria.

</comment><comment><USER11> I think it's fine to make adjustments, but the destroying, or making the raw data harder to obtain is unscientific and unethical.

I know we've moved on from Climate Gate but I didn't realize that actually happened IRL, and I thought that was one of the more important revelations.

The real problem with getting skeptics to believe is that agw is tarnished science. You have people saying things like "it didn't snow in Kansas in October, clearly global warming is real". The silence from the scientific community when people make statements like this tarnishes there validity of what they've actually proven.

<comment><USER12> And people say it snowed in the summer and therefore global warming is false. Is it the scientific community's responsibility to step up every time John Q. Public makes an entirely uninformed and irrelevant statement?

<comment><USER11> Yes of course. Do you want an educated public or are you just trying to get them to believe in a doctrine?

<comment><USER12> If climate scientists shot down every mistaken claim people make about their field, they wouldn't have any time left over for climate science.

The science is no more "tarnished" by people's misunderstanding of it than quantum mechanics is by people using it as a justification for pseudoscience.

<comment><USER11> I see. The end justifies the means? It's ok for people to lack true understanding because it's helpful for your, er, greater, cause?

<comment><USER12> > end justifies the means

What? Are you replying to what I wrote or just spewing random nonsense? Is there such a thing as an astroturfing bot? You aren't really demonstrating human-level reading comprehension here.

Is this always what it feels like to engage climate deniers?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Long time HN user using a throwaway account because of the lynch mob ( both sides )

The article page 3 mentions a crucial get-out-of-jail card that HN is taking completely hypocritically at face value.

Namely that NOAA adjustements are in response to Met Office/Hadley/UEA adjustements.

this should be setting off "tampered" alarm bells

Lets step away to make parallels:

UK Copyright extended to harmonise with US.

US copyright then extended to harmonise with UK copyright

HN response: The copyright holders are colluding to extend the term globally

</comment><comment>

NOAA adjustments: We're harmonising because of Met Office / Hadley / UEA adjustments

HN: Yay science, nothing fishy could be going on here because Scientists.

<comment><USER13> You're comparing an abstract set of laws used to control ownership of intellectual property, which are often abused, to scientists trying to collect the most accurate data they can?

You don't see a difference?

<comment><USER6> difference yes.

you dont see the similarities?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> > So in the US, accounting for non-climatic factors ends up increasing the > warming trend over the raw data—which we know is wrong.

I wish the author had been a bit more careful when writing this sentence. I think the intended meaning is "we know the raw data is wrong," but I read it at first as "we know [the increase] is wrong."

</comment><comment><USER15> You know how we were discussing the "fake news" problem? In the comments here we have the reason why it's so popular: people are not interested in facts, especially if they're inconvenient for their lifestyle. And now HN is uprooting climate change denial.

</comment><comment><USER16> This is actually an excellent illustration of how organizational incentives seep into data.

Imagine you have a historical temperature series record. You have an bureaucratic incentive to find and justify an argument as to why past temperatures should be adjusted downward, making the curve of global warming look steeper. You have no bureaucratic incentive to look for the opposite.

The result is that, overall, modern corrections adjust past temperatures downward -- what we'd expect if these biases exist. But this doesn't mean any specific correction is based on "fabricated" research. It's probably perfectly valid. It's just that downward corrections are more attractive to research, because they produce research that has a social impact that the field finds desirable.

(Edit: here's a picture of the net adjustments: [https://judithcurry.com/2014/07/07/understanding- adjustments...](https://judithcurry.com/2014/07/07/understanding-adjustments- to-temperature-data/))

<comment><USER17> This is a pretty weak argument, because (a) arguments from scientific validity always trump arguments from incentives, (b) you seem to assume that the incentives you list are all the incentives there are. Do note, for example, that scientists also face the incentive to _do good science_ that can stand up to the scrutiny of their peers. It's not enough to point out that the science has some impact and call it a day (after all, almost all good science has impact).

For this to be an "illustration", as you put it, you'd have to _first_ demonstrate that what they did was scientifically dubious, _then_ conclude that they must have done the dubious thing because of incentives. You can't just point at the sign of the adjustment and invoke incentives. I'd say you'd be much more convincing if you raised actual scientific issues, instead of making vague assertions about their incentives.

<comment><USER16> I think you're missing the point.

