Eclipse 3.6 Helios is here - <AUTHOR> http://eclipse.org/helios/

<comment><USER2> Release notes? New features? Er, nope - Eclipse.org is a case study in how making software into abstract 'products and platforms' has the potential to make it so vague that you could be, in fact, downloading anything at all, which constitutes a subproject of the Eclipse project platform, which I assume is a hamburger.

<comment><USER3> I hate searching the eclipse site for any kind of information that actually pertains to eclipse. It is that bad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I had trouble finding any useful information on the landing page. EclipseSource did a series of blog posts highlighting some of the new features, which at least gives me some idea:

[http://eclipsesource.com/blogs/2010/06/23/top-10-eclipse- hel...](http://eclipsesource.com/blogs/2010/06/23/top-10-eclipse-helios- features/)

<comment><USER5> Here you go [http://www.bigsoft.co.uk/blog/index.php/2009/10/15/eclipse-3...](http://www.bigsoft.co.uk/blog/index.php/2009/10/15/eclipse-3-6-helios- new-and-noteworthy)

<comment><USER6> Thanks! This was remarkably hard to find, for a piece of software that's only released once a year.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Does anyone know why Eclipse is dog-slow on OS X? crappy JVM implementation or something else.

<comment><USER8> On Linux 32bits and 64bits it is faster than Galileo. (Seems faster and uses less memory)

<comment><USER9> Has anyone had any issues switching? I _just_ got galileo up and running to my specs. I would hate to change environments for memory benefits and then get bogged down in version minutia.

<comment> brown9-2 Not sure which OS you are using, but at least on Windows, different versions of Eclipse can live side-by-side in different directories. So you should be able to test drive a new version without messing up your old version (might want to try setting up a different workspace while experimenting though).

<comment><USER9> True, I meant compatibility with the existing plugins out there though, Maven, Subversion, PDT+debugger, PyDev, etc. Should have been clearer on that point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I am curious whether the final release is as buggy as the Europe and Galileo releases were. With Eclipse, you should always wait for 3.X.1 ;)

</comment><comment><USER11> I only use the CDT package, but it appears to be completely stagnating. Helios ships with CDT version 7.0, which is a new major version of the C/C++ development tools. But as far as I can see, there's barely enough in there to justify a new _minor_ version.</comment>


What Really Killed the Dinosaurs? - <AUTHOR> http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/animal_forecast/2013/02/dinosaur_extinction_was_an_asteroid_the_only_cause_of_the_cretaceous_mass.html

<comment><USER2> The best theory I heard to date is this -

The moon is getting slowly away from the Earth. If we extrapolate backwards, it's obvious that at some point in dinosaur times it was mere meters away from the Earth surface and that's what kill the dinosaurs - they were knocked off by the moon.

<comment><AUTHOR> _it's obvious that at some point in dinosaur times it was mere meters away from the Earth surface_

Is there some particular reason under the Hacker News guidelines

<http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>

as interpreted by the Hacker News welcome message

<http://ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html>

that this is the top comment under this thread?

This prompted me to look up other comments by the same user.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=abcd_f>

AFTER EDIT: Just as an example of what I think is a helpful link to share in a Hacker News thread, here are new journalistic reports, "Mammal ancestry expanded after dinosaurs died off,"

[http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2013/02/08/mammal- ancesto...](http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2013/02/08/mammal-ancestor- dinosaur/1900207/)

and "Rat-Size Ancestor Said to Link Man and Beast"

[http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/science/common-ancestor- of...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/08/science/common-ancestor-of-mammals- plucked-from-obscurity.html)

about scientific investigation into the most recent common ancestor of placental mammals.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I'm no scientist, but I do think it's interesting that the theory of a massive asteroid destroying the dinosaurs arose in the age of nuclear weapons. The article mentions a newer theory involving climate change, which seems to befit the present day.

<comment><USER4> Why do you find it interesting that this theory arose in the age of nuclear weapons? The "age of nuclear weapons" has been some 60 years now, a lot of new information has come within these past 60 years. Unless your implying that nuclear weapons somehow lead them to this idea. I would argue that the 110 mile crater would be a bigger influence but that's just me.

<comment><USER5> What he is saying is that it looks like we are explaining the unknown based on our greatest fears - coming to a conclusion and then finding evidence to support it - rather than by looking at the evidence.

It doesn't mean the conclusion is wrong, just that it is always worth remembering how our ability to analyze data points is always done through a haze of our own experiences.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> One thing I've always wondered about is what would remain of anything humanity built in 65 Myrs. If there had been a species of very smart dinosaurs populating the Earth for, say 100kyrs, and having a nuclear-capable civilization for say 200yrs... would we even see it?

I keep toying writing a book around the idea that a spaceship full of dinosaurs returns to Earth, having aged very little (Langevin's paradox), and find the planet populated by the offsprings of these pesky tiny egg eaters. Kind of like Planet of the Apes in reverse.

Oh well, if only I had time to write more than HN comments ;-)

<comment><USER7> There is a Star Trek Voyager episode on the idea of dinosaurs leaving earth. <http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Distant_Origin_(episode)>

It is one of my favorite Voyager episodes.

<comment><USER8> They were quite powerful given that they had a 65MY head start. I hoped they might have brought them back for a visit to handle the borg/dominion. Geeky enough for ya?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This is very odd. Just today an article was published in Science that reinforces the theory that the Chicxulub impact was responsible (although the system was "under stress" before):

<http://www.sciencemag.org/content/339/6120/684>

<comment><USER10> I would like to know why the system was Under Stress.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> The article kind of contradicts itself. First saying that the asteroid impact theory is pretty outdated and then not really coming up with anything other than maybe it was asteroid impact and/or volcanic activity and/or changing sea levels.

<comment><USER12> The impact theory is outdated in that people used to think it was by far the _largest_ cause of the extinction. What the article is saying is that scientists now agree it was far more balanced between impacts, volcanoes, and sea levels. Exactly how much each of those contributed is still debated.

<comment><USER13> It's still generally considered the root cause.

Consider, it's hard to see how sea level changes could be a cause of such a wide spread extinction event. (~75% or more of all species were wiped out) However, it's possible that an asteroid impact could lead to both volcanic activity AND sea level change. That's not to say sea level change was not a contributing factor, just it's most likely part of the overall cascade caused by the impact.

PS: People have caused a significant die-off in what is almost a geologic instant. (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Extinctions_since_1500>) However, while habitat destruction is often blamed for man of those extinctions that's just another name for human intervention.

<comment><USER12> > it's possible that an asteroid impact could lead to both volcanic activity

It could lead to local seismic activity, sure, but I don't think it'd be enough to cause enough _volcanic_ activity. I may be wrong, though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I read an interesting comment on Reddit recently that the higher oxygen content of the atmosphere is what primarily supported massive life forms (and that seemed to be proven at least plausible by a recent experiment where researchers were able to grow larger dragonflies in an oxygen-rich environment).

Given the current descriptions of the environment at the time -- higher volcanism, an asteroid impact, global wildfires -- is it reasonable to conclude that this had a huge impact on the oxygen content of the atmosphere? And, if so, couldn't that have simply led to a tremendous selection pressure on species, where larger animals were constantly oxygen-depleted and smaller, more efficient ones were able to continue thriving? Think about it: a Tyrannosaurus would require an immense amount of oxygen to be able to maintain an active hunting pattern; if the oxygen in the atmosphere were depleted by even just a few percent, it would find things like running nearly impossible, and long-distance travel would require frequent rest breaks. I'm not sure how this half-assed notion would fit into the oceanic species' extinction, but it makes a lot of sense for why so many of the larger species died out over a period of time while the smaller ones survived.

</comment><comment><USER15> I never understood why small dinosaurs wouldn't have had the same likelihood of survival as small mammals?

Also why didn't dinosaurs living in the sea survive this?

I've always had the suspicion there was something more going on to wipe out an entire animal kingdom at once.

<comment><USER4> Mammals are more adept to adapting to climate change. Reptiles on the other hand have a very hard time dealing with even a few degrees of temperature change from there norm.

<comment><USER16> Sure, but dinosaurs were closer to birds (and thus also warm blooded, as I understand it).

<comment><USER4> Birds are not strictly "warm blooded" as mammals are, but yes they are not strictly cold blooded ether. They are able to generate their own body heat to some extent yes, but are still fare more susceptible to climate change then a mammal would be.

<comment><USER17> I don't know about birds during these "dark" times, but todays birds are pretty resilient to wide change in temperature even on a daily basis. They are capable of generating and circulating fair amount of body heat. Their average temperature is typically much higher than mammals. They are also well insulated, more than humans, apes, dogs, cats...

