Netflix to let viewers pick how TV episodes and movies will end - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-10-01/netflix-is-said-to-plan-choose-your-own-adventure-black-mirror <comment><USER2> "If you want Calculon to race to the laser gun battle in his hover-Ferarri, press 1. If you want Calculon to double-check his paperwork, press 2. Enter now."

[1]: Violent Lasergun Battle

[2]: Tedious Paperwork

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1F4OduqrtQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1F4OduqrtQ)

</comment><comment><USER3> I believe when Charlie Brooker first got on board with Netflix to produce the third season of Black Mirror, he made a suggestion to introduce some kind of interactive element to the show but Netflix decided it wasn't technically possible to do what he wanted at the time. I can't remember where I read or heard this but it got me thinking about what kind of innovation you could bring to a traditional TV series when it is distributed via the internet.

For example you could show slightly different versions of the show to different viewers, of you could subtly alter the show when viewed on second or third viewing. Or the show could change depending on the time of year that you watch it. This kind of breaking of the fourth wall and breaking of fiction from reality could fit extremely well into a Black Mirror type of story. I'd love to hear what others suggest.

As far as interactivity, and 'choose-your-own-adventure' style of story telling I think that will probably get boring pretty quick. We already have this kind of story telling with games such as Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls and while many people view those games as innovative forms of cinematic games, I would say they are pretty tedious and non-immersive forms of cinema.

<comment><USER4> > show slightly different versions of the show to different viewers

The 1985 movie _Clue_ was released with three different endings[1]. And if you really wanted to see them all, you had to go to the movie at least three times in different theaters.

[1]: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clue_(film)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clue_\(film\))

<comment><USER5> For anyone who hasn't seen it...

First, go watch it before the rumored Ryan Reynolds remake. It's a fun movie and holds up fairly well.

Second, when released for home they rolled all three endings into the storyline so you get to see all three.

Three, watch it again after the viewing the endings to see how all three actually do work in the story. May require more than one additional viewing to get it all, but worth it in my opinion.

Four, relatively safe for children and my kids love it.

<comment><USER6> Awesome, thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This sounds awful. This is a problem I have with a lot of Netflix's content. It's nobody's baby. There's no singular vision behind it where a person came up with a story they want to tell. Instead it's algorithmically generated like "Here's some things that popular things have in common, write a story around these elements". That _can_ get something passable sometimes, but mostly not.

Most great art is the product of one mind at the most basic level. Of course with something like a TV show or movie there are thousands of people involved, but there has to a captain to the ship, so to speak. Otherwise it just floats around aimlessly because multiple people can be pulling it in different directions.

It's riskier, because if that person is bad, the whole thing is going to turn out bad, but it's the only way to get something truly good.

<comment><USER8> That's not how Netflix content is written. There are sometimes algorithm- driven decisions on which projects to acquire and finance, but once they buy something, the creators have full control to execute their vision -- much moreso than with a conventional network or studio.

<comment><USER9> None of the content that makes it to mass media -- film, tv, whatever -- is the unique vision of a sole creator. People are foisting their fears about this onto Netflix, and find evidence of "writing-by-data" in its content, because they are looking for it. No one wants to pull down the curtain and look this closely at the rest of the media we consume because it would ruin the illusion that it's worth watching. Like most other media, video has lost most of its cult value.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Ehhh, if there's a group of people who _shouldn 't_ decide how a show ends... it would definitely be fans of that show.

<comment><USER11> They're talking about releasing an episode with multiple variants and you choose which one you want to watch. Fans won't influence what gets released.

<comment><USER10> My point still stands, I prefer the writer have to choose a singular ending.

<comment><USER11> I think multiple endings make a lot of sense for a show like Black Mirror, where the existence of multiple endings could help drive home the point the writer is trying to make.

It probably also makes for more engaging children's programming, where story is less important than keeping the audience active and engaged.

<comment><USER12> Indeed, I think they would be entirely appropriate for the specific case of Black Mirror -- and even more appropriate if they sort of suck, since Black Mirror is all about the unintended and depressing consequences of the abuse of technology.

For the general case of TV shows, I'm against multiple choice endings.

<comment><USER11> I'm against this in general too, but the current plan sounds good. I don't think this is likely to expand beyond occasional specials, as it costs more and makes binge and background watching more difficult.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This was a thing when I was in middle school, but for books

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

They were all the rage

<comment><USER14> Would you consider any of these books good, beyond the novelty?

<comment><USER15> I liked the Fighting Fantasy ones by Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone.

<comment><USER16> Sorcery books are especially good. The mobile adaptation by Inkle available on Android and iPhone is also high quality. I never thought text game would consume so much of my time! :)

<comment><USER15> I've been thinking of picking up Sorcery on Steam. I never managed to get stuck into those books during their peak.

<comment><USER16> Yep, me too. But the game format is I think more suited to this kind of adventure. The rewind feature is almost like cheating but actually allows exploring broader decision trees. I've finished all parts multiple times with different paths and this was definitely one of most engaging experiences I've had on mobile (in sick of casual games plague).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> As the Pontiac Aztek has shown, design by committee is not necessarily an effective approach and can lead to awful results due to the lack of a unified vision or goal. I imagine this will end similarly

<comment><USER18> A camel is a horse designed by committee.

<comment><USER19> Well, good luck using a horse when the requirements really do call for a camel.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I worry this won't end well. Netflix already lets series run on too long. Shows that start out good will cater not only to the long tail that sees them through to the end, but a smaller segment who votes.

<comment><USER21> > Netflix already lets series run on too long

Says who ? I mean, you do realize their goal isn't and shouldn't be to make the best content possible, but to make the content that the most people would want to watch and be willing to keep their subscription active for ?

If they let their series run that long, it's because it makes sense for them.

Most people have a few thing we like where, when it turned to crap quality wise, we're still following along because we love it too much to let go. How many people have kept reading the Dune sequels when they were published despite the clear fall of quality and lack of focus compared to the original book ? It isn't different.

(not that I'm not answering with your two other phrases, with which I agree, but to that one only)

<comment><USER22> > goal isn't and shouldn't be to make the best content possible, but to make > the content that the most people would want to watch and be willing to keep > their subscription active for

That is dangerous due to second-order effects. Initially, this strategy will work and be quite effective at maxing revenue. But over time, consumer perception will shift to 'Netflix makes shows that run too long' just like GP post demonstrated. This reduces the perceived value of netflix content and makes consumers less likely to start watching future netflix content.

<comment><USER20> Also, grandparent is assuming a bad season/sequel doesn't tarnish the original.

For example, my perception of House of Cards has been diminished by the subpar later seasons.

<comment><USER23> I don't think they are assuming any more than you are, that your experience is shared to the point where it matters.

The challenge in these discussions is how subjective this stuff is. If you didn't like the season, it "went on too long." If you did, then it didn't. The volume of anecdotes in HN threads show how useless that information is.

We like to think we're all art critics, but that's not how people watch television.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Populism meets art? No, thank you. Group think and optional solutions should have nothing to do with the telling of meaningful stories.

<comment><USER25> Art? Did you even read the post title? It's netflix.

<comment><USER24> Netflix has never won an Oscar but they have done pretty darn well at the Emmys: 225 nominations , 43 wins — Acting: 6, Writing: 6.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Users all separately picking endings to their shows, so that they never venture beyond what they _want_ to see? Sounds a bit like a Black Mirror episode.

<comment><USER27> Now I'm intrigued about the _meta_ -ness of the idea WRT Black Mirror...

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Focus group endings are a thing TV and movie producers have been doing for decades. It's not surprising these new media companies are coming up with some version of that which makes sense in the digital era. I'm only surprised that it took so long.

<comment><USER29> It doesn't even require focus groups. If you buy into Joseph Campbell's monomyth, or the more modern idea of tropes, then telling the stories people want and expect is so ingrained in our storytelling that it's hard to _not_ do it.

That's what amazed me most about Breaking Bad... how effectively it undermined our storytelling expectations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> Netflix has created some of the best TV shows I have watched in the past few years.

Strangers things, Maniac, The End of the F __*ing World, Narcos, On my block, Master of none, El Chapo, Ozark, Glow, Disenchanted, Black mirror, Dare Devil, 13 reasons why, Jessica Jones, The Punisher, A series of unfortunate events, The OA, Orange is the new black

Those are just some of the ones I can recall at the moment.

Only other shows that I use popcorn time to watch are Game of thrones and Homeland.

<comment><USER31> Why not subscribe to showtime / hbo?

<comment><USER32> If you're not in the US/NL(?), you can't.

<comment><USER33> HBO Go works fine in Poland

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> A little further along, but the BBC R&D have been working on something in a similar vein for a few years. [https://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/visual- perceptive-media](https://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/visual-perceptive-media)

</comment><comment><USER35> Ugh. Netflix, please don't jump the shark and do this. I want to watch what _actual_ writers have come up with.

</comment><comment><USER36> As long as they do it sparingly, it may be ok. But going from the experience of the between-seasons episode of Stretch Armstrong that one of the grandkids likes to watch, I'd be really annoyed if they did that treatment to any of my favorite shows.

First, when I sit down on the couch to watch TV, I want to relax and have the entertainment fed to me. If I want to play a video game, I'd fire up the Atari system. Really don't want to be jumping for the remote and make a decision several times in the show, and keep track of all the plot lines so I can see everything.

Now if you can set it to not prompt you, but randomize each pivot point, and / or give each permutation a number that you can select at the beginning, then it may be interesting to watch the episode multiple times to catch each variation.

