Thanks, David Cameron. No, Really. - <AUTHOR> http://b0ing.me/thanks-david-cameron-no-really/

<comment><USER2> I'm annoyed that all the attention is now directed at Cameron as if this whole thing was his idea. It isn't!

The Daily Mail have been running a very vocal anti-porn campaign for the last 2 years (at least). Forget child-porn, the Daily Mail have taken it upon themselves to rid the country of every sort of porn imaginable and have proceeded to flood the public concious with their weekly anti-porn propaganda.

The funny thing is, when they first started doing this, nobody took a blind bit of notice, the tone of comments on their earlier articles met the subject with bemusement. What's even more surprising however, is that still nobody cares! Read the comments on the most recent DM anti-porn articles and it's clear they're not fooling anybody. So why are they pushing ahead with this agenda?

The blocking of porn (opt-in or opt-out) is not the issue here. It's that we're letting our laws and policies be dictated to us by the gutter press! And that it's working!!

[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/search.html?searchPhrase=por...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/search.html?searchPhrase=porn&channelshortname=news&channelshortname=femail)

<comment><USER3> This is the same daily mail which regularly features almost pornographic images of children as well right next to their "kill all pedo's" articles.

The reason the DM is like it is stems from the fact that this country is full of vile moronic excuses for humans that will mindlessly buy and promote the shite that spews out of the mouths of that paper's writers (if you can call them that).

The politicians like these sort of people a they're easy to manipulate into voting for them.

Edit: apparently there was a nazi equivalent! [http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Der_St%C3%BCrmer](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Der_St%C3%BCrmer)

<comment><USER2> More 'laugh at Daily Mail readers' fodder: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPlEIryW8zA](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPlEIryW8zA)

<comment><USER3> Good find. Charlie Brooker is the only public voice of reason I've seen in the UK media. His work is hilarious and thought provoking and nothing in between.

<comment><USER4> Also responsible for some of the best television of the year so far (related): [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTSc2nTYUGI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTSc2nTYUGI)

<comment><USER3> Agreed! Definitely one of the best things I've seen for a long time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > I'm completely behind David Cameron being vehement about keeping children > and rape out of pornography, by the way. I don't think anyone on earth is > arguing "pro" for that one.

I'm "pro" both of those. I believe that people that have a liking for these things will seek to satisfy their desires, and I think it's preferable they do it through porn to them doing that in real life. In other words, I would prefer that perverts jerk off using images of kids, not actual kids.

I also see no reason why that kind of porn would not be digitally generated (except for the fact that it's illegal).

Also, due to the online surveillance and the general political atmosphere, I feel uncomfortable posting this using my real account.

<comment><AUTHOR> Uhhh, but what are the images of? Abused children who probably didn't want to be in pornography at the age of (not 18).

<comment><USER6> One possibility is having it be CG. Under current law that is illegal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> What will be extremely interesting is when one of these databases of people who have opted in to receive pornography is leaked. Especially if it contains the names of politicians and other high profile individuals.

I believe that's when the issue of privacy will start to be publicly debated and taken seriously.

<comment><USER8> Shouldn't politicians have extra ISPs that are not being monitored? I think politicians deal with so much sensitive information that they should be exempt from monitoring. Also, how are they supposed to form new policies on porn if they can't check it out unchecked?

<comment><USER9> Hahahahahah

Yes, and they should be given the right to judge and execute people, because they are in this special uncorruptable position that has the most information so it is best for society that they be able to weed out predators and parasites. They were voted for by the public majority, the voters have chosen! It's only natural!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> People may find these links interesting:

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

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

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libido_(Psychoanalysis)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libido_\(Psychoanalysis\))

"It is this need to conform to society and control the libido that leads to tension and disturbance in the individual, prompting the use of ego defenses to dissipate the psychic energy of these unmet and mostly unconscious needs into other forms."

Say... consuming material goods?

</comment><comment><USER8> It's not a given that people will revolt against that. There are lots of countries where people just became submissive to escalating moral terror. Now they have to run around veiled and are never allowed to strangers and stuff like that (simplified - just saying, our relatively free western culture is not normal and not something we can take for granted).

</comment><comment><USER11> I hope it leads to more use of VPN and like. The added advantage would be that your ISP and GCHQ can not easily tap into your online activities, and you'll always have plausible cover of using VPN to hide your pornographic habit.

<comment><USER12> It is of course only a matter of time before the use of VPN becomes a regulated service, maybe similar to gun control. If you can prove that you need it professionally you will be added to a government registry and allowed to use a VPN. Otherwise, no.

<comment><USER13> There is not a single network protocol in existence that allows a signal ( _any_ data under control of the sender) that can't be used to run VPN over.

DNS. "Yes, I do lots of lookups for [long hex string].some.com", and my preferred DNS server is "[vpn provider in country which won't cooperate].com", what of it?

SMTP. IMAP. HTTP.

Pretty much any protocol allows realtime transmission of large chunks of encoded data sufficient to pass IP datagrams back and forth without much difficulty (by controlling both endpoints, so the servers might be "fake" servers - e.g. an smtp server that doesn't send messages, but accepts messages and returns overly verbose errors, or a DNS server where you constantly does "queries" that embed packets, and get responses that contains inbound packets whenever there are any.

If they were to go one further and require all traffic to pass through government proxy servers (including forcing us to knowingly accept them MITM'ing our SSL connections), then it'd be a _bit_ more difficult, but not much: The IP datagrams would just need to be hidden in somewhat plausible looking requests and responses.

It might be slow, but it's impossible to stop because all we need is a way to pass data that they don't know to look for or can't stop. Ever read the April 1st RFC on "IP over Avian Carriers"? It's been "implemented": Print out packets as hex, strap it to a pigeon, have someone on the receiving end type in the hex digits. Obviously that is impractical, but it serves as a good reminder of just how hard it is to stop communication.

Before the internet, pirates exchanged pirated software by mailing floppies or tapes (and not just proper backup tapes - old audio tapes for home computer tape decks). That's how I got my first pirated software, 30 years ago. It got efficient enough that even before BBS's were common, pirated software could make it to pretty much every corner of the developed world in a couple of days, often beating the distributors of the real releases.

It'd also cause a surge in darknets. They keep getting surges in interests after each new attempt at restricting our freedom, and then it dies back but each time the base level of activity is a bit higher than last time.

Here's a network topology map of Hyperboria, an experimental "darknet" that exists as an encrypted network of tunnels over the existing internet, but using a new routing daemon that does encryption by default: [http://norlin.ru/st/map.png](http://norlin.ru/st/map.png) \- it's of course miniscule, but it's also grown from nothing to that size is a fraction of the time it took the ARPAnet.

For my part, I'm seriously contemplating experimenting with "dropping" solar cell powered wifi repeaters at a couple of spots along my commute to my local train station. I don't even have any nefarious purposes with it, nor any secrets I'm concerned about. I'd like to try it just because I'm annoyed with the quality of my mobile cell data connection, and because it'd be fun to see how long they survived, and tiny little suitable access points are getting so cheap that it's becoming viable to do just for the fun of it.

The only things stopping me are time, effort of finding suitable hardware, and that it'd need some work to be inconspicuous enough to not get some scared neighbour call out the bomb squad or something.

But we're on the verge of a situation where people can get a few grand together and get devices enough to cover a small town that are small enough and self contained enough to be "dumped" all over the place with the expectation that a high percentage of them will die or get removed every year.

The combination of more and more restrictions, and lower and lower costs brings us closer and closer to a situation where it becomes attractive _and_ possible for small groups of people to simply start deploying their own darknets coupled with whatever tunnelling mechanisms are needed at the edges to get data to suitable exit points.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Regardless of if you opt in or out, the ISP already knows if you watch adult content or not, I don't this makes much of a difference in that regard.

</comment><comment><USER15> The filter on a well known website for popular file sharing from the main UK ISP is a complete joke: only lesser gifted users are blocked by from getting their daily dose of freebies. Drawing from this experience, one can predict that circumventing this new filter will be a kid's play. If one can be a bit paranoid, one would think this in only a way to expand and investigate the practicality to check the UK population habits on the interweb in order to later on, "direct it".