The negative adjustments of past temperatures are neither the work of one scientist, nor even one scientific organization. Let's say for simplicity that they're the result of ten entirely separate confirmed hypotheses about systematic errors in old data.

Each of these was produced by an honest researcher who followed the scientific method: formulate a hypothesis, test it, etc. Let's say their technical work is perfect. All the hypotheses are correct.

But all ten researchers, faced with the choice of what hypothesis to formulate and/or investigate, naturally chose high-impact hypotheses -- ones that, if confirmed, adjust past temperatures downward.

We would naturally expect historical errors in temperature measurements to be evenly distributed. Like errors in cheap thermometers. If they are evenly distributed, we would expect there to be ten other such hypotheses, involving _upward_ corrections in past measurements, which were not studied because of their low impact if confirmed.

This hypothesis explains the data that we ourselves see: that past temperatures are continuously being lowered as the data evolves. And it requires no one to be a bad, incompetent, or dishonest researcher.

<comment><USER18> Your posts seem like classic climate change denialism. The same tactics were used to argue that lead in gasoline wasn't a problem and that cigarette smoke doesn't cause cancer.

CO2 causes atmospheric warming. The underlying principles are simple and sound. We are emitting tons and tons of CO2 by burning vast quantities of fossil fuels.

The only reason to argue against the science is if you have an ulterior motive or you've been unwittingly duped by those that do.

>But all ten researchers, faced with the choice of what hypothesis to formulate and/or investigate, naturally chose high-impact hypotheses

That isn't how science works. It doesn't matter what they hypothesize, what matters is what the evidence shows.

>We would naturally expect historical errors in temperature measurements to be evenly distributed.

No we wouldn't and you refuse to offer any evidence to back up your claims.

>If they are evenly distributed, we would expect there to be ten other such hypotheses, involving upward corrections in past measurements, which were not studied because of their low impact if confirmed.

I'm going to be direct and honest here: This is why I think you're just lying to push a point. This is not how the scientific method works. None of what you've postulated is correct. And for the record there are various groups (including some oil companies) pouring millions into scientific studies trying to prove global warming isn't happening. None of their supposed "evidence" has withstood peer review or scrutiny.

Evidence is what ultimately matters, a point you seem to be trying really hard to avoid addressing.

<comment><USER19> Your post is also lacking many concrete details so it's not adding to the conversation.

>Your posts seem like classic climate change denialism.

Any skeptical post would qualify for this.

>The same tactics were used to argue that lead in gasoline wasn't a problem and that cigarette smoke doesn't cause cancer.

The same tactics (attacking data sources) are used in any critical analysis of a given scientific field (see sociology).

>CO2 causes atmospheric warming.

Repeating the conclusion is not an argument.

>The underlying principles are simple and sound.

Right, but the underlying principle isn't being disputed. The underlying principles behind lots of research can be fine while the research itself is garbage (e.g. bad data collection methodology).

>The only reason to argue against the science is if you have an ulterior motive or you've been unwittingly duped by those that do.

This is so idiotic I don't even know where to start. You're saying that there is no reason to question scientific findings if you think a whole method of research is fundamentally flawed?

"The only reason you have to argue against numerology is if you have an ulterior motive or you've been unwittingly duped by those that do."

Sounds silly, doesn't it?

>That isn't how science works. It doesn't matter what they hypothesize, what matters is what the evidence shows.

Cute, I take it you've never worked in academia? People completely throw away experiments that fail to support their hypothesis all of the time. Especially if the result would bring down a fire of threats to their career. ([https://xkcd.com/1478/](https://xkcd.com/1478/) [https://xkcd.com/882/](https://xkcd.com/882/))

Bias in the researchers is a very big problem in all scientific fields. When you're trained to be a hammer and all you work with are hammers, and you get your funding from the hammer use-case fund, you certainly aren't out looking for screwdriver use-cases.

Please keep the discussion to substantive counterpoints other than ad hominems, strawman arguments, and appeals to authority.

<comment><USER20> > _Your post is also lacking many concrete details so it 's not adding to the > conversation._

Your post is nonsense in context. The top post provided no concrete details, so what details could the GP use but to quote it directly?

It was a non-falsifiable theory devoid of evidence; by their logic, we can't listen to experts _because_ they're experts. All research is subject to systemic and _directed_ bias, discernible without actually looking at that research.