</comment><comment><USER37> "The foray into choose-your-own-adventure programming represents a big bet on a nascent form of entertainment known as interactive TV"

Err, no, it represents a big bet on the _really old_ form of entertainment known as "interactive TV", which is older than a great deal of the HN denizens reading this and replete with a history of failure despite multiple attempts.

The question is, will this be the iPad of interactive TV, the implementation of a long-standing idea replete with failure that finally succeeds, or just another in the long line of failure? If the people involved are unaware of the history, the latter seems more likely, but I can't tell if those involved are unaware or just the person writing this article.

"Interactive TV" as an idea isn't quite an instance of what I call the BOAC fallacy [1], but it's a related idea. The short version of that idea is that you can take a new technology and computerize it, and that it will be just exactly like the old technology with all the same affordances and capabilities and business structures, "But On A Computer!", instead of realizing that the act of transferring the technology to a computer will cause profound, sweeping changes. Interactive TV is like the stupidest, simplest idea of what adding computers to video can produce; the same video system, the same production mechanisms, the same delivery mechanisms, the same amount of control over the audience, But Now It's Interactive! In the shallowest possible way. Literally; in information theory terms audiences will be given single-digit bits worth of control over the result, and ultimately I would expect the experiences to be at least semi-optimized for the viewer still watching everything in the end, which reduces the choices down to an ordering choice rather than a "real" choice.

Instead, the technology that permitted interactive television permitted video games, mobile apps that take interaction to a much higher level there as well, YouTube and all accompanying experiences, Twitch and all accompanying experiences, and so on, a rich ecosystem of options and opportunities that aren't just "it's video, hooked up to some quick time events! Wow!" Dragon's Lair is already a super-slick version of the "interactive TV" idea, and we consider it an interesting historical curiosity of an ultimately failed development line, not something content producers all strive to emulate.

Given the nature of Black Mirror, it's a decent guess they'll at least exploit some artistic possibilities out of it, but in the end I doubt this will take off. Not because it's necessarily a "bad" idea, but because the space is already saturated with _better_ ideas that are already multiple generations into their development cycle that will crowd it out, just as the newspaper web experience is now fundamentally different than the paper experience.

(So much so that it's easy for young people today to not realize that the original promise of "newspapers on the web" was very often painted not as a modern hyperlinked site with comment sections, etc., but basically as downloading a PDF (in modern terms) of a newspaper, formatted identically to the modern newspaper, with people talking about how nice the experience would be of clicking "continued on Page 8" to go to page 8 instead of having to fuss with the pages. Particularly forward-thinking prognosticators might consider the possibility of a Letters to the Editor page being updated on a better- than-daily schedule, but still, nothing much like what we actually got. I'm speaking of the general press here; the very technical people made better predictions, but this idea was very much in general circulation.)

[1]: [http://www.jerf.org/iri/post/2916](http://www.jerf.org/iri/post/2916)

</comment><comment><USER38> I read a lot of "book in which _you_ are the hero" (called "choose your own adventure" I think in the US) in my early years.

I'm always surprised the niche for this type of work in so small and revolves around the same themes and for a young audience. I think the fear of missing out on the alternate stories might be a factor but nothing would prevent you from reading all branches. Where are the "choose your own romance", the multiverse science fiction, the time travel stories where you pick the changes the hero does to the past, etc.

</comment><comment><USER39> We had a 90s TV show in Brazil called "You decide"[1]. One hour-long independent episodes with two pre-recorded endings. During the show people voted in their prefered ending by phone. The one with more votes would be displayed. The show was mildly popular, since I was a child back then I don't remember why they dropped it from the schedule.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voc%C3%AA_Decide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voc%C3%AA_Decide)

</comment><comment><USER40> I remember seeing a audience decided show at the BSA Jamboree in 1997. I don't remember anything about the content... I can't even recall if it was a video or a live action play, I just remember voting and being willing to think there was a chance the voting was rigged because one of the decisions went a different way than I voted.

</comment><comment><USER41> The best part of a good story is when it genuinely surprises me, does something I totally did not expect.

<comment><USER38> Plot twist: the options are actually swapped and when you choose one you get the other ending.

<comment><USER41> Nothing beats a good plot twist. ;-) But if I can vote for it, it's not much of a surprise, isn't it?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> "What do you think Linda?"

Reminds me of the scene from Fahrenheit 451.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxVhqtj83U8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxVhqtj83U8)

</comment><comment><USER27> Don't video games already fill the niche for interactive video-based entertainment?

</comment><comment><USER43> That seems to miss the point: I want to be surprised by the endings, or relive a great moment or quote, or I want to turn of my mind for a while -- these are basically my reasons to Netflix.

This would remove both.

</comment><comment><USER44> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voc%C3%AA_Decide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voc%C3%AA_Decide) brazilians did that first.

</comment><comment><USER45> So a TV version of RPGs? If it proves to be a success, I wonder if they'll make the beginning and middle interactive as well? Then why watch TV when RPGs are so much better?

</comment><comment><USER46> lol. I clicked through hoping this would be a way to disable autoplay and just end a show with the credits then dump back to the menus. The current "here's what's next" feels like force-feeding and I always dive for the remote to disable the post-show stuff.

</comment><comment><USER47> It will be a fun interesting mess. Imagine watchers getting completely opposing messages from the show and not being able to discuss it coherently unless they specify which version they watched. And who will watch all the versions will be as bemused as the ones who never watched it. Open endedness is a far easier solution imo.

</comment><comment><USER48> Didn't SyFy, or someone do something like this a few years ago with a show that was message board driven? This also reminds me of the Quantum Break on Xbox.

</comment><comment><USER49> Will I be given an executive producer credit and residuals for my creative input in the choice of the ending?

I'm not doing your job for you for free, Netflix. >:|

</comment><comment><USER50> has anyone seen the end of every MacGruber snl skit?.

done. you're welcome netflix ;)

</comment><comment><USER51> This sounds like a bad idea. When consuming "art", I generally care more about crazy shit I couldn't come up with rather than my ideas.

<comment><USER52> Given that it's supposed to be a Black Mirror special, I fully expect that there will not only be plenty of "crazy shit" in how they twist the user choice into something entirely unexpected (while still adhering to the precise wording of the choice option), but also that the episode topic itself will be user choice and how it can go horribly wrong.

I'd see it primarily as a hype vehicle, not as a general indication of the direction Netflix will take in the future. (If I'm mistaken I fully support your argument)

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> > It releases the same 25-minute sitcoms, hourlong documentaries and two-hour > movies as other TV networks.

I actually don't think this is true. If you actually look at their original programming they aren't constrained by the same things as traditional TV. They aren't bound to specific episode lengths, or writing around commercial breaks, or refreshing the viewer on what happened last week, etc. Those might not seem like a big deal, but IMO they are more meaningful than a choose-your-own- adventure gimmick, which will certainly not become mainstream.

<comment><USER40> I wish they would stop being constrained by making me push the "skip intro" button

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> Can't read article because I am in violation of some kind of terms:

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Using Safari Version 11.1.2 (13605.3.8). I don't care enough to confirm I'm not a robot...

<comment><USER55> Are you trying to access it through company VPN? I get similar issues when I do that from mine.

<comment><USER54> Ah, true. I use Encrypt.me on a public Wifi. Perfectly legitimate use, and I get blocked. Oh well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER56> Netflix is dead. their content quality is already "daytime cable tv" quality. and this proves they have no good product people anymore.

<comment><USER57> Really? The only real contender to Netflix content is HBO. I have yet to find a new relevant TV shows to watch which is not from Netflix or HBO.

<comment><USER58> USA Network used to have some pretty good stuff. Some of it turned very repetitive (Burn Notice, Suits, ...) because they don't know when to end series, but they did produce some really high quality series, especially if you're willing to look past the repetitiveness.

I don't know where their quality is at, nowadays. HBO is just leagues ahead of everything else.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Do you use Medium? Whom do you follow? Can you link to your blog? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Slowly starting to transition over to Medium from my own blog. Infrequent blogger but I write primarily around startups, enterprise software, the CMS landscape, and my personal hobby of genomics.

[https://medium.com/@rcasey](https://medium.com/@rcasey)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I've created myself a blog on Medium, and I thought it would be fun to find like-minded people there.

In my blog I post short sci-fi stories and articles on programming and tech:

[https://medium.com/@rayalez](https://medium.com/@rayalez)

</comment><comment><USER3> Yes, just started using Medium. I invest in startups (would invest in every YC-backed company if I could).

[https://medium.com/@baccredited](https://medium.com/@baccredited)

Thanks for kicking this off Ray I followed you.

</comment><comment><USER4> Yes, I write about mobile and product design: [https://blog.orangecaffeine.com](https://blog.orangecaffeine.com)</comment>


The DCI Architecture: A New Vision of Object-Oriented Programming - <AUTHOR> http://www.artima.com/articles/dci_vision.html

<comment><USER2> >New Vision of Object-Oriented Programming by Trygve Reenskaug and James O. Coplien March 20, 2009

hmm</comment>


FSF award given to Garrett for the wrong reasons - <AUTHOR> http://www.itwire.com/opinion-and-analysis/open-sauce/63720-fsf-award-given-for-the-wrong-reasons

<comment><USER2> Wrong wrong wrong. Linux does need secure boot, it's a very important security feature, if you care about early boot stage compromises.