</comment><comment><USER16> Regardless of whether this is the prime minister's idea or the Daily Mail's idea, it's a slippery slope that we're being placed on here.

If we treat pornography as something inherently wrong (morally) and something which people should be shamed for, sooner or later we'll end up with a society which names and shames people who, quite rightly, exercise their right to view pornographic material, even the most 'softcore' of it.

</comment><comment><USER17> Wouldn't it be simpler to ban children from the internet?

</comment><comment><USER18> I can't read text of this font and colors.

<comment><USER19> It's almost the exact same scheme as Turbo C.

<comment><USER20> Oh you're right. Wow, that's a blast from the past.

Time to go reconfigure my terminal windows. I know what my next website is gonna look like heh heh :-)</comment></comment></comment>


The Boston Marathon Bombing: Keep Calm and Carry On - <AUTHOR> http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/04/the-boston-marathon-bombing-keep-calm-and-carry-on/275014/ <comment><USER2> I ran the prestigious marathon for the first time yesterday. I had a good race, set a new best time for recent years, and had a great experience. The only thing I would have been able to do yesterday was give blood, and that apparently wasn't needed. So there's nothing I can do, and fretting and worrying isn't going to change anything. Walking around scared isn't going to prevent anything. I sympathize with those affected, from those who lost friends and family to the thousands who were not allowed to finish the race. What I won't do is make the bombing the primary memory of the race. Sorry, bombers, you're not taking that away. I'll allow it to stand as a seperate, tragic event in my mind and deal with it from there.

Today my wife and I will go walk the Freedom Trail just as we planned. Maybe we won't get into some (or any) of the monuments, but we're doing it regardless. I mean, what else are we supposed to do, huddle in our hotel room until our flight tomorrow? The breakfast place a block south of the closed off crime scene is open, so we're off to go get some food now.

<comment><USER3> read "Boston Massacre" memorial plate. The wording is interesting (at least for a foreigner).

<comment><USER4> what does it say on it, if you can recall?

<comment><USER3> That they mobbed some soldiers who openend fire and killed five. With a real effort on painting the soldiers in a negative light, and the mob in a positive light.

My head was screaming: "in Vietnam, Iraq or Afganistan there would be medals for that, this is all about spinning the news".

<comment><USER5> Fun fact, the British soldiers who fired on the civilians were (fairly successfully) defended by future US President John Adams.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_adams#Boston_Massacre>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It was a great moment of national pride for me (which are rare in the UK) in the wake of the 7/7/2005 bombings. People were back on the Tube and buses the next day, refusing to allow their lives to be disrupted further. I've always taken solace from those people- I hope that the people of Boston can be equally inspiring.

<comment><USER7> Let me offer a different opinion. There was a series of bomb blasts in Mumbai in 1993. Thirteen different explosions in the span of a few hours across the city's landmarks. 250 people died. One of the blasts was in the Bombay stock exchange. This was on a Friday, and the stock exchange opened for business on Monday. This was a huge PR win for Mumbai, as the media talked about the resilience of the residents and the manner in which they moved on and didn't let it impact their lives.

It's now 20 years and several terrorist attacks and bomb-blasts have gone by. Mumbai still carries on, but there is no pride in doing that anymore. Everyone just wants it to stop. It's been easy for the government to quickly clean up and talk about how terrorism doesn't impact us. The Mumbai residents keep calm, but no one wants to move on like this.

<comment><USER8> Exactly this. Holding your head high is not a response to terrorism.

<comment><USER4> Then what is? What is the average citizen to do, other than refuse to be terrorized?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think for HN it's worth noting, perhaps in the title, that this article is written by Bruce Schneier.

<comment><USER10> Because I needed to look it up, too:

"Bruce Schneier an American cryptographer, computer security specialist, and writer. He is the author of several books on general security topics, computer security and cryptography."

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Schneier>

<comment><USER11> If you ask me to name a cryptographer, Scheier is by far the first one that comes to mind. Also, in my experience, his book, Applied Cryptography, is by far the most reccomended book for people new to crypto.

<comment><USER12> Applied Cryptography is a terrible reference. Please don't recommend it to programmers. Instead, recommend Practical Cryptography / Cryptography Engineering (they're the same book), which Schneier co-authored with Niels Fergusen.

 _Update: I said "terrible book" but I'm going to start being more precise about this. It's not a terrible "book"; I enjoyed the hell out of it when I was a teenager. It's just misleading and dangerous._

<comment><USER4> Not having read (nor the time and inclination to read) the book, what is so bad about it, and what is the difference with the one you do recommend?

<comment><USER12> <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=639786>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Its too bad that most people don't have a basic appreciation of statistics or probability. Its too bad Schneier only spends a tiny paragraph on it: "Even though this will be in the news for weeks, we should recognize this for what it is: a rare event".

The chance that a person will die from a bombing, or be shot, or their plane crash, or a hurricane kill them is so small that there is almost NO reason to be afraid of it. It is far more likely that a person will die of Heart disease or cancer than any of the above. What will almost certainly kill us, we accept. What is almost inconsequential to us, we abhor.

<comment><USER14> People don't react to terrorism because they're afraid of being blown up personally. They do it because they're afraid of the precedent that might be set by not responding.

It's statistically unlikely that you'll be the victim of gang violence, but does that mean it's irrational prosecute and punish gang members? No, because the activity threatens social stability vastly out of proportion with the probability of any given person being victim to it. In general, we punish crimes not because it's likely that we'll be the victims of one, but because if we don't the problem might grow out of hand and undermine civil order.

<comment><USER15> #citationneeded

Really now. I don't need to go much beyond the evening news to know that people spend a lot of time being afraid of things that aren't likely to happen. (What don't you know about your toothbrush that could kill you? Probably very little.)

Your model of humanity is one that's much more rational and thoughtful than what I've come to expect from my neighbors. Nobody is scared of a decline in social stability; they're scared of getting shot or robbed or blown up. Usually by people who look different than they do.

<comment><USER14> Listen to Obama's speech on the issue. It's targeted to calm the average American. Listen to the word he uses to characterize the administration's response: justice. What does "justice" mean in this context? It means nothing other than the government's response to activity that threatens social stability and psychologically remedy the injuries created by actions that upset social stability.

<comment><USER16> What does the War in Iraq or having to remove one's shoes before boarding an aircraft have to do with justice?

I don't think anyone is making the argument that there should be no justice. Prosecuting the criminals who commit murder for the purpose of terrorism is clearly a "no reasonable person could disagree" sort of a thing.

But the question remains, how is justice won? In theory we could impose martial law and suspend elections, or permanently shut all the roads and trains and prohibit gatherings of more than five people in the same place, or nuke the entire middle east. Perhaps doing those things could bring justice to more terrorists.

Well before we reach that point, we come to a line we should not cross. We come to a choice that will cost us more of our humanity than it gains us in justice. And whipping the public into a frenzy is how popular support for crossing the line we should not cross is manufactured.

<comment><USER14> All that is really irrelevant to my point, whixh is that the nature of the word "justice" shows that people are concerned about social order, not just the individual likelihood of being killed. One can argue about the extent to which any given response helps maintain order.

That's why people care about "justice" for murderers even though more people are killed by auto accidents. Murder upsets the social order. A car accident doesn't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Glad this got posted quickly.

I can already see the glee in intelligence / law enforcement agencys' eyes as they think how they can use this latest incident as reasoning for more over- arching powers.

For a long time Londoners had to put up with IRA bombs but "Kept calm and carried on" (to use the phrase). I hope the US can follow suit.

[EDIT] Changed "secret service" to "intelligence / law enforcement agencies" to avoid confusion.

<comment><USER18> >I can already see the glee in intelligence / law enforcement agencys' eyes as they think how they can use this latest incident as reasoning for more over- arching powers.

I think this is my biggest concern.