<comment><USER18> Its also easier for birds to migrate than for land based creatures.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Dinosaurs are still alive today. Birds are avian dinosaurs. What I like to see are those dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets in the supermarket and thinking about how you're really eating dinosaurs.

</comment><comment><USER20> _This idea was punted around for a long time and gained momentum during the "dinosaur renaissance" of the 1970s. By 1996, paleontologists had begun to find fuzzy, fluffy, feathery dinosaurs that confirmed what had been proposed on skeletal grounds—birds are just an offshoot of the dinosaur family tree._

There is a part of me that wants this to be the result of a mischievous entity watching from on high and thinking "oooh, I should probably hide some bones to match that theory, why didn't I think of it when I put the dinosaurs there in the first place..."

<comment><USER21> It doesn't even have to that high of an entity - there was the Archaeoraptor scandal: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeoraptor>

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is the first I've heard of the Deccan Traps. Interestingly, they're "almost" on the opposite side of the globe from the Chicxulub impact (21'N 90'W to 17'N 77'E).

I wonder if their formation or activity might have been caused by the impact?

<comment><USER23> The Deccan lava flows started about three million years earlier, see for example <http://www.ias.ac.in/jessci/jun2001/1352.pdf>

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Judging by current-day mammals and comparing them to current-day reptiles and birds which have a lot in common with dinosaurs, mammals may have been smarter and more fit to survive in general, especially to changing conditions.

<comment><USER25> This sounds like one of those "just-so" evolutionary stories without much evidence to back it up.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Since birds are dinosaurs, I wonder what the evolutionary history is of the big birds like emus and dodos. Did they come from medium-sized dinos?

<comment><USER27> I recommend reading Jack Horner's "How to build a Dinosaur", he talks about this sort of thing, namely that you can take an existing flightless bird, give it teeth, a tail, and flip the arms around and you've basically got a dinosaur.

The creepy part is people are actually messing around with chicken genes and can turn on things like "grow teeth" and "grow a tail".

\- [http://www.ted.com/talks/jack_horner_building_a_dinosaur_fro...](http://www.ted.com/talks/jack_horner_building_a_dinosaur_from_a_chicken.html)

You'd think the guy who was the dinosaur adviser for Jurassic Park would actually learn the lesson from the movie, so if we all get eaten to death by chickens, here's your guy.

<comment><USER28> Isn't the lesson from the movie that the park would just need better security?</comment></comment></comment>


For Everyone, from Google - Going Up in Times Square - <AUTHOR> https://www.galleryforeveryone.com/

<comment><AUTHOR> I honestly didn't realize this was a Chromebook ad, anyways, c00l</comment>


[JS] How to make a nextgen 3D game with physics in browser - <AUTHOR> https://whsjs.io/ <comment><USER2> Previously: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911070](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12911070)</comment>


Contrapuntal Consciousness - <AUTHOR> https://aeon.co/essays/what-the-music-of-bach-can-teach-us-about-consciousness <comment><USER2> Dumping on Hofstadter this way feels almost sacrilegious. Sometimes the writer sounds like they get what GEB is about, then follow up with statements that show they clearly do not.

I hope the writer doesn't read Metamagical Themas (admittedly, a book I like more, but it reaches even further to the fringes). It'll clearly go over their head in spectacular fashion, and would certainly fuel more of this kind of half-informed op ed.

Even worse, the writer dishes on terms like Molecular Canon. That's not Hofstadter's invention, and it is very not as stupid as the writer makes it out to be. Those who study Origins of Life are quite familiar with the concept.

Read any of good biology text, and you'll become more than comfortable with the term and what it specifically means. Unsurprisingly you'll discover it is exactly "how ribosomes translate messenger RNA into proteins" as Hofstadter describes.

A molecular canon (ribosome) literally splits DNA into codons (kinda like half-DNA in 3-nucleotide sets), which get transcribed into mRNA, shoots it through a ring of protein (the canon), where it fuses the resulting tRNA with material available at the exit. Now attach the result to an amino acid, fold, and voila, protein synthesis, and most importantly for this analogy - a solid copy of the original material. Reproduction 101.

Taken in the Hofstadter sense comparing that to Bach, themes are ripped apart, work their way through the cannon, mix with other themes until they eventually replicate a copy of the original theme. How isn't that concept similar?

Even the idea that the canon ends an octave higher shows their ignorance, since a canon is played by multiple instruments, and those octaves do indeed resolve together. So the writer fails on both sides of their arguments.

I hate how this article is written in such a way it almost sounds like the writer knows what they are talking about, when they are snidely riffing it throughout. The writer repeatedly demonstrates they do not understand the subjects covered in GEB.</comment>


I'm Pirating the Next Version of Windows - <AUTHOR> http://littlebitofcode.com/2012/01/18/im-pirating-the-next-version-of-windows <comment><USER2> If you don't like their product or policies, don't use it. If you use it then you should pay for it. Use Linux, a BSD Unix, or a Mac. People who pirate Microsoft products don't really hurt Microsoft, they hurt the rest of the competition.

<comment><USER3> Certain applications that professionals need are only available on Windows. Most games are as well. Even for software with Mac/*nix versions, a person may have quite a bit of money tied up in Windows-only licenses.

I'm not commenting on whether pirating Windows is ethical. I'm just pointing out that sometimes you'll have to ditch a lot of software to ditch Windows.

<comment><USER4> You're just reinforcing their argument. By not using the competition, you're ensuring the market for those products on the competition's OS doesn't exist. It's _actively_ strengthening Microsoft's hold on the markets you frequent.

<comment><AUTHOR> OK. The primary application that I need Windows for is Quickbooks Enterprise. I also still use my Windows Photoshop license since it was expensive, and not transferrable to OS X. My primary operating system is already OS X, and I only use Debian Stable on servers. I run Windows in a VM when I need those application, and only when I need those applications. How would you suggest replacing Quickbooks Enterprise? Do I just stop keeping accounting records? What about the 13 years of records that are already in the accounting system? Should I throw those out? What about inventory and accountant's copies? Will you train my customer's accounting firm to use some other package? What about the inventory database?

<comment><USER2> Microsoft has 90% desktop market share. Software developers won't support other operating systems until they have more market share, and people won't switch to other OS'es until there's more software.

If the software you need only runs on Windows then you should pay for Windows. Those that can move to Mac, Linux, etc and get away with using Wine or other alternatives should. The markets for alternative OS'es will grow then more people will be able to move.

Sounds like you are stuck on the Windows environment. You should stay and pay for Windows. There's nothing wrong with that.

<comment><USER5> There is something wrong with software vendors abusing their customers, however.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> These are great points and a good portion of piraters do so for these exact reasons. There are always going to be people who steal content/apps instead of paying for them but I am sure more than a few people pirate purely because it is a better user experience than what is currently offered.

TV shows are a great example. I cut my cable about a year ago and haven't looked back since. I refuse to pay a premium for channels packaged together that I never watch.

Currently, I use a combination of Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon Prime, Apple TV, and Zune Marketplace to fill my content needs. They provide a great user experience but the pricing structure/availability is lacking. Most shows available on Prime, Apple Tv, Zune are only available for purchase. What if I don't want to purchase them? Why can't I rent TV shows just like I rent movies? I have never been one to purchase and own content since I usually don't watch things more than once. I pay to rent movies all the time from Apple TV and Zune via Xbox.

Hulu Plus is great, but they have a fraction of the content I would like to watch. Basically, there's not a perfect solution yet but I refuse to go back to cable. Here's what I would like to see:

1\. Charge me per view, don't sell me the content to own.

2\. If the margin is too thin for the rental model, throw an ad in there...I won't mind. (Hulu plus does this)

3\. Let the content producers sell their content directly to me to increase margin. This can be done by the content producers creating apps for Xbox, Roku, etc.

4\. Make all previous seasons of shows available to me for rental to increase revenue.

5\. Use these awesome new technologies to create deeper experiences/interactions with the content, which will open up new revenue streams.

<comment><USER7> Minor niggle, but please stop misusing "steal". We need to get that meme killed.

<comment><USER6> What do you call it?

<comment><USER7> Take your pick. There's:

Using unlicensed software

copyright infringement

downloading a torrent

pirating

..among others.

None of them roll off the tongue as nicely as "steal" or "thief", but copyright infringement is just as illegal as stealing.

The industry groups have been campaigning for years (with great success) to ensure they mean the same thing. They do not.

Please don't fall into their trap.

