Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon review - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/7/16105800/lenovo-thinkpad-x1-carbon-review-ultraportable-laptop <comment><USER2> Look hard at the review sites like the Better Business Bureau before you buy a Lenovo: [https://www.bbb.org/raleigh-durham/business- reviews/computer...](https://www.bbb.org/raleigh-durham/business- reviews/computers-wholesale-and-manufacturers/lenovo-in-morrisville- nc-90064256)

I bought a 3rd gen X1 Carbon. Three weeks out of warranty, the display stopped working. The repair took five weeks and they put in the wrong parts, downgrading the CPU and RAM. it took three more weeks for them to even ship a new replacement. On every single interaction I was told something false about the repair process, timeline, shipping, etc - seriously, I kept a log. Every department pointed fingers at every other department, no one (even the "Executive Support" I was escalated to) even claimed to have comprehensive knowledge, let alone actually took responsibility for the process.

Read the reviews. My experience wasn't unusual. Would having no laptop for nine weeks inconvenience you?

<comment><USER3> I'll just offer a contrary anecdote. A few months ago, I had a catastrophic failure of my X260 failure (hard crash--would not power up) while on site for a client in a manufacturing facility on the south side of Chicago. I called support and within 3 hours, a tech was on site with a comprehensive set of tools and parts. The technician had been repairing ThinkPads since the late 1990s and still wore his original IBM badge along with his newer one. He ended up nearly completely disassembling and re-assembling my machine in the temporary cubical I was sitting in to replace the motherboard, but was gone within two hours and the machine has worked fine ever since.

I'm sure service varies, but I always purchase the same day, onsite, four hour warranty option and try to be a little savvy about who the contracted service firm is. You can use Lenovo's website to find the certified repair firms and suggest that your ticket be dispatched to one you want.

I have been buying a new ThinkPad every couple years for about 15 years. I have ambivalent feelings about the newest generations, but still find them to be the most ergonomic and comfortable option for me (TrackPoint, keyboard quality, matte display, extended battery options).

<comment><USER2> Thanks for sharing your story. I wasn't aware of the possibility of buying a separate service contract from an outside firm. I'll include it in my consideration the next time I buy a laptop, along with my frustratingly-earned knowledge of Lenovo's party service.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I recommend the T460s instead to anyone considering the X1. Very similar form factor and specs but the RAM and SSD are not soldered on so it's much more future proof. I run mine with 20GB of RAM and 1TB of SSD and I don't think you can even get that in the X1. It also has a better set of connectors, including an Ethernet port. Linux runs very well in it but I assume the X1 is similar.

<comment><USER5> I was torn between the T470 series and the X1 a few weeks back. I ended up getting the X1 and have been liking it so far. Got it with 16 GB RAM and the upgraded screen. Personally the screen was enough for me to chose the X1 over the T4xx series. Also the SSD is not soldered in and can be replaced, the RAM is indeed soldered in. Linux does run very well on it, didn't have any problems out of the box.

Edit: Although I wouldn't mind the T470 since one of my previous laptops was a T430 and I love the accessibility of that series.

<comment><USER4> I have my T460s with the 2560x1440 screen. It's indeed great and I assume it's the same panel you get on the X1.

<comment><USER6> The X1 is the only one with OLED, isn't it?

<comment><USER7> You're thinking of X1 Yoga

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is my main dev machine, although I bought the 4th gen (right before they retired it last Fall). It's a beautiful dev machine as soon as you put Linux on it. I have the highest end specs and it runs really smooth. And as this article explains, the build quality is top notch. Highly recommended laptop.

<comment><USER9> Have you had any issues with the trackpad? I have a Lenovo w530 and the trackpad is junk. The texture completely rubbed off with a few months of heavy use. The scrolling behavior is erratic on both Ubuntu 17.04 and Windows 10. It's probably the biggest factor in determining whether I buy another Thinkpad or go back to Apple.

<comment><USER10> I don't enjoy the ThinkPad trackpad experience in Linux. When I type my sweaty palms touch it, and it never feels great.

My (drastic) solution was to disable the trackpad and fully commit to a keyboard-based workflow (i3wm, tmux, emacs/vim, cvim on Chrome) with occasional usage of the trackpoint.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Looking forward to the ThinkPad Retro ([http://blog.lenovo.com/en/blog/retro- thinkpad-its-alive/](http://blog.lenovo.com/en/blog/retro-thinkpad-its- alive/))

<comment><USER12> Me too!

Unfortunately it was confirmed it's not 4:3, and I think it's very unlikely to be 16:10 instead of 16:9, but I still hope it will be good.

<comment><USER13> If we are lucky they will go with 3:2.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> For anyone shopping for a good deal: The Lenovo Outlet sells refurbished products for a great discount. They often get inventory in bursts, so if you want a good deal figure out your search criteria and check repeatedly. I got a T460s with great specs for around $800 a few months ago.

[http://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/outletus](http://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/outletus)

</comment><comment><USER15> I recently made the switch from Surface Pro 4 to a ThinkPad 370 (like a smaller X1 Yoga). I was close to pulling the trigger on the X1 Carbon, but wanted a touch screen. Before the Surface, I had MacBooks and iMacs. Biggest takeaway, I love the keyboard and the TrackPoint. I was concerned about going from a high DPI screen to HD, but after a week my eyes adjusted. I will take 7ish hour battery over the Surface's 3-4.

Build quality is spot-on, no issues thus far. Having 2 USB ports and 1 USB C (thunderbolt) is clutch. I use the thunderbolt port to hook up an eGPU with 1070 GTX card. I can finally play some games and edit video.

<comment><USER16> Care to share whet eGPU solution you're using?

<comment><USER15> Akito Node with a MSI GTX 1070. Everything worked out of the box after installing Nvidia drivers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Worse pixel density than a Macbook and the screen is 16:9 instead of 16:10, giving me less real vertical real screen estate than a 13 inch Macbook.

I really, really, really want a new ThinkPad, but they simply cannot compete with Macbooks. For the record, I am a huge ThinkPad fan, I count 14 thinkpads around me, the most recent one I have being X240. For me, the epitome was X61T. I still have two of those in mint condition. But today, when I buy a laptop it will be a MacBook.

</comment><comment><USER17> After lots of thinking I eventually went with T470. The reasons: 32GB of memory, dual battery configuration (possible to swap battery while running).

Drawbacks with my choice are at least the size, probably not so good display and just PCIe x2 for the SSD.

There are small annoyances. The software-hardware integration is not on the level where it should be. Pretty much out of the box and for example sleep does not always work - sometimes when waking up all apps are gone. Windows 10 install is not clean, there's Lenovo and Intel stuff hanging there. I dislike for example the Intel popups that I get when changing WLAN. Yes, it is possible to clean up these, but I'd rather not spend time on that. The build in LTE feels a bit unrealiable, it is not there always when computer wakes up and sometimes I'm not able to get connection. Also Lenovo does not provide 1TB SSD that would be compatible with Microsoft eDrive specs, which allow Bitlocker to offload encryption to SSD (which is anyways doing it).

</comment><comment><USER18> nice to see a modern thinkpad getting a positive review. my T420 isn't going to live forever.

<comment><USER16> The T440p is waiting for you...

<comment><USER19> I still rock an X201 :)

Arch Linux + Gnome 3 + SSD everything feels instantenous.

Only thing lacking is the slugishness if I want to convert an h265 video. But that's understandable.

Battery still lasts whole day (9 cell battery at 68% health).

<comment><USER16> One thing about the T440p... You can install the i7-4900MQ in it.

That should help with the conversion...

[https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-4900M...](https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Core+i7-4900MQ+%40+2.80GHz)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I bought the 2nd gen ThinkPad X1 Carbon (20A7) back in 2014. Been rock solid to this day and not a single complaint. This is my main dev machine. Ive been running Ubuntu since I got it, so the 8GB of RAM has been more than enough. No driver issues or anything, high density screen has been great, CPU is fast (Intel Core i7 dual core), and battery life is still excellent. Even have the finger print reader working :)

<comment><USER21> You know, I'm even fond of the quirky keyboard layout, in the end. I will dearly be missing the backspace/delete combo once I upgrade.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Looks good on paper, and surprisingly bloat-free stock OS (just the usual Windows 10 crapware), but even with the highest bin kit, my Carbon Gen5 gets hot to the point of being uncomfortable to handle, and starts stuttering with just 5-6 Chrome tabs open. It can play Starcraft 2 for 10-15 minutes (just long enough to run a benchmark!), and then just starts giving up.