Once in a while at the Back Bay subway/commuter rail/Amtrak station you will occasionally see Boston Police officers - sometimes accompanied by TSA agents - set up at the station, some of which are carrying submachine guns (MP5s). We're not talking one or two officers, but somewhere between half a dozen and a a dozen, several of which have the automatic weaponry at the ready.

On two occasions, I've asked one of the officers, _"Hey, what's going on?"_. In one case it was simply a training exercise. In another, they were looking for a "person of interest".

In general, I don't want to be at a transit station trying to get home on the subway where there is a situation in which the officers feel the use of that kind of force is necessary, especially considering the fact that I can't recall a single situation in the time I've lived here where the use of submachine guns would've ever been justified.

<comment><USER19> But doesn't it make you feel safe?

<comment><USER20> Police generally do not make me feel safe because i never know when i'm going to break some silly law i may or may not know about or observe (ala jaywalking, biking without a helmet) and get cited/jailed for it, or even worse deal with some cop getting his power trip on who takes it to far.

<comment><USER19> I guess as a white guy with short hair, I just assume the cops are there for me.

<comment><USER20> I'm a white girl, and while i get surprising amount of leeway with the police i'm under no delusions of the power advantage cops have over everyone else.

drinking in the park (its illegal here) or speeding, Friends with the cop or she likes you? no problem. Cop doesn't like you? ticket or drunk tank or worse.

They are there for you, if your friends with them or they like you.

<comment><USER19> Yeah, definitely. Tucker Max had a good piece on how to deal with cops: <http://tuckermax.me/how-to-deal-with-cops-2/>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> _"It turns out that terrorism is much harder than most people think. It's hard to find willing terrorists, it's hard to put a plot together, it's hard to get materials, and it's hard to execute a workable plan. As a collective group, terrorists are dumb, and they make dumb mistakes; criminal masterminds are another myth from movies and comic books."_

He is very wrong. He is confusing foot soldiers with their leaders. Terrorist leaders are not dumb.

Yes, it's harder than we think but not for the reasons in the article. In Israel, there was a wave of bombings every few days. The bombers were not dumb. They were very successful and killed many people. I believe that it wasn't until the borders got sealed tight that the bombings subsided. That's why they had to resort to using Katyusha rockets but, believe me, if they could get in the country, they'd blow things up, no problem.

Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan all have had regular waves of successful suicide bombings.

What keeps the US relatively free of terrorism is the massive ocean that's between the terrorists and their target. It makes an operation much harder to execute because it's more remote from their base of operations. What we've seen so far is the _evolution_ of their attempts to bridge that gap. The author is confusing these early experiments with stupidity. The terrorists are smart and they learn from the failures of their experiments. Eventually, they'll get better at blowing things up from a distance. If we write them off as dumb, we're going to be in for a surprise when they perfect their methods.

Edit: Israel is tiny and could control its borders much easier than Iraq, Afganistan, Pakistan and the US. We see that Iraq, Afganistan, Pakistan are very vulnerable to terrorism because their borders are easy to penetrate. The US has the advantage of an ocean defending its borders. Eventually, they'll overcome that obstacle.

<comment><USER22> > What keeps the US relatively free of terrorism is the massive ocean that's > between the terrorists and their target.

What keeps most countries relatively free from terrorism is that they aren't occupying other peoples land or bombing their women and children all the way to hell.

Ever wonder why extremists haven't bombed the Cook Islands or Peru?

<comment><USER23> Peru has had tens of thousands of civilians killed in conflict with the Shining Path.

<comment><USER22> TIL. However, a cursory skimming of the Wikipedia page seems to indicate that it's an internal conflict.

Not really relevant to this discussion.

<comment><USER24> Quite relevant considering that no known terrorist organization actually obeys a distinction between "internal" and "external". You say "legitimate nation- state", they say, "bourgeois oppressive occupier". You say "reactionary fascist regime" they say "glorious liberator". You say "death", they say "glory".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Speaking of which, here's the results. They are notable because a non-Kenyan won for the first time in 3 years.

Men

Lelisa Desisa (Eth): 2:10:22

Micah Kogo (Ken): 2:10:27

Gebregziabher Gebremariam (Eth): ?

Women

Rita Jeptoo (Ken): 2:26:25

Meseret Hailu (Eth)

Sharon Cherop (Ken)

</comment><comment><USER26> Bruce mentions that one of the reasons why people should stay calm is that terrorists are dumb. However, this could be the actions of a new Unabomber (let us hope it isn't), who managed to go on a bombing streak for 18 years without being caught. It's really too early to start making assumptions.

I say, don't keep calm and carry on, take this as an example that life can end any second, just like that, out of nowhere. Live your life enjoying what you do. Most of us don't, which is sad. If you're enjoying life to the fullest, carry on. If you aren't living your life to the fullest, then no, don't just 'carry on'. Life is fragile, and this should be a reminder. I for one know, I shouldn't 'carry on'. I need to improve my life.

Make the most out of your precious time.

<comment><USER27> You are aware that "we" basically _created_ the Unabomber, yes?

[http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/2000/06/chase.ht...](http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/2000/06/chase.htm)

<comment><USER26> Created or not, it's still plausible that this could happen again.

Good read btw!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> One country that did it right was Norway. After shooting and bombing in 2011, this is what the prime minister's reaction was:

> Stoltenberg further vowed that the attack would not hurt Norwegian > democracy, and said the proper answer to the violence was "more democracy, > more openness, but not naivety".

Source: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Norway_attacks#Domestic>

Please, can we have such a sensible reaction everywhere?

</comment><comment><USER29> As much as I'd like to agree with the estimable Mr. Schneier, there's a part of me who remembers watching "Brazil" and the scene where the restaurant blows up and everyone just goes about their business. Later, if you remember, the protagonist goes through the wringer for failing to have a proper form 27/6 on a minor matter.

So why should we keep calm, not in the face of a terrorist attack, but knowing that our government has priorities that differ from the people's?

Consider how much time and energy our government spends to stop file-sharing and pot smoking, which despite what Nancy Reagan might have said, has not contributed much of anything to the terrorist financial networks.

I'm not so sure the measures taken so far to prevent terrorism were even designed for that purpose. Given the rotten state of government finances and the US's overall economic decline, the massive surveillance apparatus under construction seems better suited to preventing capital flight than plot detection.

It's sort of like the massive fence that used to separate Czechoslovakia from West Germany. The Czechs supposedly built it to keep NATO out, but the nuts and bolts faced towards West Germany.

But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. And I wouldn't mind it one bit.

</comment><comment><USER30> As Bill Maher so eloquently put it: "Its horrible, but this time, let's not overreact, wallow, erect monuments to terrorism; let's handle it Israeli- Munich style" Source: <https://twitter.com/billmaher/status/323951293506924544>

<comment><USER31> By assassinating (and abusing due process) those responsible rather than adressing the issues which continue to allow this circle of violence and retaliatory action to continue ad nauseum.

<comment><USER32> I know you haven't said this, but due process hasn't been followed in prior years - gitmo prisoners still languish in limbo.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Talking with some friends we all were reminded, we've been in a constant state of war for over a decade now (20 combined years if you think about in a different way). There's a qualitative difference in the populace since 9/11. The first responders in Boston were nurses who had been combat medics during the height of the Iraq war -- people who had seen the same scene dozens of times. Following them were soldiers in uniform who cleared the area of debris to make evacuation easier. It's no doubt a reason the deaths were held to 3.

One of the major outcomes of WWI and WWII was a rapid advancement in trauma surgery, with reconstructive surgery advancing decades almost overnight. It'll be one of the enduring legacies of the Iraq and Afghan Wars that those who lot their legs in this event will be running the marathon again.

</comment><comment><USER34> Reading this, the thought struck me that we should perhaps not think of terrorism as violence, but rather as black hat PR. So TSA and GWOT are actually no more helpful than a bad review for a movie.

</comment><comment><USER35> "Keep Calm and Carry On". This phrase from the British has peaked in recent times.

