I just lost my wallet on the way home from work - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/Timcammm/status/1183782929614409729 <comment><USER3> Every so often my pessimistic tendencies get a healthy slap across the face by the actions of someone who took the high road when they easily could have chosen otherwise.

It's a couple summers ago, at the height of the summer tourist season and I'm cycling up 4th ave SW in DC. Somewhere between the NASA HQ and the National Mall my camera bag - packed full with a fairly new DSLR, a few lenses, and a secondary cell phone - came unbuckled from my messenger bag and tumbled to the sidewalk. Probably a few thousand dollars of gear, not counting the considerable hassle of resetting 2fa and credentials for every possible account that could be tied to my phone (it was password-locked but I have no idea how well that would survive a determined attack).

I was booking it pretty hard trying to catch a metro, so I didn't notice the loss for a couple more blocks. After the only genuinely involuntary (and painful!) facepalm I've ever given myself, I hurried back home (lived in town close by) and immediately started cancelling every account when my main cell phone rang. The bag was waiting for me, all contents undisturbed and intact, in a hotel lobby a couple blocks away. An anonymous samaritan had picked it up, brought it in and gave it to the concierge without a word, then walked away. Concierge called me using my contact info in a business card that was also in the bag.

In one instant, some unsung karmic superhero single-handedly erased the work of several hundred asshole double parking jobs.

<comment><USER4> Is it actually legal? In France, a bag in a public place is deemed to be a bomb and the military has to come, secure the area and destroy it. Happens on a routine basis, not even worth the newspapers. You don't have such laws in Washington DC?

<comment><USER5> _You don't have such laws in Washington DC?_

Funny you should ask. A few years back my wife and I were stuck in Reagan (an airport in D. C.) for a super-long layover. As I'm watching my first ever episode of _Archer_ , I notice the family a row over gets up and walks down the concourse, leaving their bags. Now, I've heard a bit of their conversations as I've sat there, and I gather they're American and probably self-centered and clueless. Or maybe that's what the terrorists that just walked away from their explosives _want_ me to think. Regardless, we're sitting at the gate and there's a gate agent _right there_ , so I put this in the "not my job anymore" bucket.

It's been a few years, but I'll bet it was at _least_ ten minutes before the agent called security. It was long enough that I was about to get up and ask, "ya know, I'm not the super-paranoid type, but don't you think you ought to give the dog a little practice sniffing bags?" The dog and an agent or two show up, give the bags a sniff, and wait for the owners to return. I was disappointed that there wasn't at least a _little_ ass-chewing. I mean, what U. S. resident doesn't know _not_ to do that? And if they don't, how about driving that lesson home?

But anyway, we don't get too worked up about a random bag lying around. Because in the U. S., thus far it hasn't been shown that it stands much of a chance of blowing up. My sympathy to countries that have not been so lucky.

<comment><USER6> If I'm going to take a piss or dump in the WC I'd like to think I can leave my suitcase for a few minutes without people deciding I'm a terrorist.

Deciding I might be a terrorist because I went to the bathroom? That's what is _absolutely batshit insane_.

<comment><USER5> _Deciding I might be a terrorist because I went to the bathroom?_

No, because you left a container large enough to hold a fair amount of explosives, a container that has been used in other parts of the world _at airports_ to detonate explosives, and you just walked away from it. Tell me what you believe to be the sane response. But if you just want to go take a shit, by all means, do so.

And I'm with sibling comment: I don't let my bags out of my sight.

<comment><USER6> People being paronoid pyschotics shouldn't affect my ability to take a poop in peace.

Those suitcases full of explosives you are hallucinating about? Has NEVER HAPPENED.

<comment><USER7> First 2 links I found googling it,

> United Airlines Flight 629, registration N37559, was a Douglas DC-6B > aircraft also known as "Mainliner Denver", which was blown up with a > dynamite bomb placed in the checked luggage on November 1, 1955. \- > [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Flight_629](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Flight_629)

> An explosion at the New Tokyo International Airport (later renamed Narita > International Airport) occurred on Sunday, 23 June 1985 at 06:19 UTC, killed > two baggage handlers, and injured four. The bomb was intended for Air India > Flight 301, with 177 passengers and crew on board, bound for Don Mueang > International Airport in Bangkok, Thailand. \- > [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_Narita_International_Ai...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1985_Narita_International_Airport_bombing)

Not recent, but not "NEVER".

<comment><USER6> Those are both _checked_ luggage. Not briefly unattended luggage by someone who is in the bathroom. Where's the articles about unattended luggage?

Also you got 1955 and 1985. 64 and 34 years ago. Checked luggage wasn't even inspected back then. It is now. Still stuff gets through.

Are you arguing here that we shouldn't have checked luggage? Those are your examples. Checked luggage. Not unattended luggage, which almost certainly has already been inspected anyway when going through security. What now? Do we ban checked luggage and carry on luggage even after both have been inspected?

I love all the downvotes from the haters and the crazy supposed examples that prove my point for me. Facts and reality are not important. What's important is hysteria and fearmongering, and to shut up anyone that talks rational sense or is interested in a reality based approach to threat management.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Someone registered and paid for a new Netflix account with my gmail address plus a point somewhere, which Gmail ignores. So I logged into the Netflix account, thinking it was actually mine and this was some misunderstanding. I realized that was not the case, so I to tried to get in touch with the person but no other info was available, everything was done from his phone apparently according to the account logs. I figured that reporting it to support would not do much since they too did not have his info and no phone number was on record, they would cancel the account and maybe the amount paid would be lost.

Finally the only way I found to notify the user was by creating/modifying Netflix users with usernames as short telegraphic messages such as "you registered", "using my email", " firstname.lastname@example.com is mine ","contact me or change it". That message would be visible as the user opened up any of the Netflix apps or web app. It apparently worked as a couple days later my email stopped being primary on the account and never got any Netflix emails at that gmail inbox.

<comment><USER9> gmail has this weird bug that if I am email@example.com, I also get email from email@example.com.

<comment><USER10> Is that just for you? Or in general for anyone?

<comment><USER11> Gmail ignores periods in emails. It also ignores everything after the +.

So if your email is email@example.com you can also use:

firstname.lastname@example.com, email@example.com, firstname.lastname@example.com,

You can use the second one to do filtering. I.e. use a different +{filter} for bills, entertainment etc.

firstname.lastname@example.com for bills. firstname.lastname@example.com for sites you know will spam you etc.

then setup mail rules to filter based on the +

<comment><USER12> What if my email IS email@example.com, if someone registers firstname.lastname@example.com are they getting my emails?

<comment><USER13> There's a slight chance the gmail developers would have thought of that scenario.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> In terms of the kindness of strangers, I'm reminded of a friend who decided she wanted to hitch hike around Mexico when she was 18. She was poor but she wanted adventures. She wanted to get away from the beaten path, away from tourist traps, and go out into the rural areas so she could discover what Mexico was really like.

Everyone who picked her up warned her that what she was doing was very dangerous. She was lucky, they said, to get a ride from them, and not the criminals all around them. She got ride after ride like that. Family after family picked her up and took her along on their trip and all of them said, "You are in danger! You are lucky we are the ones who picked you up!"

In this manner, she traveled around Mexico for a month, and she never had a dangerous ride.

<comment><USER15> I frequently walked home from work in Oakland at 1am when I worked a night shift. I always wore headphones too and people would tell me I was being stupid. After about a year and a half of this I was coming up a hill to a four way intersection when someone popped out from behind a fence just before I passed it, grabbed my shirt and stuck a gun in my stomach.

He ended up being not the worst and let me keep my keys and license when I asked.

It only takes once, and the consequences for her would probably have been much worse.

<comment><USER16> > the consequences for her would probably have been much worse.

Are you assuming that the mugger you encountered would have raped her? (To be clear, I don't think that's a prima facie invalid assumption. It's a sincere object-level question.)

<comment><USER17> No, they are assuming it could have been worse.

That includes the possibility of having a gun pulled on them like OP which only happened once.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> In Czech Republic, during presidential elections, one of the participants (winner, Milos Zeman) opened a transparent as part of their marketing. That meant that every transaction was visible along with donor, amount and a short message.

Because Zeman is controversial person, it turned out badly. People started spamming it with lowest amount possible (about 0.01 CZK) and wrote funny messages. There were people selling their bike or computer, sending messages to their mother from a trip. Two people even played boats there [1]. Even ASCII Pikachu picture appeared there apparently [2].

[1]: [https://1gr.cz/fotky/bulvar/19/041/anime/KIT7a6caf_imgbauer_...](https://1gr.cz/fotky/bulvar/19/041/anime/KIT7a6caf_imgbauer_mediadrpl_2017_26866_173351.jpg) [2]: [https://1gr.cz/fotky/bulvar/19/041/anime/KIT7a6caf_imgbauer_...](https://1gr.cz/fotky/bulvar/19/041/anime/KIT7a6caf_imgbauer_mediadrpl_2017_26866_173349.jpg)

EDIT: Transparent account was apparently mandatory for every candidate by law.

</comment><comment> es-hn Coincidentally, I was able to return four peoples' IDs and other cards just this afternoon. Yesterday I was walking in East Oakland and found a pile of credit cards, debit cards, and IDs. Oakland Police Department wouldn't take them so I brought them home and started googling names and addresses.