It's dumb and not remotely concrete. And it's certainly a time honored diversionary and denialist tactic.

> _Bias in the researchers is a very big problem in all scientific fields. > When you 're trained to be a hammer and all you work with are hammers, and > you get your funding from the hammer use-case fund, you certainly aren't out > looking for screwdriver use-cases. Please keep the discussion to substantive > counterpoints other than ad hominems._

I'd suggest maybe doing a little self reflection before posting? This entire thread is fundamentally an ad hominem argument, and this quote just doubles down.

<comment><USER21> Hacker news agrees with him, not you. Take your elitist ration and logic elsewhere, it's not welcome here. I've just about given up on this place - <USER2> think Thiel has been astroturfing for years and it's getting worse.

<comment><USER19> >Take your elitist ration and logic elsewhere

Did you read my post? It was pointing out that that the parent's post was lacking ration and logic and was resorting to ad homs, strawmen, and appeals to authority.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> If only there were something that wasn't man-made that would integrate the temperature reading continuously over 100 years and display if the temperature is increasing or decreasing. Anything that did that would probably be subtle and take data processing that the deniers would question.

Oh Look: [http://www.nbcnews.com/id/36224913/ns/us_news- environment/t/...](http://www.nbcnews.com/id/36224913/ns/us_news- environment/t/glacier-national-park-loses-two-more)

<comment><USER23> We also have rain fall studies that show no change in sixty odd years, we have studies which can indicate or disprove about any point anyone can raise. Glaciers are interesting because they don't all melt at once and some increase while others decrease. Based on some skeletal and other findings with some retreating glaciers its pretty obvious it has happened before, long before we were having an effect.

all articles like the one we have today is simply explain that its not a decided science and anyone claiming otherwise is just as bad as those who refuse to believe any changes occur.

the question that must be answered is, are the estimates for change in line with what has occurred and is occurring and if not, why.

<comment><USER24> > we have studies which can indicate or disprove about any point anyone can > raise.

What are you basing that belief on? How many studies did you spot check to reach this "studies can disprove about any point" determination?

That's an exceedingly broad claim, and I'm skeptical you've done more than hand pick studies that support your worldview, but I would be incredibly relieved to be proven wrong.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I read the NOAA papers, they're enlightening.

</comment><comment><USER26> z

<comment><USER27> > how do statisticians prove other factors are not responsible?

satellite observations over ~30 years have tracked the amount of outgoing radiation in various regions of the electromagnetic spectrum over time. The amount of outgoing radiation has decreased, only in the spectra that co2 and methane block. The amount of reduction is as expected given the amount of co2 and methane we have added to the atmosphere:

chart: [http://static.skepticalscience.com/images/harries_radiation....](http://static.skepticalscience.com/images/harries_radiation.gif)

This is just one of many ways we can confirm the attribution of climate change, it is IMHO the most clear, and obvious one, and the one for which I have never seen a refutation that even sounds serious, so I like to use it. There are many other ways to confirm this though.

<comment><USER28> 30 years! How old is the climate and Earth again? How many volcanoes erupt daily, weekly, monthly... and how much do they contribute to "other factors?"

I worked at AFWA in 2004, in the Global Event office. I tracked Volcanoes, Hurricanes, Haboobs, and the like... The scientists there loved to have these conversations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> So in other words, you really have no idea what you're doing do you?

</comment><comment><USER30> What about urbanisation? Near where I live 20 years ago there was huge green space. Now it's all concrete, buildings and roads. Urbanised area is much more warm. Aren't those stations getting closer (without moving) to urban areas over time - just because urban areas tend to expand? What about new stations? Are they being setup in remote areas only?

<comment><USER31> Mentioned in the article.</comment></comment>


Stroads and Strails - <AUTHOR> https://pedestrianobservations.com/2019/03/19/stroads-and-strails/ <comment><USER2> Livable streets, which are a joy to walk down, are essential. And the author of this piece is correct that you can't just use a top-down plan to segregate roads and streets.

It seems to me that the key is to find ways to make automobiles less mandatory in general. So instead of needing two or three lanes for automobiles in each direction, you only need one. And, ideally, a reduction in the need for curbside parking.