[http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=Calm%20and%20Carry%20...](http://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=Calm%20and%20Carry%20On)

A week hardly passes that I don't see it on a shirt, a coworkers wall, or in a meme.

<comment><USER36> It certainly beats the prior poster in 1939 of "Freedom Is In Peril Defend It With All Your Might".

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> "Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

<comment><USER38> BTW, as far as I understand, this quote is nowadays used in a way that rather different or even contradicting with its original one. Originally, Franklin was rallying up militia to take up arms against roving bands, or perhaps even "extremists" as they might be called today.

So "purchasing safety" was "not joining armed forces that fight criminals and enemies". This was before the revolution, and what Americans call "the frontier" was in Pennsylvania.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Probably going to get very well down voted for this, but it hasn't stopped me before.

It's not through terrorism they beat us. But through politics. Either twisting the minds of the current leaders, or infecting political parties and slowly implementing sharia - happening in Sweden, with our own tax money.

Forget gay and female civil rights.

<comment><USER40> Seivan, I apologize deeply for getting your comment off track, and I hope others will not follow this further from your main point.

However, I would just offer a quick point of advice. Don't spend keystrokes saying you might be down-voted for something. It's actually bolder to just say what you're going to say. When you reference downvoting, you stigmatize it and influence people not to do so. I would rather know if people are going to have a downvote reaction to my comment than shame them into not downvoting me. I've had the exact same tendency to observe "well I might get downvoted for this," but I think it's a tendency that should be resisted.

<comment><USER41> Or just don't write it at all since expected to be down voted is often a sign of unfounded opinions. In this case there's no indication at this point of this being done by jihadists, which makes the previous comment ignorant at best.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> That is refreshingly sane. Sadly I fear that there will be total overreaction by the government and the media.

The only proper reaction is take care of the survivors, bring the responsible to justice and then cry for the dead. Do not assassinate them - bringing them in chains in court is much more humiliating.

<comment><USER21> _"bring the responsible to justice"_

Probably the most difficult parts of this will be to define who is responsible and what exactly constitutes as justice.

<comment><USER42> Tried in a federal court with the full rights and protections defined by the US constitution etc etc.

Killing them like osama, blasting them with a drone or detaining them in gitmo means the terrorist have won, because they have dragged the system down to their own level.

Also it still may be not an act of terror. Just some wackos that decide it is fun to blow stuff up. They don't have a need for a political agenda or ideology to do stuff like that.

<comment><USER14> If he's not caught on US soil and is not a citizen, like Osama, then he has no protections under the constitution and its duck hunting season. The Constitution does not create any protections for international fugitives engaged in acts of war. Terrorists are the modern day Barbary Pirates. Nobody in the founding generation suggested they should get full Constitutional protections and a trial.

<comment><USER42> Sorry but there was no act of war because Osama never represented political entity that could declare war on the US. And there are good reasons why the Israelis went to such pains to bring Adolf Eichmann to trial instead of just shooting him in Argentina.

Also murder is crime in Pakistan ... so if there was Pakistani rule of law the navy seals are murderers.

<comment><USER12> I don't think there's a way to make the logic you're employing work. Wars are routinely fought between entities that do not recognize the sovereignty of their adversaries; see, for instance, every civil war ever. We fought one of those too.

On the nuts and bolts, the distinction you're trying to draw is also moot; Congress explicitly authorized:

         That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate
         force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines
         planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that
         occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or
         persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international
         terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or
         persons

If you'd like to look this up in the Geneva Conventions, you'll find GCIV isn't particularly helpful to your argument; it refers to "persons taking active part in hostilities" or "combatants", not nation-state actors, and explicitly acknowledges conflicts that occur where one side or the other doesn't acknowledge a state of "war". And "the presence of a protected person may not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations".

About the best I think you can say is that striking Bin Laden could have been an act of war against Pakistan. Somehow, I don't think they're going to follow up on that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> I got lucky to leave the USA the day before they raise the crazy level at the airports. I wonder what they will imagine to render flying and border-crossing worse.

I guess "make the leaders live abroad for a while and force them to read enlightenment century books" is off the table as a reaction to terrorism?

<comment><USER43> FWIW, Obama and Romney have both lived abroad. I think it takes a certain kind of person to want to be president, and the effect of travel is different on a person like that.

For this and other reasons, I think electoral politics is one of the least effective places to put energy, in working for change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> Wow this article is bullshit. If we want to stop getting bombed, we need to stop bombing other countries. Simple as that. What happened in Boston today happens every day in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thanks to America.

</comment><comment><USER45> _Those on the other are criminals. They should be found, arrested, and punished._

Wait, you are saying terrorists deserve a fair trial, too? What a strange concept...

</comment><comment><USER46> Inter arma enim silent leges.

<comment><USER47> Ergo impiorum designare omnia tempora "inter arma"

<comment><USER48> Translation from the Latin, with help from Google Translate:

 _Amidst warfare, laws are silent. Therefore the wicked shall designate all times "amidst warfare"._

Edit: Searching for the first phrase, " _inter arma enim silent leges_ ", found this:

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter_arma_enim_silent_leges>

Apparently, the original is from Cicero (slightly differently worded).

<comment><USER49> Thanks for this quote (and the translation) -- this is great.

Thought I was reading House of Leaves there for a second.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> "Terrorism, even the terrorism of radical Islamists and right-wing extremists and lone actors all put together, is not an 'existential threat' against our nation. Even the events of 9/11, as horrific as they were, didn't do existential damage to our nation. Our society is more robust than it might seem from watching the news. We need to start acting that way."

I wonder if there were people saying that to Romans about the barbarian Germanic hordes.

<comment><USER50> There's a key difference between the two, and I'm confident that you know that yourself :)

<comment><USER14> Enlighten me.

<comment><USER51> The Germans were the border of the nation of Rome from 100 BC until the Empire fell. They once slaughtered an entire Republic field army--and remember the Republic's army consisted of most of Rome's young, able-bodied citizens. They defeated Augustus, among other emperors, and eventually sacked Rome. Twice. Before making the whole thing collapse.

So, small difference.

<comment><USER14> So because we're geographically isolated, there is nothing to worry about? Modern technology doesn't change the circumstances any?

<comment><USER52> What exactly are you envisioning here? If not a sacking of the country by terrorist hoards, what _exactly_ are you proposing the parallels between the fall of Rome and our modern society will be?

I _can_ envision terrorist attacks doing _major irreversible_ damage to our society, but only through the fear, spiraling out of control, that they have the potential to cause. A fear _so excessive_ that it could figuratively drive our society off the cliffs of Saipan.

Presumably (since you _appear_ to be _advocating_ fear, and since it would be plainly idiotic to suggest a sacking is immenent) you are suggesting a different mechanism.

So what is this mechanism?

<comment><USER14> With modern technology, you don't need to sack New York to cause tremendous damage. People downplay the magnitude of 9/11, but as I noted somewhere else today, it involved more deaths than Pearl Harbor, and economic damage of almost $100 billion (without accounting for the economic impact on the stock market). Is a terrorist attack ten times stronger inconceivable? An attack on a nuclear power plant could cost into trillions ([http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/03/a-nuclear-accident- co...](http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/03/a-nuclear-accident-could-cost- trillions-of-dollars-and-bankrupt-us.html)). Maybe not irreversible damage, but crippling nonetheless. Is it totally pointless to fear one or more appropriately, to take affirmative actions to avoid one?

<comment><USER52> You really think that could bring "The Fall of New Rome"?

An attack _a hundred_ times more deadly (which would be something like 3% of NYC's population dead, if my mental math does not betray me, or something a little less than 10x The Blitz.) than 9/11 would be a tragedy with only a few parallels in history. It would be an astronomically staggering blow to our economy. Hell, the mangled remains of the economy after such an attack probably would not even be recognizable as an economy at all... But bring down our society? No, not unless we allowed our fear to betray us. Not unless we abandoned any pretenses of maintaining our morale. Not unless we _permit_ it to destroy us.