What Sam fails to mention is that the MS specs for secure boot require that users be able to load their own keys into the bios, this freeing them from MS signing. It may not be a standardised interface, but it is required. The only reason MS signing of linux boot loaders is important is so that it works out of the box without users fiddling with bios settings.</comment>


Ask HN: What is the most important information for you in job posting? - <AUTHOR> Hey there!
I'm just worried about the straight text job postings that are really hard to read. Often HRs message me on LinkedIn and send a huge straight text job description and almost always I don't read all the description but I'm looking for the most important information for me. So, I will be happy if HRs will message me only the essential information in job descriptions.
Bad examples of what I'm talking about:
- https://jobs.github.com/positions/b6c80cae-c346-11e7-86c5-c93f25ed52e5
- https://boll-and-branch.workable.com/j/D706917161
For that I just want to ask everyone who understands me. What is the most important information you're looking for in job postings? (salary, requirements, full time or contract, remote or onsite, visa sponsorship, etc.)
I'm just going to create a sort of a service with a template to create job postings with only important information about a job. <comment><USER2> Salary range

What they do - pitch it to me like you would pitch an investor. If you're hiring people solely on tech stack, the team is likely pretty bad.

Tech stack, but not too rigid. I want to know whether a company uses React or Laravel, but not every single library.

Interview process

Some hint that the recruiters are competent and that the office isn't terrible. Which is just to know that the team I'll be working with is good.

<comment><USER3> I absolutely agree with number two. I love coding and solving problems but I get so much more enjoyment if it's something I believe in too. I'm fortunate to be at a place where I can actually listen to the non-techs and say "what you're doing is so cool, what tools do you want me to make?".

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Salary range, Working hours (/flexible) and Holiday #

Location/remote

What problems you will be solving

What tech stack you use

</comment><comment><USER5> Salary range

The problems that you're hoping your new hire to address

</comment><comment><USER6> Salary - it shows confidence and usually the ones with salary range published is above market.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Salary range

Location or remote

Tech stack and essential requirements

Project description</comment>


Was Moore's Law Inevitable? - <AUTHOR> http://www.kk.org/thetechnium/archives/2009/07/was_moores_law.php <comment><USER2> The difference between semi-conductors and solar/battery tech is that you are already working at the molecular level with solar panels/batteries and have to change materials to get different results, this is complex as we don't have analytical models of this sort of thing.

With semi-conductors things materials don't need to be changed so much. We are still working with doped silicon (although we do need to make variations with SOI), we are just shrinking something we understand well.

</comment><comment><USER3> Can't help but follow Kevin Kelly's vision of the future. Thanks for the share raju, surprised I missed this in my reader. Now to sneak out of the office for a walk so I can enjoy the read.

(my comment) While reading this post Kevin, I was captivated by a background image of a great stonelike wheel with many great spindles, your technium, grinding forward inevitably. Have you ever commissioned artisits to capture a fleeting image?

The paths our society rifles down are chosen by us. Even accepting the unerring push of progress we are free to navigate what rechnologies to pursue by the resources allocated to their improvement. We may be able to steer the technium rudder more easily than that of our world's societies.

<comment><USER4> But who is the "we" who is guiding the navigation? On the one hand, you have millions of programmers and engineers like you and me, who are working toward some short- or medium-term technological goals. However, those goals are hardly chosen out of the blue. Many of us are working on goals determined by some arcane corporate bureaucracy, which we would never have chosen on our own. Others are working on goals which are self-selected, but reflect the needs of the rest of our society and our existing technological framework. The growth of bandwidth and storage (and the software to power them), for example, have such compelling entertainment applications that if one of us didn't work on them, a thousand others would.

On the other hand, if you look for the driving force behind those needs and corporations, you don't find any more control. In America, we have a central administration, backed by hundreds of representatives, who are guided by thousands of advisors and staff and lobbyists, elected by three hundred million Americans through often dubious arguments and questionable motivation. Hundreds of other nations can claim the same.

Nobody is navigating.

<comment><USER5> "Nobody is navigating."

Stronger: Nobody _can_ navigate. The complexity of the task of navigation exceeds what one human can do by many orders of magnitude and remains firmly out of the grasp of even the best corporations or governments. Moreover, it's getting harder, not easier.

Like the sarcastic laws of thermodynamics that end with "You can't get out of the game", we're on a wild ride, nobody is in control, and there isn't anything you can do about that fact.

(In truth, it has always been this way. Control over technology has always been an illusion. It's just that now that illusion is all up in your face and you can't ignore it.)

<comment><USER6> While I can accept the strong notion that no person can navigate, this does not map to navigation doesn't happen. Smith's invisible hand ala co-evolution (and more appropriately natural selection) guides technology perhaps even more than economics or biology.

I want to spend more time reading the article because the suggestion to let it these curves guide investment and personal application of time and effort seems less than straightforward.

<comment><USER5> Indeed; the reason humans can't navigate is that one human's influence is dwarfed by the "invisible hand". (Which may or may not be exactly Adam Smith's "invisible hand", but there's certainly an "invisible hand" of one sort or another in play.)

<comment><USER3> (btw great comments above gents, voted them all up) We crave efficiency, but always end up in local optima based on resource allocation limitations. Great business opportunities are creatively observed by sharp minds and unleashed by relentless entrepreneurship. There are social forces pushing towards lower cost, ease of access, higher functionality and always entertainment!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> KK is no blogger. I have absolutely no time to read this giant essay while at work.

I did skim enough to have some optimism that Kelly knows what he's talking about. The biggest problem with many pundits is that they overgeneralize Moore's Law. It's not some magical exponential improvement in everything that has a battery attached. It's a statement about a specific technology: silicon transistors.

Kelly seems to have noticed this. He spends some time discussing the fact that magnetic storage is on a _different_ exponential curve.</comment>


Cheap hosting for Rails app? - <AUTHOR>

Building my first Rails app, and am coming to a realization that hosting will be a problem. Right now I'm freelancing full-time and just scraping by, so I don't have a ton of money to put into an app that won't be generating revenue anytime soon.
I set up the app on Heroku, and in a matter of ~1-2 weeks, I managed to get charged $75 for using the MemCachier add-on. I would like to be able to cache all my static assets with memcached.
I don't expect this app to generate any material traffic for awhile, it's still in development. What are the cheapest options out there? <comment><USER2> Go look into EngineYard - they have 500 free hours so you can shutdown your server when you don't expect any users to use your app. Otherwise, go buy yourself a dirt cheap VPS, or even OVH (their cheapest dedicated server plan is $40/month). Or.. just host it yourself. Yep, buy a 8 GB RAM PC quad core, and put in your basement. Sure it will be slow, but since it won't be generating traffic for awhile, who cares?

Second, why are you even prematurely optimizing by worrying about caching static assets? Wait until you actually have 100,000 users before doing that. You might even realize you don't even need it when that happens.

</comment><comment><USER3> [http://myhosting.com/](http://myhosting.com/) will be much cheaper with a linux vps. I get sub 100ms page loads with a sinatra app and redis hosted on myhosting.

</comment><comment><USER4> If you're willing to manage everything yourself, DigitalOcean is awesome and cheap. I don't know about memcached though.

</comment><comment><USER5> If you have a vps box, you can easily install memcache and set the size on it (64 megs, 128 megs, 512 megs etc).

For static assets, are you referring to actual files being served? If that's the case, you don't have to put that in memcache. I would recommend putting it on a third party cdn (e.g. amazon s3).

</comment><comment><USER6> I run a small (dedicated) hosting environment with a few successfully deployed and running Ruby apps, I could setup a VPS and help with config if you're interested. Roll-your-own VPS usually works out best.

<comment><USER6> As for caching, I'd suggest nginx proxying against unicorn with a cache store for static files. This is functionality built into nginx.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Sakura VPS 1GB RAM, 2 virtual core, 100GB HDD, about 10$ a month. [http://vps.sakura.ad.jp/](http://vps.sakura.ad.jp/)

</comment><comment><USER8> +1 Webfaction - cheap, great docs & service, very solid technically.. really can't be beat for a simple, public dev/staging server.

</comment><comment><USER9> I'd just go with DigitalOcean and serve up the static assets with nginx until that is no longer tenable (longer than you think).

</comment><comment><USER10> Any reason why you're using memchache for your static assets? If not, put your static assets on S3 instead.

<comment><AUTHOR> No good reason in particular, someone recommended I do it.

<comment><USER10> If it's only static assets (e.g. images, js, css files) I'd suggest you look into Asset_Sync gem and AWS S3. S3's free tier will be enough for your needs.

<comment><AUTHOR> Great, thanks. New to all of this so need help along the way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> DigitalOcean is your option. For, static assets suggest you route through CloudFlare / self hosted ngnix.

</comment><comment><USER12> Webfaction (shared hosting with 512MB dedicated ram)</comment>


Bacteria on the outside of the International Space Station - <AUTHOR> http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/alien-life-bacteria-space-international-station-bacteria-cosmonaut-astronaut-russia-a8080036.html <comment><USER3> Sounds slightly surprising, but the exterior of the ISS is not a sterile environment. There are thousands of ways terrestrial bacteria could have ended up there. I guess the interesting thing is that the bacteria seem to be able to survive the extreme environment. But that's hardly a new discovery about bacteria.

<comment><USER4> Maybe it's a matter of time? I mean, there's quite a bit of UV from the Sun baking that surface every day. Perhaps those bacteria would eventually die if they are not being replenished from somewhere.