Of the four IDs I found three belonged to adults; the third was a state ID for a minor related to one of the adults. I was able to find a contact number for all three, via relatives, and had reached them all by afternoon.

I learned that the person who'd dumped the cards had committed a series of car break-ins in San Jose yesterday morning and had fled to Oakland. They stole purses, laptops, and an iPhone. I wish OPD had taken an interest in the theft or at least in returning the stolen property.

<comment><USER19> > wish OPD had taken an interest in the theft

Sadly, in California most theft is merely a misdemeanor, and busy PDs do not have time to chase down criminals to give them a ticket.

<comment><USER20> > Sadly, in California most theft is merely a misdemeanor, and busy PDs do not > have time to chase down criminals to give them a ticket.

But they sure do like camping out all the time to give people speeding and parking tickets. Priorities!

<comment><USER21> Speeding tickets make sense. They're putting people's lives in danger by speeding. Driving is the most dangerous thing most people do regularly. Having a set of predictable behaviors saves a lot of lives. People who think that think they're "great drivers" or "everyone else is doing it" violate those norms and create risk.

<comment><USER20> > Speeding tickets make sense. They're putting people's lives in danger by > speeding. Driving is the most dangerous thing most people do regularly. > Having a set of predictable behaviors saves a lot of lives. People who think > that think they're "great drivers" or "everyone else is doing it" violate > those norms and create risk.

Speed at which you drive has very little to do with your predictability. "Oh, no, Betty is driving 5 mph faster than me. I'll never know what she'll do next!"

Even if you try to give an example of someone coming up on your left at a 50+mph difference, it's not an issue if you signal _and_ look in your rear view mirror to make sure it's clear. Most people just don't do either.

<comment><USER22> "Even if you try to give an example of someone coming up on your left at a 50+mph difference"

70 mph in a school zone? Not an issue if you just look both ways before crossing the street!

Seriously (not that you sound very serious) every morning, I make a left turn out of my development onto a nominally 30 mph road where people go 40-45, and it's impossible to see very far to the left before pulling out. Given normal speeds, it is possible to make the turn before the oncoming car if they are just out of sight.

So if anyone is _ever_ going 80 there at the wrong moment, it will be impossible to avoid them and probably lethal to one or both of us.

<comment><USER20> My example was mainly on a straight road because it's easy to understand. It applies to curvy roads where you won't see ahead too though. As someone driving, you should never drive faster than what you can see ahead and be able to stop in time. I kind of imagine what I'd like to call a "meteor" incident. Would I be able to stop in time if a meteor randomly crashed just outside of my vision ahead in a turn? If not - probably going too fast. (It's not uncommon to meet a "meteor" in the form of a car) One could call that "speeding" but that's not what it is colloquially. (Speeding to most is going 1+mph over the posted limit)

If the visibility is good, there's nothing wrong with going faster. Aggressive speed limits make more sense to be followed when there's very limited visibility, high chance of stops, people crossing the road, intersections, etc.

But if visibility is good, I don't see it making a difference much in what speed you're going.

<comment><USER22> "As someone driving, you should never drive faster than what you can see ahead and be able to stop in time. I kind of imagine what I'd like to call a "meteor" incident. Would I be able to stop in time if a meteor randomly crashed just outside of my vision ahead in a turn? If not - probably going too fast."

Seems like you've ignored what I just wrote in the previous comment. If I make a turn just as a car is barely out of sight, then at 40 mph there is just enough time to go before it hits me, assuming my car doesn't stall or something. If it is going much faster, say 80, then there would not be enough time. If I have no model of other drivers, and assume anything can happen outside my vision, which is what you seem to be expressing by the word "meteor" then there is no way I can make a turn in either direction safely at all, ever. The only way a person can deal with everyday situations is to assume roughly "normal" behavior (both in a social sense and in terms of physical law) and act accordingly.

<comment><USER20> In this case, you're the meteor and the other person is at fault. They turned a corner (I don't see how else they couldn't see the intersection - if it's a straight then they can see the intersection - thus my cornering talk) and went into an intersection where another car was already. It's no different than someone romping over a very steep hill (very prevalent in SF) and assuming the intersection they're running into is "clear". (It usually isn't!) It's not a thing they can do and they shouldn't do it.

Either way - sounds like a bad intersection and they should design it differently. (Turn on left with left arrow only, etc.)

<comment><USER22> "In this case, you're the meteor and the other person is at fault."

Ah, but I'm not. There's a lot of people who live in the same place I do, and they all have to come out of that road in the morning. It's very predictable, not like being hit by a meteor which billions of people have no experience with.

People can and should plan for people turning out of side streets.

A "meteor" would be a car making a turn and stalling right at that moment. Wanting to eliminate that sort of risk is probably related to the problems people are having developing software for self-driving cars.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> This is neat! I once found someone's debit card on the street (in the US). It had a small face shot on it, so I found them on Facebook and sent them a message. Of course, Facebook had already started doing the "messages from non- friends are really hard to find lol" UI dark pattern, so like two years later the woman responds thanking me, but also saying she just canceled the card. Which is what I would've done, but I at least wanted to provide some peace of mind or closure that it wasn't stolen or anything.

<comment><USER24> "Dark pattern". Do you know how many unsolicited messages women receive on Facebook ?

<comment> crooked-v This is a legitimate concern, but the way to combat isn't to silently hide messages behind unfamiliar UI. For a contrast, consider email junk filters, which generally serve a similar purpose but are accessible enough to easily scan through in case of legitimate messages being lost.

<comment><USER25> I've come across a type of scam where someone on a dating app like tinder will pose as an attractive person with the intention of trying to convince the victim to engage in sexually explicit texts or snapchats. Once they do, the scammer then looks up the friends of friends of the facebook profile associated with the number and then tries to blackmail the victim with threats of sending embarrassing texts to their closest friends. There are now TV commercials warning about it too. The best thing you can do is beg the scammer to post the texts, it really confuses the hell out of them and thanks to this facebook feature, the threat is greatly minimized.

<comment><USER26> Actually, the best thing you could do would be to not send someone pictures of yourself you wouldn't like shared. Also, the scammer could just add them as friends first.

<comment><USER25> Yes that would be the best thing but sometimes kids aren't wise enough. Yes they could add all your friends, but the idea is to kill their incentive. After all they're banking on you being ashamed for their blackmail to get money from you. Those that matter don't mind and those that do don't matter.

<comment><USER26> They would still probably send nudes to your mother out of sadistic pleasure. Sometimes people get themselves into a situation where they have no good choices to make.

<comment><USER25> So what if they do? You can't let other people dictate your emotions or they will take advantage of you any way possible. That feeling of shame and embarrassment comes from within, not from the scammer, and therefore you have power over it, not them. There's no sadistic pleasure to be had if the victim doesn't care. If the victim doesn't care, why should the scammer waste their time? But just in case they do, good thing there's that facebook feature that hides messages from obscure users. By the time someone ever finds the message, you can just say it was a deepfake.

<comment><USER26> Just because it comes from within doesn't mean it's realistic to control it. People feel shame for complicated reasons, and to stop feeling shame about something would likely change parts of someone's personality. Maybe he or she thinks that only special people should see them nude? You can't just will that away. Plus, the perpetrator might be satisfied in knowing something like "now all her friends will know what a slut she is" or whatever those people tell themselves.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I hate it when my cynicism alarm goes off, but this feel-good tweet about hacking payment transfers for good is written by a guy who's twitter bio says he's a PM at Transferwise ("We're building the best way to move money around the world.")

All the replies are people contrasting shitty experiences they've had with their own wallets and money transfer services.

His top pinned tweet is:

> Reasons to work at @TransferWise:

> 1\. Irreversibly change the world of finance to be fairer

> 2\. Excellent office dogs [video of cute dogs running around]

I mean, I'd love this to be true, but the coincidences are uncanny.

<comment><USER28> Hi, I'm the guy who lost his wallet! I agree it's a convenient overlap and understand your cynicism but I assure you that it's genuine. I can even provide you with the receipt from me riding a jump bike around for an hour looking for my wallet! :)

EDIT: spelling + I did pin the tweet about transferwise after it blew up, and I also changed my bio to share my small side project: Podmast.com - check it out :)

<comment><USER29> You're making it worse.

Anyone can conveniently lose a wallet, but one with a bank card with no identifying info in it anywhere? A finder who went to bizarre lengths to make Faster transactions to your bank account to send you a message? Absolutely no other identifying information in the wallet? A plan to ride a jump bike around to prove you looked for it with receipts?

Before sending someone pennies with context in the transactions, hoping that person would get them before they canceled all their bank accounts because they lost their wallet, I would just take the card to the bank and have them call the owner, or take it to the police and they'd do the same.

Uhg, sorry, "I ensure you" and "jump bike receipts" is not enough to convince me.

EDIT: Removed the quotes from Faster, my point seemed to get lost because of that.

<comment><USER30> Um, this is how banking works in the UK. Nobody cancels their bank account if they lose their card, they just cancel their card. And given someone else's card I could send them 1p within a minute (even if it's cancelled). Now I've seen this approach, it's what I'll do next time. And it doesn't involve the poster's company in any way, transferring thousands of pounds instantly within the EU is trivial.

<comment><USER31> Also in a lot of cases these days you don't even have to cancel the card.