<comment> chao- _> starts stuttering with just 5-6 Chrome tabs open._

I have a 3rd Gen, and have several dozen tabs open right now, with no issues, stutter or otherwise. One is playing a video, quite a few are also larger page/webapps (e.g. Gmail, Trello, Github in a large PR). I am have the 1440p version, and am plugged into an external monitor that is at 1440p, which should be further taxing the integrated graphics, but it's not showing. I can't imagine you're coming close to hitting any memory limits with just five or six tabs, so presumably something compute related?

What five to six tabs cause stuttering?

<comment><USER22> I'm guessing you didn't make the mistake of paying more for a much hotter CPU...

<comment> chao- Your guess is incorrect. I have the most expensive available from that lineup at the time of purchase. I might be mis-remembering but I recall there being two i7 offerings (plus an i5 version) and I shelled out for the more expensive one.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I've been using an X1 (3rd gen with the 4K display) for about 2 years now I think, and it's a great laptop for Linux. A full charge will last around 8 hours, maybe 9 or 10 if you turn of Chromium and WiFi (this all depends a bit on what you end up doing).

My only complaint is that I had my display replaced 3 (or maybe already 4) times either due to dead pixels, or these white smudges on the screen (these appear to be caused by damage to the LCD). These smudges in particular keep popping up and aren't too uncommon amongst other users either. There's a new one since I last had my screen replaced, but it's fortunately only visible when looking down on the laptop from the top (even then it's hard to see).

<comment><USER24> I've got the most recent generation, and in addition to killer battery life, the battery charge times are incredible. I basically don't have to think about it -- plugging it in while I'm in the shower gives it enough charge to last the day. Seems to charge about three times faster than my phone...

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Extremely happy with my current generation X1C running Fedora. The selection of ports hit a sweet spot for me: two full-size USB, two Thunderbolt 3, and full-size HDMI. After years with Macs, it's wonderful to finally be free from dongles.

<comment><USER26> I didn't require a dongle until the latest generation.

<comment><USER25> With my Macbook Air, I needed a Mini-DisplayPort to HDMI adapter.

With my Retina Macbook Pro I also picked up a Nexus 5X, so I needed a USB-C to USB-A adapter.

With my wife's Touchbar Macbook Pro I need a USB-C to USB-A adapter _and_ a USB-C to HDMI adapter.

Finally, with the X1C, I need none of these.

I have no doubt that USB-C / Thunderbolt 3 are the future, but as a transition laptop, I couldn't be happier.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I wonder if they really did get the hinge right. The reason I ask is that I just replaced the wife's laptop because the hinges were stiff enough to beak the case around them (after years of use.) That was an economy model that we purchased off lease so it didn't sting too badly. The housing on my Y50 is cracked around the hinges. I need to open it up to clean out the dust but I'm afraid to do so.

My wife's laptop was replaced with an Acer. If I were to replace mine today it would probably be with a Dell XPS 15. Only time will tell if these are any better.

<comment><USER28> I replaced my Thinkpad by an XPS15 with a small fear that I would regret the Thinkpad, and I absolutely not. Under Windows, the Dell software is far better than the one of Lenovo (far less bloated, and far more discret).

I thought that I would regret the Thinkpad keyboard, but the keyboard of the XPS is actually not bad at all (well, the Thinkpad one better, but the XPS is still largely ok for me).

The only thing that I clearly regret are the lack of dedicated Page-up/Page- down keys. This is even ridiculous given there are empty space next to the arrow keys where they could have been put (same place as on the Thinkpad). Well, I can live with that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> just my 2 cents after owning one for quite some time now. Avoid.

Right after the warranty ended the screen has constant flickering and will sometimes turn to straight up static for 5 minutes at a time. moving the laptop hinge doesnt affect this at all which leads me to believe its a motherboard issue rather than a screen or ribbon cable issue. Besides that, the build quality is actually pretty terrible for what one of these costs and the hinge is flimsy and wobbles around when you move the laptop.

<comment><USER30> Flickering in an LCD is usually caused by a bad inverter, which is an inexpensive part ($20 range) you can generally replace yourself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> my thumbs are still on the inside of my hands so unfortunately I still cannot deal with trackpad buttons _above_ the scrolling surface.

I have an older thinkpad from my job which is a great machine but unusuable trackpad-wise due to this design. I use a cheap asus zenbook daily. Would love to have a trackpad-buttons-where-my-thumbs-are lenovo again.

<comment><USER32> Those buttons are for the nipple not the trackpad. The trackpad otherwise is like an Apple trackpad.

<comment><USER31> Haven't used my T540P with a GUI in quite a long time, I think I may have noticed that the bottom of the trackpad is trying to be like an apple trackpad button also, however I recall it working very poorly; the whole trackpad physically clicks very nicely and definitively for the upper buttons, and on the bottom it just works like crap. Perhaps they've improved that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> 1080p screen, awful headphone audio quality, limited to 16GB of RAM, and ships full of Windows crapware - I guess "Apple has made its MacBook line worse, not better" from the intro is describing reversion to the mean.

<comment><USER34> This will of course be a matter of personal preferences, but yes, I concur with the sentiment: Apple made its MacBook line worse, not better:

\- They confine better specs to the touchbar models, which I would tolerate (not love) if it had the decency of starting _after_ the ESC key. As it is, it's an abomination which must die, die, die.

\- They give you USB-C ports (yay) at the expense of leaving you with _zero_ USB-A ports (nay).

\- They supply you with a low spec charging cable, indistinguishable from a high spec one

\- They took away MagSafe which I love and has saved my laptop

\- They took away the SD slot (but left the headphones jack? While arguing in favor of its removal on the iPhone? A bit inconsistent?)

\- They massively bumped prices, making it considerably less appealing from a price/specs ratio perspective

\- ...and they max out at 16GB just as you criticized the Lenovo.

<comment><USER35> For the headphone jack, I'd argue that different use cases for laptop and phones mean removing the headphone jack on one and leaving it on the other is justifiable.

The other things you mentioned are definitely annoyances I run into occasionally with my MacBook Pro.

> \- They supply you with a low spec charging cable, indistinguishable from a > high spec one

What do you mean? My laptop came with an 87W charger and a cable that works fine with it.

<comment><USER34> >> \- They supply you with a low spec charging cable, indistinguishable from a high spec one

>What do you mean? My laptop came with an 87W charger and a cable that works fine with it.

The supplied USB-C cable only supports USB-2 data speeds (480Mbps). If you want to achieve USB-3 or 3.1 speeds (either 5Gbps or 10 Gbps), while still having the full 5A charging current supported by the 87W charger, you need to buy this $12.99 cable from monoprice: [https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=24285](https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=24285)

We're talking a laptop which can be configured between $2500 and $4100 and you need to go buy a better cable for it. I'm sorry but this is _not_ the Apple I used to love.

<comment><USER36> Same with the recently launched Keyone phone from Blackberry, at least it prompted me to learn about the extra pins on a USB3 connection.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I own and prefer the smaller footprint of the Yoga 370 ... BUT ... I really dislike the glossy display.

The X1 is fantastic because it's a matte finish.

I really wish more laptops used a matte finish.

It's so much easier on the eyes (due to lack of reflection).

</comment><comment><USER38> If you like the X1 Carbon, but need more ram, the Toshiba Portege X30 is the only machine that has fully serviceable components at only 1,1kg of weight. I ordered mine with 32 GB of ram, loving it so far.

<comment><USER39> How is it in terms of build quality compared to Lenovo or Apple?

How does Linux run on it?

<comment><USER38> You can read a few reviews about it, personally I find it "good enough", a little bit below Lenovo or Apple. But for me the Gold Standard currently are Surface Books regarding build quality, so take my opinion with a grain of salt if you dislike them.

I run Windows 10 and haven't installed Linux so far, but the hardware seems very standard. If you are interested I can try an Ubuntu Live Stick later.

