American energy use - <AUTHOR> https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/4/13/15268604/american-energy-one-diagram <comment><USER3> Contrary to what the article claims ("Transportation is a huge, looming, and almost entirely unsolved climate problem") transportation can be a solved problem. If you notice one of the graphs while transportation is the top emitter hasn't increased much since 2005 and it is very sensitive to oil prices.

Carbon taxes or excise taxes on fuel are the solution. They are endorsed by most economists (often in addition to emissions trading). Taxes must be imposed on emitting greenhouse gasses or at least on purchasing fuels; in addition a cap must be placed on the total amount of emissions.

If you are libertarian and you feel like there are too many taxes already - the carbon tax can either substitute other taxes or the revenue from it can be returned to tax-payers in some form.

Vox itself recently had an article about carbon taxes in California, it includes a part where the collected revenue is then redistributed back to citizens: [https://www.vox.com/energy-and- environment/2017/5/3/15512258...](https://www.vox.com/energy-and- environment/2017/5/3/15512258/california-revolutionize-cap-and-trade)

<comment><USER4> > Electricity wastes two-thirds of its primary energy; transportation wastes > about three-quarters.

The electricity generation _waste_ I'm willing to take at face value, but only because I am somewhat familiar with the concepts of conversion factor loss and line loss. I find both of these assertions require digging into the footnotes to understand better. Their presentation is a little too _hand wavy_. I'm really at a loss to understand what the transportation waste means. Sure, you also need to propel the mass of the vehicle. Is it comparing every other vehicle to a bicycle? I don't know.

<comment><USER5> The fact the tailpipe on your car ejects a lot of useless heat is waste. Similarly, a car's radiator is ejecting a lot of useless heat. Sure, tracking this feels hand-wavy but using less fuel because you drive less is different from using less fuel because the engine is more efficient.

However, this stuff still very simplified as lighter cars use less fuel even without changing the % of waste energy generated.

<comment><USER6> Heat is energy. Any heat that enters the atmosphere is energy you're giving up.

<comment><USER5> 99% of energy from gasoline ends up as heat, but saying it's ~0% useful energy is not really meaningful.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I think that the LLNL methodology has changed over time. That, rather than "we've become so much more inefficient," seems a more plausible explanation for changes in useful/rejected energy since 1970. I was recently reviewing the recent LLNL charts. It seems impossible that 2011 and 2016 are using the same methodology:

[https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/charts/Ene...](https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/charts/Energy/Energy_2011_United- States.png)

[https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/charts/Ene...](https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/charts/Energy/Energy_2016_United- States.png)

They both show 97.3 quads of primary energy use, but in 2011 the chart shows 41.7 quads going to energy services while that dropped to 30.8 in 2016. The US use of energy _lost_ over 25% efficiency in just 5 years? While keeping primary energy use totally flat? The only way to make that work, mathematically, is if people are reducing their use of energy services and preferring inefficient ones for their remaining use.

I return to a simpler explanation: the chart methodology for identifying rejected energy and energy services has changed, so you can't compare two arbitrary charts. I wish they would keep the original charts around but also produce a time series showing each year's results with the latest methodology.

EDIT: the 2015 chart seems to be the one that introduced new methods; compare to 2014. There's a big shift in just one year.

<comment><USER5> Just to add the methodology is rather flexible as for example passive solar heating is ignored.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> The diagram itself

[https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/charts/Ene...](https://flowcharts.llnl.gov/content/assets/images/charts/Energy/Energy_2016_United- States.png)

But I believe the blog adds useful context (starting with the quads)

<comment><USER8> The chart type is known as Sankey:

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

[https://bost.ocks.org/mike/sankey/](https://bost.ocks.org/mike/sankey/)

<comment><USER9> Super fun diagrams. I interned at LLNL at one point and did a little work with some Sankey variants visualizing energy and resource flows in urban environments[1]. I think I still have the code lying around somewhere, I'd love to return to it someday.

People at the lab who were aware of them were uniformly pretty proud of those main energy figures. I had multiple old hands approach me at the poster presentation who were really enamored of the design, one fellow actually said he thought it was the best figure the lab produced. Of course, I was a pretty dumb grad student and wasn't totally sure what I was doing, so mine don't have the polish of the official ones. They were fun to work on though.