If you're like "Oops, that's gone" and it fell into a waterfall or something then, sure, you cancel it and have a replacement sent, but say you just got back from the store and it isn't in your wallet. You call a modern bank. "Hi, I think I lost my card maybe?" Good chance they say - "OK, we'll freeze the card, call us if you find it or if you give up and we'll send a new one".

<comment><USER30> Both my accounts I just freeze it in the app, but yes, quite.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> See also ancient bash.org lore: [http://bash.org/?814243](http://bash.org/?814243)

<comment><USER32> When I see bash.org, my first thought is, "I put on my robe and wizard hat."

<comment><USER33> For reference: [http://bash.org/?104383](http://bash.org/?104383)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Since we're sharing, I lost my wallet in the park on the day before I had to hand in my thesis. When I realized it was gone, I just blocked my bank card, but otherwise I put it out of my mind because I was focused on last-minute changes. An hour later or so, the police called and told me that someone had handed it in and that I could pick it up at the station. I told them that I would do that the next day because my thesis deadline was more important. So they sent two officers to my address and and brought me my wallet. Talk about service!

</comment><comment><USER35> Two weeks ago in Maui at the visitor center at Mt. Haleakala a distraught young woman came in saying she had dropped her wallet somewhere between the visitor center and the peak. When she went to the women's bathroom in the visitor center to check if she might have dropped it there, she found someone else had forgotten their iPhone by the sink. Within a few minutes an older couple walked into the visitor center and said they had found a wallet on a hike but had lost their iPhone :-) Two individuals each finding the others lost item was pretty karmic!

<comment><USER36> and at that moment the volcano erupted..

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> I found a wallet once. It has a bankcard in it, so I called the bank, telling them I had found the wallet of one of their customers and asking them if they could help me return in to the owner.

They weren't allowed to give contact details of the owner to me, but they were allowed to forward my contact details to the owner of the wallet.

Through this route we eventually got the wallet back to its owner. Took half a day to get everything in order, but man were they happy to get the wallet back.

<comment><USER38> Same find, in Australia. But they (Commonwealth) wouldn't entertain _any_ swapping of details. I was just on the phone to the service centre and I thought all was lost ... but of course they said "just take it to any of our branches and we'll sort it out".

So I lose the satisfaction of closure — who knows what happened to that thing after I handed it over — but this does feel like the most-safe option.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> It reminds me of the automated collect calls of yore.

"You have a collect call from 'GAME IS OVER PICK ME UP MOM THANKS'. Would you accept the call?"

<comment><USER40> That's a classic Geico commercial, one of my favs.

[https://youtu.be/jWPlfWwgFKI](https://youtu.be/jWPlfWwgFKI)

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Life lesson:

Keep a note with your email address in your wallet - clearly marked "wallet owner's email".

Paranoid version of the life lesson:

Keep a note with an anonymized email address, with forwarding set up for the message to go to your actual mailbox, in your wallet.

<comment><USER42> I assume your drivers license is in your wallet. You are concerned about anonymized email?

<comment><USER43> I imagine the bigger concern is that it's pretty easy to social engineer your way into most online accounts with an email and the info from a drivers license.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> I was riding my mountain bike in the woods about 5 years ago. I found someone's wallet in there. Looked them up on Facebook and LinkedIn and sent them some messages. Never heard back from them for a few years.

Then one day, they responded to my Facebook messenger message that they didn't notice my original message. I never looked deep in the wallet, but evidently there was some sentimental stuff in there they were happy to have back. I can't believe I held onto that wallet for so many years.

</comment><comment><USER45> I once lost my wallet the night of a work Christmas party. Went through the trauma of cancelling cards etc, getting some cash from the bank branch to tide me over, using my passport as ID. A real pain.

Found it a few months later in the back pocket of my smartest suit trousers, which I'd drunkenly hung up in the wardrobe. Never thought to look!

FML.

At least I found £50 that I assumed had gone forever.

</comment><comment> m-i-l Nice hack.

The "official" way of dealing with lost property in the UK is to take it to your local police station. If no-one claims it within 6 weeks, you might be able to keep the item. I certainly remember doing this a few times when younger. Not so sure many people know this nowadays.

Anyway, my mother lost her purse a few months back in the small town in Scotland where she lives. Someone suggested she try her local police station (actually not so local any more thanks to the current government having closed over 600 police stations[0]) and lo and behold someone had handed it in there!

[0] [https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/600-police-stations- shut-...](https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/600-police-stations-shut-in- eight-years-nvjdjwmwj)

<comment><USER46> Going to a local bank also works. And you want to do that to get their cards replaced/blocked as well. And they have the owners contact details.

<comment><USER47> I've found bank cards a few times and have called the bank in question, they've just thanked me, made a note of it, and asked me to destroy the card myself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> My bank only seems to allow 12 characters.

Why is that? What am I even supposed to do with 12 characters?

<comment><USER49> Mine allows about an original tweet in length, but forces a line break in the middle, and it disallows dangerous characters. Just the usual suspects that always break everything and cause database tables to be dropped or commands to be injected. Exclamation marks are super dangerous.

I never understood this.

<comment><USER43> Honestly, I can understand stripping characters at a large organization like a bank. It _shouldn 't_ ever be necessary, but it protects against that brainfart/junior dev/marketing analytics software, with little cost.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Am i reading too much into this?

The twitter user just so happens to works for a company that uses the technology the "good Samaritan" used. I just glanced at who the guy was, and found it funny that he works in the industry. Who knows, maybe that's why he found it so awesome.

"In April 2018, TransferWise joined Faster Payments as the first non-bank payment service provider to be a directly connected settling participant,[23] after being the first of its kind to gain access to Bank of England's Real- Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system.[24]"

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

"Money transfer firm TransferWise has become the first non-bank company with direct access to Britain's Faster Payments Scheme, which the start-up said on Wednesday would help it compete with banks on sending money overseas."

[https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-transferwise- britain/start...](https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-transferwise- britain/start-up-transferwise-breaks-into-britains-faster-payments-scheme- idUKKBN1HP110)

<comment><USER51> Yes.

Pretty much any domestic bank transfer initiated electronically via mobile/online banking will be cleared through Faster Payments up to a limit of about £25,000 ($32,000) for most banks (the theoretical limit is an order of magnitude higher), making it the de facto way of transferring money in the UK. When I was a student, bank transfers by Faster Payments were more common than cash payments for settling small debts between friends.

In addition, BACS/CHAPS transfers (the other two main electronic clearing systems in the UK) typically incur fees, and would normally only be used if the value exceeds the limit for Faster Payments. In addition, Faster Payments normally clears "instantly" (i.e. in seconds); it's literally the most convenient way I know of to transfer money domestically in the UK, and is accordingly ubiquitous: cash requires you to have exact change and have cash to hand, which is increasingly rare in Europe; BTC addresses are too long compared to a UK account number/sort code.

Having recently moved to the US for a year, I've noticed that the financial institutions tend to be years/decades behind Europe in terms of electronic payment processing and clearing.

<comment><USER52> This... In India we have UPI Unified Payment Interface, in which with a bank account & phone number, you can signup to any of the tens of participating banks UPI address, in format of user@bank Mine is dav@hdfcbank. Totally safe & one way only, incoming. You just need to plug this into your bank app, in micro seconds the money will be out of your account & in to my account. Works 24x7x365

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> I feel pleased reading the stories on the comments here.

Two years ago, I was in a mountain ski resort in Big Sur with some friends and found an iPhone (with no emergency contact) with a wallet case containing an ID card on the floor. They were afraid of taking it from the floor. Still, I had just been past the security office, took it without thinking at all, and went straight to it while trying to find the girl who lost if on Facebook to send her a message.

When I arrived there, I was holding the ID to copy the person's name in the Facebook search. There was a queue with some people talking with the security officer there. Once it was my time, I was putting back the ID.

The officer was such an asshole, I thought he might call the cops to question me about it.

I said I found the phone on the floor. The officer kept me asking why I went through someone's else things. Multiple times like I was doing something evil.

I got upset really quick and told something like 'look, I found this on the ground full of snow and am trying to find the owner' and left the office immediately.

I told my friends (all Brazilians, like myself), and they told me the culture there was different, and probably I should have asked someone to come over to retrieve the object instead of taking it there on my own, as I didn't want to be accused of anything. I never bought this explanation.

Despite what happened, I'd have done the same again.

</comment><comment><USER40> Stupid American question - how does someone get your bank account information from your wallet in the UK?

<comment><USER54> You bank account information is written on your bank cards, which are in your wallet.

<comment><USER55> Not always! My debit card # is not the same as the checking account # with which it's associated.

<comment><USER31> That makes sense, the debit card will be EMV compatible so it'll need a number that's about 16 digits long, because that number needs to be unique compared to all the world's payment cards.

However most such (debit) cards in the UK have the associated account number and "sort code" in smaller type on them too. Certainly all the ones I've ever had are like this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Does Twitter not allow connection from the Tor network any more? What a depressing reality.

> 403 Forbidden: The server understood the request, but is refusing to fulfill > it.

<comment><USER57> Nah I think the tweet is gone, I can't see it from a browser. (edit, weirdly I tried again and it worked. Definitely errored with a strange error the first time)

<comment><USER58> No, the tweet's still there

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> Around 2007-2009, Germany had fairly expensive SMS on mobile plans, but bank transfers within Germany were usually free, and Swift transfers allowed like 200+ characters of text.