This can be accomplished through tax policies, zoning, and ordinances that promote walkability and transit-oriented development. Shift taxes off buildings and onto land value. Allow mixed-use development. End mandatory minimum parking requirements. Implement congestion pricing and smart parking meters. Use pigouvian penalties for pollution, in proportion to the harm caused.

All of those could be implemented without requiring top-down planning or accumulating more municipal debts.

I'm all for spending money on parks, libraries, bike trails, and public transit, but you can't just drop those into a community where all the economic incentives incline us towards the McLifestyle with big box stores, strip malls, and drive-thru.

<comment><USER3> The dreaded electric car is the answer.

When you look at busy streets where all of the houses have turned their backs on the noise, pollution and general filth that comes with regular traffic think how different it would be if every one of those vehicles 'sat in traffic' and inching forward was an electric vehicle.

People could have clean windows and open their front doors to the street. They could even grow a few plants. Crossing the road even in solid traffic would be safer just because you could hear.

If individual communities could vote if their street was electric only then there would be an incentive for people to get their street essentially car free. Imaginably the lamp posts would be charging points too.

Streets designed a century or more ago and where community once thrived would come back to life. House price values would be vastly more for 'electric' streets just because the standard of living is better. So you could buy an electric car and offset that against the higher valuation of the house - assuming you are owning and not renting.

As for old fashioned cars blazing through and creating pollution, there are license plate reading cameras and fines. As for the folks from the countryside that still have their old ICE vehicle, they just have to park a street or two away when visiting their friends on 'electric' streets. This will obviously stress out the parking in neighbouring streets incentivising them to go electric too. Eventually everyone can have a livable street even if there is lots of slow moving traffic moving at a snails pace. It just won't be noisy traffic with killer fumes.

<comment><USER4> Electric cars still make noise.

<comment><USER5> Especially when the hypothetically self-driving ones are all tooling around the block 20 times because there's nowhere to park.

<comment><USER2> That's why I mentioned smart parking meters. They would set prices so that there's always spots available for those willing to pay more. The end result being less congestion and shorter commuting times for everyone, by avoiding the need to circle the block.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I read Jane Jacobs in grad school (surprisingly relevant even after five decades), and I think she would question whether all of that traffic needs to exist in the first place. The article mentions "micromanaged" zoning in North America, one element of which seems to be that no residential window should ever face a commercial enterprise. Allowing small shops and restaurants to exist within residential areas (as they do in Europe and elsewhere) would eliminate some amount of the car traffic we current accept as normal. When every destination requires a car, every street becomes a stroad.

<comment><USER5> I think that's a fair assessment of Jane Jacobs' view. At the same time, a lot of people read Jacobs somewhat selectively. She may not have wanted multi-lane traffic to go through Washington Square Park and [have wanted] mixed-use organic growth. However, she was also in general very much not in favor of bulldozing swaths of low-rise housing to build large apartment blocks as many seem to feel is the antidote to high housing prices in the city of their choice.

ADDED: I expect a lot of folks here would absolutely characterize Jabobs as a NIMBY in a lot of ways given that I think it's fair to say she was far more concerned with the livability of cities for their residents than enabling a large population influx.

<comment><USER7> Low-rise housing isn't really _the_ problem. Take Barcelona, for example, which has nearly twice the population density as New York City—the U.S.'s densest city. Barcelona does have high-rises, but much of its density can be attributed to its narrow streets.

So, while bulldozing low-rise buildings in poor neighborhoods to build highrise apartment buildings would increase density, it's a very costly and inequitable way of doing it, especially when SO much area of NYC (and all U.S. cities) is designated exclusively for personal automobiles.

<comment><USER8> Highrise apartments ("bulk housing") is the obvious outcome of where ridiculous zoning has taken us. If cities were allowed to organically build upwards in duplexes and triplexes, we'd have naturally higher density/capacity without the need for adrenaline shots of highrise apartment buildings.

<comment><USER5> >If cities were allowed to organically build upwards

Zoning is no doubt sometimes the issue. But there's a lot of evidence that, given availability of land at the time of initial construction, the organic behavior tends toward detached single-family homes and duplexes.

<comment><USER9> initial construction is not an end state though. Towns change over time. Some locations are desirable and rich will always keep them like that because they are willing to pay for it. Some locations become less desirable and the rich move out leaving a poorer class to move in, this class is willing for an apartment because it is cheaper for them.

<comment><USER5> >Towns change over time.