<comment><USER5> Here are some rough calculations on the matter: [https://what- if.xkcd.com/117/](https://what-if.xkcd.com/117/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Couldn't this simply be from an astronaut sneezing on a glove prior to a spacewalk, then grabbing a handrail? We already know about water bears that can survive in space, so why not bacteria.

<comment><USER7> Pretty much - even opening the air lock will do it.

> The former cosmonaut, who spent nearly a year in orbit back in the 1980s, > said that outer surface of ISS is "heavily contaminated" by the waste > products from engines of the arriving spacecraft, atmospheric discharges > from the station during spacewalks by the crew and other factors.

[https://www.rt.com/news/181472-iss-marine-plankton- space/](https://www.rt.com/news/181472-iss-marine-plankton-space/)

There is also evidence that bacteria get carried up on air currents and the ISS orbits low enough that it can intercept this stuff. (note that while this is widely reported, there doesn't seem to be anything actually published, and the air current theory is, well, a theory).

There are several papers on _interior_ contamination though, e.g [http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0923250805...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0923250805002627)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> So... You found bacteria on your swab while orbiting the largest and only known source of bacteria in the universe and you think it might _not_ be from that largest and only known source of bacteria? Bah!

click bait...

</comment><comment><USER9> Unlikely to be ET, but deserving of careful study. All extreme life is interesting.

</comment><comment><USER10> What if it is extraterrestrial in origin but also exists on earth (originally coming from elsewhere)? How would they know the difference then?

<comment><USER11> If the alien organism originally evolved independently of life on Earth, then analyzing its genetic material - its equivalent of DNA - would tell us a lot.

We haven't yet found any organisms on Earth that have evolved independently, so an organism found in space that has a different genetic structure from Earth life would be a good bet for being alien in origin.

An alternative, albeit unlikely, possibility is that Earth life was originally seeded from somewhere else - panspermia, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia).

In that case, Earth life and (some) alien life would have a common origin, and we'd have to examine the differences in its DNA to find out more about its history.

Even in that case, it ought to be possible to determine that the organism had branched off from Earth life long enough ago to make it a candidate for alien life.

<comment><USER12> >An alternative, albeit unlikely, possibility is that Earth life was originally seeded from somewhere else - panspermia, [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia).

I've seen this hypothesis before. I've also seen the oft repeated assumption that other intelligent life might be out there, more advanced than ours.

Crazy though: what if we _are_ the most advanced life in th universe?

<comment><USER13> If the probabilities are such that it's feasible that we're the first/most advanced life in the universe, then (given our planets comparably young age) it's exceedingly likely that we're the _only_ life in the observable universe.

It would be plausible for us to be alone, and it would be plausible for us to be one of the less advanced lifeforms among many, but it would be quite surprising if we'd to be the most advanced civilization among many; since many/most of them would have gotten a significant head start.

<comment><USER12> Did they get a head start though? All these atoms bouncing around started with the big bang after all :)

One theory I'm fond of is that we are not alone, but life is so rare that the distances between intelligent civilizations are too vast for us to ever observe them (or vice versa).

<comment><USER13> Many, many other planets had conditions suitable (as far as we understand what's suitable) for creating life when our planet didn't exist yet; out of all feasible planets we're younger than average, so others would have had a head start.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> The Independent was a great newspaper, but it collapsed some years ago and the website is just baloney.

</comment><comment><USER12> Doesn't the ISS blast human excrement out into space? Maybe that explains the bacteria

¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

<comment><USER15> Actually, they ship it down to Earth during the resupply missions.

<comment><USER16> I'm getting conflicting information from NASA on this.

According to the first link (PDF, sorry), waste is disposed of in re-entry craft.

But according to the second link, it's ejected to burn up in the atmosphere.

[https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/issrdc_2013-0...](https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/files/issrdc_2013-07-17-1600_carrasquillo2013.pdf)

[https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/inf...](https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/infographic_yearinspace)

<comment><USER15> In any case, we know that they use special waste storage containers, and don't expose feces to space directly (presumably until these systems fail during re- entry - far away from the ISS). Take your pick of the several videos on YouTube that describe the ISS's toilet to see the waste containers in question.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> There are a handful of scientists attempting to collect life forms from very high altitudes using balloons. In one instance [1] they discovered UV resistant bacteria. Could it be remotely possible that high altitude species have managed to live on the ISS?

[1] [https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090318094642.h...](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090318094642.htm)

</comment><comment><USER18> Any type of leak can contribute to this bacteria. Maybe there is some benign bacteria that was stuck on the outside from earth that will thrive in such environment

</comment><comment><USER19> Earlier this year, Russian scientists announced that the "Test" experiments had found a range of different organisms that had been brought up from Earth and seemed to be surviving by clinging onto the ISS's hull.

The above quote from the article suggests to me that there is a good chance that some of the bacteria remained on the hull long after the experiments performed by the Russians earlier that year.

</comment><comment><USER20> If bacteria have survived on the surface of the ISS, I wonder what we have introduced to the Moon and Mars (and maybe Venus!) on landers. Perhaps they'll be covered in a biome soon.

</comment><comment><USER21> Guys, come on, this is The Independent...

</comment><comment><USER22> And this is how we bring live to other planets. These bacteria will survive somewhere on a planet.

</comment><comment><USER15> The suggestion that the bacteria is extraterrestrial in origin is absolutely ridiculous. Much, much, _much_ more research is necessary before such a claim can be made. The speculation on Shkaplerov's part is hugely unprofessional.

<comment><USER11> Shkaplerov appears to be a very accomplished pilot - <USER2> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Shkaplerov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anton_Shkaplerov). It's not clear why anyone would pay attention to his claims about exobiology. The journalism is unprofessional, too, although that's not news.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I can't help but keep wondering if "life originated on Earth" might not be the last geocentrism.

It's only speculation at this point but it's one I've harbored for many years. Part of this is because of how common we've found organic materials to be in the universe, and part of it comes from how poorly other geocentric ideas have fared.

<comment><USER24> There are plausible theories about how life arose on Earth.

If you want to assume it came from somewhere else, you either have to invoke some kind of magic, or assume it happened somewhat along the lines that it would have done on Earth, then arrived somehow. It just kicks the can down the road without solving anything, IMO.

<comment><USER25> > It just kicks the can down the road without solving anything

Panspermia is an attempt to explain one inconsistency in our observations so far: it appears that life spontaneously emerging from inorganics is hugely unlikely. On other hand, geological records show that life appeared on Earth very soon after it became viable.

If life on Earth originated somewhere else, then this discrepancy can be made to disappear. For example, abiogenesis only needs to arise once within a large radius around Earth and within a much broader time margin. Hence it can be a very rare event while still not making early life on Earth a unique event in the universe.

I don't personally believe panspermia is likely. But it is a valid theory (although without much supporting evidence as far as I know).

<comment><USER24> It's certainly a valid hypothesis. And stronger (any?) evidence for possible life on Mars or Venus would possibly support this.

With a sample size of 1, and loose record-keeping from ~4B years ago, it's hard to tell, but we don't really know if it took life 1 day or 500M years to evolve once it was chemically/geologically viable. We do know that life was very primitive for > 1B years (not even eukaryotic, let alone multicellular).

We also know that space isn't teaming with little biologically active spores from other worlds (unless it is and the government is covering it up, of course), which suggests that in the vastness of space, life doesn't really hitch rides on asteroids or comets and colonize the galaxy accidentally. And if some beings were doing this on purpose, why not send more advanced life forms or robots?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> This is CLEARLY clickbait. Why is this on the front page of HN? It is currently ranked #7!!

Article tldr: There's bacteria on the outside of the ISS. We've found some before and this isn't new. BUT THIS TIME IT MIGHT BE ALIEN!!! Why? Well... because it COULD be.

</comment><comment><USER27> Culture it, fill a probe full of canisters of the bacteria, and fire them directly at Europa. Spreading life should be of more importance than preserving the absurd idea of "pristine" environments for the selfish reasons of future scientists not wanting to do 4 minutes extra work determining whether the thing they observe occurred before or after human action changed things (as if such a distinction actually matters in the slightest).

<comment> cup-of-tea Why Europa? Why would you want to introduce a foreign bacteria that could potentially wipe out any possible life there? Why is spreading life important?</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do you assess the quality of open-source projects? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> The first signal I look for is how well will it actually solve my problem. Do I have to hack around how it works to integrate it or is it straight forward.

The second signal I look at is activity. If a project hasn't had a commit somewhat recently, then there is a good chance it's not actively worked on, or does not serve a very large audience.

To be clear, not having a large audience isn't always an issue, every project starts with 0 forks, but it's always tough relying on a project that has open Pull Requests sit un-merged simply because the original author has abandoned the project.

If the project has a small user base, the third signal I try to use is to look through some of the code base and documentation. Can I jump in and make a fix, or is the code style so esoteric that it would take me a long time to grok.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you also evaluate its security posture?

<comment><USER2> I try to, unfortunately security is typically the hardest to measure. If the projects documentation specifies security as a goal of the project, I always look at that kindly, but most projects don't list that as a major goal.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Does it solve my problem out of the box? If so, and it works out of the box, then it's a winner. All software has bugs, but if you have a specific use case, and it works for that, it's good for me.

If it is close to what I need, I submit a pull request against it. Depending on the reception and how people take it, and how easy it is to get it accepted is good signal on how easy it is to work with the project.