Me and some friends knew each other's bank account numbers due to shared orders and stuff, so we would send each some joke amounts typically smaller than 20 cents just for the cool messaging medium.

</comment><comment> zenit-mf-1 It remind me this study " Would You Return This Lost Wallet?" published on nyt back in June 2019.

[https://www.google.fr/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/06/20/scien...](https://www.google.fr/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2019/06/20/science/lost- wallet-what-to-do.amp.html)

</comment><comment><USER60> Great story.

I seem to keep finding cash. The first time when I was 9, a couple hundred between racks in a department store. I showed my mom and we brought it to Lost&Found. A year later after nobody had claimed the money, they called us up and gave it to me as the finder. I promptly invested it in a shiny new skateboard.

The last time I was walking behind two guys on the street and one of them dropped a bundle of bills. He didn't notice. I picked them up and yelled "hey, stop!" after them. It was dark. I'm sure they heard me, because they stopped talking to each other, but they quickened pace without looking around. I kept yelling at them - in hindsight it must have come across as aggressive, because they just kept hurrying away. At last one of them turned around, saw that I wasn't trying to jump them, and gladly accepted his money back. He wouldn't let me go until I reluctantly accepted $20 as a thank you.

</comment><comment><USER61> This is very nice use of the (now) mandatory message space for SEPA transfers!

Ah, this reminds me from the days when Dutch postbank transfers were instantaneous if not send to another bank. A friend and I did a chat with the short messages you could send. We even got a printout of all the 1 ct messages as that was still a thing back then.

<comment><USER62> It's (UK standard) 'Faster Payments' l, not SEPA. I don't know if it's mandatory, but all the (five that I recall) banks I've used since its introduction have supported the reference/message field. It's usually pretty instant, especially if intrabank.

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> I worked at a university a while back. Found a student's wallet in a park one day while running, but I couldn't find any contact info. I looked them up in the university database to find their phone number and was able to meet up to return the wallet.

I'm pretty sure I could have been fired for that.

</comment><comment><USER64> I once was comming back from academy, and was late, so I didn`t want to stay and shower there, and decided to go home in may exercise clothes. When I was going inside the car, I put the duffle bag containing wallet, clothes and watch, OPN the car roof to open the door, and forget there.

When I was on my way home, it fell somewhere. I didn`t even notice.

I got home, showered, I was getting ready to go to bed when I got a call from some guy.

Turns out he was walking with his dog, and saw the duffle bag fall of the roof. He took a look inside, and there was my Id and a business card, but not my contact information.

He recognized the business card because it was someone who got to med school with him. I was my step mother busIness card.

She gave he my cel number. I was incredible luck that day.

</comment><comment><USER65> Anything that can hold arbitrary text and can be seen by more than one user eventually becomes used as email.

About a decade ago, I discovered a featurephone-based BASIC programming environment (as in, you write code directly using the phone itself) where you can upload programs you've written and download programs by others. There had sprung up a cottage industry of programming kids whose sole access to technology were their phones; that was pretty amazing & amusing in itself, but I laughed out loud when one of the uploaded programs consisted entirely of comment lines, essentially using uploaded source code as a message to one of the users of the service.

</comment><comment><USER66> Another solution is to look up the BIN (bank account identifier, i.e. the 6 first digits of a credit card number):

[https://binlist.net/](https://binlist.net/)

Then drop the wallet at the bank's closest office.

<comment><USER67> Can't you just look at the big logo on the front of the card that says "Halifax Bank" or whatever?

<comment><USER68> Hahahaha overengineering at its finest

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER69> I've lost my wallet multiple times in my life. Always got it back, intact (ie. nothing missing). Why? Because most people (99%) are good, and people are empathic to such circumstances. They'll help you out. I've done the same (in The Netherlands, the police will forward it to the city council).

Last time was a year ago. I lost my wallet out of my back pocket at a tunnel, on the road. I did not even know I was missing it, when someone was on the door. His son found it. I gave him a bottle of wine as a gesture (couldn't come up with something different, it all went fast).

</comment><comment><USER70> On the flip side, I knew a woman who started being stalked by her ex after they broke up. Even though he was blocked on everything he was sending her e-transfer requests with abusive stuff in the comments field.

</comment><comment><USER71> A few weeks ago I found a working iPhone X on the side on the sidewalk. I thought about using siri to call a recent contact and try to get it back to the owner, but I found the language was set to Chinese (which I cannot read or speak) and I gave up and put it back on the sidewalk in case the owner came back.

In retrospect, I don't think I could have done anything even if the language was English apart from wait for the owner to call their phone. That said, I'm curious if anyone has any suggestions about how I could have been a better Samaritan.

<comment><USER72> Use google translate text-to-speech function, and make your phone ask the other phone in Chinese to "call mom".

<comment><USER73> "Wei?"

Then what?

(It's the Chinese greeting when picking up the phone)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER74> Hmm. That's neat. But usually someone has a bank card or other membership card with a support line on it. Is there some reason to not just call one to report the found wallet?

The times I've found a wallet, I've called one of those support lines. The support person was able to contact their customer to give them my phone number. The customer called/texted me, and we arranged for them to pickup the wallet. This has worked every time to get the wallet back to its owner within a couple hours of my finding it with minimal inconvenience to me.

<comment><USER75> It depends on the organization. Some larger financial institutions are sometimes more likely - or even bound by internal policy - to simply trigger their standard card-cancellation procedures.

Instead, one could present the financial institution with the hypothetical question, and then only give the specifics if the institution's policies are non-destructive.

If the finder is a decent sort, and has the time to try alternatives, I'd rather get the cards back intact than to have to do the cancellation dance.

</comment></comment><comment><USER76> When I was in grad school, I was 10 miles from home without a phone. I had been walking for miles, and eventually found a beat up old Galaxy-S3 on the road. I picked it up, turned it on, and it happened to still be logged into Facebook. So, I posted a new status on their Facebook account: "Hey, I found your phone -- give me a ride home if you want it back".

It worked. About a half hour later, I was sitting in their car, getting a ride home in exchange for the phone they lost, which I happened to find out in the middle of nowhere.

</comment><comment><USER77> The ticket machines of the German railway system print the ticket before releasing the bank card (to prevent a charge if the printer is broken), which makes it very easy to forget the card in the machine. Happened to me twice, both times someone found the card, brought it to a branch of my bank, which sent the card to the branch in my home town, which then contacted me, saving me the 10 EUR for a new card. Thanks, strangers!

</comment><comment><USER78> Interesting approach. I would have the wallet given to the bank. The bank can't disclose the phone number of the customer but will be happy to give him a call and tell him he can pick it up in the branch.

I remember vaguely having given a wallet with some ID and a business card of a medical doctor to the office of the doctor. They will never disclose private information but will call the owner himself.

</comment><comment><USER79> _Beware of lost wallet frauds_.

At some countries they drop a wallet on the road, wait for you to find it and then appear and claim that few hundred bucks (or a local equivalent) are missing. First they try to threat you, and then resort to the police. Your fingerprints are on the wallet.

If you want to help, make sure you have a stranger witness at least, who is willing to help, or better look for a policeman nearby.

<comment><USER79> Similar fraud: a guy who looks like a bad guy "finds" the wallet near you, makes sure you seen it and then inclines to split it. "Don't even try to call cops!", take your cut, etc. If you take it, even out of confusion, bad guy vanishes and their friends come and claim they seen all in reverse and that _you_ took most of the money. Banknotes with known serials / pen marks are in your pocket, threats, police.

<comment><USER80> Here's a variation I've seen: bad guy finds jewelry (necklace/ring) near you, making sure you've spotted it too. Then you get in an argument for ownership. He suggests splitting the cost - he would leave if you pay him, in cash, half the estimated price of the expensive-looking but fake jewelry. And then, of course, he vanishes.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER81> Wouldn't it be much easier for the finder to just get in touch with the bank and ask them to notify the owner?

I once got a call/mail from my bank giving me the contact details of someone who had found my lost keys that had an RSA SecureID token generator thing on them and the finder called the hotline imprinted on it.

I don't remember much details around it since it happend in the mid 2000s.

<comment><USER82> No it wouldn't. Sending three or four transfers from mobile banking app is for sure faster than finding bank number, calling them, listening to the info that the conversation will be recorded, listening to the menu, then listening to music interrupted with "we will be with you shortly" etc. I guess I could send 20 transfers at least during this time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER83> Interesting that there's an 18 character limit. In Australia, with the NPP (equivalent to UK's Faster Payments), your description can be up to 280 characters including, of course, emoji.

Out of curiosity, does Faster Payments allow you to pay to any other identifier (email address, phone number), or only bank account number? More importantly... does it support emoji?

<comment><USER84> > does Faster Payments allow you to pay to any other identifier (email > address, phone number)

There is a system called Paym which lets you send money to (the bank account associated with) a phone number, but you have to sign up for it explicitly to associate your phone number with your account, and I personally have never used it nor heard of anyone I know using it.

> does it support emoji?

I believe it's limited to some subset of uppercase ASCII only. However, some banks allow emoji for transfers to other accounts within the same bank (e.g. Monzo).