<comment><USER39> Thanks for the kind offer, I was just curious if you knew. You don't need to go to such lengths.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> No mention of wifi performance. The last ThinkPad I had (T450s) it really wasn't that great even though I had the high-end Intel wireless option.

</comment><comment><USER41> Has anyone gotten OSX stable on this thing yet?

</comment><comment><USER42> Asus ux330 has basically the same characteristics but it is available for half the price

</comment><comment><USER43> I don't think it matters how much better Windows hardware is, or how far along the Linux subsystem gets, I only feel at home in a *nix OS. The best UX/most stable is MacOS, and it doesn't hurt that I can run Photoshop, Sketch, etc.

<comment><USER44> Possibly relevant: [https://www.reddit.com/r/hackintosh/comments/1iybjq/is_it_po...](https://www.reddit.com/r/hackintosh/comments/1iybjq/is_it_possible_to_install_osx_on_x1_carbon/)

Information is dated, though; I have no idea if it's still relevant to modern X1 Carbons (or to modern macOS versions).

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Why do they put the touchpad off-centre to the left?

<comment><USER46> Because of the numpad. That way it's centered between your palms so you don't touch it accidentally while typing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> > Lenovo has mostly been a good guardian of the ThinkPad brand, but it did > misapply the label on its plasticky ThinkPad Edge laptops. I owned one of > those and it definitely didn't live up to the storied reputation of this > portable PC.

I had a ThinkPad Edge E525 for many years and I was quite happy with it for the price. I finally decided to upgrade later this year mostly because of how I had (unintentionally) physically abused the machine over the years. But I still think the Edge series was pretty nice.

</comment><comment><USER48> Can someone explain to me what the point of an i7 (or even an i5) is on a laptop? Aside from speed? They all have dual core processors. It's not like the desktop lineup where each step up gets more cores.

<comment><USER49> Cache size and clock speed. In Ultrabooks i[3,5,7] are all 2 core 4 thread differentiated by cache and clock.

You can get 4 core CPUs in larger laptops where the i5 is 4 core, 4 thread and i7 4/8\. Similar to desktops.

<comment><USER40> Right, 3MB vs 4MB of L2 cache in the case of the X1

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> I've been using Thinkpads and Macbooks on and off for the last 15 years, and this gen-5 Thinkpad is easily the best laptop I've ever owned.

Some subtle features of this gen-5 laptop that may not be apparent:

\- The audio jack creates no hiss. If you used Thinkpads in the past with sensitive headphones, you'd hear a buzzing noise. The Macbooks never did that and this is the first Thinkpad that is a silent audio jack.

\- You can spill water on the keyboard and it'll just flow though.

\- Seriously best keyboard in class compared to all other ultrabooks. I really don't like the Macbook keyboard design... the depth on keypress is too shallow and it doesn't have the nice bounceback effect of the Thinkpads.

\- Battery life is around 6-7 hours, which is long lasting ThinkPad finally.

I think the build quality of Thinkpads is way more functional and utlitarian than Macbooks. I like the matt screen of Thinkpads more. The touchpoint to use your index finger to move the mouse lets you keep your hand in the typing position. Fingerprint sensor is fast and works well.</comment>


Why clean energy is now expanding even when fossil fuels are cheap - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/01/14/why-clean-energy-is-now-expanding-even-when-fossil-fuels-are-cheap/ <comment><USER2> Because it's mostly oil that's cheap, and barely any of it is used to generate electricity (electricity being the key industry of renewables). Coal and gas is down, too, but not nearly as much, and don't have a long-term low-cost forecast as strongly as oil does right now.

Further, despite the green-energy rhetoric (which I'm largely supportive and in favour of, despite it being a bit disingenuous sometimes), renewable subsidies are huge, or at least have been as of late.

Further we're seeing wall street come in with securitisation of renewables, making it a bit easier for renewable companies to finance everything. At the end of the day, you can't be disruptive without capital in a capital-intensive (energy in general, including renewables, have large startup costs) industry. Securitisation allows relatively new entrants like solar city raise financing essentially by factoring 20 years of utility bills, without having to sell out the company.

Beyond that, renewables are still tiny and if they weren't growing like they do, it'd be pretty strange tbh.

And lastly... they're really getting cheap, and at some point there's a threshold moment you cross.

<comment><USER3> >renewable subsidies are huge, or at least have been as of late.

relative to what? Fossil fuels in the US still get huge subsidies.

<comment><USER4> I think parent is European, perhaps Dutch even (judging by his post history). Here in Europe I don't think fossil fuels are subsidised.

<comment><USER5> The UK certainly subsidizes fossil fuels.

[http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/12/uk- breaks...](http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/12/uk-breaks- pledge-to-become-only-g7-country-increase-fossil-fuel-subsidies)

'A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "We are committed to meeting our decarbonisation targets – we've made record investments in renewables and are focusing on lower-carbon secure energy sources, such as nuclear and shale gas. However this will not happen overnight - oil and gas will continue to play a role so we can ensure hardworking families and businesses have access to secure, affordable energy."'

<comment><USER6> Keep in mind that there's a lot of spin and misleading statements made in this area. The article repeats the words "tax break" over and over, but it never actually explains what this means.

But if you Google the actual change being discussed:

"Effective tax rates on production from older oil and gas fields will be reduced from 80pc to 75pc immediately, and backdated to january, while on newer fields it will be cut from 60pc to 50pc, Oil & Gas UK, the industry body said. The changes serve to entirely reverse the tax grab on the sector in the Chancellor's 2011 budget."

Or to put it another way, the UK taxes newer oil fields as 50%, which is a horrible subsidy compared to how they taxed it two years before that, but no change from how they taxed it before _that_. And in general the UK has (even after the change) some of the highest taxes on petroleum production in Europe.

Question: If the UK has above average tax rates, does that mean it has no subsidy at all? Or is there some "natural" tax rate and any deviation from that is a subsidy? Does it even make sense to call the way you set the amount of money you take from someone a "subsidy"?

<comment><USER7> I always assumed this tax/subsidy was to account for the fact that the oil/gas belongs to the country. In that framing, giving away natural resources below market rates is a definite subsidy.

<comment><USER6> > In that framing, giving away natural resources below market rates is a > definite subsidy.

So...what's the "market rate" for taxes on a new well in the UK's territorial waters in the North Sea? Given that the UK has a monopoly on allowing wells to be drilled in that area, isn't the market rate whatever the UK says it is, and thus there is always zero subsidy by definition?

Or should we compare to what other countries charge for other wells in other areas? Should we adjust for, eg, the difficulty of drilling in the North Sea compared to, eg, off the coast of Brazil and if so, how? Should we only compare to EU countries, or only to rich countries, or do we compare to everyone? And if, as is the case, the UK has relatively high taxes compared to others, in what way would it be accurate to call it a subsidy?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> The article is a bit misleading with it's focus on "generation capacity" as opposed to "production." Consider the situation in the U.S. The latest data shows that natural gas increased it's share of electricity generation from 27% to 32%. Solar increased from 0.4% to 0.7%. Wind held steady at 4.3%. [http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/pdf/sec7_5.pdf](http://www.eia.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/pdf/sec7_5.pdf)

Yes there's a lot of spending on renewables and they are building a lot of capacity, but that overlooks actual generation.

<comment><USER9> Still...

"Overall, the addition of 121 gigawatts of solar and wind globally (also a record) means that roughly half of new electricity generating capacity installed last year was in these two technologies."

Also, Biomass = 1.7%

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> When considering investments in power generation, the price of coal/natural gas is likely a better indicator than the price of oil. And it does seem like the price of both have been decreasing.

Its highly likely that the investments that happened in 2015 were planned before, when the the prices were higher.

<comment><USER11> Your comment and barney54's comment pretty much invalidate the interpretation offered by the author.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I wish some politicians would take note: Right now is a perfect alignments of the planets for a carbon tax. Get on it before the window closes.

<comment><USER13> What is the coming event that is going to close the window?

<comment><USER12> In the short term I would worry about consumers adjusting to the lower prices and start buying more gas guzzling vehicles. In the long term, once the supply glut for oil is over the prices should normalize. Right now oil producers are basically playing chicken to see who can outlast the others, but I would expect prices to creek back eventually as the competition clears out.

<comment><USER14> How confident are you in this belief? Are you shorting a diverse set of oil company stocks and/or buying oil futures, or just posting on the internet?