When doing the PR, you get a feeling of how the code looks. Is it straightforward? Commented? Do you like the style, do you see obvious errors? Any red flags should be noted.

At any point, if you think you can do better, you can fork it or start over from scratch and do it yourself, with a lot more information on what you need, and what the possible pitfalls are.

</comment><comment><USER4> Reading the source tends to be the most valuable way to assess the quality. Other factors like contribution frequency, ownership, contributing guidelines, documentation etc are important as well.

I think many people spend too little time on qualifying open-source dependencies or tools that they will use on a project. It'll do you a lot of good to dig into the source for an hour or so. If nothing else, read through the source that makes up the surface of the API that you are going to be using.

</comment><comment><USER5> One more very important signal that I haven't noticed anyone else mention is whether it has a test suite.

</comment><comment><USER6> Evaluate the quality of the documentation. I think it's a litmus test for collaborative developers.

</comment><comment><USER7> I've been using [https://libraries.io/](https://libraries.io/) to get at-a- glance stats on age, activity, number of dependent projects and other metrics that, arguably, are a good proxy for quality.

<comment><AUTHOR> What are some of the things that you like/dislike about libraries.io?</comment></comment>


Picture This: Where does Google's revenue come from? - <AUTHOR> http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/07/15/picture-where-does-googles-revenue-come <comment><USER2> I think it is a funny irony that the leading-edge-tech-megacorp Google gets all of its revenue out of small textads that every experienced internet user ignores and only get clicked by people who mistake the advertisement block of a website for its content.

<comment><USER3> I'm an experienced internet user, and I occasionally click on an ad (maybe 4 times a year ;-)) just because I'm in buying mode anyway. For what that's worth - not much.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> By that measure TV companies, newspapers, and magazines are also just glorified advertising companies. Except they're not - and neither is google.

PS: What would be non-glorified (i.e. regular) advertising company?

</comment><comment><USER5> It comes from the devil. The devil, I say. Beware, the Ides of March!</comment>


New York Subway X-Ray Area Maps - <AUTHOR> http://www.projectsubwaynyc.com/x-ray-area-maps/ <comment><USER2> Relevant: [https://www.wired.com/2016/07/lose-tomoyuki-tanakas-x-ray- il...](https://www.wired.com/2016/07/lose-tomoyuki-tanakas-x-ray- illustrations-tokyo-train-stations/)

TOMOYUKI TANAKA hand-draws ballpoint renderings of the innards of Tokyo's sprawling train stations.

<comment><USER3> Beautiful but geez, Wired's headline typography is simply unreadable. It's such a pain to read.

<comment><USER4> I _think_ you can thank/blame former Wired Editor in Chief, Scott Dadich for that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Clicked on this link expecting to see an expose on police-state expansion of x-ray usage into subways.

[https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/10/the- nyp...](https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/10/the-nypd-is- using-mobile-x-rays-to-spy-on-unknown-targets/411181/)

Glad to see this awesome subway-station depiction instead.

</comment><comment><USER6> Transport for London produced similar drawings for all 124 Tube stations:

[https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2015/07/12/3d-maps-of- every...](https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2015/07/12/3d-maps-of-every- underground-station-tuvw/)

<comment><USER7> It's a shame that they're not more complete. In reality Camden Town looks more like a motorway junction because it has to switch both branches of the Northern line in one place.

[http://husk.org/www.geocities.com/athens/acropolis/7069/ltca...](http://husk.org/www.geocities.com/athens/acropolis/7069/ltcamden.jpg)

<comment><USER8> That's Camden Junction, which is not part of the station. The axonometric drawings exist for fire safety reasons AFAIK -- similar drawings are usually displayed somewhere in the ticket hall -- so details of the tunnels are out of scope.

(1927 drawing of the junction on this page: [http://districtdavesforum.co.uk/thread/6095/camden-town- junc...](http://districtdavesforum.co.uk/thread/6095/camden-town-junction))

I like that it's a non-blocking switch. There are alternatives which would restrict concurrent traffic between any two branches.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The 42nd street stop seems to be missing the 8th avenue line downtown platform.

Maybe it's just completely covered by the walking area?

It'd be great to have a 3d visualization where you can rotate the camera around.

<comment><USER10> I noticed that, too. I think the angles are such that it wouldn't be visible from this perspective. The steps are there. (Although I could _swear_ there's another set of steps just across from the "Urbo" entrance. May have to take a detour down there tomorrow to satisfy my curiosity.)

<comment><USER11> The platform is there, just not quite visible because the upper floor is obstructing it. But you can see the bottom of the platform next to the accessible ramp.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The MTA has a similar 2D version of this on their website, divided into the "Neighborhood Maps," which are also posted in some stations[1, 2]. Apple maps has had this for the New York City Subway for a while[3], and Google is adding it but still doesn't have the entrances/exits like Apple Maps has (which are very helpful!)[4].

[1]: [http://web.mta.info/maps/neighborhood_maps.htm](http://web.mta.info/maps/neighborhood_maps.htm)

[2]: [http://web.mta.info/maps/neighborhoods/mn/M12_MidtownEast- Gr...](http://web.mta.info/maps/neighborhoods/mn/M12_MidtownEast- GrandCentral_2015.pdf)

[3]: [https://i.imgur.com/nDsEOIP.png](https://i.imgur.com/nDsEOIP.png)

[4]: [https://i.imgur.com/Mc0WTAc.png](https://i.imgur.com/Mc0WTAc.png)

</comment><comment><USER13> As a sidepoint:

You know what's annoying? When sites implement views that capture all your input on mobile, potentially trapping you and preventing scrolling away from them. This site is a good example of this.

<comment><USER14> I know what's annoying - these maps are made using Z-rays, not X like claimed by the title. /s

Honestly, I am initially thrown causing me frustration, and do recover, when my mind is required to switch between technical and aesthetic descriptives.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> Not even close to being that good, but parts of the Frankfurt Metro have basic station maps on the platforms.

Of-Marktplatz: [https://dl2.pushbulletusercontent.com/lxmCMsRFcz6eOy53QqHHzk...](https://dl2.pushbulletusercontent.com/lxmCMsRFcz6eOy53QqHHzk5VgKX3dsc6/20170808_172821.jpg)

Of-Kaiserlei: [https://dl2.pushbulletusercontent.com/BEJXV2Cp8UDZ1dbbXVRPZe...](https://dl2.pushbulletusercontent.com/BEJXV2Cp8UDZ1dbbXVRPZeE0HNnoBWIc/20170808_173617.jpg)

<comment><USER16> There are similar maps for complicated tram intersections in Dresden: [https://www.dvb.de/-/media/files/liniennetz/%C3%BCb_hst_hbf_...](https://www.dvb.de/-/media/files/liniennetz/%C3%BCb_hst_hbf_15.pdf) (all at [https://www.dvb.de/de- de/liniennetz/haltestellenumgebungspla...](https://www.dvb.de/de- de/liniennetz/haltestellenumgebungsplaene/) )

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Berlin got these simple maps printed out for every station: [http://www.bvg.de/de/standortplan/9003201](http://www.bvg.de/de/standortplan/9003201)

They can be found on the map icon on the left below the city map if you searched for any station over here: [http://fahrinfo.bvg.de/Fahrinfo/bin/stboard.bin/en](http://fahrinfo.bvg.de/Fahrinfo/bin/stboard.bin/en)

</comment><comment><USER18> I've been interested in generating reasonably accurate 3D models of NYC subway stations for awhile. It always bothered me that routing stops the second you descend into the station. If anything, that is where you need it most because some of the stations are confusing and the signage varies in helpfulness. Visitors often do not even know what side of the platform to stand on.

I went so far as to purchase a Project Tango[1] tablet several years back. I was trying to automate some of the mapping work using SLAM[2] but did not get very far before real life took over. I would be very interested in picking this project back up, especially with the recent developments in AR/VR. If you are interested in helping out, please reach out. Email is in my profile.

[1]: [https://get.google.com/tango/](https://get.google.com/tango/) [2]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simultaneous_localization_and_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simultaneous_localization_and_mapping)

</comment><comment><USER19> Some other train stations that would be interesting to see:

\- Atlantic Ave Pacific Street station (Most number of connections in the entire system)

\- South ferry old and new stations (some of the sharpest rail curves in the system right at the edge of the Hudson river)

\- 191 St station (deepest in the city at 180 feet/ 50 m)

\- Hudson yards (They had to build the 7 train below the Hudson yards construction and all the existing and new Amtrak rail to New Jersey.)

<comment><USER10> " _Atlantic Ave Pacific Street station (Most number of connections in the entire system)_ "

If you count the _Port Authority_ and _Times Square - 42nd St_ as one, then you've got the 1, 2, 3, A, C, E, N, Q, R, W, 7, and S trains. That's more, right?

<comment><USER20> You can also connect to Bryant Park/42 and get BDFM. That whole complex is definitely the most transfers.

<comment><USER21> How do you connect to Bryant Park - 42nd street from Times Square? I have always walked above ground.

<comment><USER10> Yeah, I don't think you can. Protip: if you toggle "transit" on Google or Apple maps, then it shows outlines of the stations.

However, there is this:

[https://www.6sqft.com/video-go-inside-the-citys-longest- unde...](https://www.6sqft.com/video-go-inside-the-citys-longest-underground- tunnel-from-rockefeller-center-to-times-square/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> My eye gets drawn to the tradeoffs made in drawing them. For instance, often things on the surface are inked behind things below (like the monument in Columbus circle) because the things below are "more important" but this does make decoding the scene harder.