To be honest, it really just sounds like you've been having too many Red Dawn fantasies. There are no more barbarian hoards; sorry to disappoint.

<comment><USER14> No red dawn fantasies, just realpolitik ones. I would consider it a destruction of our society if our economy was not "recognizable as an economy at all." Indeed, the current recession only wiped out about $600 billion of GDP at the worst, and look at how much suffering it caused. I'm willing to vote for the US to send quite a few more drones to Pakistan to avert a possible 10x 9/11 event, even if we could technically rebuild from one.

<comment><USER52> You define "society" far too narrowly. A society is not an economy, a government, or even a piece of land enclosed by a border. It is an abstract idea, a sort of shared culture and basic methodology.

Here is the real trick though, this "New Rome" is not a city. We don't have a seat of power from which we derive our identity and shared culture, or any sort of sackable cultural Mecca which we define ourselves by. You could level NYC and kill every last person in it, dismantle the government and turn dollars into papiermarks, but you would not have dismantled the society.

Remaining you would still have hundreds of millions of _Americans_ with no invading army to eradicate them and what they beleived in. _More importantly_ , you would still _billions_ of others, across the world, who would _continue_ to make up bulk of our society. The worldwide shared culture of the 21st century, of which Americans represents but a fraction. A culture of appreciation for scientific progress, the arts, and political theories. A collective history, solemly remembering the same wars, sharing the same accomplishments. A Library of Alexandria that (thanks to dramatic advances in publishing and distribution since the last) cannot be burned.

A few well placed bombs by a few extremists who want nothing to do with any of this could never put an end to all of this. This is a society that cannot be taken, cannot be sacked; we can only give it up. Only we present an _existential_ threat to ourselves.

Could there be massive lose of life, and would that be worth preventing? Absolutely. Are these people the Germanic hoards, posed to sack us? Are they in a position to dismantle our society? _No._

<comment><USER14> > You define "society" far too narrowly

You're defining "society" as a pointless philosophical abstraction. I'm defining "society" in terms of the only thing I care about: the people and country around me. I'm not interested in the history books that remain to be written. I think most Americans feel similarly. It might be satisfying in some intellectual sense if "the worldwide shared culture of the 21st century" (of which America might represent a small fraction numerically, but which is disproportionately American in its composition) survives, but does little good for Americans who suffer.

<comment><USER52> > _I'm defining "society" in terms of the only thing I care about: the people > and country around me._

The country/government is irrelevant, the people are the society and that _is_ what I am defining it as. Governments have come and gone with great frequency; societies almost always survive them. Really only genocides, cultural or otherwise, can halt them (and mad bombers are in no position to perform _any_ sort of genocide against modern society).

It strikes me as a fairly American-centric viewpoint that conflates American government and American society. Plenty of other countries with strong, long- lived, cultural identities have gone through _numerous_ governments in past centuries, many of these governments lasting a few short decades or less. A government is much easier to kill than a society, and dies with _far_ fewer consequences.

If the death of a _society_ is not what you are actually concerned about, then perhaps you should have put some thought into your initial comment before drawing comparisons to the fall of the roman empire. If merely the fall of governments and economies is what you are worried about, there are countless better examples.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> Finally some common sense in a world where common sense isn't so common. Don't let fear rule you, i'm glad not all media is out to scare people.

</comment><comment><USER54> Excuse my frankness, and this is a nice article and all, but why is this on Hacker News? I understand it being a very big story in the general news, but I come here for stories about a particular topic.

</comment><comment><USER55> "Our fears would play right into the perpetrators' hands -- and magnify the power of their victory for whichever goals whatever group behind this, still to be uncovered, has."

Thats really bad writing!

</comment><comment><USER56> Thank you for this.

</comment><comment><USER57> The title "Marathon Bombing" does not give right vibe. :(</comment>


Regeneration of the articular surface of the rabbit hip joint by cell homing - <AUTHOR> http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(10)60668-X/fulltext <comment><AUTHOR> Interesting article, paving the way for the 'hip replacement' of the future.

I expect that in the coming decade we will see more of these stem cell related re-generation proofs of concept, which will slowly work their way in to treatments.</comment>


Facebook is now completely useless - <AUTHOR>

I spoke too soon. Not a day before I was declaring that Facebook had beat the crap out of Google+ just to have Facebook release a layout change that makes it completely useless. Everyone is now subscribed to but the default setting is to only show "Most updates" in your news feed unless you manually change the setting for every single friend. Instead of having a news feed with all status updates they are forcing everyone to use a variation of the "most important updates" or whatever it was called before. Facebook really screwed up. <comment><USER2> I deeply admire Facebook for having the guts to make these large UI changes. Every time they rollout anything that is different there is a near riot of people clamoring about how bad it is or how things were so much better with the old system.

I don't think the updates are capricious or arbitrary, I think they are the result of doing lots of testing with lots of users and then having the strength to weather the criticism that inevitably comes with change while they watch the metrics to see if things are actually improving.

<comment><USER3> Agree. It first became obvious just how big Facebook would come when they simply breezed through the objections to the introduction of the newsfeed and opening up of the site to high-schoolers.

They've also proved willing to dump more good ideas than most startups have ever had.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Useless? Really? I used facebook last night. And it seemed to get the job done. Are you sure you're not being overly dramatic?

</comment><comment><USER5> Sorry, but this post is ridiculous. To expect hundreds of millions of people to up and leave a site...that is highly unlikely.

Is facebook obnoxious? Yes. Do their features generally work well enough to keep the unwashed 95% happy? Yes. Are people proficient with computers/interwebz more likely to be upset anytime FB/another entity changes something? Yes.

This post seems to fall into the latter of the above 3 categories. The take- away, I suppose, is that people tend to be averse to change. No surprise there...

</comment><comment><USER6> I don't understand what they want? Who asked for this text wall?

To be honest, 99% of the time i just check for new messages or use the chat and don't care about anything else.

There may be a lot of people who care about this stuff, but how are they supposed to find anything relevant?

</comment><comment><USER7> I think they are wary about being a has-been site like all the big networks before them. Whereas the other two failed to innovate quick enough, Facebook seems prime to innovate itself right out of existence.

<comment><USER8> Innovation is fine.. in fact, it should be encouraged. Where websites (and most other products) really fall down is that few companies are good at introducing innovation subtly. If you create some hot new feature, surely you have to make it front-and-center in your site design, using up space to make it stand-out to users.

Do this enough times and you start to look like myspace (or now Facebook) a jumbled mess of previously "hot new" features scattered all over the place. I can barely tell what the hell is even going on when looking at a Facebook page anymore, which is exactly where I was with myspace pages right when the service peaked and then started plummeting into the ground.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> > Facebook is completely useless

FTFY

</comment><comment><USER10> Agree that FB should not be trying to make things more complicated. Simplicity and the large number of users they had were their two strong points. Now one of those is starting to go.</comment>


Efficiently grouping similar DNA sequences to remove duplicates (2019) - <AUTHOR> https://blog.liudaniel.com/n-grams-BK-trees <comment><AUTHOR> I am a high school student and this blog post is a summary of a research project I did. The full published paper can be viewed here: [https://peerj.com/articles/8275/](https://peerj.com/articles/8275/).

This is not really explained in the blog post, but the "naive" method is O(N^2) brute force search, and the "combos" method is recursively going through all combinations of UMIs within a certain edit distance. There are also some other variants that are evaluated.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask me!</comment>


Siri What Happened in Tiananmen Square? - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2012/06/19/siri-what-happened-at-tiananmen-square-in-1989/

<comment><USER2> I'm pretty sure Siri would react similarly if you asked it about 9/11 or D-Day. It's a helpful personal assistant, not an encyclopedia, and I haven't seen any Apple ads mentioning that you can ask it about specific events in history.

The directions thing is curious, I'll give you that, but then again, it might just be because of the dev beta.

<comment><USER3> I just tried this on my iPhone (iOS 5). You are correct about the date.

"Siri, what happened on September 11, 2001?" "You don't have anything on your calendar on Sep 11, 2001."