<comment><USER15> I don't know if a guy "putting his money where his mouth is" is more or less trustworthy than a guy who isn't:

* If I have a position, I'll want to convince everyone that I'm right because _it 'll make me right_ (if everyone thinks energy stocks are worthless, they will be.) That's why most people with lots of skin in the game, long or short, are very happy to publicly argue that their bet is correct.

* Someone very risk-averse can think, correctly, that he's likely right, but loathe the 10% probability to lose money. Conversely, someone can be near-addicted to gambling and make bets based on very little, or someone can just be wrong regardless of their risk preference.

Overall, a random commenter's arguments seem more interesting to me than their claim to have bet on being right, even if I trust this really hard to verify claim.

<comment><USER14> Prediction markets work much better than polls. This is because those who know are willing to bet on it, and those who do not are (rightly) reluctant.[1] Some such as Tetlock have (plausibly) claimed they can do even better than prediction markets, but not by listening to random commenters with no skin in the game.[2]

TLDR; Talk is cheap, and people are much more careful with their wallets than their mouths (or keyboards).

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

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_E._Tetlock](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_E._Tetlock)

<comment><USER15> Well, prediction markets do better than polls, but actual financial markets are in part prediction markets and they do pretty badly at times and sometimes there's a guy who calls a bubble long before it pops. And that guy doesn't necessarily stake a huge fortune on that prediction. So yeah, talk is cheap, and yeah, on average people are more careful with their wallets than their mouths, but on the other hand, people sometimes have interesting things to say, and asking how much money they bet on being right is less interesting to me than asking how they arrived at their conclusions. Now in some cases I will ask someone how much money he'd put on being right, but I'll do that when I think they're either wrong or fairly uninformed and yet very opinionated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Saudi Arabia must think that if it can only hold oil prices low for a few more years, its competition will be wiped out and then it can go on selling even more oil than it does now and for $100/barrel, too.

It's going to be in for a rude awakening in a few years when it tries that, because by then EVs will almost achieve critical mass, and once it tries to raise the prices, the EV sales will only accelerate. This is even more true for solar power, as I think we've already passed critical mass and there's no stopping its growth.

</comment><comment><USER17> When I saw the title, my first thought was:

"Because fossil fuels won't always be cheap, and will be gone in a couple hundred years"

It seems pretty obvious that renewable energy is going to be the way of the future, so of course there will be large investments in it.

This really isn't surprising either, because "clean energy" doesn't usually pollute the air (as the article pointed out).

<comment><USER18> From a money/self-interest perspective, most of the fortunes in carbon have already been made. The people who get rich off renewables today will be creating new dynasties.

<comment><USER19> That was the general wisdom back in the late 70's but the reality now is we have found WAY WAY more carbon based fuel sources than we ever thought could be captured. Updated global estimates for oil are somewhere between 50 and 250 years and most estimates (other than those by left leaning not for profits) estimate 100 to 180 years worth of coal.

<comment><USER18> No I get that but nobody is going to get on the ground floor of oil. Remember the old James Dean / Rock Hudson "Giant"? or "There Will Be Blood"?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Another part of the equation is the efforts of companies like mine, Genability, that are working to drive down the "soft costs" of clean energy.

If you want to help create software to make clean power cheaper, you should join us -- we're hiring: [http://genability.com/careers/work_with_us.html](http://genability.com/careers/work_with_us.html)

<comment><USER21> Cool company and concept. Wish you allowed remote work. Oh well. Best of luck!

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> is it posssible fossil fuels are becoming cheaper because clean enegery is expanding

<comment><USER23> No, the two are disconnected.

Oil is getting cheaper because the House of Saud is attempting to drive out frackers in the US. Jokes on them though: That oil is always going to be profitable around $50-60/barrel. Once the Sauds lower production to raise the price of oil back up, frackers will fire right back up. It'll take 12-18 months, but it'll still happen. Almost no one burns petroleum for electricity mind you (nat gas, yes, but not oil) except Hawaii and parts of Alaska, and they're moving as fast as possible to renewables because of price spikes that occur occasionally.

So you're going to see this seesaw effect. Oil shoots up, more oil comes onto the market, oil goes back down, etc.

Renewables. Oh how I love me some renewables. There's this legislation, the production tax credit [1]. It generously subsidizes the installation of renewables in the US. There's always been this quagmire though, as Congress would only extend it 1 year at a time (hard to plan capital expenditures worth billions when the legislation you're relying on is always up in the air).

But things changed in December of last year. At the end of 2015, in a landmark deal, Congress extended it for _5 years_ , and in return, the US lifted export restrictions on crude oil. That means that solar and wind is going to roll out faster than ever. Natural gas will push out the remaining 30% of coal fired generation in the US, and wind and solar will fill the gaps (this is good; natural gas is cleaner, and produces much less CO2 per MWH produced). As more wind and solar comes online, along with utility scale battery storage, we'll reduce our reliance on natural gas (protip: don't invest long-term in generators who own substantial nat gas generation assets).

China is deploying wind at an astonishing rate, faster than even nuclear [2]. They're heavily subsidizing electric vehicles now as well [3]. The price of coal is plummeting (which is good!) [4]. The best case scenario is whatever is left of it is left in the ground.

If you can afford it, elect to get renewables from your utility. The premium should be ~1-3 cents/kwh. If you can afford to get an electric car, and it makes sense for your lifestyle, do so. If it doesn't, use a carshare program.

Collective effort can change the status quo.

[1] [http://energy.gov/savings/renewable-electricity- production-t...](http://energy.gov/savings/renewable-electricity-production- tax-credit-ptc)

[2] [http://www.earth- policy.org/data_highlights/2015/highlights5...](http://www.earth- policy.org/data_highlights/2015/highlights50)

[3] [http://www.ibtimes.com/chinese-consumers-bought- nearly-300-m...](http://www.ibtimes.com/chinese-consumers-bought- nearly-300-more-electric-cars-year-compared-2014-2222591)

[4] [https://www.quandl.com/collections/markets/coal](https://www.quandl.com/collections/markets/coal)

<comment><USER24> I agree with your facts but disagree with your assessment. I believe that the drop in clean energy prices is what drove the crash in oil prices.

The reason the Saudis are trying to drive the frackers out of business is because the Saudis no longer believe that we're going to get all the oil out of the ground before clean energy takes over. Previously they were fine cutting their own production in order to maintain a particular price because they were certain that eventually ALL of the oil in Saudi Arabia would get sold on the global market. If that took 100 years, that actually was even better for them. If you believed in peak oil, then being the last one standing with reserves actually would be awesome.

With clean energy beating projections it looks like we're not going to burn every drop of oil in the Earth. Given that, the Saudis are no longer patient. If they hold back their reserves to maintain a particular price it's very possible we'll get off oil before we run out of oil. Thus the Saudis would have left money on the table if they didn't shift strategy.

It seems like their new strategy is to extract every dollar they can for their oil reserves. In the short term that means fighting off the frackers, but the broader picture looks like a race to the bottom for all oil producers.

The good news is I don't think we're going to burn all the oil on Earth. The bad news is low oil will slow down the rollout of clean energy because it makes ROI worse.

<comment><USER8> Where is the evidence that renewables have driven the crash in oil prices?

There is only a tiny bit of competition between renewables and oil. In the U.S. less than 1% of electricity is generated from oil. Oil is used as a transportation fuel and electric vehicle sales have stagnated. (few EVs were sold in 2015 than in 2014 in the U.S. [http://insideevs.com/december-2015-plug-electric-vehicle- sal...](http://insideevs.com/december-2015-plug-electric-vehicle-sales-report- card/))

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> Obviously more expensive carbon-intensive fuels favors renewables, but I wonder what the threshold is to really give a long term incentive for innovation.

For a lot of renewable energy technologies, the biggest problem is operating at a large scale. It's fine to show something works in a lab, but will it work at 1,000x, or even 10^6x scale? You can't figure that out without building it at that scale, and you can't build it at that scale unless the probability of the investment paying off is high enough. In practice, having some confidence that you'll be somewhat price competitive through some mechanism (subsidies, favorable tax treatment etc.) over the long term.