<comment><USER6> Hmm...interesting. I see the difference you are trying to illustrate but to me, obtaining something illegally that was intended to be purchased is stealing. We're talking about the same thing though:)

<comment><USER8> If they were the same thing, then that would mean downloading a copy of Star Wars is equivalent to pocketing the Star Wars DVD in your entertainment center.

When does the act of stealing occur? If I download a torrent and then delete it without watching/playing/listening, did I steal it? If so, then does that mean repeatedly copying the file to and from an external hard drive is repeated theft?

Does it become stealing only if I make use of the material? If I buy the movie and show it to ten house guests for free, are they thieves? They didn't pay to watch and the author would have preferred it if they did. If they aren't thieves, why would they become thieves if I uploaded ten copies to each friend instead of showing it to them in my living room? Of course, I would be _infringing on the author's legal copyright_ , but I don't see where any stealing can be definitively identified.

<comment><USER9> It's equivalent in an ethical sense, not equivalent in the legal sense. I think it's perfectly fine to call it stealing, since it embodies the core meaning "steal" is meant to convey. You're depriving another of something that is rightfully theirs, control over their creative content. Let's not get pedantic here, lest we devolve into discussing what "to steal the spotlight" means.

<comment><USER10> "Stealing" generally connotes taking something away from someone else. With piracy, a potential sale is lost: the pirate _might_ have bought the item were it not available illegally for free. With theft, there is both potential sale loss and property loss: if you steal a car from Toyota, they lose the ability to sell the car to you, and they also lose access to the car itself (which prevents them from selling it to anyone else). So Toyota loses twice, whereas the RIAA loses only once.

Of course, the ethical difference is probably larger than simply double. To use an old saying, let us assume that:

        potential sale = a bird in the bush

and,

        access to physical product = a bird in the hand

As we know from the ancient algorithm,

       a bird in the hand = 2 * (a bird in the bush)

Piracy loses a potential sale, and theft loses a potential sale and access to a physical product. Therefore, given the following equation:

        a bird in the bush = x * (a bird in the hand + a bird in the bush)

We should be able to solve for x, where x is the amount that piracy is as morally reprehensible as theft.

        a bird in the bush = x * (2 * a bird in the bush + a bird in the bush)
        a bird in the bush = x * (3 * a bird in the bush)
        a bird in the bush / 3 = x * a bird in the bush
        1/3 = x

As you can see, piracy is clearly 1/3rd as bad as theft. But, I have a feeling that the above algorithm still doesn't sufficiently illustrate the ethical difference between piracy and theft. Let's try again:

With piracy, the RIAA has lost the potential sale to the individual pirate. However, they still can sell the same DRMed AAC file to someone else. With our theft example, not only has Toyota lost the ability to sell to the thief: they've also lost the ability to sell that car to anyone else in the world. Therefore, if

        X = likelihood of sale to one individual

and we assume that reduced likelihood of a potential future sale (which is the RIAA's claim of loss) is equivalent to some loss of income, Toyota's lost income is:

        X * world population * price

And the RIAA has lost:

        X * 1 * price

Meaning that piracy, at the time of writing, is approximately 7 billion times better than theft, and increases in its relative virtue at every moment.

<comment><USER9> I'm not sure if you're joking or not by trying to define a quantitative relationship between piracy and stealing, but here goes anyways:

First of all, relatively pricing should not matter. By your logic, if Toyota's price was suddenly 0.5 * price, then stealing just got two times better! What's wrong is wrong.

Second, your equation does not do justice to math. If your definition of X is the same as mine (i.e. average likelihood an individual will buy this item, independent of the world population) then you're saying Toyota's lost income can potentially be GREATER than the price of the car.

In clearer terms, if

      dX / d(world population) = 0

then

      lost income = X * world population * price

does not have an upper bound! With the explosive nature of the world population, it would seem that theft gets exponentially worse as the years go by.

Where does the logic break down? Well it seems you've modeled the world's purchases of A SINGLE CAR as independent of each other. (In other words, you've modeled the lost income if Toyota had a car stolen by every human in the world.) What you really want, for n people, is

      X*P + (1-X)*X*P + (1-X)^2*X*P + ... + (1-X)^(n-1)*X*P  = P*[1-(1-X)^n]

\- and there's our upper bound at P.

So now the comparison is between (1 - (1-X)^N) and X. In the case of software like Windows 7 where relatively few people will go for a free alternative, X is pretty damn high. I won't argue that it's greater than (1 - (1-X)^N), but it's nowhere near your estimate of 7 billion.

In all seriousness, I definitely agree that the "relative virtue" of digital theft is better than other forms. But, as you acknowledge, there is indeed a loss of value.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> _Why can't I just enter my product key and download an updated ISO with slipstreamed service packs?_

This is especially odd, since you can do exactly that with a one-year TechNet subscription. [https://technet.microsoft.com/en- us/subscriptions/buy/hh4429...](https://technet.microsoft.com/en- us/subscriptions/buy/hh442910) So it's not like they don't have the infrastructure ready.

</comment><comment><USER12> I share the pain this guy experiences. I had Age of Empires 3 which would not run on my machine, period, because it didn't recognize the CD Rom driver and, as Microsoft explained, it might be a 'virtual' CD ROM and that would violate the terms of service. And even though it wasn't and didn't I could never run their software on that machine.

Thus the who piracy economic argument is broken in three ways:

1) Folks who pirate software won't pay full price, sometimes they won't pay any price. So the economic 'loss' from piracy is either '0' or the area under the curve described by units pirated vs actual purchase price.

The loss is 0 if you use the reasoning that if there were perfect piracy prevention, none of these people would have paid for the retail version.

2) The cost of protection adds additional production costs (printing unique product code stickers and adding them) adding additional steps to boxing/shipping, adding additional activation software and its testing.

3) The additional cost of support when legitimate users like this guy call support to have a human you're paying anywhere between 10 and 25/hr to 'solve' this persons install/operation problems.

Folks who have done the math, with real numbers (and Lotus comes to mind), determine that they earn more money by not including DRM on the product. When Lotus first announced they were removing DRM from their 1-2-3 product they mentioned that nothing they had done had ever slowed down the availability of pirated versions but had added additional support burdens every time.

<comment><USER13> Just had a thought on seeing your point 1): Part of the value some people buy is exclusivity. If others can get it for free, it reduces this aspect of its value.

<comment><USER14> How does exclusivity add any value to a piece of software? The utility and productivity that I get out of a piece of software is in no way influenced by how anyone else obtained it. Sure, I might be bitter that I didn't also break the law and obtain an illegal free copy of my software, but that's really just sour grapes.

And in business if the value I'm able to produce with software is governed more by my exclusive ownership than my skill with it and other professional skills, then it's probably a good idea to find another line of work.

<comment><USER13> I'm saying some people pay more for exclusivity. You're saying they shouldn't.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Windows activation is shockingly easy. Enter your key and when you go online it verifies it. If you're not connected to the internet make a 5 minute phone call. If you don't want to do that, no problem - there is no need to activate for up to 180 days. Really don't want to activate? No problem - it'll just turn your screen black and announce it's unlicensed software.

It seems the author's only significant complaint is that they don't provide him with updated slipstreams to download. It's true - he'd have to make them himself with the free tools they provide. Maybe they should provide public updated slipstreams, but this hardly seems like a valid reason to refuse to pay for the software.

<comment><USER16> No it is not, at least not for every version. I didn't have to use windows for a very long time, and about a month ago I installed a windows XP SP3 in a virtual machine. The grace period ended a few days ago:

      - the automatic activation failed
      - my product key is said to have been pirated
      - the phone support for registration is now fully automated, and just rejects my phone activation.
      - the machine won't load whole subsystems of windows until is activated (you can monkey your way around from the IE instance you can launch from the activation dialog, but your system is not fully functionnal)
      - I am searching for how to get a human to deal with the situation

I might be failing somewhere and this situation is all due to my lack of experience, but I am with a CD of windows in one hand and a hosed install on the other, and nowhere to go from there. This is just one of the worse software experience I ever have in a few years.

<comment><USER17> It sounds like the problem stems from the 2 things: 1.) the media you installed from was not legit 2.) Windows gives you notices that it needs to be activated, which you ignored.

You won't be able to fix that without reinstalling or using a crack. The phone activation will work but you need to change product key. There is an article of Microsoft support site on how to do that actaully.

However, it's a problem with your XP Media... are you 100% sure that is a legit copy of windows? Where did you get it from?