"Siri, what happened on 9/11?" "You have a couple of meetings for September 11, 2012"

I wasn't able to think of a close analogy for the directions to test, unfortunately.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What happens when you ask the tiananmen square questions outside china?</comment>


Ask HN: What prevents Microsoft from adding a 'secure mode' to combat cheating? - <AUTHOR> Could Microsoft (using them as an example since gaming is my focus) implement something in the kernel so that applications can "opt in" at the request of the user to be isolated from other processes?
Imagine I run a game server and demand that players who play on it must put their client into secure mode where even if they have root or admin rights, they can't read or write to the memory of the secure process.
Is there any technical or other reason why MS doesn't provide a secure layer inside of windows for applications like online games? <comment><USER2> There is no way your game server can verify that the clients are actually running in a hypothetical secure mode.

Any calculation or data that client could send to your server could equally be calculated or sent by a hacked copy running in an insecure environment.

<comment><USER3> Not necessarily. If TPMs/Trusted Execution Cores come into play, Microsoft can ensure that only trusted software can understand server communications. Most modern systems already have the hardware for this, as it is required for Secure Boot.

See: Netflix 4K requiring Kaby Lake processors for their on-die DRM solution.

<comment><USER4> The only way for this to work would be for Microsoft to provide the hardware to begin with. As it stands, all the "security" technologies are still under the control of the user, which means the only barrier is the time it takes to reverse-engineer how they work.

> Netflix 4K requiring Kaby Lake processors for their on-die DRM solution.

Just a matter of time before it's reverse engineered. It's not secure by any means. You can prove this by using the same technologies to allow anyone to download (but not use, due to DRM) a private key associated with a lot of cryptocurrency, and see how little time it takes before someone steals the money.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> They are working on such a tech. It's called TruePlay and already exists for UWP games.

As much as a recall it's not as much Anti Cheat but anti tamper that could be used to detect cheating and then be used to disable access to online gaming or just shutdown the game right there and then.

In its current form it much ask you for permission to monitor your game and is only available for UWP titles and I have yet to be pestered about such premission though the only recent UWP game I currently play is the latest Forza Horizon.

</comment><comment><USER6> How about you rewrite your program instead? you should never ever trust the client. Validate output, dont send more data than necessary (player positions etc).

<comment><USER7> I never understood why this isn't the case already for competitive games. I'm not a game dev so I don't know if there are hidden complexities but for e.g. a game like CS:GO with a small number of moving parts, couldn't the server only send positions to a player if they are liable to be able to see the other person, in a manner similar to occlusion culling and spatial partitioning? That would at the very least prevent wallhacks beyond a short distance, and some level of validation on inputs would prevent speedhacks, spinbots etc. I'm guessing the limitation is on the amount of work the server would have to do?

<comment><USER8> This already happens, spinbots and speedhacks aren't a thing anymore.

The current hacks are aim triggers, aim lock, aim/spray assist, and some close proximity wallhack.

The cheats calculate the recoil spread and auto lock to enemy heads. It's obviously not as a bad as before with client side bullets, but it is still a problem.

<comment><USER7> is that a recent innovation? I haven't really played CS regularly for about a year, but before then when I'd overwatch I saw quite a few cases of blatant long-distance wall hacks - people looking directly at an opponent's head through a wall from spawn to spawn.

I'm not sure how you could feasibly prevent the remaining hacks server-side as they're nigh-indistinguishable from player skill, if the hacks supply some non-determinism/jitter so you're not instantly snapping to a player's head when they're behind you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This could be one use case of Intel SGX: [https://software.intel.com/en- us/sgx](https://software.intel.com/en-us/sgx)

</comment><comment><USER10> Read up on TPM

</comment><comment><USER11> > Is there any technical or other reason why MS doesn't provide a secure layer > inside of windows for applications like online games?

Yes</comment>


New net rules set to make cookies crumble - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-12668552 <comment><USER2> I'm mystified that they're trying to pressure countless advertisers rather than a handful of browser vendors who could make the problem go away by changing the defaults from "persist every cookie from anywhere forever".

<comment><USER3> Don't forget flash cookies.

<comment><USER4> And there's precisely one vendor in charge of the defaults and capabilities of those.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The ad networks and such will just track you through browser/device fingerprinting instead of cookies. Except for extremely tightly controlled, homogenous systems in corporations, it doesn't take _much_ info beyond your IP and user agent to uniquely identify a PC. Your history/cache, fonts, plugins, screen/viewport size, etc. are all discoverable from the browser.

<comment><USER6> Indeed -- it'd be the browsers job to make this kind of profiling less effective. Just restricting cookies is not enough.

Does anyone know of a firefox addon (or for another browser) that 'homogenizes' the info sent to sites?

<comment><USER7> TorButton does that (and, of course, allows you to switch Tor on/off).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "Specifically excluded by the directive are cookies that log what people have put in online shopping baskets."

I am speechless beyond words about this total lack of imagination. So the only ebusinesses endorsed by the government are shopping sites?

Thinking about it, this will probably just strenghten Facebook. Facebook will hide a "consent checkbox" somewhere in their intractable pricavy settings. Then all sites that use Facebook authentication are good to go.

I suppose Facebook might even be able to provide some sort of server side cookie service. Perhaps it could be a JavaScript from Facebook that reads the Facebook cookie from Facebook and sends a hash value to the server. The server can then ask Facebook for the identity. Or something like that.

<comment><USER4> I heard that some people also use Google, Yahoo, MS Live and other services besides Facebook.

<comment><USER8> Not for logging in, though. And in the future more and more sites could turn to Facebook as their single login solution, because they solve the tracking consent problem.

<comment><USER4> Facebook is popular for that, but personally I use Twitter, Google and Yahoo (via their openid services) for login to several sites, including this one. Facebook has by no means won the contest to provide a 'single login'. I don't think anybody is going to.

Facebook is my _last_ choice for signing into a site, as they give the site access to more data then is needed.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This article isn't clear whether it means all cookies or just cookies that are tracking users cross-website. I really, really hope it means the latter.

<comment><USER10> From para 66 of the Directive ( [http://eur- lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2...](http://eur- lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2009:337:0011:0036:En:PDF) ):

"Exceptions to the obligation to provide information and offer the right to refuse should be limited to those situations where the technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user."

I would take this to mean that session cookies, shopping cart cookies and wotnot are exempted. But I'm a coder, not a lawyer, so pinch of salt 'n all that.

Edit: in fact reading it more closely, it would appear that this statement merely places a restriction on exemptions that individual nations implementing the Directive might carve out. If they make exceptions, they must be limited to the situations described, but they don't _have_ to exempt all such uses. Which is a less-than-comforting thought.

<comment><USER9> Paragraph 66 in full:

Third parties may wish to store information on the equip ment of a user, or gain access to information already stored, for a number of purposes, ranging from the legiti mate (such as certain types of cookies) to those involving unwarranted intrusion into the private sphere (such as spy ware or viruses). It is therefore of paramount importance that users be provided with clear and comprehensive infor mation when engaging in any activity which could result in such storage or gaining of access. The methods of pro viding information and offering the right to refuse should be as user-friendly as possible. Exceptions to the obligation to provide information and offer the right to refuse should be limited to those situations where the technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user. Where it is technically possible and effective, in accordance with the relevant provisions of Directive 95/46/EC, the user's consent to processing may be expressed by using the appropriate settings of a browser or other application. The enforcement of these require ments should be made more effective by way of enhanced powers granted to the relevant national authorities.

(apologies for linebreaks, PDF copy/paste fail)

This isn't nearly as bad as what the BBC are saying. In fact this seems perfectly reasonable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Does this include use of cookies in analytics services such as Google Analytics, KISSMetrics, etc?</comment>


How Will Free Wikipedia Access Change Africa and the Middle East? - <AUTHOR> http://www.readwriteweb.com/enterprise/2012/01/how-will-free-wikipedia-access.php

<comment><USER2> Surprised the article is so negative.