</comment></comment><comment><USER85> What's a "reference"? You can enter arbitrary info during a transaction?

Genuinely curious. Is this a UK thing or available everywhere?

<comment><USER86> In the Netherlands, for at least the last 35 years, transaction forms have a field "Description" where you can enter arbitrary text. Originally on paper, now electronically.

Is that in any way remarkable?!

<comment><USER87> In the US, you pay $16 to send a wire and $16 to receive a wire. So, wires are not as common as in Europe.

On the other hand, ordering your bank to print a paper check, and send it through postal mail is free of charge.

<comment><USER88> $16 to pay someone? How do you do something like transfer your friend some money? Or pay someone who did some work for you?

Here in New Zealand you'd tend to get their bank account number and send them a (free) direct deposit through your bank's Internet banking service. Until very recently that was also the main payment method for our eBay auction site equivalent TradeMe (they've now started a sort of PayPal clone called Ping so that they can skim a little extra from each auction).

But I've heard people can potentially withdraw money from your account if they have your account number in the US?

<comment><USER89> in practice, no one uses the banks directly to send money like that: we use apps like Venmo / CashApp that take your debit card/bank info and act as an intermediary for sending/receiving money.

<comment><USER90> A lot of US based startups make a lot more sense to us Europeans in case we move to the US and notice how broken all infrastructure is.

Banking still uses cheques, so you have Paypal, Venmo, CashApp and so on.

Public transport is bad or even non existent which is why Uber and Lift exist.

The programm of over-the-air TV sucks and you get Netflix, HBO, Hulu and so on.

<comment><USER91> Over the air has the newest stuff. Streaming is for yesterday's hit.

Uber exists because taxis suck.

Cheques are safer and more portable than give me your bank account because you choose where to deposit.

Paypal is for websites no stores accept it and doesn't replace a cheque

<comment><USER88> > Cheques are safer and more portable than give me your bank account because > you choose where to deposit.

Maybe it's different in the US, but I have a different account number for each of my bank accounts. So I can still choose where I want to deposit someone's money when I give them my account number, by choosing which account number I give to them. And no-one has to go to a bank.

<comment><USER91> That's true you can give out different account numbers. You can't change that once you give it out though a cheque allows you to decide at the very last moment.

<comment><USER92> Is it _really_ that hard to receive the money then transfer it to the right account?

Yes, it's an extra step, but you're already doing way more steps to cash a cheque than use a transfer service where you only give an account number and suddenly the money is there.

IMO, this sounds like a solution looking for a problem to me.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER93> A few years ago I found an iPhone on the floor in central London. I was on my way to dinner with friends that were in town for a couple of hours, so I put it on the table and waited for something to pop up.

Eventually a message popped up with a full First Name and Surname, so I got my phone out, looked up the name and found the guy on twitter, I asked him about who he'd messaged saying I'd found this phone, I'd like to get it back to its owner.

Before he replies, the device starts ringing because FindMyiPhone had been activated.

A couple of minutes later this girl barges into the restaurant, grabs the phone from the table and starts shouting abuse at me and accusing me of stealing it.

I apologised and explained that I had been trying to get the phone back to her, but I'm also out at dinner with friends, and I'd found it practically in front of the restaurant, so I hadn't wondered off with it somewhere.

The last thing she shouted at me before leaving was "why didn't you just call one of the numbers in the phone then, or message someone?" at this point, my patience had ended with this idiot. "Because it's locked you dumb bitch" as she stormed out.

Anyway, this guy replied, turns out it's her cousin, he apologised for her attitude, and thanked me for my effort. I asked him to give her a promise, that if I come across lost property in London again, I'll just step over it and carry on, thanks to her.

I don't go out of my way anymore to return things I see on the floor.

</comment><comment><USER94> I left my laptop (£2,000+ MBP) on a train in the UK (South eastern rail). Some amazing human handed it in, yay! The rail company charged me £30 to collect it as an admin fee.

Now, when I find things, and this happens relatively often (I've no idea why) I find the individual using social channels like LinkedIn or waiting them to call the phone.

</comment><comment><USER95> A little over 2 years ago I found an iPhone while I was passing by Subways in downtown Palo Alto at around midnight. Before I had time to figure out how to get the phone back to his owner the owner called and I told him in the first sentence that I just found his phone, where I am and that I'll wait for him to pick it up.

</comment><comment><USER96> It's a shame Apple makes it so hard to return their devices. I've tried with a locked phone and AirPods but thought they have serial numbers and probably Apple's databases have owner info they totally refuse to forward any "it's been found" type messages.

<comment><USER97> I think with "find my phone", it's possible to display a message on the phone - provided it is switched on and connected.

</comment></comment><comment><USER98> About 4 years ago, I found this credit card on the street in Pittsburgh when I was walking home. When I got home, I just emailed the persons email@example.com. They actually responded and I walked back to near where I found the card and gave the guy his credit card back.

</comment><comment><USER99> What a strange coincidence: just a couple of days ago our local Nextdoor had someone who found a wallet in the street.

She found his debit or credit card in the wallet and went to the local branch of his bank. They called him and he got in touch with her, and wallet was reunited with its owner.

</comment><comment><USER100> If social media posts cost 0.01, things would be way better.

<comment><USER101> this might actually be a decent idea for an instagram competitor. Sounds dystopian, but I'm sure a good marketing department could make it seem normal.

<comment><USER100> If I had deep pockets I'd actually work on this idea. One issue I find is the processing cost of such nanopayments. Cryptocoins didn't live up to the promise of enabling this use case :(

<comment><USER19> Just bill monthly. Your power company doesn't process a charge of $.08 every time you use a KWh of electricity...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> Was easier just to call the bank, and leave a message to the manager.

I once found credit card on the floor. I searched the agency on the internet, talked to the account manager, and left my contact info. The manager talked to the owner, and the guy give me a call.

</comment><comment><USER102> My license dropped out of my pocket when I was visiting a friend in a town 2 hours drive away. Didn't even notice until I got home. 3 weeks later it shows up in the mail. A stranger went through all that trouble to mail it back to me.

</comment><comment><USER103> I lost my wallet in the centre of town but didn't notice. The next day a stranger knocked on my door on the outskirts of town to give it back!

I'm thankful that a drivers license mentions addresa, would have been annoying to replace all those cards.

</comment><comment><USER32> Why does "acccount" have three Cs? Is that really production code screenshot?

</comment><comment><USER104> Has anyone understood how this has been done? how can you place a message in a transaction like this?

If not mistaken this was done via contactless payment, right? how is that possible to add a message? (maybe you can in some country)

<comment><USER84> It's not a contactless payment, it's a bank transfer. The person who found the wallet sent payments of £0.01 to the owner. When you make bank transfers you can include a short payment reference which can be any text you want, and it appears on the other person's statement.

The UK has the Faster Payments Service which enables most bank transfers to be completed in a few seconds, so they would have seen the messages immediately as soon as they logged into their bank account to freeze the lost card.

<comment><USER104> now i got it, so he sent the money to the owner, and the owner had the switf & co in the wallet, but not his data. that's strange :)

<comment><USER84> It's not so strange. Many debit cards in the UK have the sort code and account number printed on them, which is all the information you need to send money to that account.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER105> Similar situation with a lost kindle [1]

[1] [https://twitter.com/MbyM/status/1183796234420736002](https://twitter.com/MbyM/status/1183796234420736002)

</comment><comment><USER106> I once found someone's iPhone in a shopping basket at my local supermarket and spent the whole day getting it back to them. I decided to buy a lottery ticket - after all, my cosmic karma must be running at an all time high.

But first, I'll make myself a nice cucumber salad and I'll use that new mandoline slicer we got - protective dongle thing be damned (The very same mandoline slicer my wife told me to be every so careful with before she left on her trip). Wow.. this is cool - every slice of the cucumber is identical down to the en.. OW!

Sliced my finger opened and spent the evening in the ER getting half a dozen stitches and the top of my finger sewn back on.. So much for karma...

The lesson I learned from this is never, ever return a phone you found - <USER2> will only lead to pain! :)

</comment><comment><USER107> The first thing I do with a new wallet is to put a piece of paper in it containing my name and phone number. It stays there forever useless, until it gets lost. I stole the idea from a reddit thread.

<comment><USER108> This is a perfect use case for those free address stickers that you get in the mail.

</comment></comment><comment><USER109> Within the past couple of years, I dropped my wallet while downtown and when I got home my wallet was waiting for me there. Was impressed that they went to the trouble of delivering it.

</comment><comment><USER110> In the thread somebody mentioned that they used Siri to get the name of the owner.

I asked my Android phone and it replied that technically I am a Homo Sapiens...

</comment><comment><USER111> Lots of comments talking about a possible fraud behind the story, if that's the case why anyone use the expression growth hacking, it wouldn't be the appropiate term ?

</comment><comment><USER112> While this is neat and kind, wouldn't it have been easier to see which debit / credit cards are in the wallet, and simply take the thing to the nearest branch?

<comment><USER113> Easier than sending those transactions online, possibly from their phone?

</comment></comment><comment><USER114> Dang... super unique. We might need to add this approach to our Lost and Found software when the digital outreach and postcards don't quite get through. Love it.