<comment><USER18> I currently have this problem with a Windows 7 machine I bought from eBay. I can't activate it and I have a black desktop (sorta annoying) and two or three different things that pop up periodically to yell at me (incredibly annoyingly, especially the one that makes an obnoxious error noise). This situation is _definitely_ my fault - there are a few possibilities for where I went wrong:

1) maybe the guy I bought it from was not legit - I asked him lots of questions before going through with the purchase but that's about as much as I could (or would be willing to) do,

2) Using what I believed to be the correct, legal process, I created an install disk and looked up the key for my existing OEM install, which I used to reinstall a fresh instance without any of the HP nonsense the machine came with,

3) For a couple days I had an install using the same key on a VM to test something with IE9.

Any one of those things could be the problem and they were decisions I made, Microsoft didn't force or manipulate me. But here's the thing, at the end of the day what I have is a really obnoxious machine and if I had just bought a Mac (off of eBay even!) or installed Linux instead, I wouldn't have to deal with any of this. You're right that the Microsoft experience isn't so bad, if you follow the rules you're probably going to have a bare minimum of hassle, but it is still _so much worse_ than the competition on this front.

<comment><USER19> > looked up the key for my existing OEM install

I think your machine has to have a Windows sticker with the key if it shipped with an OEM license.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> While I'm entirely sympathetic to the author's DRM plight, buying the software and getting the pirate's cleaner experience are not mutually exclusive. If you want the best experience and a clean conscience (I'm assuming here you think piracy is wrong, since you've bought so many other copies of MS software), buy the software, then install a pirated a copy.

I usually do this with new PCs that have Windows pre-installed, so I don't have to deal with crapware.

<comment><USER21> Would this still be legal though? You are still using an unlicensed copy regardless of whether or not you happen to additionally own another copy. For all they know you might install your licensed copy on another computer later and not remove your unlicensed one.

<comment><USER20> I have no idea whether it's technically legal, actually. But I'm working off two premises: 1. The author doesn't care about legality, since he's finally resorting to piracy anyway. 2. The author would like to compensate MS for the use of a Windows license. If those are true, then buying a copy but actually using a pirate copy does what the author wants.

<comment><USER22> Eh, the author wants to pay MS money for the product, but also to be able to use the product without jumping through a bunch of stupid pointless frustrating hoops.

MS insists these hoops are needed.

The author, after years of giving MS money and jumping through hoops decides to stop giving them money, and stop jumping through the hoops.

The author is trying to tell MS, in the post and with the lost sale, that the anti-piracy measures are totally counter-productive, and have pushed a paying customer into a pirate.

<comment><USER23> The author says:

>" _if I have to go through the hassle of pirating it to get a working copy, I will not be paying for it_ "

Yet his whole argument up to then has been how much easier 'pirating' the OS is. In short he just doesn't want to pay.

If it were about ease of use he'd send them the money somehow.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> I understand the resentment, but the right course of action must surely be to not upgrade. Instead go with an alternative, such as Mac OS or Linux.

<comment><AUTHOR> OS X is actually my primary operating system. There is some software I still need Windows for though, like Photoshop and Quickbooks Enterprise. I guess I could upgrade that software, but I am not paying thousands for new features I won't use. I had to reactivate because Bootcamp is a pain in the ass, so I removed the partition, installed VirtualBox, and installed on that. It activated fine, and has deactivated itself twice now, necessitating phone calls each time. I have probably been through this process 20 times now, with family computers, Windows XP reinstalls, and the like.

<comment><USER25> In an effort to expedite your transition away from Windows entirely, may I suggest Pixelmator (<http://www.pixelmator.com/>) as a Photoshop alternative? It is a pleasure to use and has all of the core features of PS (compositing layers, tools etc).

<comment><AUTHOR> I have Pixelmator, and I think it's a good 60% solution, but it's no Photoshop. For example, the other day I fired it up to make constrained rectangular marquee selections, and it can't do that. That doesn't sound like a big deal, but I wanted to select at a specific aspect ratio because I needed an image to fit in a specific box. There are lots of little things like that. Not to mention I've been using Photoshop since the 90s, so I'm very proficient with it, it does every single thing I need, and I already paid a lot for it.

There really is not a good substitute for Quickbooks Enterprise. And I forgot Regex Buddy. I downloaded Patterns off the App Store, but it's a poor substitute. Regexes aren't pretty, but if you are hacking on something a quick regex can do a lot for a little.

EDIT: I just re-read this, and thought it sounded a little too negative toward Pixelmator. I think being a good 60% solution in relation to Photoshop is a huge accomplishment, and that Pixelmator is great software. It is absolutely worth the money. It is a very competent intermediate image editor, and would be $30 well spent for anyone. The criticism is mainly directed toward the lack of some esoteric advanced features, and my curmudgeonly desire to have it work exactly like Photoshop, since that is how I have edited images for the last dozen years.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Seems like a pirated .iso would be a great place to deliver malicious code to Ring 0, hiding itself from the kernel and becoming essentially impossible to detect from the infected OS itself. I'm sure botnet creators are already well aware of this.

<comment><USER27> This is what I marvel at when I read such (poorly justified) piracy screeds.

Are people insane?

I might not have ultimate faith in Microsoft, but comparatively I have zero faith (and a lot of suspicion) of what are essentially bands of thieves among piracy groups.

I engaged in casual piracy when I was a teen out of necessity, though I never felt the need to invent justifications. In my adult life, though...pirating executables is the domain of the naive or the ridiculously trustworthy.

<comment><USER7> I've got a lot more faith in a torrent uploaded by a person with lots of other torrents (who has no motive but reputation and altruism), with lots of seeders than I do in a corporation who has a clear and present motive to make me miserable.

And somehow, I've never been infected by this. It's my conclusion that, much like the *AA groups nonsense comparisons of piracy to theft, the security threats are overstated by companies in an attempt to scare people straight.

<comment><USER28> If it's a really good root kit, how would you know you have been infected?

<comment><USER7> Probably because I'd find the appropriated information used somewhere.

It's been at least 5 years with not a hint of fraudulent use of my ID or payment info.

I have, however, been victimized multiple times by corporations being negligent with my data in the same time period. Sony and whatnot.

Kind of interesting that it's safer to download random untrusted OS code from the internet than to give my information to a "safe" corporation...

In any case, it's an interesting thought experiment but it gets absurd quickly when realized. How do _you_ know you're not infected right now by a "really good rootkit"? Unless you wrote the compiler by hand, compiled every bit of the OS by yourself, wrote the firmware for your hardware using the same compiler, etc etc etc, you can't be 100% sure.

You can be reasonably sure, of course. 99% with a few juicy trailing 9's for good measure, but not 100%.

It's the same way you can't objectively prove you're not dreaming right now.

<comment><USER29> Even if you wrote the compiler by hand, it doesn't matter. See the _outstanding_ "Reflections on Trusting Trust": <http://cm.bell- labs.com/who/ken/trust.html>

<comment><USER7> Haha! Believe it or not, I had that story in mind when writing the previous comment. Really the only way to be 100% sure is to manually "bit bash" the compiler together without using ANOTHER compiler (like you would do if you're building a toolset for an entirely new architecture).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> "Why do pirates have a better experience than customers?"

This pretty much sums it up. I couldn't agree more.

<comment><USER31> In many cases, like downloading movies, I agree. But with Windows, I couldn't disagree more. I used to pirate every version of Windows I owned, back in the days of Windows 98 and up to Windows XP it was a breeze. Starting around Windows XP SP3, it got a bit more difficult. It was easy to pirate, but after a few weeks/months of use, you get the Genuine Advantage warning. With Windows 7, it is even worse. So I decided to purchase my first legitimate copy of Windows. I haven't looked back. It is so much easier and I don't waste my time re-cracking my Windows installation every month. It is well worth the price. Since then I have also acquired a legitimate version of Office 2010, even though I got it heavily discounted for students, back in the Windows XP days, I would have laughed at the thought of buying $100+ software.

And anytime I upgrade hardware or even want to move my install to another computer, the activation is so fast and easy. I don't see how anyone could make the claim that pirating Windows is easier than installing a legitimate copy.

<comment><USER7> For the majority of people, windows activation and windows genuine "advantage" works exactly as advertised.

However, when you get on the wrong side of it, it is a pain in the ass of Lovecraftian proportions. I don't know if it's my luck, choice in hardware, or what, but I've had perfectly valid (retail!) keys start throwing WGA errors after working fine for a few months. After spending literally hours on the phone with someone who speaks broken english, I took my crippled XP install (this was back in the pre service-pack 2 days where failing activation meant you got locked out after a few minutes), went to a torrent site, and downloaded an activator.