Also the S line platform in the 24nd-TimeSq station is drawn in such a way that it is not so clear what it is, which bugs me because I see that platform as one of the distinctive things about that station.

</comment><comment><USER23> There was a interesting book I had when I was a kid. Its was about all the underground infrastructure by David Macaulay.

Google books has some pages :

[https://books.google.com/books?id=Lqav0No51cEC&pg=PA92&sourc...](https://books.google.com/books?id=Lqav0No51cEC&pg=PA92&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false)

</comment><comment><USER24> Anyone aware of similar maps for Boston's T system? (as the oldest subway system in America, its stations have many quirks)

<comment><USER25> I'd love to see this one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Interesting... although it seems obvious in hindsight, I hadn't really appreciated that the terrible internal layouts of these stations was dictated by the lines following specific avenues so exactly.

</comment><comment><USER27> Since we're on the topic, anyone know where to find these kinds of individual station diagrams (2D or 3D) for Metrorail in DC? I haven't been able to turn up anything besides system maps.

</comment><comment><USER28> These are beautiful! I would love to know more about the process she goes through when surveying these. They look quite accurate. Thanks for sharing.

</comment><comment><USER29> These are beautifully rendered. I'd love to be able to interact with them as you would in sketchup.

</comment><comment><USER30> I really like this! I wish I had more of the track visible. Possibly with layers.

</comment><comment><USER31> Beautiful, but 14th street/Union square is missing the L line

<comment><USER32> It's the gray platform that intersects the middle of the 456 and the end of the NQRW

<comment><USER33> That's confusing. I wonder why it's rendered that way. (Though I feel kind of bad about complaining.)

<comment><USER34> Because the NYC Subway "color" of the L line is gray! It's logo is a gray circle with a white "L" in the middle in a sans-serif block font.

<comment><USER33> Yeah, though also the other two tunnels seem to be shown with much wider colored strips. The L looks here more like a walkway between them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER35> Love it! Fantastic!

</comment><comment><USER36> They're beautiful. Would it kill you to use a sans-serif font so I could read it?

<comment><USER37> Oh my, you can't read text with serifs? That sounds like a horrible affliction!</comment></comment>


Inome people search API - <AUTHOR>

inome has opened up its people big data platform for developers via search API. platform has over billion profiles that you can search via API. Visit developer.inome.com, get API registration key, and start searching using Search API. Full documentation provided on the website. <comment><AUTHOR> once you signup and use the service, please provide feedback via contact us form. thx!</comment>


Beta of "a startup" I'm working on: Billable. Easy invoicing. - <AUTHOR> http://billable.co.za <comment><USER2> First thing I notice is that your site remind me of this demo that Chris Coyer published on his website: <http://css-tricks.com/examples/EditableInvoice/>

What would your app offer beside a single editable page?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yup, absolutely his idea inspired me. It was the single creative element that made me realise that I can make invoicing a bit better than the other folks.

Besides a history and autocompletion... I can't think of anything else to improve this app.

<comment><USER3> Are you planning on adding PDF export? Or, at least, something like "email this invoice"? I don't interact with my clients in person, so just the ability to print an invoice is clearly not enough to make me use your app.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yup.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> How would this be different than any of the other online invoicing apps out there?

...Freshbooks, Invoice Machine, Less Accounting, Billing Orchard, CashBoard, BlinkSale, Bill My Clients, Harvest, Invoices Made Easy, Simply Bill, Simply Invoices... There are a lot of options in this space.

<comment><USER5> I have tried a couple of those and they had too many features for me -- overcomplicated.

<comment><USER6> Try CurdBee(<http://curdbee.com>), if you want simple, but not a toy invoicing solution ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I like that everything is on the first page. Is it going to stay that way?

<comment><USER8> I love this idea. With everything on the front page, immediately usable, it would be my first choice for invoicing. If you add required user accounts and a huge site around it, I've got no reason to switch (optional user accounts obviously wouldn't bother me and I think some people would want them).

<comment><AUTHOR> Once I've got the PDF generation done I'll work on this next.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> <http://billmebob.com/> has been around for a while and seems to work fine for me. You need to find and implement a reason for me to switch, but I like what you have so far!

</comment><comment><USER10> Great Idea.

I actually needed something like this a while ago. started using intuit's Billing Manager.

Suggestions: Tax options, custom logo, and pdf generation. Also predictive text on previously used line items stored in cache might be handy.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I've still got a ton to implement; but I would love some feedback!

<comment><USER11> I would appreciate if I could also change the words INVOICE, Invoice #, Date, Item, Description etc. - you know, it would be useful for those of us living in non English-speaking countries :)

<comment><USER12> You can already do that now.

<comment><USER11> only the INVOICE at the top - or am I doing something wrong?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> J-L add computation of U.S. sales tax/GB VAT/DE Umsatzsteuer/...

</comment><comment><USER13> So how will you make money from this site?

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm not sure yet. I was thinking of maintaining it at as free service to provide advertising for my pay for products and any other products that I launch in the future.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> It would be nice if it could remember my changes (company name, address). Perhaps save them and provide or short URL or update URL in real time (/#field=value&field2=value2) so it's bookmarkable. Being able to add custom fields to the top would be good too (client number for instance).

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm using local storage; when you leave the page it should remember all that information - As soon as I've got the user accounts down I'll make it happen.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> The first time a visitor shows up on the site, maybe have a box hanging over the middle (light-box style - darken the content of the page), explaining you can just edit in place, no accounts, etc.

It feels...weird to be able to do all that without logging in, especially for this kind of data/form.

</comment><comment><USER16> There was an OS X app that does something similar to this called Billable, but they recently renamed the app Profit Train. Not sure if that's something that should be on your radar or not as you move forward.

</comment><comment><USER17> Looks clean. What is the reason you went with a .co.za domain?

<comment><AUTHOR> Just to expand on this a bit - The South African webspace is a not very interesting and maybe a bit dead; we have a few gems and I would like to add my own voice to that.

Also... I'm looking for very rich South African clients :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Awesome instant interaction - though for me to switch, I'd still want an account so I needn't fill out the generic info each time.

</comment><comment><USER19> There is very nice piece of mac software which does what you're doing... and unfortunately has the same name :(

</comment><comment><USER20> it seems like a nice sub-component of a larger CRM website. Would your startup offer any further functions for a small business?

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, we want to do a ton of apps in a similar fashion. Supremely focused on getting things done in the simplest way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> what is the longer term vision for the product? what's the next feature that you're planning?</comment>


Is Facebook capable of adapting to the world it created? - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/25/magazine/can-facebook-fix-its-own-worst-bug.html <comment><USER3> Observations from this article:

\- Zuckerberg denied he is running for president in 2020. I wonder what is the reason of his postelection tour in America and his big PR team. [1] I don't think it's possible to be both Statesman Zuck and Silicon Valley engineer Zuck. As the article says, you cannot be concerned with only quantifiable outcomes and at the same time propagate fuzzy human ideas like ethics, judgment and intuition.

\- Facebook's motto of Move Fast and Break Things seems to be replaced with Break Things and Test Results. The News Feed has turned into a Skinner box to study the daily behaviour of more than a billion people.

\- I get very overstimulated looking at the picture of their newsfeed office for a few seconds - bravo for people being able to be focused and able to write code in that environment!

[1] [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-18/this- team...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-18/this-team-runs- mark-zuckerberg-s-facebook-page)

<comment><USER4> > Zuckerberg denied he is running for president in 2020.

That's a common tactic. I'm all but sure he plans on entering politics. In addition to his recent tour of America and big PR team, he also recently renounced his atheism. That, imo, is a big tell.

Trumps win this fall is going to open the door for many other billionaire- celebrities. He basically proved that name recognition alone can take you very far.

This is why you see people like Mark Cuban mulling a campaign.

Zuck has name recognition - arguably more than Trump - is less _blatantly_ offensive, and has a treasure trove of data. Not to mention a natural marketing/communications/propaganda platform. He also has a seasoned team of lobbyists at his disposal. Oh and he's loaded, too.

<comment><USER5> Zuckerberg lacks the charisma. His run will be more Carson than Trump.

He severely lacks the oratory skills of Obama, the fiery commitment to economic justice of Bernie, the decades of government experience of Hillary, or the Barnum-esque showmanship of Trump.

Trump is the first non-stateman to win, and he did it by keeping the cameras on him at all times, and competing against a wide field of primary candidates that split the vote. And also by appealing to some base desires that Republicans have only dog-whistled in the past.

And the left is much less friendly to a billionaire with eyes on purchasing the presidency than the right. Why would anyone pick Zuckerberg in 2020 when they could pick someone like Warren or Booker?

I'm not saying he won't run, but I think it's delusional to think he can win a primary, let alone the presidency.

<comment><USER4> 1) He has name-recognition. This carries you very far. Who doesn't know Zuck? He even had a hit movie made about him.

2) He has money. Doesn't need to waste time raising funds. He can also take Trump's line and say he is independent, not in the pockets of big money doners

3) He has access to possibly, the best voter database, and a platform to communicate and drive home his messaging (remember, some say that Trump's win was due to massive FB analytics and targeted ad campaigns)

4) He is likely already in bed with the "establishment". I'm sure he has deep connections to the intelligence agencies and local, state, and federal government. Not to mention of course, the media.

5) He is young and likely more appealing to the millennial generation, who will be more deeply entrenched in society by the time he runs. Certainty more appealing than say Booker or Warren.