</comment><comment><USER115> I lost my wallet in the gas station and got back from the state police dept after check whether I am the owner for 20 mins. Of course, all cashes were gone.

</comment><comment><USER116> I found a wallet recently. I found the guy on linkedin, sent a request, and we coordinated the pickup. Less creative than OP I suppose.

</comment><comment><USER117> I've lost my wallet half a dozen times in the US. Twice, people gave my debit card to the bank & the bank called me. :)

</comment><comment><USER118> Yeah yeah, they coincided with a good one. I have lost 2 passports, 4 laptops and 6 cellphones on the subway in NYC. Half of those were literally stripped off of me. The other half I was drunk and negligent.

I don't believe in good samaritans. People only return wallets when they have no value or gains to be realized from them. The good folk leave it there, the ones with varied motives take it away.

Again, congrats for recovering your wallet. I'd never dream of it.

<comment><USER119> I've seen some studies[1] that suggest wallets are returned more often if they contain money. Suggested reason: we tend to surestimate the value of money vs the other contents when we find a wallet.

[1] could be [https://text.npr.org/s.php?sId=734141432](https://text.npr.org/s.php?sId=734141432)

</comment></comment><comment><USER120> I have no problem with the substance of this article, but the title does not seem clear enough to meet HN guidelines.

</comment><comment><USER121> it was clever but he just didn't want to get caught by the surveillance state /s

I lost my phone one day and a stranger returned it by guessing my 1111 pin. People are generally good. He threatened me with a $20 fee but I agreed to pay and he refused it.

</comment><comment><USER122> Why couldn't they call his bank and get them to contact this fellow?

<comment><USER123> The bank might be suspicious that it's part of some kind of scam. Like they might trust the info more because it's coming from their bank's official number.

<comment><USER46> No. People come in to banks with lost wallets and cards they found all the time. But you should do it at an office. You can't just call and have them send messages to users.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER124> Cheaper than SMS used to be :)

</comment><comment><USER125> Definitely not Colombia.

</comment><comment><USER126> Better to just keep a phone number to call inside your wallet tbh

</comment><comment><USER127> It's so cool

</comment><comment><USER127> So cool

</comment><comment><USER128> "We've detected that JavaScript is disabled in your browser. Would you like to proceed to legacy Twitter?"

Yeah, whatever. But I apparently also need a cookie or something to see what this is about, so no thank you.

</comment><comment><USER129> feel like a large part of where we are in the world now is because in 2015 or so, YouTube mindlessly and singlehandedly funneled millions of apolitical young male gamers into gamergate extremism. It took forever for YouTube to stop giving me personal recommendations for various alt-right content no how many times I told it I wasn't interested.</comment>


Why the Macbook's New USB-C Is the Port of the Future - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/2015/03/usb-type-c-faq/

<comment><USER2> I'm going to jump on it anyway, but Apple is a connector tramp. They were fast on USB 1, average on USB 2, slow on USB 3, now the first on USB 3 redux, with a quaint interlude with Thunderbolt. Thunderbolt may stick around for things like video and RAIDs which sorta puts it in the what was FireWire, because it's rather self evident now that there's no significant non-Apple Thunderbolt adoption happening. They're will always be change, but it's the hot cold attitude with those changes that bugs me.

</comment><comment><USER3> Does this support a one to many configuration? Will we have USB-C to HDMI/ETHERNET dongles that work at the same time?

</comment><comment><USER4> After years of shunning USB, the USB-C port is now the "Macbook's New USB-C" port? Seriously???</comment>


U.S. military is expanding special forces operations in Africa - <AUTHOR> https://news.vice.com/story/the-u-s-is-waging-a-massive-shadow-war-in-africa-exclusive-documents-reveal <comment><USER2> My information from buddies who were there is at least six years old so do with it what you will.

Organizations such as AQM have so much support and capability that local governments are often afraid to oppose them directly for fear that things will escalate and they'll lose the entire country. This often presents logistical challenges for US forces.

American forces are working on multiple levels and approaches not just "direct action".

It's not just about Somalia. Somalia is the poster child and gets the most press but really a drop in the bucket. Africa is a big continent with systemic challenges and those challenges are the perfect power vacuum for these groups.

We've been there since before 9/11\. It's an ooooold fight.

<comment><USER3> The article doesn't say activities in Africa are new, but that they are significantly expanded. From the article:

> In 2006, just 1 percent of all U.S. commandos deployed overseas were in > Africa. In 2010, it was 3 percent. By 2016, that number had jumped to more > than 17 percent. In fact, according to data supplied by U.S. Special > Operations Command, there are now more special operations personnel devoted > to Africa than anywhere except the Middle East — 1,700 people spread out > across 20 countries

<comment><USER4> What are the raw numbers? How do we know the percentage increase isn't mostly due to other commandos coming back home?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The U.S. has lost any strategic thinking.

The U.S. is now fighting a active war against "loosely connected groups from north West Africa to Central Asia" most are Sunni Extremists. This is already a insane thing to do, war on loosely connected groups that reach over 10000km even when the waste majority of these groups have never actually attacked the US or have any plans to. There is also almost no evidence that one can actually win such a war in a military sense. The guy who lead ISIS was turned into a terrorist not in the 1980s when the US was supporting Afgans against the Soviets but rather in 2004 during the Battle of Fallujah. Fighting and bombing people everywhere will create more Anti-American opinions then it destroys. Ironically the only place people actually like the US is in Iran where the US have not been able to bomb anybody for 40 years or so.

Outside of that they are also actively working against and sometimes fighting with the Iranian block (Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and maybe even the Houthis plus a few other groups) who are often equally opposed to the before mentioned "loosely connected groups from north West Africa to Central Asia". This means the US is at a total strategic impact where there are people already fighting but the US wants to get in there and crush both groups but also make sure the destruction of one does not empower the other.

The allies of the US, Israel, Saudis and Pakistan are all highly problematic and in many ways strategically counterproductive. Israel because support for Israel makes everybody else, especially among the population of the region angry prevent the government from embracing any alliance with the US. The Saudis and the Pakistanis are largely responsible for the creation of many of the before mentioned "loosely connected groups" and continue to support them all over the world.

The US supports Sunni governments against Shia governments but is fighting a war against both Shia and Sunni non-government actors. At the same time non of the governments they support actually give flying fuck about the US except for the support they can get from the US.

Why all of this? The US was only involved in the region because of oil. The US does not actually need the oil anymore, even if they did the resources spent are probably higher then just paying the higher price for oil. Not to mention that even without the US everybody who has oil has a huge intensive to sell it.

If you look objectively at any of this you can only shake your head. The danger of all of these groups is minimal. Yet the US spends the same amount of money they did when they were opposing another world supper power.

Sadly in Washington there is a foreign policy consensus and a echo chamber and there is almost nobody who moves very far from the 'party line' on foreign policy. Not to mention the massive vested interest that it supports when the Saudis buy 10 Billions in US weapons.

<comment><USER6> >Why all of this?

It's about strategic positioning to control resource routes in anticipation of the coming resource wars that everyone pretends isn't going to happen. This while the Leo Strauss-ians like Kissinger and Brzezinski work hard to initiate cold-war 2.0 because the Middle East destablization program was simply a precursor to bigger more nasty conflicts, (which start economically) and most of this is arising due to the fact that technology has advanced so fast it altered the nation-states threat model and they don't know how to handle a kind of world where any lone-wolf actor could do devestating things. Hence a surveillance state of totalitarian dystopia is the only response they know that might be able to handle it except they don't really care about national security that much or they wouldn't be wasting taxpayer dollars on kickbacks to relatives around the beltway instead of fixing problems.

Africa is a war ground for precious minerals and metals (and some oil) and because the Chinese have been making big plays there the Americans want to balance out the power so they have a foothold when the minerals that go in that phone in your pocket become more scarce because China suddenly halted exports of theirs or something similar.

I spent some time in the Horn of Africa, and I can tell you I'd rather be in Iraq... at least Iraqi's pickup their dead bodies, and I never saw a 12 year old patrolling with an AK in Iraq either.

The point is that while you are right that we need to rethink how far we overextend our forces into foreign entanglements, there are other things at play here of which terrorism is only a part of and is often a _byproduct_ of. We also need to consider how often such moves have resulted in blowback worse than the initial problem. I look all over the world and see problems that are blowback from our meddling in the first place. (Iran is a prime example of this. The Mullahs would have never come to power if we hadn't overthrown their gov for oil in the first place.)

<comment><USER5> Well, what your are arguing is essentially a conspiracy theory. That does not mean its wrong, but it does mean that there is a waste upper class that have a secrete agenda for the world. I don't think that explanation makes any sense.

> It's about strategic positioning to control resource routes in anticipation > of the coming resource wars that everyone pretends isn't going to happen.

I don't know why that should happen. Even if it did, why would you care about the Middle East? Oil will no longer be a important resource and as long as it is the US has its own supply. A middle east that is unable to export Oil would mean LESS resources for china who I assume would be the enemy in that massive war you are predicting.

> because the Middle East destablization program

If they only want to destabilize the region there would be more effective ways to do it. It also assumes that all the people involved in for example the Iraq invasion were all lairs and all of them seem to be able to keep this secret even once they are retired. It also does not explain why the US send 100'000 people into Iraq to stop the civil war, it would have been far cheaper just to keep out and let things happen.