2 hours (spent on the phone in a fruitless endeavor with the best of Indian tech support) and 5 minutes (spent downloading and running a crack) later, I finally was able to use my bought and paid for software.

After that, I pulled down an ISO with the service packs and cracks and other goodies slipstreamed in (XP Ultimate Edition by Johnny, still exists out there somewhere), burned it to a disc, and haven't used "legitimate" channels since.

Microsoft does not have my permission to use my CPU cycles and power to inflate their antipiracy metrics.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Huh, seriously? I purchased a laptop with a genuine Windows 7 version because of this particular issue. I'll spend weeks to find a relatively _good_ Windows copy.

The average seeded copy of Windows on the pirate bay or the likes is crappy. Cracks sometimes doesn't work. Sometimes the copy comes with a load of crappy software. Sometimes the cracker changes the Windows theme (not sure why he is doing so). And sometimes everything goes smooth until some day I get a problem because my version is not genuine.

I don't install my OS on a daily basis. My average Windows OS install keep up with me for 3-5 years. I wouldn't be bothered to spend some time activating the software. So far, the activations for my MS products was easy, fast and simple.

<comment><USER33> I recently purchased a laptop with Windows 7 at a national chain, and there is no CD. If I set up a dual boot, which I normally do, I'll be forced to get a pirated version. There is supposedly a way to reinstall from a hidden drive or partition, but that would take over the entire drive. I always wanted to be legit, but I'm not going to pay again for something that I legally already have.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I, too, am getting really tired of this. It's not just Microsoft though. It's a lot of different companies.

Right now, I'm in the middle of an epic battle with Adobe to get a refund. I bought an educational version of the CS3 master collection back in 2007 when I was in college. I tried to upgrade it because a chat representative said I could, but they were wrong.

After calling their support line 10 times, spending 2-3 hours of my life either on hold or talking to them, being told twice they would call me in X hours and them not calling, they have still refused to honor the deal. It has been the worst customer service experience of my life.

At this point, it's up to some committee at Adobe to decide whether I should get my refund. Like, really? It's that hard of a decision? You told me X when X wasn't true. Give me my money back! Quit being tools.

Anyways, I'm hoping I get it. It's a lost opportunity for them though. They could have said, "Hey, we screwed up. Here are three licenses. We value your business and hope you'll stay a loyal customer." Then, they could have kept my money, and kept me as a customer. But that's not what they did.

Going forward, I really don't think I'll be buying Adobe products anymore. Not because their products are bad. It's that they're over-priced and their customer service sucks.

</comment><comment><USER35> If you already have a windows license but lost your installation media, you can download it without resorting to piracy. The link below has the URLs for the retail ISOs hosted by Amazon.

[http://www.mydigitallife.info/windows-7-iso-x86-and-x64-offi...](http://www.mydigitallife.info/windows-7-iso-x86-and-x64-official- direct-download-links-ultimate-professional-and-home-premium/)

<comment><USER36> Microsoft Store officially tells you that your download time has expired after you purchase a Windows license, and wish to re-download / re-install more than 3 months after your purchase.

The official solution is to buy an additional copy of the Windows license which will provide you with a new download URL.

I knows this because I complained to the @microsoftstore twitter account: after purchasing 2 copies of Windows (the crapware-loaded OEM version, the clean one from MS store) I had no intention of purchasing a third.

For some reason they simply couldn't allow me a second download, and sent me a physical disc, which arrived about 6 weeks later, by which time a pirated Windows 7 was working fine.

However

<comment><USER37> I've never had any problems with the copy of windows 7 I bought from the microsoft online store. I've had to redownload it two or three times now, and it's always been there (although the page is near impossible to find). I had a screenshot of the page, but imgur is down today so I can't link it.

<comment><USER36> Actually, apparently it's 12 months until you can no longer download the OS again:

"Be kindly informed that the availability of the software download, purchased at the Microsoft Store, is limited to one year.

Please understand that as you placed your order more than one year ago, Microsoft Store does not have access to your order and cannot reset the download link."

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> The result has been the same for as long as Windows has had serial keys: Pirates find a way around them, they share keys, they disable activation, they patch files, they block hostnames in their hosts files. Regular users jump through hoops, have activation issues, lose their discs, need to phone in, etc.

I'm anti-piracy in general, but whenever I install Windows 7 I always bypass the activation because I've had too many problems going legit.

Likewise with Photoshop. At a previous company, we had a license that would let us install on up to five machines. At some point, we hit that limit and couldn't activate it. The confusing thing was that we only had three machines running it (the main user's desktop, her laptop, and another coworker's laptop). What we realized was that we'd reinstalled her laptop and the coworker's laptop recently, and both of those machines were still activated.

When we called Adobe, they pointed us to a KB article on how to de-activate a Photoshop install, but that requires that it still be installed and working. Adobe said that they couldn't actually de-activate those machines. After some arguing back and forth, they agreed to add another machine to our account (so now we have six machines registered, four with it installed, and two using it concurrently). Now, every time we reformat a machine, we have to call them again because no one remembers to de-register Photoshop before they reformat a user's machine.

iTunes lets you register five computers, and if you hit the limit, de-register them all to start over again. How hard is that?

</comment><comment><USER21> I don't use pirated versions of Windows so I don't know the answer to this but I would assume it's a bad idea because:

Your trusting a .ISO image from a random website, how do you know there is not time bombed malware pre-installed?

Do you still have access to Windows update? If so for how long, I assume it can't be difficult for Microsoft to figure out who is using it illegitimately since some versions must be using either the same keys or keys that have never been issued to a copy of Windows that they have sold?

<comment><USER39> > Your trusting a .ISO image from a random website, how do you know there is > not time bombed malware pre-installed?

You don't have to use torrents. You can get a direct download of vanilla Windows 7 ISO's hosted by Microsoft: [http://www.mydigitallife.info/official- windows-7-sp1-iso-fro...](http://www.mydigitallife.info/official- windows-7-sp1-iso-from-digital-river/)

> Do you still have access to Windows update? If so for how long, I assume it > can't be difficult for Microsoft to figure out who is using it > illegitimately since some versions must be using either the same keys or > keys that have never been issued to a copy of Windows that they have sold?

Nope, there's a workaround built into Windows because the OEMs strongarmed MS into adding it. You can get a piece of software called the Windows Loader that will activate Windows using this workaround with just one click and a reboot: [http://forums.mydigitallife.info/threads/24901-Windows- Loade...](http://forums.mydigitallife.info/threads/24901-Windows-Loader- Current-release-information)

<comment><USER21> Ok, so you can activate it but what happens if MS decides at some point to block your updates or track you.

I assume they keep a record everytime they issue a license either to an OEM or wholesaler etc and if your using a keygen they could simply check their database and find that such a key was never issued.

If you use a key that was already registered to someone else then surely they know because your computer name/username or a hash of your hardware config (I assume this info is sent to windows update) will be different.

<comment><USER40> > _"Ok, so you can activate it but what happens if MS decides at some point to > block your updates or track you."_

You run the same risk anyone who used the old FCKGW key ran. I'm not suggesting it's a good idea, I'm just pointing out that many, many people were willing to do just that. And they won't blink at the similar risks in this new workaround.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> One of the greatest features of the Mac App Store is the ability to download the latest version of OS X Lion and then make a bootable image of it.

I upgraded from Snow Leopard to Lion the day it came out but then had to do a clean install a couple of months later.

Instead of using my out-of-date installer I downloaded the latest version of Lion and did a clean install. No waiting hours fro system updates because my install medium was old.

<comment><USER42> With newer machines (2011 MBA, Mini, maybe the iMac too?) you can even start the OS install straight from the boot loader. It basically net boots the Lion Recovery image and then proceeds with downloading/installing the OS. Pretty slick.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> #7 on the front page of Hacker News. And there's confusion as to why SOPA is being considered by Congress.

</comment><comment><USER44> I'm actually pirating the version of windows i am using to write this. I bought this laptop which came with a super bloated version of windows 7 64 home edition. no media was provided. you can create your own but it includes the bloatware that comes with it originally installed which defeats the puprose. therefore i went to my favorite torrent site and download windows 7 64 bit home edition and installed it.

i know its not exactly microsoft's fault their os gets so much bloat.. but the experience i was getting from new machine was nowhere near the one i am getting after the clean install.

</comment><comment><USER45> I disagree totally with the logic the article is following. If you do not like Microsoft's products and services (I don't) that is totally acceptable, and i might add understandable, deal with other software vendors ! I do not understand the logic saying "I hate your service and so i will just steal the product".

If you want to make your point just go ahead and complain, send a written letter move to another vendor (I Have). Stealing, And i will call it that because it is stealing, is not a legitimate nor a logical reaction to crappy service.