This is an awesome step. Is it perfect? No. Not all of the 3000 languages spoken in Africa are represented in the wikipedia. There are probably some challenges with the ones that are whistled or drummed. But 75% of Africans speak 12 languages.

I've never edited a wikipedia article, yet I've found enormous benefit in reading the articles. I'm glad this step is opening up access to so many people that would not have been able to afford it otherwise.</comment>


Babylonians tracked Jupiter with calculus precursor 1400 years before others - <AUTHOR> http://science.sciencemag.org/content/351/6272/435 <comment><AUTHOR> Lends credence to the belief that the Magi who came from the East were from Babylon.</comment>


ZeTrip: Travel Inspiration - <AUTHOR> http://zetrip.com

<comment><USER2> Err. I think that should be Social Travel Site rather than Socialist Travel Site.

Unless of course they specialize in trips to North Korea.

<comment><USER3> Or the White House.

(btw, this is a joke)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What exactly is socialist about it? Does everyone put in a pool of money or a place where they really want to go to, and then travel together with the accumulated budget?

That might actually be a good idea.

<comment><USER5> I think it's supposed to be social, not socialist.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> From each according to his frequent flier mileage, to each according to his need!

</comment><comment><USER7> the infographic is really nice. I wish I could directly ask about my friends advice about a place with a few clicks.

</comment><comment><USER8> The infographic is truly amazing.

</comment><comment><USER9> i love their infographics! it is awesome to see my social graph in an infographic. i wonder what they will come up with next</comment>


JQuery vs. Reactjs Thinking - <AUTHOR> http://blog.zigomir.com/react.js/jquery/2015/01/11/jquery-versus-react-thinking.html

<comment><USER2> I don't know for Reatjs but you can be shorter with jQuery : [http://jsbin.com/pumocohiyu/1/edit?html,css,js,output](http://jsbin.com/pumocohiyu/1/edit?html,css,js,output)

<comment><USER2> What I wanted to point out is that the complexity of the algorithm YOU choose is not a good basis to compare libraries on.

<comment><USER3> Exactly. Testability, ability to render on server and overall readability and a slew of other points make for a good basis.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> It pretty much comes down to imperative vs declarative thinking.</comment>


Open source CMS for schools? - <AUTHOR> Hello everyone, I am wondering what options there are as far as open source CMS for schools that people who are less tech savvy could use pretty easily. We used to use something called Julio (A drupal distribution) which I had to update what I could since it was no longer being updated.
https://www.drupal.org/project/julio
I really liked the school focused options it had. Thats kind of what we are looking for.
I'm sorry if this isn't the right place to post this. <comment><USER2> It really depends on the scale of what you're doing. K12 or higher ed, how many students, how many classes, how many students in each class, etc.

I used to work part time as a jr. sysadmin for my university, we hosted Moodle for a slew of engineering courses. From both sides of the equation --- both as a student using Moodle in classes and as someone who was semi-aware of what went into hosting Moodle (wasn't a primary responsibility of mine), I think it's a great platform.

The university at large now uses Canvas. I can't speak to what it's like to host it, but I can say that as a student I think it's vastly inferior to Moodle or Desire2Learn. It has the same problem that a lot of modern websites have: the UI is very beautiful and modern but it requires a million clicks to get anything done, and the organization is a mess. There's no central page to see my grades. Some teachers don't put assignments into the system until they're due, which means that the "upcoming assignment" pages are useless because there are often times where an assignment isn't listed there. It seems very extensible, eg: there's an embedded Piazza tab on a couple of the Canvas pages for my courses, and my math class has a tab that brings up a real-time video chat if students want to work together remotely. These are definitely 3rd party and so the sky is the limit if there's some particular workflow that you want to add onto the platform.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think you might have thought that I meant LMS or learning management system. I'm really just looking for a good content management system for a small K12 school district. A district website you know. We've been using WordPress which isn't terrible but I'm just wondering what the options are. Thank you for the great comment though. Alot of good information in there.

<comment><USER3> WordPress is what I was going to suggest. There are so many great plugins and themes now, as well as drag and drop screen builders that don't require coding. For a free CMS, it's hard to beat.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Check out OctoberCMS

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

Very nice simple but powerful system.

Open source as well.</comment>


Boomerang for Gmail Alternative MailFred Open Sources Server Components - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/MailFred/mailfred-appengine <comment><USER2> If you're like me, this low-info-density GitHub account left you scratching your head. The information about what this is and what it does can be found here: [http://www.mailfred.de/](http://www.mailfred.de/) .</comment>


Ask HN: Should I translate my website? - <AUTHOR>

I run a website that is a simple tool for a certain task. Right now it is available in english only. It attracts half a million visitors a month. It's mainly word of mouth, press and social traffic. Since it's a tool, there is no text content. So I only rank for very few keywords in search engines. Do you think I should translate the page in all languages? It contains only few words, so it would be easy. I could have a french version at fr.mysite.com, a portuguese version at pt.mysite.com etc etc. Have you made good experiences with this? <comment><USER2> I've tried this with my website thinking it would be a quick way to expand my income, but it was not worth it. My SEO "juice" didn't translate much to my /de and /en pages. In my experience, you're more or less starting from scratch when you do this. And getting word of mouth and press coverage in a language that's not yours is not an easy thing. That said, what is your app about? I am a native French speaker and perhaps I could help you out.</comment>


The Source Code for NYC's Forensic DNA Statistical Analysis Tool - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/propublica/nyc-dna-software <comment><USER2> For context, this is getting released just after the city council committee on technology had a public hearing about a bill that would require any software used by the government to prosecute folks for crimes to be open source:

[https://www.fwdeveryone.com/t/FrtKpHJ2T0mCic3j_FSzPQ/nyc- sof...](https://www.fwdeveryone.com/t/FrtKpHJ2T0mCic3j_FSzPQ/nyc-software- transparency-bill-1696)

This bill would set the standard for the entire country, so the testimony is actually pretty interesting and worth watching, especially the opening speech by councilman Vacca.

[https://councilnyc.viebit.com/player.php?hash=xHL4m7vQXCM9](https://councilnyc.viebit.com/player.php?hash=xHL4m7vQXCM9)

I also testify at 56:00, albeit hadn't prepared remarks in advance so wasn't as polished as some of the other folks.

<comment><USER3> This is excellent news and I'm incredibly grateful the code used to convict people will be publicly scrutinized.

That said, me and other C# devs have already found numerous signs that at least parts of the codebase were done by someone clueless or inexperienced with C#. And there's no tests.

If someone spends the time to look into the codebase, I'm predicting a basically 100% chance that parts of this code will be shown to produce inaccurate or completely wrong results. Innocent people will probably go free because of this.

<comment><USER4> The fact that there are no tests makes me feel incredibly sad - there are probably plenty of people who were unfairly sentenced because of this.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Code in "Comparison.cs" on line 1307

       // if we don't have frequencies, use the default (this should never happen, but here it is)
                        if (tblFreq == null || tblFreq.Rows.Count == 0)
                        {
                            a = (float)0.02;
                            b = (float)0.02;
                        }

is kind of fishy. Why not bomb out instead of failing silently for things that are never supposed to happen? Not saying this is inherently wrong - I'm certainly not capable of actually understanding the details of the analysis

<comment><USER3> This guy that wrote this is a c# noob. He should just use a null conditional for the if, Epsilon for tiny but non-zero floats, and should very likely be using doubles instead of float since they're basically the same speed for double the precision.

Bonus points for not using the shorthand float literal syntax.

I would expect to see this many goofs only from someone that's been using C# for a month or so. I only used it for a couple years

<comment><USER6> Your criticism seems a bit overboard. You are making assumptions about things you don't know about, and are judging personal choice floating point representation.

<comment><USER3> I can overlook a lot of coding issues, but seeing so many in a few lines is a sign somebody doesn't know what they're doing. Just using a linter would probably find some of these automatically, so the fact that they're there is a strong signal that the dev didn't even know/care to use one.

I'm making assumptions based on experience with C# codebases and I think my argument on double vs float is solid. I don't think I've ever seen floats used in a production C# codebase because there's no point.