I see no evidence for this theory.

> they don't know how to handle a kind of world where any lone-wolf actor > could do devestating things

Bomb building has not changed that much, Anarchist have killed far more people in the US then Muslim Terrorists. A small group of students started WW1.

> Africa is a war ground for precious minerals and metals (and some oil) and > because the Chinese have been making big plays there the Americans want to > balance out the power so they have a foothold when the minerals that go in > that phone in your pocket become more scarce because China suddenly halted > exports of theirs or something similar.

The US position on Africa has been extremely light touch. They operate with special forces for the most part. They don't attempted massive economic inroads or outright conquests that would be required if resource security was the main goal.

I agree about blowback.

The main difference between us is that I believe that it is stupidity and internal political intensives. Not some long running prepare for some future war. I don't think any such war will happen, politically, economically and there is the problem of nukes.

<comment><USER6> > upper class that have a secrete agenda for the world. I don't think that > explanation makes any sense.

I don't think people will be able to ever understand whats really going on in the world until they understand it's true, and makes lots of sense. (not sure what you mean by "waste" though.) I have spent the vast majority of my time since I got out of the military tracing the big picture for myself based on the evidence, wanting to find the truth regardless of where it took me. Those who invoke variations of hanlons razor (it's all incompetence) or just say it's perverse results of bad incentives organically corrupting the system, simply haven't carefully examined the evidence. That being said, I do acknowledge two things that hamper my claims somewhat. First, when dealing with such issues I am often restricted to inductive logic due to a lack of hard evidence. Deductive logic is always preferable. Two, I know it's hard for claims such as mine to be taken at face value without better citations, but I do have many contextual citations that I simply haven't made public _yet_. I also understand such a vast scope means I still have a shitton of things to learn, and don't know everything.

> why would you care about the Middle East? Oil will no longer be a important > resource

This is a line I have heard from the intelligencia that hasn't stood up to actual real-world tests. Like I said most of the oil issue was never about us actually having the oil, it was about us _controlling_ who did get the oil. Likewise, I find it humourous that people have already bought the line about no needing oil hook line and sinker. It's simply not realistic to pretend a lack of potential depedence on oil in 2030-50 is going to cause us to suddenly give up our imperial ambitions. Oil is but a part of a much bigger game.

> If they only want to destabilize the region there would be more effective > ways to do it.

What other than war, and especially civil and secretarian war comes even close to the same amount of destablization?

> It also assumes that all the people involved in for example the Iraq > invasion were all lairs and all of them seem to be able to keep this secret > even once they are retired.

First of all, yes, most of them were/are pathological liars. Second, the nature of compartmentalization creates a breeding ground for such abuses to be top down while middle-men ground-pounders (in this case military generals) have no clue about what's really going on. This is a variation of the fallacy I hear too often about "if X conspiracy theory is true, it would take Y number of people to be silent which is impossible/improbable and therefor conspiracy theory is false." Really, all you needed was a core group running the show, the rest tend to just do as told. (Bremer/Wolfowitz/Cheney/Rumsfeld part of core group)

> I see no evidence for this theory.

Then I don't think you have examined very much material relating to it.

> Bomb building has not changed that much. Anarchist have killed far more > people in the US then Muslim Terrorists.

Modern threats are cyber, genetic, etc. That's the threat model shift many in the natsec industry are at least pretending to try to shift to, and even the most academic of the natsec group admits technology has rapidly shifted the equation faster than nation-states of been able to adapt. Ignoring this with such a flippant dismissal isn't a serious attempt at conversation on the topic.

> A small group of students started WW1.

History as written by the instigators. King Edward the 7th was the single man most responsible for WW1. I don't have time to get into this one though.

> The US position on Africa has been extremely light touch.

It has been, but it's not going to be for much longer.

> They don't attempted massive economic inroads or outright conquests

The American's haven't, but the history and modern history of Africa and it's current state is inextricably tied to the European colonialism and exploitation of Africa through "economic inroads" and "outright conquests". Rhodesia, Congo, Suez, Morocco, are all examples of this. Not to mention IMF/World bank explotation that creates the corruption and inculcates the extremism being fought. Hell, South Africa apartheid barely ended in 1991!

So your comment about the US is mostly true, but I'm also talking about the supranational oligarchy of the west as a whole, not just the US.

> The main difference between us is that I believe that it is stupidity and > internal political intensives.

I dismiss Hanlons razor as an inherent logical fallacy, and the organic incentives angle simply doesn't match the evidence or fill the gaps needed to understand the global geo-economic/political games being played here.

Don't get me wrong. I see this response from intelligent people quite often, and I understand it because it's the safe academic viewpoint especially without all the contextual knowledge/evidence required to say otherwise, but I'm telling you now it's not the truth of the matter at all.

The pages of history are littered with conspiracy, and until people can stop trying so hard to dismiss it because of the negative modern connotations they won't be able to approach the evidence and follow it to the truth regardless of where it leads.

See part 4C. [http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-02-23/1967-he-cia- created...](http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-02-23/1967-he-cia-created- phrase-conspiracy-theorists-and-ways-attack-anyone-who-challenge)

<comment><USER5> I'm sorry but I'm not seeing your logic at all.

> King Edward the 7th was the single man most responsible for WW1.

I would actually be interested in that one.

I have only heard one person ever to blame Britain for WW1. That person was conspiracy theorist who believed in Anglo-Saxon elite that has a secret plan for world domination and they had it since 1066.

I myself have read quite a lot about WW1 and making Edward the 7th responsible is simply wrong.

<comment><USER7> From my understanding the problem was that Germany was growing very strong and threatening Britain's domination.

An interesting book about the topic is The Great Illusion By Norman Angell [1]

Saying a bunch of students started WW1 is quite absurd.

I did find some material pointing fingers at King Edward though, might want to take a look [2]

[1] [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38535/38535-h/38535-h.htm](http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38535/38535-h/38535-h.htm)

[2] [http://www.larouchepub.com/eiw/public/1995/eirv22n13-1995032...](http://www.larouchepub.com/eiw/public/1995/eirv22n13-19950324/eirv22n13-19950324_017-king_edward_vii_evil_demiurge_of.pdf)

<comment><USER5> > From my understanding the problem was that Germany was growing very strong > and threatening Britain's domination.

That is an argument often made, but the evidence for it is basically speculation based on pure balance of power theory.

There is just one very big problem with that theory. Why would Britain not have the same issue with the US? The US was tracking and even outpacing Germany in growth and population, but Britain was willing to compromise with the US based on reasonable disagreements. Because the US did not overreach, Britain was content with losing influence.

The US for example promised not to annex Cuba and signaled that they did not have much interest in further expedition in the east. The also agree on how to deal with South America.

Germany on the other hand was different. They essentially tried and did everything to piss everybody off. Britain was in some cases actually prepared to agree with Germany, but Germany behaved so stupidly that they drove them in French hands.

Then Germany continued to behave like idiots so that eventually the arch enemies Russia and Britain agree to an alliance even when they had outstanding issues in Persia and other places.

Even then, once German soldiers were literally walking threw and destroying Belgium Britain only joined the war on a thin margin in parliament.

I really don't see how Britain can be made responsible for any of it. Britain loudly called for peace talks until right before WW1 and Germany/Austria refused any kind of talks.

> Saying a bunch of students started WW1 is quite absurd.

The caused a geopolitical event who's fallout caused the war. Of course they did not put on German uniforms and walked over the Belgium border.

> I did find some material pointing fingers at King Edward though, might want > to take a look [2]

Seems to me that amounts to about a conspiracy theory. There is this Anglo- saxon elites conspiricy theory going around. Everything that happens was somehow planned and put in place by the British so they could profit form it.

I have read multiple very modern books that in detailed researched these diplomatic relationships and not a single modern historian seems to endorse this theory.

> An interesting book about the topic is The Great Illusion By Norman Angell > [1]

He had some good points. His problem was to misunderstand the political economy of the countries. In the autocratic empires the people who have the power to declare and make war are not the same people who mostly profited from the markets.

The German and Austrian high officials were part of a separate culture where they actually look down on many business men and the newly rich, all they car about was power and honor. Looking at the Austrians makes this point quite clear, these people were not living in the same world that Angell was outlining.

Many German capitalist understood the problem and were against war, but they did not have the required influence.

Edit:

If you want to read one book on the subject I would recommend "The War that Ended Peace" by the highly respected historian Margaret Macmillan.

<comment><USER7> A conflict with the US would have been pointless I assume due to geographical reasons, very hard to send troops over. Meanwhile Germany was posing a threat quite nearby. But indeed there were very complicated times and it's hard to blame someone explicitly.

I agree with you about the King Edward material, feels a bit conspirative to me too. Although some political and economical points there make sense.

Thank you for the book reference, will check it out.

Btw, this discussion is a bit discouraging to me since I realise that not even after 100 years we can properly agree on some facts. Tech giants fighting fake news will have a big challenge.

<comment><USER5> A war with the US or Germany is pointless from Britain perspective. So is it pointless for the US or Germany. Nobody benefits.

Britain was perfectly willing to accept the rise of the US. They were willing to accept the growth of Germany until they started behaving very aggressively.