The entire internet philosophy, IMO, was build on trust and a certain code of honor if i may say (at the risk of sounding corny) breaking that breaks the internet. Imagine people just screwing up Wikipedia because they think Jimmy Wales did something wrong in their opinion or because an article of their got removed or whatever.

Piracy has always been, and will always be, a thing of the internet. think of it as a wicked charm. I will not encourage eradicating it. To be honest i have used pirated software to evaluate when vendors wont offer evaluation options. But then i would go and buy the damn license, because: 1 - it is the right thing to do, regardless. 2 - If i like something, paying for it will support the vendor to continue on making the stuff i like.

I personally do not like the way Microsoft does business, i dont like their products and i think they are arrogant pricks but if i need to use windows (god forbid) i will still pay for the damn license.

</comment><comment><USER46> Pirating makes sense when the pirates end up providing a superior product that the publisher won't provide at any price.

This was true for video games, where the copy protection schemes often resulted in a bad experience for paying customers.

But for an OS, having to enter a product key once doesn't seem to harm the experience as much as possibly getting a rooted kernel would.

I think, in general, there aren't a lot of good reasons for grown-ups to not pay for the commercial software they want to use.

</comment><comment><USER47> Although I don't find MS to be the worst of all suppliers, it is yet an other prime example how companies fail to grasp that the only way they will ever compete with pirated content (be it right or wrong) is by service and by service only. The pirated price is already unbeatable and shamefully, its service is arguably better.

A bit of a rant, but I am getting a bit tired that, still as we enter 2012, what does the paying customer get for his troubles? You don't live in country xx? You can't see/listen/buy online content yy. Although definitely in music and games there has been progress, I could still add hundreds of more examples.

And what currently is the envisioned answer to this flawed business model? A set of laws that will inevitably alter some of our more dear democratic principles. Not to mention the economic fallout.

On a side note, I can't help wondering my thoughts to the teen-sex debates in the US, where some people hopelessly cling to abstinence measures which in theory, work fine. Whereas in practice, there seems to be quiet some empirical evidence that young people, well, just do it.

</comment><comment><USER48> that and Windows its 50 times the minimum wage here in mexico.

</comment><comment><USER49> I've got several legitimate Windows licenses. I tried to install it on my dad's computer but I had to leave before the installation completed. I returned a few days later to activate it but somehow a virus managed to infect it. I removed the virus, but Windows just refused to activate with a LEGAL KEY. I tried activating by phone and I received an activation key but it didn't work either (permissions error or something). So I just did the sensible thing and installed a version that I found on TPB.

Seriously Microsoft, drop the activation scheme. It's not necessary and causes nothing but frustration for your end users.

</comment><comment><USER50> I dont know why they do this for their client OS but for server OS you can get a free evaluation download of any server product and activate it with a purchased key, no muss no fuss. Also using the provided download manager I have never seen speed issues with these downloads. As far as phone activation, which we have to do for several sites without internet access, the process is a bit long but not nearly as tedious as described. I am admittedly against DRM but if anyone comes close to doing it right its Microsoft on their OS software.

</comment><comment><USER51> I wouldn't recommend you try this at your startup. Some day, a potential investor or partner is going to audit your licenses and it'll be pretty embarrassing if you're way out of compliance.

<comment><USER52> Might seem like I just hate MS, but honestly I would be just as upset as a potential investor or partner that they were running Windows in the first place. Licensed or not. Unless of course your startup was focused somehow on Windows development, users, etc. where it would obviously be necessary.

Startups are hard enough as it is, no need to make them harder.

<comment><USER53> Microsoft Bizspark (<http://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/>) gives startups that are less than 3 years old and earn less than $1M in annual revenue free MSDN Ultimate access.

That means free access to all of MS software. It's actually a really amazing program.

<comment><USER54> The BizSpark program has limitations (although still a fantastic deal!).

* AFAIK you are licenced to use the software for development and testing purposes ONLY. Not internal use (see the BizSpark FAQ, even though other BizSpark materials seem to imply otherwise).

* Except you do get a production 2 proc SQL Server licence, and Windows Server licences... However you may not be able to use the licences with some hosting providers (due to their licences with Microsoft, or just unfamiliarity or complexity overhead).

* The BizSpark websites are a time-wasting labyrinth whenever you must update anything (might have improved?).

* There are so many catch-alls to prevent "misuse" of the licence, that it looks as though you can't legally use any of the software... although in spirit you can use it and Microsoft isn't going to chase you... (at least that was how I read the licences last time I looked but IANAL YMMV).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> I think the author is missing the point. Microsoft doesn't really care about the license fee. Your lifetime value to them as a consumer of Windows specific services, digital media, and software is much more valuable than the license fees you'll pay.

On a related note why bother to use Windows if you don't plan on purchasing other Windows-only software? Is the author also planning to pirate Visual Studio and the like as well? If no Microsoft software is being used why not try Linux or Mac?

</comment><comment><USER56> [http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/shop/download- win...](http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/shop/download-windows-7)

</comment><comment><USER57> If you're activating MS products by entering "100-digit" activation keys into your telephone, you're already doing something wrong...

Or are a complete edge/outliner case.

<comment><AUTHOR> Says the guy that doesn't have any family members that persistently fubar their systems, necessitating enough reinstalls to trip the activation limit.

<comment><USER57> If your family members are destroying the OS, the best solution is to either run in a VM which is set to not persist changes (via VMWare or the free options), or to boot from a VHD file for your other members (keep a clean and activated copy that you can revert to).

There are many options to solve this issue (ex: the native VHD boot, VirtualPC, HyperV).

Telling Microsoft to remove activation is a knee-jerk reaction that helps no one.

You can even run Linux as the Host OS.

I write and sell software, and activation is absolutely critical and responsible for at least half my revenue.

<comment><USER58> That sounds like an heck of a lot of extra work just to deal with Microsoft's anti-piracy activation system. IMHO, your "answer" just reinforces the original author's point. Why should legitimate paying customers have to deal with all of these workaround and annoyances? Why should legitimate customers have to endure being treated like potential criminals? Especially when these activation systems _aren't stopping the pirates_!!!!!!!

<comment><USER57> He's not dealing with Microsoft's anti-piracy activation system as much as he's dealing with issues about family members.

And your point about MS not knowing what it's doing...

If the activation system was useless, and had no effect on revenue, it would be gone the next day.

I've been a legitimate customer since Windows 3.1, and I've only had to activate by phone 1 time. It was painless.

<comment><USER58> Having to re-install the OS because of virus issues, etc. is _NOT_ usual and shouldn't be punished by forcing the user to go through some stupid activation system.

Having to re-activate because of hardware upgrades (new motherboard, etc) is also not unusual. Again, I don't see why a PAYING customer should be be punished by forcing the user to go through some stupid activation system, when pirates _don't_ have to deal with the activation system.

Just because the activation system hasn't negatively affected _you_ doesn't mean it hasn't negatively affected many, many paying customers. Why should I get treated like shit for being a paying customer, when I could get a better user experience by pirating Windows?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> This is why i will always save a copy of my windows xp enterprise edition cd. It's xp, which is still decent enough, and it doesn't require any activation, as opposed to the home/pro-editions.

In case apocalypse happens (ehum, my ISP goes down for 24h) i know i can still get a computer up and running without problem if i have to.

<comment><USER60> Is that legal? One of the reasons MPAA/RIAA are pissing everyone off and have lost all credibility is that they have helped write and pass many copyright related laws that make even the most natural things to do illegal. They are so out of touch with reality.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> This was the case for music for a long time (still is, but to a lesser extent) before iTunes came along. Downloading music through Napster, Limewire or BitTorrent was simply easier and more effortless. Even though people were willing to pay, they didn't because that would have required more effort to do so.

</comment><comment><USER62> >"Why can't I just enter my product key and download an updated ISO with slipstreamed service packs? "

This is why i still use the MSDN account from many employers ago...

YOU CAN DO THIS with MSDN -- Why not make the MSDN model the way everyone receives their copy. Also, stop selling me CDs or DVDs - put them on USB sticks.

</comment><comment><USER63> This is another example of companies pushing away would-be paying customers. This dumb logic has been the music industries policy for a while now; every person brought to trail for piracy was a potential customer or fan of the artist whose music they were pirating.

</comment><comment><USER64> Disaster recovery is much easier with a legitimate windows licence. Both in terms of having the original recovery disk, and support.