Indeed, they do. And I'm not defending all resistance to zoning changes, etc. But, if you have a large swath of 1-2 story housing, even in the absence of significant zoning and permitting restrictions, it's probably going to be a very slow process for that to densify into 3-5 story housing organically.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The same approach would be useful for dealing with the ubiquitous electric scooters. The real danger of them lies not within the technology (or their use) itself, but in infrastructure that was designed to support cars instead.

<comment><USER11> Well, after Lime had to recall their scooters from the Swiss market due to their nasty habit of spontaneously engaging their front brakes while in full swing I, for one, wouldn't be so sure.

Edit: spello

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I wonder if the author has ever tried to walk across a stroad. It is a horrible experience: 5 lanes of traffic with no crosswalks or traffic lights. Left turns over 4 lanes are similarly irksome. There is no need for this apologism for stroads: certainly the author is not arguing we build more of them. He says something has to give: let it be the cars.

</comment><comment><USER13> > Bicyclists prefer riding on major streets as well, which is why Copenhagen > prioritizes bike infrastructure on major streets rather than on side streets > – on side streets car traffic is so light and slow that mixed traffic is not > so bad, but the desirable through-routes remain the major streets.

I've never really understood the appeal of major roads for bicyclsts. I much prefer sidestreets when bicycling and don't mind cutting over a block to have to deal with less traffic. I think this demand along with a general blowback against cars due to American culture treating non-vehicle traffic as second class leads to bad outcomes.

In my town, a six-lane arterial connects neighborhoods with a major N-S arterial, downtown, and past downtown is a US highway. The town has taken that six lane road and turned it into a two lane road with center turn lane, bicycle lanes, and parking. What should be a 40+ mph speed limit is now a 25 mph speed limit.

This has bad outcomes for drivers and bicyclists.

Effectively, from the perspective of a driver, this road is now equivalent to any of a dozen parallel roads: single lane in each direction and 25 mph. This disincentivizes drivers from cutting over to the arterial, effectively spreading out the traffic onto parallel roads (many of which lack traffic lights when they hit the major N-S artery). However, it remains the busiest road for vehicle traffic, and because it is so wide, speed significantly faster than 25 mph _feel_ safe, so speed variance can be higher, with traffic typically traveling between 20-40 mph. It's particularly sketchy for traffic turning on from side streets. Drivers expect traffic to be going the posted 25 mph, but are sometimes surprised by the person going 40 mph. So, drivers generally get where they are going more slowly, but at increased danger due to increase in speed variance.

But it also increases danger for bicyclists in two ways. First, it encourages the bicyclists to use the still relatively busy arterial. It's not clear why anyone would want to incentivize this. For a bicyclist, any of the parallel streets were already attractive options and would get the bicyclist where he was going. Second, because of the changed incentives, those parallel roads are now busier than before (making the bicycle lane on the busier road more attractive). Whatever a bicyclist decides, there is an increase in vehicle/bicycle interactions.

A much better solution would have been to keep the arterial an arterial and make dedicated bicycle lanes on some of the parallel roads. This would encourage a separation of vehicle and bycicle traffic that wouldn't really inconvenience either one of them.

<comment><USER14> > _In my town, a six-lane arterial connects neighborhoods with a major N-S > arterial, downtown, and past downtown is a US highway. The town has taken > that six lane road and turned it into a two lane road with center turn lane, > bicycle lanes, and parking. What should be a 40+ mph speed limit is now a 25 > mph speed limit._

This is a description of a heavily car-oriented urban plan.

Ideally no urban street should have 40+ mph driving; it's grossly unsafe for pedestrians/cyclists. Save those speeds for the highway. In my opinion cities should not have 6 lane streets. Such wide bands of pavement break up the neighborhood and are very unfriendly to everything but cars. Unfortunately, once you have built your city on such a plan with a 100 foot gap between buildings, figuring out what better to do with the space gets tricky.

<comment><USER15> > Ideally no urban street should have 40+ mph driving; it's grossly unsafe. > Save those speeds for the highway.

A six lane, 40+ mph urban arterial street is a (significant) highway, though it may not be a controlled-access freeway (in practice, they have _more_ controlled access than less significant urban streets, though often less than freeways, which also have higher speed limits; it's a continuum.)