All the technologies mentioned in this article are to a first approximation old, and are doing well because they've become cheaper. The real problem here is for next-generation technologies which need to be demonstrated at industrial scale.

<comment><USER26> If I recall correctly, the major difficulty currently is stable financing. The latest budget did a great deal to assist this according to reports (I have not read the budget myself).

It's really tricky to deal with the finances when capital costs are huge but operating costs are minimal. Once the plant is built, the low marginal cost of production drives prices down to levels that make roi complicated.

<comment><USER25> True, but the marginal cost of oil is cheaper still, and when building a new plant it's even easier to have massive cost overruns due to unforeseen complications in building the plant.

As an aside: someone in the oil industry once told me that to a first approximation the marginal cost of a product coming out of a refinery is inversely proportional to the mass in metal of that refinery. The bigger the refinery, the less it costs to produce once it's built.

If this is true, then demonstration-scale plants face an even bigger hurdle, because they're in a sort of valley of death of efficiency, not big enough to be cost competitive down the line, but too big to be a (relatively) low-risk investment.

<comment><USER26> Your friend in the oil industry is probably assuming that the products are fairly high value, which is pretty much guaranteed versus the value of electrical energy. Minimum approximate price for anything is the value of the energy you get by burning it, doing essentially anything else will result in a much higher value product.

The costs would be (first order) feedstock + O&M + capital amortized. For a chemical plant, the feedstock is irrelevant not because it's cheap compared to the value of the energy you get from burning it but because the difference in price between the product and feedstock swamps the O&M + capital costs. What bigger plants do is decrease O&M and decrease capital (per unit capacity), but they can do nothing to decrease the feedstock price...

If a barrel of oil is $50, a barrel of oil equivalent is 6.1 GJ, so if we translate to the weird US units we use it's just under 3 cents per kWh if conversion were 100%. In practice efficiency is closer to 45%, which I'll call half, so the 2x gets you to an absolute minimum cost of around 6 cents per kWh for oil electricity generation.

That's including no wear and tear, no capital costs, and no staff to keep an eye on things. This is the absolute thermodynamic floor on the cost of oil based electricity, with the plant size getting bigger at best driving the price to 6 cents as O&M and capital costs are driven to a smaller percentage of the total costs (i.e. O&M + fuel).

For comparison, look at figure 44 of this report:

[http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2015/08/f25/2014-Wind- Tec...](http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2015/08/f25/2014-Wind-Technologies- Market-Report-8.7.pdf)

and you can see that the median marginal cost (i.e. operations and maintenance) of wind power is ~0.8 cents per kWh ($8/MWh).

So I stand by my claim that the marginal cost of wind power is much lower than the marginal cost floor for oil base electricity. Chemicals just have a different first order approximation due to very different margins.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Maybe the lack of volatility in pricing is a big factor?

I know for me, swings in natural gas prices for heating is a real drag. One year I pay $500/mo, one year $150. Making a big capital investment with high fixed or financed cost would be awesome if I could do it.

<comment><USER28> You should not see swings that big at the retail level. I'd say whoever your supplier is isn't very good at managing price contracts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> _" The addition of 121 gigawatts of solar and wind globally (also a record) means that roughly half of new electricity generating capacity installed last year was in these two technologies."_

That's impressive. Much of that is in China, which is adding capacity. The US and EU have about as much generating capacity as they need.

</comment><comment><USER30> The things I find much more interesting is why we expect the opposite, and the nature of the political mess that stops us from using the best clean energy solution we have.

I'm convinced the only real problem here is keeping people happy in a really superficial way.

</comment><comment><USER31> So did the article answer the question lithe than a passing remark that they were getting more cost effective?

</comment><comment><USER32> renewables: pay once. fossil: pay per barrel.

<comment><USER8> Not true. If you want to have electricity, only when the wind blows or only when the sun shines, that is true. Otherwise, you need thermal (coal, nat gas, nuke) generation to produce electricity when you want it.

<comment><USER33> Not 'Not True', if you don't mind my double-negative.

I can have some electricity from renewable sources and some electricity from your selection of thermal (coal, nat gas, nuke). This results into an energy mix, not a binary value of renewable-vs-thermal.

Even if a renewable sources are predictably intermittent, they can still play a positive role in an energy mix setting.

Furthermore, this role can be very valuable from an investment point. For example, one pays for installation of solar arrays and gets some electricity every day until its life cycle expires. It might not reach 100% of one's consumption - but there is some electricity every day. Compare this to constructing a thermal power plant - who knows what its operating costs will be 20 years down the line.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> Because clean energy and fossil fuels fill entirely different demands. Fossil fuels (and nuclear and hydro) supply useful energy. Clean energy (apart from small niche uses) does not. The demand for fossil fuels is driven by the demand for energy. The demand for clean energy is driven by politics.

</comment><comment><USER35> I think it's the logical next step for every western country that has the technology.

Russia and the Arabs are considered "the devil", so why give them money for stuff you can do yourself?

"But we're also outsourcing our food and tech production?!"

Yes but people to do cheap work are everywhere, if China stops "selling" cheap, we can go to the next country. Oil and Gas isn't everywhere and even if it was, it wouldn't be there forever.</comment>


Babashka – A Clojure for the grey areas of Bash - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/borkdude/babashka <comment><USER2> Interesting trivia on the name (from Wikipedia):

> Some English speakers use the word "babushka" [бaбушка] (the word for > 'grandma' in Russian) to indicate a headscarf tied below the chin, as still > commonly worn in rural parts of Europe.

However the author should be aware that most people would interpret "bab(a|u)shka" as "grandma" and not as a scarf. Which works too, I guess. Personally, I always think of a [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matryoshka_doll](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matryoshka_doll) (which is also sometimes called babushka) when I see this word...

<comment><USER3> It's very strange to me that someone would keep using this word in those contexts even after being told that this isn't what it means. It's almost like "babushka" to the English-speaking mind is stand-in for "funny sounding Russian word". It does have a rhythm that sounds a little whimsical in English. It's also usually pronounced in English with stress on the wrong syllable. [Should be bábushka.]

<comment><USER4> It's not at all unusual for loanwords to get different meanings when they are adopted. Wikipedia gives this lovely example:

The English word Viking became Japanese バイキング (baikingu), meaning "buffet", because the first restaurant in Japan to offer buffet-style meals, inspired by the Nordic smörgåsbord, was opened in 1958 by the Imperial Hotel under the name "Viking".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I think Babashka (bb) takes important lessons learned about how Clojure grew and applies them well. Piggieback on the tools and libraries already in place and just provide a simpler, more uniform syntax and build in portable standard library (in Clojure and I assume in bb just really need to use maps and arrays). Clojurescript (CLJS) does this beautifully and bb is setup to achieve the a similar success story. CLJS is not perfect (see [https://twitter.com/royalaid/status/1224830807807676417](https://twitter.com/royalaid/status/1224830807807676417) for an example of the runtime leaking through) but it is wonderfully pragmatic and incredibly productive and hope to see bb become to bash what Clojure is for Java and CLJS is for JS.

<comment><USER6> Also noteworthy, Babashka is powered by the Small Clojure Interpreter [1] (same author) which has additional applications. Both are very promising!

[1] [https://github.com/borkdude/sci](https://github.com/borkdude/sci)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why are many of the examples so easily solved using other much simpler methods? Could they not come up with some actual reasonable use cases?

>ls | bb -i '(count _input_ )'

ls | wc -l

>bb '(vec (dedupe _input_ ))' <<< '[1 1 1 1 2]'

send your input to `uniq` for chrissakes

>ls | bb -i '(filterv #(re-find #"README" %) _input_ )'

just `ls * README * ` (there shouldn't be spaces around the * s but HN formatting doesn't like me)

like

come on, honestly.

<comment><USER8> I guess the examples are so simple so that every bash user can translate them easily.

<comment><USER7> Who cares? That doesn't do a good job showing why this software is useful. At first glance it makes it look like everything is just more complicated.

<comment><USER9> Do you speak Clojure?

If not, this isn't for you anyhow.

<comment><USER10> Genuinely curious, what advantage does Clojure provide in this context that other tools don't handle as well or at all? I agree with the GP post, none of the examples listed show that this tool is superior to what bash and other GNU tools already provide.