> And the left is much less friendly to a billionaire with eyes on purchasing > the presidency than the right. Why would anyone pick Zuckerberg in 2020 when > they could pick someone like Warren or Booker?

Warren and Booker are pretty discredited IMO. It'll be hard for Warren to win the Bernie votes, given her disloyalty and lack of action during the primaries. I had such high hopes for her, but she really let the power and possibility of a presidential run corrupt her. Her who shtick was this fearless, independent, populist. That image came crashing down this election. If she would have publicly backed Bernie early on, he might have taken the nomination. It's obvious to all that she only backed HRC to kiss-ass to the establishment and curry favors for either a VP nom or to secure her "successor" status to Hillary. Compare her actions to someone like Gabbard.

Booker is similar discredited, given his non-transparent lobbying for a variety of corporate elites.

The main problem for Zuck is his young, rich, tech, Jew shtick makes me persona non-grata for alot of blue collar voters in the key swing states. But who knows, the next generation of those voters, who grew up on FB/Instagram, may not find him so unappealing as their parents.

I think he has a pretty good shot. I def agree that his main weakness is his lack of charisma and perceived fakeness / always-scheming persona, but thats something that can be changed with the key handlers, messaging, and media campaigns.

<comment><USER6> > He even had a hit movie made about him.

In which he was the villain.

He has more or less zero people skills, but truckloads of money, and creepy amounts of personal information. IMHO his best bet for being elected President would be to straight-up purchase a major party's nomination, then buy the necessary votes in swing states. Let's say it costs $1b to buy a party's nomination. Florida was won by about 100,000 votes in 2016, and he can probably target persuadable voters using FB's data. Can he buy those people's votes for another billion (i.e. $10k apiece)?

<comment><USER7> Not just any kind of villain---the angry, rejected nerd villain. Villain or hero, nobody really wants to get behind that.

<comment><USER4> Well a lot of people got behind Bernie, who has that whole, old-man-get-offff- myyyy-lawwwwn-socialist-curmudgeon, image going.

I think a team of handlers could prob mold Zuck into presentable shape.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The thesis of this article explores the idea:

"After studying how people shared 1.25 million stories during the campaign, a team of researchers at M.I.T. and Harvard implicated Facebook and Twitter in the larger failure of media in 2016."

This is one problem, but according to Nicholas Carr the problem might be deeper and more fundamental : "free-flowing information makes personal and cultural differences more salient, turning people against one another instead of bringing them together."

[http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2017/04/21/how- technology-c...](http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2017/04/21/how-technology- created-global-village-and-put-each-other- throats/pu7MyoAkdyVComb9aKyu6K/story.html)

<comment><USER9> Well of course..It's the echo chamber effect that's been discussed since the 90's.

I didn't read the article because, frankly, I have no interest in Zuck's pointifications ... He created a 900lb gorilla and sometimes the beast is gonna wreck havoc. Nothing with the deep social significance of FB can skate through culture without ripping up a few roads.

I think it's much ado about nothing and is nothing but the new normal.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> All I wanted from facebook regarding that problem on how to deal with news on my timeline was one option to hide all shared links and content and show only my friend's original content. When I want news I know where to find them and it's not on facebook.

<comment><USER11> News on Facebook is a real problem, because the news stories that get shared on Facebook are things that people get really upset about. Donald Trump got tons of press because he deliberately and repeatedly said the most outrageous things.

I've now individually hidden every major news source (BBC, CNN, etc...). Huge improvement to my Facebook experience. While I still get ads from companies, my Facebook feed has been entirely purged of Donald Trump and mass murders.

<comment><USER10> Every time someone shares something from some source, I block the source. It improves the experience indeed, but people never cease finding different sources.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Bernard Stiegler and a bunch of French philosophers have been writing about this idea of 'Algorithmic Governmentality' which I think is a useful way of discerning Mark Zuckerberg's intentions, press releases, denials etc aside.

"I would like to show that with algorithmic governmentality, what we face is precisely a crisis of the regimes of truth. To my mind, we are less facing the emergence of a new regime of truth than a crisis of regimes of truth. A whole range of notions are in crisis: the notions of person, authority, testimony."

More here if you're interested: [https://iainmait.land/pdf/Rouvroy- Stiegler.pdf](https://iainmait.land/pdf/Rouvroy-Stiegler.pdf)

<comment><USER13> looks like a great contemporary read.

Buckminster Fuller talked about the same thing in Cybernetics. He made the proposal that a feedback formula such as PID would lead to utopia when applied to government... but as many note, the problem is less about distribution of quantifiable resources than managing conflicting values.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Good info in article. Name / age of news feed head and 99.9% belief to name one thing.

I also came away still believing even more how we are still better off now - even with some fake news- than the time of Walter Cronkite and the pre cable networks. All you had was whatever THEY decided you should know. One of two newspapers with editors that chose for you.

Even as a news junkie in my pre teens I wondered why they chose what they chose. Thus, by default , what they chose was important.

Now people choose and we just don't like the results, especially the old school hardcore journalists.

To the people working at FB NF, do not let old school editors change your "user decides" algorithms. And never put a human in an editing position.

Remember, it's JUST news.

<comment> rm_-rf_slash I think the Internet and competition from social media has made journalism better, as you can no longer buy up every local paper when Twitter and Facebook and Blogger make journalists out of anybody, and as a result the news companies have to work extra hard to justify their subscriptions.

In addition, mainstream US newspaper subscriptions have been booming since the election with readers demanding unprecedented oversight over this new administration and its addiction to blatant lying. In a way, fake news made real newspapers great again.

<comment><USER15> > I think the Internet and competition from social media has made journalism > better, as you can no longer buy up every local paper when Twitter and > Facebook and Blogger make journalists out of anybody, and as a result the > news companies have to work extra hard to justify their subscriptions.

Why would you need to buy up anything when you own the entire platform people consume their news on (e.g. Facebook)? Sure anyone can be a journalist, but unless Facebook's algorithms like what you're writing you might as well be yelling at a wall. I think the internet's golden age of information freedom is quickly coming to a close with the re-centralization of content publishing and discovery into a handful massive, privately-owned platforms.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> > _In the span of a few months, the Valley has been transformed from a > politically disengaged company town into a center of anti-Trump resistance > and fear_

Is this true? As a Valley-raised New Yorker who visits frequently, Silicon Valley seems politically sleepy. Conversations are vibrant as ever. But action is slim.

<comment><USER17> I would guess that the "action" of SV-ites would show up more online than in- person. Building websites that send letters to congressmen, things like that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> My guess is that this discussion wouldn't even be happening if Hillary had won. Is my instinct correct there?

The whole article basically paints Trump supporters in the same light as terrorists and Nazis - nothing unfamiliar in discourse certainly - <USER2> certainly not a neutral stance.

I mean basically all of this "introspection" and everything surrounding facebook "investigating" fake news etc... came, not from FB, but from the MIT/Harvard study as well as from either side of the aisle shouting fake news and news bubbles.

<comment><USER19> This article and (one-sided) discussion is simply an extension of the Ad Hominem filled election cycle. Anyone who doesn't believe Trump is a dictator must be a nazi, racist, sexist, reads fake news, doesn't understand how (insert topic) works etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> That picture of the newsfeed floor makes working there look like a nightmare.

<comment><USER21> oh look at least they have a Black Lives Matter poster.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is why establishment politicians were so scared of Trump's victory -- it may well have triggered a celebrity apocalypse in DC, a city sometimes referred to as Hollywood for the Less Attractive.

At least we haven't reached the point where the armed forces are auctioning the Presidency.

</comment><comment><USER23> OT: The article's cover picture is a masterpiece.

Reminds me of 'Spirits that I've cited // My commands ignore.' (Goethe)</comment>


Geo Stalking Your Childhood - <AUTHOR> http://www.ericbeland.com/admin/articles/show/53

<comment><USER2> Does anyone else just get a Mephisto login prompt?

Can I have an account please, Eric? :D</comment>


6ft Is Not Always Enough: How Saliva Droplets Spread Through the Air - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-human-os/biomedical/imaging/six-feet-is-not-always-enough-how-saliva-droplets-spread-through-the-air <comment><USER2> Are they calculating how much the droplets travel, or how much viral load someone gets at a specific distance?

This sounds confusing. If I remember correctly, R0 for the virus was around 3 before it was controlled. Is it really plausible that a virus that can spread through droplets due to asymptomatic people breathing in the street, where those droplets travel 6m, would have an R0 _as low as_ 3? Wouldn't it just infect everybody immediately? What am I missing?

<comment><USER3> People who have a significant risk of death don't care about R factor, they just want to avoid infection.

Reasonable precautions for the vast majority of people don't seem like enough if you're 70+.

<comment><USER4> Who are these people at risk exactly? I think there isn't enough talk about it. There are studies now that show that zero carb and intermittent fasting can reverse type 2 diabetes. But nobody seams to suggest to people at risk to try to eat less sugar.

<comment><USER5> I'm pretty sure the first thing people are told after being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes is to control their carb intake.

<comment><USER6> I actually don't think that's true. But that might depend on the country, doctors etc. Many still give the exact wrong advice of limiting fat intake, focusing on "slow burning carbs" and all that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Of course 6 feet isn't always enough, they need a reasonable guideline that's also easy to implement. Most Americans have an intuitive grasp of what 6 feet is, as the height of a "regular tall guy" and can thus estimate 6 feet much better than 8.