<comment><USER14> Yes, and we shouldn't put at-grade highways through the middle of city neighborhoods with housing/small businesses/etc. along the sides, no grade- separated pedestrian crossings, etc.

I grew up in Southern CA, and the way cities there are crisscrossed by super- wide 6-lane roads (and every destination is surrounded by parking lots) is very disruptive to anything but a car-dominated lifestyle/culture. In many cities people almost exclusively travel by car, even though the weather is pleasant throughout the year. As a consequence lives are heavily scheduled and people spend little time talking to their neighbors.

I also spent significant time growing up in a colonial city in southern Mexico, designed around narrow streets with little available parking. The cultural difference was stark: in the Mexican city people walked everywhere and it was impossible to go anywhere without running into multiple friends in the street.

<comment><USER15> > Yes, and we shouldn't put at-grade highways through the middle of city > neighborhoods

We generally don't. Arterial roads—what was being discussed—are typically between neighborhoods forming a widely-spaced network, from which a dense network of smaller roads branch off which are the roads "through the middle of city neighborhoods".

That's what the word "arterial" means.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This just made me think of shopping centres (malls), you have a pedestrianised area surrounded by roads (and car parking).

I'm not suggesting that they're the solution, but a symptom, and evidence of demand for shopping without having to dodge cars.

</comment><comment><USER17> An avenue is not a stroad; while it can have multiple lanes and less of an expectation of mixed use of the asphalt than a residential street, it's not designed for high speeds, and will often contain many speed-inhibition mechanisms (crossroads, traffic lights, curves, etc).

A good approach is to split the lanes - instead of 3+3 as in a high-speed road, they have 2+2 in the middle for thru-traffic, sandwiched by strip of sidewalk, plus another lane on each side for local traffic, and finally another sidewalk next to the buildings.

<comment><USER18> Queens Boulevard[0] is like that, with through-traffic lanes and local lanes divided by a barrier, and it's very much not a pleasant experience to walk or bike near it. It's just so wide, loud, and dangerous[1], though there have been some recent fixes to improve safety.

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

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queens_Boulevard#Safety_issues...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queens_Boulevard#Safety_issues_and_improvements)

<comment><USER19> A large stretch of Queens Boulevard has a bike lane alongside of its local lanes now. I just biked the length of it the other day, it's actually quite a pleasant urban biking experience in terms of safety (though not in terms of scenery). The lane is wide, separated from traffic, and the intersections with cars are sensibly designed[0].

(In the map view below, the bike lane is the green lane, where the tan painted area is designated for pedestrians. But almost no pedestrians are going to be walking parallel with the road between the local and through lanes. And if they are, they're likely going to be on the actual median instead of in the painted area. So it's safe to bike in the tan paint, and leave the entire green bike lane as a buffer area. This may sound disrespectful to pedestrians, but when I biked the entire length of the bike lane the other day, I didn't see a single pedestrian walking in this area or even on the median.)

[0]: [https://email@example.com,-73.8891268,64m/data...](https://firstname.lastname@example.com,-73.8891268,64m/data=!3m1!1e3!5m1!1e3)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Interesting piece. I'd quibble with one point though:

> The same situation occurs on railroads: all uses want the same piece of > infrastructure, leading to the usual problems of mixing trains of different > speed classes on the same tracks. Freight bypasses are possible, but > passenger bypasses are rare

France has built thousands of miles of what are effectively passenger bypasses: their LGVs (Lignes a Grand Vitesse).

</comment><comment><USER21> The fundamental failing is that the ownership of 'stroads' (including those in city centres) is typically with a government entity that is charged almost solely with vehicular traffic concerns.

The design solutions are there and obvious for prioritising pedestrians, cyclists, etc. But its impossible to enact these when road authorities are separate to planning authorities. The overarching solution is a structural change in governing these spaces.

</comment><comment><USER22> I think ideally you would have at least three separate but interconnected ground transport networks: one for pedestrians, one for bikes, and one for motor vehicles.

</comment><comment><USER23> I think this piece takes too long to arrive at a underwhelming point, seemingly that prime transportation and activity corridors all want to co- locate because of interrelated and natural, rational reasons. This finding isn't obvious but is easily revealed, and though it's worth talking about, there's deeper insights if we continue the examination further.