In other words, if I don't speak Clojure, why should I learn? This project hasn't convinced me it's worth it yet, but maybe it is?

<comment><USER11> Author of babashka here. This tool is intended for people who find Clojure easier to work with than Bash because of familiarity or whatever other reason. If you're not one of them, that's fine, just use Bash.

<comment><USER12> There is no reason for not using more compelling examples.

<comment><USER13> What other things that exist offend you?

<comment><USER12> I think you accidentally replied to the wrong comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Reminded me of Closh ([https://github.com/dundalek/closh](https://github.com/dundalek/closh)), which is a Bash-like shell based on Clojure. Both Babashka and Closh runs Clojure code directly from shell.

</comment><comment><USER15> Aside from the obvious problem that the babushka is the grandmother herself, not the clothing she traditionally wears, what on earth do headscarves have to do with coding? How is this metaphor intended to work?

<comment><USER11> Author of babashka here.

The original tagline was "a sprinkle of Clojure for the command line". A user of babashka commented that this tool was exactly right for him to cover up the grey areas of bash (bash constructs he could not remember the syntax for). If you picture bash as a grey woman and Clojure as the headscarf to cover her grey hair, the metaphor might start to make sense.

<comment><USER15> Aha, that makes more sense - thank you for the explanation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I've been out of the Clojure ecosystem for some time now -- has GraalVM solved the slow start problem? I remember the 1-2 second start up time being a deal breaker for many applications.

<comment><USER11> You can make CLIs with Clojure + GraalVM that have instant startup. Babashka, a Clojure interpreter written in Clojure, is one of them.

This is a nice writeup of someone diving into GraalVM + Clojure at work:

[https://gist.github.com/cldwalker/663c3e1a82dc2ccf9e53eb8f45...](https://gist.github.com/cldwalker/663c3e1a82dc2ccf9e53eb8f45d08fc4)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> as a sidenote, the README contains two really bad practices, pipeing the output of curl into bash (running arbitrary code that can do whatever it wants), and parsing ls.

[https://mywiki.wooledge.org/ParsingLs](https://mywiki.wooledge.org/ParsingLs)

<comment><USER18> `curl X | bash` provides _more_ transparency than most other usual methods of software distribution, as I can always inspect X, which is usually a simple, self-contained script.

In contrast, running code from an unaudited source (GitHub, NPM, etc.), or executing a binary from some random website, all less transparent yet just as dangerous, but for some reason raise way fewer eyebrows.

<comment><USER19> You can only be sure of what you're running if you download it first, examine it, then run what you downloaded.

[https://www.idontplaydarts.com/2016/04/detecting-curl- pipe-b...](https://www.idontplaydarts.com/2016/04/detecting-curl-pipe-bash- server-side/)

<comment><USER20> "You can only be sure of what you're running if you download it first, examine it, _then run what you downloaded_."

What if, before "run what you downloaded", first perform a dry run and _observe it while it is running_.

       set -x
       curl https://example.com/setup.sh | bash -n
       set +x

-x Execution trace

-n Read commands but do not execute them

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_run_(testing)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_run_\(testing\))

<comment><USER17> a script can just set +x before doing anything else, and then fake output.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21>
        $ bash <(curl ...

Seeing this in a README immediately indicates that the author has no idea what they're doing security-wise, and that I probably shouldn't trust their project.

<comment><USER22> I've never understood why people think this is somehow less secure than downloading a binary blob you can't inspect and running that instead.

<comment><USER21> I don't think I've ever downloaded and executed a binary blob. Either use a package manager or compile from source, it's really not that hard.

<comment><USER22> How is compiling and executing source you didn't examine any more secure than executing a bash script?

It's not like package managers are immune either: [https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/11/26/npm_repo_bitcoin_st...](https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/11/26/npm_repo_bitcoin_stealer/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Why? If you really want to do scripting in lisp, why would you not just use guile?

This is just embracing complexity when scheme is a perfect fit, and already exists in multiple ways in the domain.

Did Gauche stop existing?

[http://practical-scheme.net/gauche/](http://practical-scheme.net/gauche/)

<comment><USER24> Oy please. Some Lispers are stuck in the past with their ivory tower ideals, saddened that nobody wants their favorite flavor of Lisp anymore. Why can't you embrace the fact that Lisp just like any other idea does have right to evolve and change?

> Did Gauche stop existing?

Out of all the five people who ever heard about it, three probably stopped using it and for the rest, it may just be like it never existed - they've never heard about it.

Clojure on the other hand somehow managed to become third most popular JVM language and very popular alt-js language. Out of all PLs that can be considered somewhat esoteric, Clojure today is the most vibrant - it has more books, podcasts and conferences. More than Elixir, OCaml, Haskell, Elm, Purescript and even Rust.

Very few people used Guile, even before Clojure got some spotlight. So instead of whining why can't you be happy for the fact that people still want to use Lisp in 2020 at all?

<comment><USER23> So your argument is that I'm somehow a lisp fanatic and I should be happy that at least one lisp made it into the current fad?

<comment><USER25> Exactly.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


When Telecom Companies Search Your Home for Piracy - <AUTHOR> https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/9k7pya/tv-addons-sued-by-rogers-bell-fairplay-members <comment><USER2> > ... and his use of a web service that hides a site's hosting provider > (Lackman says it was the immensely popular service Cloudflare), meant that > there was a real risk that Lackman might destroy evidence if they didn't > conduct a surprise search.

TIL Cloudflare makes you suspicious in the eyes of the law. Lawyers are truly great humans. /s

<comment><USER3> Law is an industry entirely based around charisma and precedent. Entirely "(s)he said, (s)he said". It's quite boring on a technical level, because maths are rarely involved. And quite frustrating on a human level, because judgments are based more on the judge's previous meal and night's sleep than the case facts.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I find it weird that they just took down the site and took over the twitter account during a search. Nothing has been ruled illegal. It's like if someone sued Google and decided to take the search engine down during the initial search for illegal material. How is this legal? And even if the site is deemed illegal, how does that allow them to hijack his twitter account?

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm more and more concerned about shit like this. I'm not doing anything illegal now, but that doesn't seem to stop companies from destroying your entire life if they even think you have done something illegal.

I feel like if I'd have to have anything that could be seen as remotely shifty behind additional encryption layers, preferably with a way to destroy the records completely at a distance.

</comment><comment><USER6> I don't understand why searches can be done by private parties, with no police present. This seems extremely wrong to me. How can this be?

<comment><USER7> They had a bailiff, so presumably they'd already been to court and got a court order.

If you refuse entry to a bailiff they'll just call the police and knock your door down.

<comment><USER8> > they'll just call the police and knock your door down

Not in this case they won't. They are absolutely not allowed to use force, even (legally) reasonable force, to enter. As such, if the defendant isn't home, they can't enter at all.

Also, the defendant is legally allowed to refuse entry. Or more precisely, they may only enter if the defendant permits entry. However, if the defendant does not permit entry, they may be in contempt of court.

And yes, I know the last bit is perverse. Apparently that's deliberate (at least it was in the English law from which the Canadian law was derived).

<comment><USER9> > And yes, I know the last bit is perverse

They would rather have it dealt with quietly in a court room than have a breach of the peace. In this case its your neighbors being protected not the defendant.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The concept of intellectual property was invented to further certain economic goals. It provides a social good. There is no doubt about that but it has a drastically shorter history than the concept of physical property (which predates written records to my knowledge)

The legal system has evolved many safeguards over the years related to improper search, self-incrimination and due process.

I find it curious how easily the latter is sacrificed in favour of the former without anyone suggesting we need to continually reevaluate the degree that the former provides us benefit.

I think this is partly a language problem. Intellectual "Property" has now become merely Intellectual Property without the quotes. This sleight of hand has led many to forget it's origin's and contingent nature and to treat it as some kind of natural right rather than a concession from the state to further commerce and creativity.

<comment><USER11> The websites offering piracy services or advertising/promoting the availability of pirated content should simply be blocked at a national level. It seems to be working well enough in Australia: piracy visits are down 50%, piracy volumes are down 25%. This is following their DNS-based blocking of sites like ThePirateBay a few years ago. Its certainly better than suing people.

<comment><USER12> Let's start by dialing back the ridiculous DRM, which makes it a lot more convenient to pirate content, rather than pay for the DRM-laden official releases.