<comment><USER8> Europe is going with 2m, while a bit longer than 6ft, I doubt it will make much of a difference, especially in an informal setting.

<comment><USER9> we are only going with 2m cause its a round number almost the same 6ft

<comment><USER8> Yes, I know, I was just pointing out the distance is slightly bigger

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Source study: [https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2020/05/12/2006874117](https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2020/05/12/2006874117)

</comment><comment><USER10> Also...

"Masks Don't Work: A review of science relevant to COVID-19 social policy"

[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340570735_Masks_Don...](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/340570735_Masks_Don't_Work_A_review_of_science_relevant_to_COVID-19_social_policy)

<comment><USER11> Not peer reviewed and reads extremely politically charged. I'd hardly call this science.

<comment><USER12> Agreed. Also, if respirators don't work, how come there isn't a mass infection among doctors treating COVID-19 patients worldwide?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Scientific studies concluding masks don't work:

[https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19216002/](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19216002/)

[http://tiny.cc/krfhpz](http://tiny.cc/krfhpz)

[http://tiny.cc/5sfhpz](http://tiny.cc/5sfhpz)

[https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/jebm.12381](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/jebm.12381)

[https://www.cmaj.ca/content/188/8/567](https://www.cmaj.ca/content/188/8/567)

[https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747](https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/65/11/1934/4068747)

[https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2749214)

<comment><USER14> I checked the first link, it's about the common cold. They test groups with and without masks and in both groups there was one person getting ill. Conclusion: the sample size is far too small to reach any conclusion.

Also checked the second link, it says:

There is some evidence to support the wearing of masks or respirators during illness to protect others, and public health emphasis on mask wearing during illness may help to reduce influenza virus transmission.

Not very convincingly concludes the opposite of the claim.</comment></comment>


Investing in 2016: 'The Only Winning Move Is Not to Play the Game' - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/articles/investing-in-2016-the-only-winning-move-is-not-to-play-the-game-1453485940 <comment></comment>


Show HN: Meta.re – Track top trending cryptocurrency news through social data - <AUTHOR> http://www.meta.re/news/crypto <comment><AUTHOR> The app is built to cut through the noise and find what's the most influential crypto news for the day. There are some other news aggregators out there but they mostly just ingest RSS feed and without a really good way to rank it. We are actively crawling and aggregating news from the web.

I just finished the MVP very recently, so I'd love to get your feedback. So far the coverage is pretty good and I've been using it constantly to stay tuned, but I'll be adding more news sources and improving the crawler in the coming days.

<comment><USER2> This looks very interesting, thanks.

<comment><AUTHOR> glad you like it. If you have anything you want to see, let me know.</comment></comment></comment>


How U.S. Surveillance Still Subverts U.S. Competitiveness - <AUTHOR> http://www.itif.org/publications/2015/06/09/beyond-usa-freedom-act-how-us-surveillance-still-subverts-us-competitiveness

<comment><USER2> It's gonna cost us money? Now THAT's a reason to stop monitoring everybody (which is rather expensive in itself).</comment>


Apple Unveils iTunes Radio - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2013/06/10/itunes-radio/

<comment><USER2> I was a holdout against subscription music for a long time but the time has come (actually probably a year or 3 ago). I accidentally lost my 15,000 song collection and was pleasantly surprised that I could still listen to it with Match (in fact I liked that doing so did not take up any drive space). But I still pretty much ever listen to my iTunes collection, instead just call up (almost) anything on Spotify. Being able to access almost any track for the cost of an album per month beats the heck out of pay-per-track/album.

Will be interesting to see if iRadio (and some of Apple's other things) make it to Windows and Android. That's the only way to become Pandora-et. al. killers.

<comment><USER3> Pandora's stock ended up 2.5% today. Perhaps iTunes radio isn't as big a threat as suspected?

<comment><USER2> Well, it went down 20% on the initial news a week ago.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Since it comes for free with iTunes Match, I suppose I will cancel Pandora if this doesn't suck. But I don't have much faith in that... iTunes Match is barely serviceable IMHO, and I'm mainly paying for it as a cloud backup of my music.

<comment><USER5> What's wrong with iTunes Match? It wasn't great at launch in terms of reliability but I have no problems with it now.

<comment><USER4> On the desktop it is fine. On the iPhone, it's slow to play songs that aren't local yet, and doesn't really work as seamlessly as I want. I know which songs are downloaded and which are not, because they act differently.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> So weird not having support for individual songs. This might hurt Pandora but this won't be touching Spotify's business.

<comment><USER7> Legally they are completely different things, different royalty rates.

<comment><USER6> Yeah I understand, it's just that I'm surprised they didn't make similar contracts to Spotify.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The functionality looks much worse than Google's Play music service, but it's free, so there's that.

<comment><USER9> much worse? iTunes has 10X more functionality than the web-based Google Play interface. For $25/year you get to match 25,000 songs to 256kbps AAC and you get ad-free personal stations. Google play may give you individual tracks and 20,000 songs matched for $90-120 a year. They have their pros and cons, but I don't think either is clearly "worse" than the other. Personally, since I already use iTunes Match, iRadio is a way better choice for me.

<comment><USER10> Google will host 20,000 uploaded songs for $0 per year.

<comment><USER8> And it's also 320kbps. I think it will even preserve the format of the uploaded file and just stream at 320.

<comment><USER11> re:preserving format: it does not, unfortunately. Anything non-mp3 is transcoded to 320kbs mp3, and the original copy is not stored.

Any metadata that doesn't fit into their system is also lost in the process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> So now Apple will have a pretty major ad platform in the near future. I just wonder if it was their idea or a result of negotiations with the labels.

<comment><USER13> iAds is already a significant ad platform, it's not clear to me that this one will definitely eclipse it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> Still think the Spotify model is a lot better in terms of sharing and finding new music people are listening too.. Seems like I still have to pay for my individual songs on iTunes, which I think is a dieing breed.

</comment><comment><USER15> I don't know if this has been mentioned anywhere yet, but on Apple's iRadio page, there are pictures of iPhones with colored edges.

[http://www.apple.com/itunes/itunes- radio/](http://www.apple.com/itunes/itunes-radio/)

<comment><USER16> maybe a new ipod touch? does not have a speaker but only a camera at the usual location.

<comment><USER15> Ah, I keep forgetting those still exist.

<comment><USER3> The devices with colored edges also say "iPod" instead of the carrier (which are now ____* in all new Apple stuff, probably to avoid showing carrier favoritism).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> What compels me to actually "buy" any song now when I can just stream it on "iRadio" for free?

<comment><USER18> If you are like me, then the answer is bandwidth. Alot of plans only have 500Megs per month of data. I'm looking at plans in Canada

If each song takes 5 Megs then I can stream 100 songs a month if I don't use any additional bandwidth.

Additionally I can't listen to this music during my subway commute into work, which is my primary music listening time.

<comment><USER19> Rdio lets you sync songs / albums locally onto your mobile device and then doesn't require a connection to play them. Not sure if other services have similar features.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Just tried it on the new iTunes for OSX and it kind of sucks. Great collection of Radio stations but you can't: 1\. Save any stations as your favorites. 2\. Quality of audio is below par 3\. Station frequently looses signal and iTunes has to rebuffer.

I don't see it replacing Pandora yet.

<comment><USER21> What? I'm pretty sure it's not available until the fall.

<comment><USER22> On iOS 7 (beta), it should be available now.</comment></comment></comment>


Is another human living inside you? - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150917-is-another-human-living-inside-you <comment><USER2> The title is very much clickbait. A few cells possibly living inside the body, during gestation either as a fetus or as a mother, ar enot another human living inside you.

<comment><USER3> Say hello to the BBC 'DQF' driving their web content by entirely the wrong metrics. They purposely use misleading headlines to promote clicks.

I'm not usually one for harking back, but I miss the days of the circa-2005 site with descriptive headlines and content-dense pages [1].

I occasionally write to them to complain about how shocking their news home page [2] is (over time the items trend to "magazine" and "is this a 'question'?" pieces; looking at the page now there are three news summaries and seven headlines taking up 1/4 of the page) and it seems to improve a little for a day or so. Now - if other people would also write in...

[1] [https://web.archive.org/web/20040609093102/http://news.bbc.c...](https://web.archive.org/web/20040609093102/http://news.bbc.co.uk/) [2] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/news](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news)</comment></comment>


Plenty of Passengers, but Where Are the Pilots? - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/17/opinion/sunday/plenty-of-passengers-but-where-are-the-pilots.html <comment><USER2> Oh no, the regional airlines may have to start paying their flightcrews something more than dirt.

$26K for a life-critical job? Sounds ridiculous.</comment>


Counting Clicks and Looking at Links (article on Google, 1998) - <AUTHOR> http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2048866/Counting-Clicks-and-Looking-at-Links?ref=resubmitting-with-correct-year-in-the-title-oops

<comment><USER2> Best part of the article is at the end:

 _Will Google be going commercial? Page has no opposition to it, but said there's no particular hurry.

"We're Ph.D. students, we can do whatever we want," he said. And what they want is to find the right partners to let them focus on improving relevancy. "I'd like to build a service where the priority is on giving users great results," Page said.

If you pay a visit, don't be frightened by the interface. One thing Google needs is a good facelift. Relevancy scores and other extraneous information can obscure the actual listings -- but I did say this was an experimental service, right?_

</comment><comment><USER3> "portal heaven"</comment>