Germany could not defeat Britain in a naval race. They had already given up even trying before WW1. Why would Britain intentionally start a war, after Germany had already been defeated. That would only give them the chance to conquer France/Belgium.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> According to a former South African coworker - the number 1 problem in Africa is corruption. Terrorism is a byproduct of that.

<comment><USER9> Sadly it's quickly becoming the #1 problem in the US as well.

<comment><USER10> Corruption in the USA and corruption in the developing world are two completely different beasts, similar in name only. Corruption in the developing world is from the bottom up, it's the way that the common person does business. Corruption in the developed world is from the top down.

Try bribing a cop in a developed country and you'll find yourself in an even bigger hole. But in the developing world, it's the normal way of doing business. You bribe a cop to get out of a ticket, you bribe an official to get your paperwork done faster.

<comment><USER11> It's beyond even that. Corruption is the lubricant of bureaucracy. These countries are messed up. One way to "fight" corruption is to create lots of paperwork: after all, if everything's documented, then you can't get away with anything, right? Ignore the fact that most official papers end up rotting in a box in a warehouse.

Faced with these stupid requirements and tons of needed stamps and seals and signoffs, if you wanna get stuff done, you pay Vs letting the ineffective system slowly get to it. In one case, the customs officer worked overtime: after 5, he'd continue to process paperwork, correctly, legally, but extra money decided which pieces he'd work on. After anti corruption systems went into place, he can't do this anymore and just goes home at 5. No one wins.

<comment><USER12> > In one case, the customs officer worked overtime: after 5, he'd continue to > process paperwork, correctly, legally, but extra money decided which pieces > he'd work on. After anti corruption systems went into place, he can't do > this anymore and just goes home at 5. No one wins.

Isn't that analogue to net neutrality though? Old situation: those who pay enter the bureaucracy fast lane, screw the rest. New situation: everyone gets processed at the same speed, regardless of monetary power.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Clickbait title could be fixed..

Edit: You fixed it, hurrah!

<comment><AUTHOR> I should have titled it "The U.S. is waging a massive shadow war in Africa", which is actually not clickbait IMO. I think the current title is misleading, given that the article is more about the already sizable scale of US military operations in Africa.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Oh, United States military operations in Africa? I've heard of that one. Interesting article though.

What bothers me is that there is a ,largely, simple solution here: stop global warming and build educational, medical, and governmental structures to support the people in Africa. We need to bring them along with us in our prosperity, and, find a way for them to enjoy stable government. I know that part of the stable government solution involves taking down dictators and other military action, but this has to also include education, food, medicine, and teaching people how to build things.

<comment><USER15> Much of Africa's poverty comes from the oppression imposed by white people in the past and present. Yes, they [edit: Africans] came with their own problems, but white invaders really fucked things up.

<comment><USER5> What is your evidence for that? Countries with the least colonial involvement are not richer then those with colonial involvement. You can simply not explain wealth in Africa based on history of colonialism. The data just does not check out.

<comment><USER16> Can you provide some data?

It seems that pretty much all of Africa was affected by colonialism; even "litte" colonial involvment would have dramatic effects. Just upsetting an established government can lead to extreme instability down the road, and redrawing country borders can pit cultures into unresolvable conflicts forever.

A country not affected by colonialism would be Japan which did quite well throughout the years.

<comment><USER5> It has been a long time since I went really deep into this topic, so I can not remember where exactly what paper or book had the numbers.

Almost all of Africa was in some way effected, but that leaves you with the same problem. Why is Botswana doing fantastically well when Zimbabwe is going down the drain. Why is Tunis doing better then Libya?

We also have to account for the fact that all of these countries were pretty poor before the Europeans arrived as well. So you can really only blame Europeans for them to continue to not do very well.

Colonization is still a very important topic, but more in the context of how it shaped the institutions in those countries. The question we are trying to explain is why are all these countries unable to make sustainable institutional changes NOW.

> A country not affected by colonialism would be Japan which did quite well > throughout the years.

Well, first I would argue that Japan culture has been far more effected by the West then the culture of Nigeria or Botswana. Why the Japan is a pretty special and unique case is a separate debate.

The same pattern does not hold for south east Asia for example. The countries not colonized are not doing better then those who have.

<comment><USER16> In 1990 people thought the German unification would be a piece of cake. We're rich and we're sprinkle some market economy on the formerly communist part.

Turns out that even under perfect conditions developing a country that was held back just 40 years in its development is extremely difficult.

Africa was held back 1000x more, and in crucial moments in history (industrialization) at that. The situation of Japan is highly relevant as an example what can happen when you have continuity and a stable environment.

<comment><USER5> I agree with everything you say. It just to narrow. Japan would not have not developed if not pushed. Botswana would not as rich if the Brits had never come.

It just not as simple, its not linear and then colonialism comes along and is holding you back. The reality is that the institutions need to develop are complex, culture, foreign involvement, geography all play a role.

Africa is poor because colonialism story just does not hold up. Its a part of the story, but by itself it explains little.

Japan is not successful because they were not a colony. The are successful because they had a centralized state for a long time, that state was was able adopt new institutions. Even had the been a colony, once the imperialist leave Japan would probably have better growth is the avg. growth in Africa.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Why do big companies suck? - <AUTHOR> http://scottberkun.com/2010/why-do-big-companies-suck/

<comment><USER2> He missed an important point: that most of the work itself in many (not all) big companies is not exciting, more like routine maintenance. A friend got a PhD in CS from Northwestern and now all he does is maintain email servers for a BigCo (essentially). He has a pager so that "clients" can contact him if anything goes wrong

</comment><comment><USER3> this is a great article. true of any large company.

</comment><comment><USER4> Division of labor. In smaller places, people wear several hats. Some interesting and exciting, others not.

In large organizations, things are more segregated and stratified. If you aren't in one of the interesting/exciting roles, all you get is suck.

Better managements work to mitigate this. But it's an ongoing struggle, and the dark side calls.</comment>


Ask HN: Which todo app are you using to manage daily tasks? - <AUTHOR> Hello Hackers,<p>There are tons of todo apps (or even note-taking apps) out there. I manage my tasks using Trello (earlier used Wunderlist). I was wondering what other hackers are using to manage their tasks. Are you using app? or plain old postIt notes (made of paper)? <comment><USER2> Our team used several apps before (like Asana and Wrike), but now we are working on our own tool. It's rather a project management software for teams, not just task planning for an individual user.

</comment><comment><USER3> For programming tasks I've been using waffle.io - similar to trello but is built on github integration. Makes tracking/resolving issues for me easier.

For tech/programming tasks that don't involve github, I use trello.

For everything that doesn't require writing code, post it notes. I've found that using an app instead of post its lead me to over filling my day, forgetting to mark stuff as done, and subsequently I stop checking it all together. Post its are simple, easy to manage, and satisfying to cross things off of.

</comment><comment><USER4> I use Remember the Milk for everything. [https://www.rememberthemilk.com/](https://www.rememberthemilk.com/) I use both the iOS app as well as a command-line client found at [https://github.com/dwaring87/rtm-cli](https://github.com/dwaring87/rtm-cli)</comment>


Serious New Java Flaw Affects All Current Versions of Windows - <AUTHOR> http://threatpost.com/en_us/blogs/serious-new-java-flaw-affects-all-browsers-040910

<comment><USER2> I already commented on another one of these link bait articles here <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1253870>, but I'm reposting my comment here. Just because I felt let down after having clicked through to get the details on some 'juicy' new Java flaw. Only to find the reality to be less serious than advertised. I don't like feeling duped.

BTW - The last article was called 'Javocalypse'. Now with a name like that, when I test the exploit, it better deliver the goods.

I don't know.

That's just how I feel.

Anyway, here is the comment I left on that one:

\----

I love all these 'embarrassingly trivially exploitable issues' that require me to set up my machine in just the right way to make them work. And for all that effort, you can't even own the machine using the exploit.

What has it been? 15 years? and this is the best they can come up with for java security holes?

You know, I don't like java, but the more stuff like this I read, the more I have to admit that it is smart for enterprises to use it so heavily.

An interesting comparison might be to look at the number of java security holes vs activex vs windowsxp vs apache vs iis vs php vs ruby vs (you get the picture). Maybe group by client side and server side. That would give a real 'data based' look at software security quality.

Though I suspect that the jvm would be at the top of the 'security quality' heap in both groupings. (ie-least number of holes). I think it would be interesting to see nonetheless.

</comment><comment><USER3> Perhaps Sun didn't respond to the vulnerability because Sun doesn't exist anymore.</comment>


Gmail doesn't recognize email addresses at fully qualified domains - <AUTHOR> http://webapps.stackexchange.com/q/24247/40

<comment><USER2> A friend of mine had an email address of the format

      "username."@example.com

which AFAICS is legal (as long as you keep the quotes around the username and the trailing dot there).

But damn if it didn't break a lot of systems out there!

In the end, he got booted off his email provider as they were upgrading their mail systems -- to one that didn't support accounts named with a trailing dot!</comment>


I'm Sticking with Moviepass as Long as I Can - <AUTHOR> https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2018/08/01/collins-crypt-im-sticking-with-moviepass-as-long-as-i-can <comment><USER2> Maybe moviepass could pivot to a babysitting/housesitting/petsitting service that happens to give free movie passes and other date-night packages to parents of young children or pets. They could charge way more.

Like a going-out version of blue apron</comment>