Early road bypasses failed precisely because of the lack of development restrictions: they increased traffic and cheap land value drew businesses seeking to capitalize on it, so now the bypasses of yesteryear are of the urban fabric. The classic way to armor against this is to make the roadway limited access, and then you have development concentrating only at intersection nodes. Or the jurisdictions at play can always place additional restrictions on development.

But underneath all the SimCity we can play with roads and zoning, the transportation geography will always remain constrained to edges and nodes, corridors and chokepoints. It's these chokepoints that truly define the way people will get around, because getting to a point beyond them will require crossing it, and there's only ever a handful of time-effective paths to take between you and it. Bridges and mountain passes are the obvious chokepoints, but in a car-oriented world so are motorway interchanges and meetings of big arterials. Much criticism is levelled at US suburban development where single- family homes are plopped onto winding streets that only discharge to big avenues at subdivision entrances, so everyone has to take the big roads to get anywhere, but most European cities aren't that different: the lesser streets aren't passable at a pace that motorists have come to expect, and rarely does an uninterrupted network of them exist to get into a different part of the city using only small streets. Although the planning forces, commercial forces, and histories are different, they both arrive at the same result, of cars being channeled to a small number of higher-capacity paths, instead of distributed more evenly throughout.

There's cities that have leveraged the grid to great effect to arrive at a less crushing result. Las Vegas is a good example: attractions are located along a narrow corridor with heavy traffic that locals have learned to avoid. The rest of the urban area forms a large grid with dozens of avenues at regular intervals, and amenities and retail are sprinkled among housing. You have many options of traversing the urban area from one side to another.

There's other urbanized areas that have the same basic form, but they're imbalanced by a nearby node that draws traffic and upsets the network. Plano, TX looks really similar, but is a surburb to much larger Dallas. Other times, there's far too little commercial in a sea of residential, like much of South Florida or Inland Empire or Oklahoma City, or the desired directions of travel don't match the grid, like in Orange County, CA. Sometimes the grid is limited by natural obstructions that create chokepoints, significantly impairing the utility of the grid, like in Seattle, Minneapolis, or the connections of Manhattan to elsewhere.

One of the goals of railroads, motorways, subways, etc. is to "warp" and cheat the natural network and create connections among nodes that previously didn't exist, or weren't even nodes. This requires clever and thoughtful design that goes beyond simply putting transit along every avenue, or putting in more lanes.</comment>


Ask HN: How can I deal with self-entitlement, job-hopping and boredom? - <AUTHOR> I've begun the process of looking for a new job after only 11 months into my current position. It started off well, but we've had 2 solid employees move on due to frustration with the way the company operates. Everyone else feels the  same way.
Development-wise, things aren't terrible. There's no pressure which makes me bored if anything. I've gone about 4 months without doing any significant work.
On the plus side, the company is more 'agile' than others I've worked at - we use a CI system, pair program and when I started we did do retros, but that dropped off after a few months.
Some things are worrying though. The loss of key staff, the increasing amount of work which is passed over to our offshore consultancy, the slow decline of the company (no growth), company departments that don't talk to each other, departments that don't care.
I know some of you might say - "Stay! Fix the place. It might get better" but there are people that have been here for 10+ years who say that it's always been like this.
Looking around there are some interesting companies, but nothing that's captivating me. This makes me worried that I'm just going to repeat the cycle. Should I just need to suck it up?
I'd love to develop a side-project to the point where it can support me but I'm simply not motivated enough. I feel my ideas are bad.
I applied to move to Canada from the UK and was accepted, so any move now would only be for 18 months before I leave to go there.
I'm conscious of being labelled a job hopper (see link below). I'm also conscious that by acting this way, I'm a 'Gen Y trophy kid' as the author puts it.
I get itchy feet. I get bored easily. I want a 'better thing'. I want to use new tech I find interesting. I'm looking for a perfect job which probably doesn't exist. I'm not being professional. I'm 'flakey'.
http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2010/04/22/never-hire-job-hoppers-never-they-make-terrible-employees/ <comment><USER2> In this essay you haven't mentioned what you're passionate about. Yes it's good to know what you don't like, but knowing what you do like is just as important in this world be it finding a job or going on dates.

Something else to keep in mind is that while you'll see a great deal of press about the excitement of tech, the reality is that most of the industry can be dry by nature. And on the flip side the "fun stuff" can be a death march schedule followed by your company going under.