Overboard maybe :) but I still think whoever wrote that is very inexperienced.

<comment><USER7> Looks pretty bad to me. Null conditional doesn't really matter because the code likely predates its existence. But...

[https://github.com/propublica/nyc-dna- software/blob/master/F...](https://github.com/propublica/nyc-dna- software/blob/master/FST.Common/Database.cs#L122)

1\. Knows how to use "using" but doesn't use it for myConnection.

2\. myConnection.CreateCommand would be more idiomatic than new SqlCommand ... cmd.Connection = myConnection;

3\. Doesn't know how to use "using"! using (DataTable myDt ... then goes on to "return myDT"

4\. Also just noticed the oddity of myAdapter.SelectCommand = cmd although cmd is immediately disposed after that, then Fill is called later.

That's one function although the rest seem to repeat similar sins (CTRL+C, CTRL+V).

<comment><USER3> Nice! I can see more too.

Using out parameters, these are highly discouraged. C# let's you do terrible things (including goto) but the community is pretty aligned that it's bad practice. In my years of doing C# I've never used one once.

Not using var anywhere. This is C# type inference 101.

Throwing "Exception" in catch with only a message. This is horrific because it throws away the original context and any stack trace. You can just say "throw" (just the one word) or rethrow the exception with an innerexception with the original info trivially. This is unforgivable, an experienced C# developer would never do this.

Extraneous uses of "this" when it's the default.

Initializing variables to null

Not using shorthand object initializers(but this is only in newer versions of C#)

Using class variables instead of properties

Using parse instead of TryParse... Like Java exception handling is an expensive stack unwind on failure, not supposed to be used for control flow.

The worst though, is how did they didn't make a method to reuse the SQL connect and data table code and instead copy pasted it around 20 times.

<comment><USER8> If the input parsed is supposed to be well formed or isn't in a high performance area it's totally fine to use parse rather than the sorta ugly TryParse (which require using out params you just said were bad).

Especially if all they're going to do is throw.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I haven't had a chance to dig into the analysis part of the code yet, but here's an amusing variable assignment that jumped out at me in `FST.Common/ComparisonData.cs`.

        compareMethodIDSerializationBackupDoNotMessWithThisVariableBecauseItsAnUglyHackAroundACrappyLimitiationOfTheFCLsCrappyXMLSerializer = comparisonID;

<comment><USER3> I love this type of thing in C# because it's such a terse and well designed language. It's easy to make something stand out.

A cult favorite of devs at my previous employer was to (ab)use the power of LINQ to try to create the longest single line methods possible. I held the unofficial record for a while with a LINQ statement over 1200 chars. Innocent enough since resharper can unwrap them into sane code but lots of fun

<comment><USER9> I love/hate it when someone writes a linq statement and ends with "look, one line".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> On first glance it uses very old frameworks (for example, ASP.NET WebForms) and there are 0 unit tests.

A concerning thing is that a dev database username and password was committed to multiple files, like this: [https://github.com/propublica/nyc-dna- software/blob/master/F...](https://github.com/propublica/nyc-dna- software/blob/master/FSTServiceConsoleHost/app.config#L17).

<comment><USER11> For this kind of project, given the stakes involved (e.g. a defendant's freedom), why would you want to use the brand-new framework-of-the-month that the cool kids are using?

<comment><USER12> Possibly they shouldn't be using bug ridden trash either seems like a compromise ought to be possible.

<comment><USER13> Webforms are not trash, just very annoying to use as a developer.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It seems that the source code for any computer program who's output is used as evidence in a court of law should be available for inspection.

</comment><comment><USER15> The accompanying article/blog post linked in the Readme ([https://www.propublica.org/article/federal-judge-unseals- new...](https://www.propublica.org/article/federal-judge-unseals-new-york- crime-labs-software-for-analyzing-dna-evidence)) has good background & information about the history of this, as well as potential impact moving forward.

</comment><comment><USER16> I work in DNA analysis and stuff like this makes me happy specifically because I know just how easy it is to have flawed analysis techniques written in software.

<comment><USER17> How long does this stuff typically take to run on a dataset?

<comment><USER16> That depends on the specific kind of analysis being done and one what size of dataset you want to run the analysis. Some analysis techniques filters data down to just a few MiB, others need as much as a few hundred GiB, for a single individual. Sometimes you do population analysis on that data which can end up multiplying individual sample size to the size of the population.

<comment><USER17> Ok, what kind of ballpark time do each of those entail? You didn't give a single hard number.

<comment><USER18> I've done work in statistical genetics, but not in forensic analysis specifically, so take these rough estimates with a grain of salt. That said, forensic analysis generally involves identifying the origin of a tissue sample. If the sample is substantial enough for reliable genotyping, once the genotyping is done the actual identification step should take less than a second in a well-optimized system, even to pick out the origin from every human genome in history (assuming such a database was available.) It's just a matter of finding who has matching allelic variants, and ensuring that you match over enough common alleles with low linkage disequilibrium (shared- haplotype correlation) that the risk of a match is infinitesimal, even among individuals with high consanguinity. If you organized the genomes in a tree where each node split on a single allele, you could search in logarithmic time.

<comment><USER19> The situation is more difficult if you consider the possibility of having multiple contributors to a sample (mixtures), allele dropout, etc. I've heard some models/implementations take a day for MCMC sampling to calculate the probabilities. (I'm talking about forensic DNA specifically)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Is there a large dataset of anonymized DNA samples that we could try this tool against? Does 23andme do something like that? I hope they don't but it would be very useful for just this one case!

<comment><USER18> Amazingly, it looks like they still use Sanger sequencing, and a lot of the uncertainty will probably come from genotyping errors.

There is a lot of anonymized genotype data in the 1000 Genomes Project ([http://www.internationalgenome.org/data](http://www.internationalgenome.org/data)), but the devil is really in the genotyping details with this kind of thing. It looks like in the validation project ([https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4113877-1-19-17-Exhi...](https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4113877-1-19-17-Exhibit- I-FST-Executive-Summary.html)), they went from biological samples to sequence data to analysis results, which is the right approach.

With this kind of low-througput genotyping so much depends on the accuracy of the genotyping method, though, which in turn depends on the lab, the protocol, the technicians, and sometimes even the weather. The software is not where I would start, in worrying about forensic evidence based on this method, though it definitely could be a source of errors.

<comment><USER21> I'm not sure what you mean by "amazingly, it looks like they still use Sanger sequencing". Sanger is considered gold standard-- all HTS genome methods are validated against it.

<comment><USER18> For this task, the low throughput harms performance. There are genotyping methods which will measure tens of thousands of common variants for a couple of bucks. And the more genotypes you have, the surer you can be of a match, even given a slightly higher genotyping error rate.

<comment><USER21> I think you may be misunderstanding my point (it's not clear if you are an expert in this area; I have more than a passing knowledge of DNA). In every area I have worked in, Sanger sequencing is considered gold standard and is used whenver the results are being used for medical purposes. That includes genotyping as well as verifying the results of WGS>

It's considered a critical QC step.

Throughput doesn't matter if you have false-positive or false negative errors that cause erroneous medical decisions.

<comment><USER18> I'm very familiar with Sanger sequencing. Base for base it's one of the most accurate methods. It is by no means worthy of being considered a gold standard, it's just somewhat better. And the drawback is that dollar for dollar, it's pretty inefficient. You can genotype all the common variants using an Affymetrix gene chip,and base your inference on vastly more data. For forensic analysis, where the goal is to discriminate genomes, that would be much more accurate. Maybe go back and verify the most discriminatory/confirmatory loci with Sanger sequencing after that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> I just love the way they have connection string along with what seems real database URI and accompanying username and password.

</comment><comment><USER23> Nested ternaries, ungodly amounts of repetition, ZERO tests, hardcoded sensitive info... this code wouldn't pass code review anywhere. I don't care when it was written, any day it is used to send people to jail it should be the best possible code humans can write. And it is so far from that.</comment>