<comment><USER13> No thanks.

I prefer to help content rights holders fund increasingly broad DRM capabilities which enable control of my devices by unknown third parties. Can't wait until the next "innovation" like this gem comes out: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootk...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Media companies behave like warlords claiming an absolute monopoly on media content distribution and treating accordingly anyone they might perceive as competition.

</comment><comment><USER15> So according to the article you don't have to let them in to search your residence (although you may be held in contempt) but these fine individuals turned up with a locksmith?

IANAL but sounds like a case of bad faith if I've ever heard it. Should've forced them to use the locksmith and then had the cops charge them with burglary.

<comment><USER16> I'm not familiar with Canadian law, but under UK law which I suspect is similar, this is called a Civil Search Order[0] or Anton Pillar Order.

"A search order is probably the most draconian order the court can make" [1]

However there is no forcible power of entry and there is no right _as such_ to require entry, however the judge granting the order can hold you in contempt of court and jail you if you do not grant entry. An independent lawyer must be present who is not directly acting for the plaintiff to represent the subject of the order. It's very very expensive.

Edit: Canadian law does appear to be based on UK law to some extent [2]

[0][https://www.inbrief.co.uk/civil-court/search- orders/](https://www.inbrief.co.uk/civil-court/search-orders/)

[1] [https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/2-204-8056?origin...](https://uk.practicallaw.thomsonreuters.com/2-204-8056?originationContext=document&transitionType=DocumentItem&contextData=%28sc.Default%29&comp=pluk)

[2] [https://www.mnp.ca/en/posts/civil-search-warrants-in- canada-...](https://www.mnp.ca/en/posts/civil-search-warrants-in-canada- guidance-for-anton-piller-orders)

<comment><USER17> It says in the article that it was an Anton Pillar Order. They scewed it up though, everything said by the defendent was ruled an interrogation and thrown out.

Most of these companies are not run by very bright people. Their businesses are only still here because they are a government oligarchy.

<comment><USER18> > "everything said by the defendent was ruled an interrogation and thrown > out."

No, the article says that ruling was overturned later.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> > Deep-pocketed companies, on the other hand, "not only have the resources to > pursue [perceived harms] to the point where individuals don't have the > ability to defend themselves, but also to advance mechanisms with fewer > safeguards," Israel said.

Does anyone else feel this shouldn't be the case? Clearly, the amount of money in your pockets shouldn't decide the quality of legal representation. We need to evaluate alternate proposals that fixes these gaps.

<comment><USER20> I'd say the law should pool together the defense and plaintiff budgets and split it half and half for each parties lawyers who then would auction for the right to represent.

Thus giving each party comparable lawyers, driving down the cost of legal representation and giving everybody a fairer process.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> He was smart for calling a lawyer during the search, but he committed a major error by providing login credentials for his machines. Yikes.

<comment><USER14> > he committed a major error by providing login credentials for his machines

At the point when one is forced to unlock electronic devices on request even during security check on the airport, one is simply unable to identify when some legal bullies exceed their authority.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> That is just awful...and all this time i thought Canada was a far freer (as in liberty) place to live. Huh.

<comment><USER23> When it comes to individual protections specifically around searches and especially speech protections, the UK, Canada and Australia are far less free than the United States.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> I wonder if there's a Linux package that can wipe your server/ computer when you input a specific code when logging in?

<comment><USER25> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18153862](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18153862)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> > _"I never saw this as hurting [rights holders]," Lackman told me. "People > run sites that link to content—torrent sites. Those are the people who are > stealing the movies."_

typical feigned naivete

</comment><comment><USER27> How come pirates making decent money with sites like this always seem to be woefully unprepared for any sort of legal action being taken against them?

<comment><USER28> What is there to gain? They know they're boned as soon as they get sued. Might as well just take the money instead of giving it to a lawyer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> They meet my 2 Rottweilers and my German Shepard?

<comment><USER30> You will be left with your dogs dead even if you are innocent.

<comment><USER18> If they come to my house and hurt my dogs, that is not going to end well.

<comment><USER31> True. It won't end well for the dogs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Canada is NOT a democracy, is a "protectorate" of UK crown, so do not be surprised. Canadians are NOT citizen, they are, formally, subjects of her majesty the queen.

In continental Europe such an action is simply illegal: only officers can enter a home, only with justice permission or for danger-life situation. Also any IT device can't be sized looking for digital proof, they must be imaged locally with image given to the defendant with relative hashes and a proper chain of custody. Of course sometime police forgot doing that and in MANY cases any proof became simply invalid in court.

Dear "citizens" freedom does not came from "ether" and stay forever, must be conquered and kept. Business as usual and classic Chomsky frog principle are the best weapon few people have to shift between representative government to corporatocracy.

<comment><USER33> > Canada is NOT a democracy, is a "protectorate" of UK crown, so do not be > surprised.

It is not a protectorate of the UK crown, it is a separate constitutional monarchy that happens to have the same sovereign as the UK; like most similarly-situated ex-British states (and Britain itself), the substantive form of government is a representative democracy.

<comment><USER34> And further, having a monarchy (or even being "a \"protectorate\" of [a] crown") says nothing of the legality of private companies searching citizens homes...

<comment><USER32> Sorry for my poor English, not my motherlanguage. You are right being a monarchy says nothing of the legality of private companies searching citizens homes. However being a monarchy means NOT being citizens, peer between peers and thet's a very very very important thing that may justify anything else.

Symbols are symbols but still have their importance.

<comment><USER35> English may not be your first language but you clearly are not in possession of how constitutional monarchies work.

Even in the UK British people _are_ citizens, so could you please stop repeating this nonsense? [https://www.gov.uk/check-british- citizen](https://www.gov.uk/check-british-citizen)

Canada has it's own rules on citizenship and you can find them here: [https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees- citizenship/se...](https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees- citizenship/services/canadian-citizenship.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> I know we are supposed to be all up in arms about his rights and certainly that is a big issue, but at the same time... he was running a questionable / edgy website... "he took a laissez-faire approach to policing which addons made it onto his site."

At some level, given the history of previous issues like this, what did he expect?

<comment><USER37> Yet corporates seem to routinely take a 'laissez-faire' approach to policing and get away with it. No one is banging on Google's or Uber's door with orders.

Businesses seem to get away with more, protected by law and due process, and with recourse to lobby and challenge and even if found guilty merely fined while individuals lives can be turned upside down, with processes and records that have far reaching consequences.

There seems to be a fundamental imbalance at work here.

<comment><USER38> It brings to mind that recent case of a Facebook user who posted a recent movie on Facebook which was downloaded 6 million times!

The uploader is facing prison, but Facebook is seemingly above reproach.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18004544](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18004544)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> In my humble opinion, this guy deserved what happened to him, which was justified in its entirety.

He was an enabler of technologies that allowed sharing of information for enjoying content without permission from authors of said content.

Also, in my humble opinion, this should cover anyone that provides links, including search engines.

Furthermore, again in my humble opinion, copyrights should be permanent, and I really see no reason why someone should stop enjoying the success of their creation as long as their creation is popular. If there is demand for something, why shall it not produce profit?

<comment><USER40> Permanent copyright? So you're saying your great-grandchildren should be entitled to reap the benefits of something they did not create and has nothing to do with them, long after the death of the original creator?

<comment><USER41> Permanent copyright might in the end be a good thing, because it's so completely unworkable in real life, that we'll be forced to put in place enough exceptions as to make copyright in its current form extinct.</comment></comment></comment>


From Laptop to Lambda: Outsourcing Everyday Jobs to Transient Containers - <AUTHOR> https://www.usenix.org/conference/atc19/presentation/fouladi <comment><AUTHOR> GitHub repo: [https://github.com/StanfordSNR/gg](https://github.com/StanfordSNR/gg)

Intro article in packt: [https://hub.packtpub.com/hello-gg-a-new-os-framework- to-exec...](https://hub.packtpub.com/hello-gg-a-new-os-framework-to-execute- super-fast-apps-on-1000s-of-transient-functional-containers/)

> The functional approach and fine-grained dependency management of gg give > significant performance benefits when compiling large programs from a cold > start.