By the way I think if you're unhappy that "sucking it up" won't help you over the long run. My advice is to get some help thinking this out: Don't be afraid to find a mentor outside your company, or even go into therapy. And of course talk to peers who work at other companies. Also be open to the idea that your passion might not even be software.

Last note: You may have several careers in your life time. If you look around it not always the case that a coder in his or her 20s will be a coder by age 50.

</comment><comment><USER3> I can't give you any advice about working in a shitty boring job you hate, because I myself am quite terrible at it, but I think Paul Graham has already answered one of your questions.

If you're serious about making a business out of a side project, PG once talked about how you shouldn't try to think about ideas that are "good startup ideas" Instead he says, work on things that you find profoundly interesting. When you've hit something that users love, the idea according to him his, it will take over your life and you will know that your side project is no longer a side project, but a startup. So I wouldn't worry about if you think your ideas are bad, as long as they are interesting to you, work on them.

</comment><comment><USER4> I can definitely relate to this post - There are a lot of factors to weigh when considering self-termination.

Czechs mix is right... When I make music, I only care that I like the sound. For tackling an idea with execution, I imagine the concept is similar.

I decided I'd rather be happy and on a budget, working on things I enjoy, rather than somewhat financially stable and no time for what I'm passionate about. This has been a gradual point of realization for me.

</comment><comment><USER5> > I'm conscious of being labelled a job hopper.

A great deal of the employers perception depends on how you frame the conversation and get in front of telling your story. In short-- it's time to get smarter about the jobs and companies you pursue. Here's a solid read on the subject by Nick Corcodilos > [http://corcodilos.com/blog/page/2](http://corcodilos.com/blog/page/2)

<comment><AUTHOR> Your comment is pretty much on the money:

1\. Joined my first company straight out of university. Wasn't really aware of what the market was like and it was the first offer I received.

2\. Second company was to get back to my home town. Ended up being a nightmare.

3\. Joined the third company because they used Rails and I needed to escape company 2.

I'm trying to be far more picky this time around. I can survive in my current position and I'm not desperate to get out. This might cure the 'job-hopping'.</comment></comment>


404 Page Not Found - <AUTHOR> http://sua.umn.edu/404

<comment><USER2> Very creative. But what's the objective? I'm sure it's not to increase page views or improve user experience.

</comment><comment><USER3> I forget we were on the new Reddit.

</comment><comment><USER4> Don't stick around until the text fades out; there's nothing more.</comment>


Jack welcomes Twitter's post-140 character era with giant screenshot of text - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/jack/status/684496529621557248/photo/1 <comment><USER2> I thought I'd transcribe this line (it seems the most relevant):

> "Instead, what if that text...was actually text? Text that could be > searched, Text that could be highlighted. That's more utility and power."

</comment><comment><USER3> The stars have aligned and the circle of dumbness is complete. Arise great Dumbthulhu!</comment>


Ask HN: Why is Microsoft *too* careful with the accounts and passwords? - <AUTHOR> MS keeps logging me out of devices/apps/browsers after a very short while. Logging in then requires passing some security gates: sometimes it asks to use the MS Authenticator but before entering the code on the app, there appears an error that the code was not successfully sent to the app. Sometimes it asks to send a secure code to another email (e.g. Gmail) to verify the login to Outlook account was valid, but then it keeps asking to change the password for the Outlook account over and over again. I've never had these sorts of issues with Gmail and other G-Suites, but apparently MS doesn't know how to handle account logins properly. Right now, I'm logged out of my Office 365 again. The same thing happened to me yesterday. <comment><USER2> I've never heard of this behavior, nor has it happened to me.

It sounds like you've triggered something in Microsoft's automated anti- intrusion system, and it's suspicious of either your behavior or all of your account's activity.

Sometimes customer service can remove these flags (I know American Express can, at least). It may be worth asking them to do that.</comment>


Do you use a CI/CD for your infrastructure code - <AUTHOR> https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeQjDaoYnf7_Iu0tqOZzslVKcu9gIs8-zc2IRefa4eQ-J4KYA/viewform <comment><AUTHOR> Hi all We're building a CI/CD for infrastructure code with a launchpad. Actively looking for feedbacks to see where people stand. Would be very grateful for 5 minutes of your time on a very short form to help us shape a better product :pray: (PS : Ping me if you want to chat. Happy to connect)</comment>