There are subtle issues with pirated installations that can cause serious issues when things start to go wrong. (Speaking from experience)

</comment><comment><USER65> Plain and simple, the existence of piracy is not due to the lack of legislation but due to market failure. I find that many people are more than happy to pay for good service and good products -- even if there are cheaper/free alternatives.

</comment><comment><USER66> You don't have to use Windows. The best way to protest is by using another product.

Claiming that you have the moral authority to pirate it is just wrong, doing so re-enforces the need for MSFT to have even stricter anti-piracy measures.

</comment><comment><USER67> I am buying my next copy of Windows. You can get a copy really cheap now if you look hard enough (less than $100) through MSDNAA or through another student organization. For me, peace of mind is worth the price.

<comment><USER14> The discount is a nice thing for students, but there are plenty of non- students in the US and especially other parts of the world where dropping a few hundred dollars on software that makes their computer work is a major burden.

Given the large distribution of the Windows OS (this isn't boutique software with a small customer base), it really doesn't make much sense that it's so expensive. If the price was lowered significantly ($50 maybe?), I think MS would see piracy numbers go down and sales go up more than enough for them to remain profitable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER68> Bought windows XP. Lost the CD. Had to pirate it.

Bought windows 7 online. Had to download it through windows special download manager which took ages, then gave me some exec that I couldn't burn on a CD... I had to pirate it.

</comment><comment><USER69> These are all valid points, aligned with many of the views being upvoted today. However, I'd just like to point something out.

According to this article and many others, we all "pirate stuff" because it's "easier than the paid model"... well, the same goes for driving a car.

I would much rather just walk into my underground parking lot, hotwire a car, and ditch it once I got to my destination. But, I have morals.

I am not likening stealing a car to copyright infringement, only pointing out the reasoning that "I pirate because it's easier to do so" isn't really a moral/valid point.

It's easier for me to kill you instantly with my gun than it is for me to reason with you about a topic I don't care to reason about, too.

<comment><USER70> Killing only easy in the absence of social and legal pressure, and in our instincts to not harm members of our "tribe"

</comment></comment><comment><USER71> Seriously, you should start to support free Operating Systems instead of loose your time with Microsoft, pirating it or not.

</comment><comment><USER72> The site seems down. Do we need a mirroring service to help with "the HN effect"? Or just people to fix their sites?

</comment><comment><USER73> This is not how to show them, nor is it a way to justify piracy.

Unless you really can't live without the next version of Windows, don't use it at all. Keep with the current version for as long as you can (I'm still on XP on the only Windows machine I have) or switch to an alternative (this may be the route I take when I next rebuild).

I'll be rebuilding that desktop machine at some point this year and what-ever OS goes on the new build I hope will not need reinstalling for a few years (so I'll have to upgrade from XP as it drops out of security update support early in 2014). I'm trying to decide to go for Windows 7, or just go completely Linux - currently the Linux option is winning in my mind.

Pretty much the only reason I still run Windows on this home desktop is games. I use OpenOffice for my own documents, and when I need access to MS Office, Visual Studio, and so forth from here I simply VPN+RDC into my machine at the office these days. The rub is that lately I've not been playing that much (I've not had time) and there aren't any games in the near future that I could name as being something I'm waiting for (I'm done waiting for HL?EP3 - if they release it before I leave Windows-land then I'll pre-order, if not then they'll only get a sale out of me if it runs on Linux fine), with PC gaming apparently going in the "beg and jump through hoops or we won't let you play" direction ([http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/01/17/1838237/ubisoft- has...](http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/01/17/1838237/ubisoft-has-windows- style-hardware-based-drm-for-games)) I can see myself simply refusing to buy any new games from the major publishers even if I do keep Windows, and most of the games I have played much of recently could probably be implemented in browsers soon enough (if not already) at which point the choice of underlying OS becomes irrelevant.

So my position is: _if_ I buy Windows 7 in the next six months it may well be the last Windows license I personally purchase. If I don't, then XP will have been (unless you count the Windows 7 Starter license that came with my netbook but currently remains unused). Either way I won't pirate it: it is a buy or don't decision. Heck, if I decide to not keep up-to-date games wise (and decide that I'm not likely to be bothered by losing access to the games I've bought previously) then I'll not only save £80 for the Windows license but I could save a chunk getting a less flashy GFX card too (I'm only upgrading that in this build to get a card with 3 or more outputs that can be used concurrently).

Pirating will just tells them that you want their platform but don't want to pay, using something else tells them that you can live without them and if they want you not to live without them then there are things they need to change.

<comment><USER74> He is protesting against the overly difficult DRM in an otherwise desirable product. It's easy to skip all the annoying parts, with so few if any downsides.

It's the Windows version of the DVD flow diagram[1] that explains why a pirated movie file is much better than the DVD. I rip all DVDs I come into contact with, and borrow friends DVDs just to rip them. Even if I had time to watch them without ripping I wouldn't want to.

<http://i.imgur.com/Xm27A.jpg>

</comment></comment><comment><USER75> The problem is that it will never be enough. Even if Microsoft gave you everything to you exact specification and only charged $20/license, there would still be a group of people trying to defend piracy.

Just look at the Android/Iphone app market. 99 cent apps are still not convenient or cheap enough for many users, so they pirate it.

This is why I feel that all of these excuses are bullshit.

<comment><USER76> > there would still be a group of people trying to defend piracy.

Of course, just as you'll always find DRM apologists who find Ubisoft's insanity still isn't enough. That's not really a segment of the population worth discussing with though, since they won't buy either way (either because they don't want to, or because they just don't have the money, I was once that impoverished student).

What you can rely on are numbers and the results of those who thought convenience was a major reason[0] for piracy and tried to fix it. And what do you find out? That Steam and iTunes turn out to make money. Who'd have thought?

> This is why I feel that all of these excuses are bullshit.

Oh, bad apples are sufficient to dismiss out of hand anything that comes even remotely close to something they could say?

Well I guess you can trivially be dismissed as well, then.

[0] preempting your strawman, I did not write "the only reason".

</comment></comment><comment><USER77> This is laughable! User gets pissed by activation system. User does the exact thing that causes the activation to not only exist but become more infuriating as time goes on.

How about you either deal with it or not use Windows. If its that much of a pain then there's no reason to use it. Come on. How do we not see the blatant excuse to pirate something here?

<comment><USER14> What's more laughable is that a minority decide to pirate a piece of software, and everyone gets punished. No, actually, in large part only the people who chose _not_ to pirate get punished. How far does it have to go before people realize the whole strategy is absurd?</comment></comment>


What do I need to do to prepare my Android app for heavy usage? - <AUTHOR>

Traffic handling? Load balancing? Fault tolerance? Cloud computing? Map reduce? Database optimization?
I'm writing an Uber-for-X type of platform.
I'm overwhelmed with all of this stuff and I don't know what to start with or how to start it ...
Thanks <comment><USER2> As others have mentioned, YAGNI[0]. You have to avoid the tempting sirens call and wait until you actually have scaling problems, before anyone can tell you how to solve them.

Make sure you follow "best practices" in whatever parts of the app you're building. Also try to have some good instrumentation in place, like New Relic for server usage/app performance and Sentry/Bugsnag/etc for catching exceptions if/when those happen.

If it's mostly a client-side app that runs on someone's phone, then there really is no central scaling bottleneck. If you're worried about scaling the backing API, I'd start with one of Amazon's Elastic Load Balancers and put two micro EC2 servers behind it. If you get a ton of traffic, you can easily take one server out to increase its size without bringing the app down, or you can just add more micro/small servers and scale horizontally.

[0]: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_aren%27t_gonna_need_it](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/You_aren%27t_gonna_need_it)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks a lot.

So, I'm guessing I should opt for AWS right off the bat ? (vs, say a normal VPS like DO?)

<comment><USER3> AWS will be significantly more expensive than DO. Unless you need enterprise- grade scalability at your fingertips and have the cash on hand to ramp to that, you may want to start with a handful of Digital Ocean or Linode boxes and see what the traffic looks like.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The reality is you can't. Dealing with more traffic than you expected is a good problem to have. You can lay down the ground work by using something like AWS (Amazon Web Services) and using auto scaling to increase resources when load increases. At the same time, premature optimisation can be a costly mistake. If you prematurely assume your app is going to be more popular than it is, you could end up with a massive hosting bill because you spun up 200 large Amazon instances and only get 100 users.

My advice would be to read this link: [https://www.airpair.com/aws/posts/building-a-scalable-web- ap...](https://www.airpair.com/aws/posts/building-a-scalable-web-app-on- amazon-web-services-p1) \- it details building a scalable web application and I know of one startup I worked with who found it useful.