In case of Inkscape, when running "cold" on AWS Lambda, gg was nearly 5x faster than an existing icecc system, running on a 48-core or 384-core cluster of running VMs.</comment>


What I learned from reading 8,000 recruiting messages - <AUTHOR> http://blog.alinelerner.com/what-i-learned-from-reading-8000-recruiting-messages/ <comment><USER2> No brainer about a few things. No matter what anyone says, unless a recruiter gives you the following information, I am not interested:

\- Salary Range. yes, a range. don't give me crap like "market rate" and "depends on experience". That's the same as saying "we won't tell you". It is understood that not everyone can negotiate the same amount of money but the range is crucial to know. For example, if I want to get paid 150K base salary and the range says 100-120K, I am not going to be bothered any further.

\- Name of the client/company: Please don't play games with this one. Either you tell me the name or I am out. I don't wanna hear "Fortune 500 client with great benefits". really ?

\- What are they looking for? Ok this one is subjective and sometimes difficult for a recruiter to explain. Totally understood. But please work with the hiring manager on understanding their requirement more. I blame hiring managers more on this one. I have got calls saying "we need an excellent C++ developer but donno any further details". Umm no.

\- Location: Where will I need to be ? If you don't know, then I am not going to guess. I cannot move to Austin from New York (well I can't) Only when I know these things at a minimum from a recruiter, they will get my attention.

<comment><USER3> If they told you the company, what would stop you from just bypassing the recruiter and going straight to the company?

<comment><USER4> What purpose would that serve? Why go to the trouble of cold-calling a company when I already have an inside track via this recruiter?

<comment><USER5> Compensation - ultimately the company has a budget for hiring for a role, which would include any fees required to bring you on board. In many (not all) cases the recruiter's fee subtracts from your own salary negotiations.

Also, a lot of recruiters are not retained but work on contingency, so they're at best arms-length from the companies they "work" for - it's questionable how "inside" they are. Going with them may not confer as much of an advantage to getting the job as one might think.

In any case, I feel like tech recruiting is a poor solution that encompasses two problems: job discovery, and candidate discovery. Recruiting is effective at the latter, but oftentimes is used to fulfill the former.

<comment><USER6> > In many (not all) cases the recruiter's fee subtracts from your own salary > negotiations.

Do you have evidence of that?

Anecdotally that has not been my experience. While recruitment fees are taken into consideration, between choosing a locally sourced vs 3rd party source candidate, it has had no bearing on salaries.

<comment><USER4> And in fact, it would work against the company to do this. Either you're going to pay me a salary I consider acceptable, or I'm going to move on. I don't care about your expenses from sourcing talent.

As an employer, the trifling cost of a referral that leads to a hire doesn't even enter into the conversation. Any candidate who would go around a recruiter (regardless of the fact that their reasoning is misguided) is demonstrating bad faith already, and I would not hire them.

<comment><USER6> > Any candidate who would go around a recruiter (regardless of the fact that > their reasoning is misguided) is demonstrating bad faith already, and I > would not hire them.

Perhaps, but not always. I've been in a situation previously where I felt that the recruiter was not working in my best interest and decided to contact the hiring manager directly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I learned that the author hasn't checked out their web site from a phone. A big subscription window pops up, overhangs the right half of the screen and can't be closed because you can't reach the button. Couldn't read article.

<comment><USER8> I wish that subscription window happened near the end, not at the beginning when I'm reading the first paragraph--that's just distracting.

<comment><USER9> fixed!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8103540](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8103540)

As I mentioned in those comments, the statistical analysis is a bit arbitrary and not very scientific.

<comment><USER11> Even if the statistical analysis was sound the conclusions don't follow. The "effect" of personalized responses may be due to multi-colinearity: personal letters may be written only in cases when there is a genuine personal connection, so adding personalization may have no effect in other circumstances.

There are other issues as well, but that's the most obvious. The whole thing is a cautionary tale of not doing data analysis when you don't have appropriate training and experience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> A fun secondary analysis would be cost estimate. So a truly personal message might cost an hour of labor, but a form letter costs only a few seconds to make sure you're sending the correct letter. On the scale of $ expended per decent candidate, form letters would appear to be much better than personal messages, even if they are less effective.

WRT "Instead I wrote a little script that hashed messages with an edit distance" an alternative, possibly faster strategy, might be vocabulary. Look at the form letters full of meaningless idioms and cliches, total corporate- speak, all "believe" and "passionate" (that word is only used in cheap pr0n and corporate speak) and "casual" (See commentary on "passionate") and "challenge" "fit" "strong" (what is this ESPN Sportscenter or a recruitment email?) and "Agile" (which has been poisoned in the market to mean absolutely nothing now) How the corporate-speak form letters avoided classics like the phrase "work life balance" is a mystery. Words like "opportunity" and "experience" are kind of on the bubble and generally indicate corporate-speak. Relative lack of corporate-speak vocabulary in the personalized written by and for humans messages is also apparent.

(edited to add, an interesting difficult startup idea would be addons for word processors or web browsers which highlight corporate-speak words and phrases to dramatically improve writing styles. Any time "key takeaways" or "metric" appears in the text box its underlined in yellow or something.)

</comment><comment><USER13>
        Note that all the graphs in this post
        are interactive, so you can hover and
        do other fun things.

            502 Bad Gateway
            nginx/1.4.6 (Ubuntu)

<comment><USER10> The graphs are using plot.ly, which are externally hosted.

I don't understand the appeal of interactive charts for simple, static data.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> I suppose you'd need a much bigger sample size but I'd be very interested in a continued analysis on how many of those that responded went on to get offers and how many accepted. The comment about salary ranges got me thinking about this, giving me a range probably increases my response rate but then if I am later offered the low end of the range am I less likely to accept than it I hadn't been given the range? Maybe, so it isn't at all clear to me that maximizing response rate maximizes hiring rate.

</comment><comment><USER15> Salary range is the most crucial point. I would not take a sub $120k job under any circumstances, so please don't waste my time. Sub $140k would have to be a very good opportunity at a rocket ship with boatloads of equity. If you want responses, be honest and up front on what you are willing to pay, then we can start to filter through the other information.

</comment><comment><USER16> I found the use of slightly different shades of the same color to differentiate data bars to be incredibly frustrating, which made me assume this was written by a marketer and not someone with a technical background. Fair or not, that instantly made the message less interesting to me.

Anyways, just an interesting take on another type of factor that can impact recruiting messaging.

</comment><comment><USER17> From a quick scan I could not find the author discussing it, but I found it amusing that the response rates did not increase as the bid-to-ask ratio increased past 1.1. I think this is because a job which advertises pay significantly more than what the engineer's preferred salary is signals that the job could be out of their league.

<comment><USER18> Or that there's some other reason it's undesirable and they have to pay people a lot to do it...

<comment><USER17> Good point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> [https://hn.algolia.com/?q=What+I+learned+from+reading+8%2C00...](https://hn.algolia.com/?q=What+I+learned+from+reading+8%2C000+recruiting+messages#!/story/forever/0/What%20I%20learned%20from%20reading%208%2C000%20recruiting%20messages)

</comment><comment><USER20> Gateway errors all over for me...

</comment><comment><USER9> Author of the original post here. Happy to answer any questions!

<comment><USER21> Nice articles in general! The MS vs BS was spot on. So are the observations on GitHub projects in "Lessons from a year's worth of hiring data"

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I'd like to pick on the point that Founders and Engineers are as guilty as Recruiters in terms of sending boiler plate messages.Recruiter: 53%, Founder: 49%, Engineer: 47%.

A recruiter's _only_ job is to recruit talented people. A founder/engineer has other things to do. Yes they should be spending a significant portion of their time recruiting. How realistic is that expectation though?

Also, how do the %s above add to 100 unless there is a significant overlap between Engineers and Founders?

</comment><comment><USER22> Highly recommend reading all of her post, very genuine and insightful view of recruiting.

</comment><comment><USER23> "Despite the title of this post, reading almost 8,000 messages and scoring them for how personal they were was clearly intractable."

Big data!

</comment><comment><USER24> Being sent on a goose chase. Been to interviews where the recruiter sent me for a role that didn't exist. Had recruiters call from blocked numbers.

When a recruiter from a recruitment company contacts me on linkedin, I immediately flag and block them.</comment>