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow .That link looks amazing, thank you!

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Someone couldn't possibly answer this question without you giving insight into what it is your app does, what kind of traffic you're seeing now (if at all) or even what kind of traffic you reasonably expect to see.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry. It's an Uber-for-X platform.

<comment><USER3> Alright, what is the current architecture? Is the app just a dumb client and the intelligence lives on the server? Or is it flipped where the intelligence is all in the app and the server is just a central dumping ground for data? How In the course of regular usage, how many times would your app talk to your server? What would be the average size of those data transmissions? What would be the size of the edge cases? I'm not being pedantic for pedantry's sake. You need to have answers to all of these questions before you start thinking about capacity planning and high availability.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm trying to draw up a schematic on paper, so this is it...

1) The app will essentially be the front-end. The user will only be using the app to make payments, view a map (with cars on the road), track their car, request / cancel a car, and provide feedback.

So the heaviest usage would be from the server to the user and not the other way around.

I'm not sure how much Google Maps uses up per minute and how much data is needed to push a car's new position to the phone. That would seem to me to be intensive though, especially over thousands of people.

Edge cases would be 0 and 25 cars live on a map.

Also, I currently have one droplet with DO. Am I supposed to have at least 3? (website, app, DB )</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Do battery costs justify "buy all sell all" over "net metering"? - <AUTHOR> Are batteries the primary justification for "buy all sell all" over "net metering"?<p>Are next-gen supercapacitors the solution? <comment><AUTHOR> > _Ask HN: Do battery costs justify "buy all sell all" over "net metering"?_

> _Are batteries the primary justification for "buy all sell all" over "net > metering"?_

> _Are next-gen supercapacitors the solution?_

With "Net Metering", electric utilities buy consumers' excess generated energy at retail or wholesale rates. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_metering](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Net_metering)

With "Buy All, Sell All", electric utilities require consumers to sell all of the energy they generate from e.g. solar panels (usually at wholesale prices, AFAIU) and buy all of the energy they consume at retail rates. They can't place the meter after any local batteries.

Do I have this right?

 _Net metering_ :

(used-generated) x (retail || wholesale)

 _Buy all, sell all_ :

(used x retail) - (generated x wholesale)

For the _energy generating consumer_ , net metering is a better deal: they have power when the grid is down, and they keep or earn more for the energy generation capability they choose to invest in.

Break-even on solar panels happens sooner with net metering.

Utilities argue that: maintaining grid storage and transfer costs money, which justifies paying energy generating consumers less than they pay for more constant sources of energy like dams, wind farms, and commercial solar plants.

Building a two-way power transfer grid costs money. Batteries require replacement after a limited number of cycles. Spiky or bursting power generation is not good for batteries because they don't get a full cycle. [Hemp] supercapacitors can smooth out that load and handle many more partial charge and discharge cycles.

Is energy storage the primary justifying cost driver for "buy all, sell all"?

What investments are needed in order to more strongly incentivize clean energy generation? Do we need low cost supercapacitors to handle the spiky load?

Are these utilities granted a monopoly? Are they price fixing?

Energy demand from blockchain mining has not managed to keep demand constant so that utilities have profit to invest in clean energy generation and a two- way smart grid that accommodates spiky consumer energy generation. Demand for electricity is falling as we become less wasteful and more energy efficient. As the cost of renewable energy continues to fall (and become less expensive than nonrenewables), there should be more margin for energy utilities which cost-rationally and environmentally-rationally choose to buy renewable energy and sell it to consumers.

Please correct me with the appropriate terminology.

How can we more strongly incentivize consumer solar panel investments?

<comment><AUTHOR> Here's a discussion about the lower costs of hemp supercapacitors as compared with graphene super capacitors: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16800693](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16800693)

""" Hemp supercapacitors might be a good solution to the energy grid storage problem. Hemp absorbs carbon, doesn't leave unplowable roots in the fields, returns up to 70% of nutrients to the soil, and grows quickly just about anywhere. Hemp bast fiber is normally waste. Hemp anodes for supercapacitors are made from the bast fiber that is normally waste.

Graphene is very useful; but industrial production of graphene is dangerous because lungs and blood-brain barrier.

Hemp is an alternative to graphene for modern supercapacitors (which now have much greater [energy density] in wH/kg)

"Hemp Carbon Makes Supercapacitors Superfast" [https://www.asme.org/engineering- topics/articles/energy/hemp...](https://www.asme.org/engineering- topics/articles/energy/hemp-carbon-makes-supercapacitors-superfast)

> _"Our device's electrochemical performance is on par with or better than > graphene-based devices," Mitlin says. "The key advantage is that our > electrodes are made from biowaste using a simple process, and therefore, are > much cheaper than graphene."_

> _Graphene is, however, expensive to manufacture, costing as much as $2,000 > per gram. [...] developed a process for converting fibrous hemp waste into a > unique graphene-like nanomaterial that outperforms graphene. What's more, it > can be manufactured for less than $500 per ton._

> _Hemp fiber waste was pressure-cooked (hydrothermal synthesis) at 180 °C for > 24 hours. The resulting carbonized material was treated with potassium > hydroxide and then heated to temperatures as high as 800 °C, resulting in > the formation of uniquely structured nanosheets. Testing of this material > revealed that it discharged 49 kW of power per kg of material—nearly triple > what standard commercial electrodes supply, 17 kW /kg._

[https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=hemp+supercapacit...](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=hemp+supercapacit..).

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

I feel like a broken record mentioning this again and again. ""'</comment></comment>


On the business of literature - Richard Nash - <AUTHOR> http://www.vqronline.org/articles/2013/spring/nash-business-literature/

<comment><USER2> Very good article. Long but definitely worth reading for the historical context it brings.

quote: "The business of literature is blowing shit up."</comment>


The answer to Uber's profit challenge? It may lie in its trove of data - <AUTHOR> https://www.reuters.com/article/us-uber-ipo-profit/the-answer-to-ubers-profit-challenge-it-may-lie-in-its-trove-of-data-idUSKCN1SF0O5 <comment><USER2> thanks to the GDPR data troves are a liability.</comment>


Udemy: The Complete iOS8 and Swift Course for $19 (90% Off Coupon) - <AUTHOR> http://best-course-online.com/reviews/course-review-udemy-complete-ios-developer-course/

<comment><AUTHOR> I know this sounds like spam and linkbait, but it is not. This is an interesting introduction to Swift and iOS8 programming, with 150 hours of video (you'll skip half of it, but the other half seems worth it).

I missed yesterday's discount (75% off, for $49), only to find this 90% (!) discount coupon.</comment>


Ask HN: How hard is it for blind people to code? - <AUTHOR> I've read some stories about blind people who code successfully, but can't really imagine debugging using screen reader. Well, even reading, and navigating through a code sounds frightening.<p>Can anybody here share their experience first-hand? <comment><USER2> Not first-hand, but I found this fascinating:

[https://www.vincit.fi/en/blog/software- development-450-words...](https://www.vincit.fi/en/blog/software- development-450-words-per-minute/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, thanks! That's quite an interesting article.

Although author doesn't go into much detail about difficulties of learning how to efficiently use those screen-reading tools, I liked that he gives a broad picture of blind people's everyday code-related routine.

BTW, how does one understand all that synthesized gibberish? I bet it could give you a headache :D

<comment><USER3> Yea I would like to know how he understands the synthesized speech @ 450 wpm. I'm not sure what the WPM rate is, but when I listen to lectures anything over 1.5-2x normal speed is usually where I start missing stuff. If someone talks faster than normal, even 2x is too much for me.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Draw and extract tables from PDF reliably - <AUTHOR> http://getbluetail.com <comment><USER2> Reliably* - coming with limitations

      1. Text pdfs only

      2. Template is needed

From what I've spoken with 50-60 paid customers for a service I maintain, the most common concerns I listen are

      1. No, We get scan pdfs as well

      2. No, We deal with lot of customers, cannot template all

<comment><AUTHOR> Yes, agreed that this is indeed a difficult tradeoff.

Just curious, does extracttable.com provide offline mode? It seems that quite a few people can't submit their documents to 3rd party server

<comment><USER2> We are far away from offline mode. May be 2-3 years later thing, if we survive till that time.

Btw, did you check OpenCV morph line detection? It will help to auto detect the evident cell/row boundaries - thus reducing human effort

<comment><AUTHOR> I did a bit, but there are tables that simply don't have any lines. Given that human beings are just so much better at detecting tables than AI, I figured maybe the solution is to help people quickly draw the table they see, rather than tweaking algorithm -- hence this new product.</comment></comment></comment></comment>