[1] [https://www.flickr.com/photos/23215983@N02/albums/7215763423...](https://www.flickr.com/photos/23215983@N02/albums/72157634234830818)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> It's weird how infrequently Agriculture is ever mentioned when talking about CO2 emissions. Transportation is _always_ brought up, but agriculture (which is responsible for significantly more greenhouse gas emissions) is conveniently left out.

<comment><USER7> According to the EPA, as of 2015 agriculture is responsible for 9% of American GHG emissions and transportation is 27%.

[https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas- emis...](https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources-greenhouse-gas-emissions)

Maybe you're thinking of the global level, where agriculture is comparable to transportation and the IPCC grouping "agriculture, forestry, and other land use" (AFOLU) is greater:

[https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment- report/ar5/wg3/ipcc_wg3_a...](https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment- report/ar5/wg3/ipcc_wg3_ar5_technical-summary.pdf)

I would venture that the reason that latter figure doesn't come up much in American policy discussions is because American policies can do a lot more about American transportation emissions than American policies can do about foreign agriculture or deforestation.

<comment><USER11> The US also imports quite a bit of food (I'm not finding a definitive figure right now, but seeing 15% in several places), so that complicates the calculation a bit. Also, you'd want to see a breakdown of how much transportation comes from agricultural activities as well, to get a better idea of the full picture.

Still, agriculture is a big player no matter how you cut it, and your own eating habits are a lot easier to control than overall policy or law changes (and probably even your transportation, given the strong need for cars).

<comment><USER12> The US is a net exporter of food.

<comment><USER11> For a US consumer making choices and understanding the impact of what they eat that doesn't matter, what matters is what ends up on the plate. A ton of exports ends up as feed for animals, which can then be re-imported as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> When I first saw this, the concept of "rejected energy" from the pink boxes seemed to need some explanation. From the outside view, nothing is "wasted"\--there's just the cost and benefit. You compare alternate sources and alternate uses this way. Losses don't really mean anything unless they are comparative, and the only thing that matters is the ultimate value of the work, not what you would get if you ran a science experiment to figure out the joules.

Even the losses in electrical transmission don't _really_ mean anything unless compared to an alternative, which will have its own losses, and which can't really be compared kWh but instead relative cost.

Someone can correct me if I'm off-base.

<comment><USER14> Losses mean something because they demonstrate the efficiency of a particular conversion, and demonstrate the overall size of the inefficiency compared to other problems in the system. Two quick examples:

(1) LED light vs incandecent where incandescent's rejected energy is waste heat

(2) Natural gas used to heat a house versus natural gas used to generate electricity to run an electric home heater. The direct use rejects far less heat.

This is information that can lead to policy. If you see a lot of waste in a particular path that could be substituted with a different path, policy could be used to encourage the more efficient path. For example, due to abundant hydroelectric energy, the Northwest US used to use a lot of electric heating. Once hydro no longer met demand, the government had a commercial campaign to educate consumers about how they could save money by switching to gas.

<comment><USER15> The home heating thing is interesting, since burning gas for that is roughly 100% efficient. Burning gas for electricity maxes out in the best possible case at 60%, and then there's some tranmission loss (though I suppose gas leaks from pipes need to be counted as well then).

But, electric heat pumps don't generate heat but, as the name suggests, "pump" it from one place to another, so they can be more than 100% efficient, generating something like 2-3x the input energy for air source, or up to 5 for ground source pumps. Which puts electrity ahead again (especially as some of that electricty can come from low carbon sources rather than gas).

<comment><USER16> Heat pumps only work in mild climates though. From what I understand, you can't heat your home with a heat pump in a place like Wisconsin, where the temperature is below 0F for a fairly substantial part of the winter.

I hadn't even heard of a heat-pump until recently, which makes sense, since they seem to mostly be concentrated in warm, dry areas.

Edit: According to Wikipedia, I'm specifically thinking of Air-source heat- pumps, which have a terrible coefficient of performance below 17 degrees Fahrenheit. Geothermal is better, though I believe you still have problems with saturation in cold climates.

<comment><USER17> _> you can't heat your home with a heat pump in a place like Wisconsin... Geothermal is better, though I believe you still have problems with saturation in cold climates_

Geothermal heat pumps can definitely work in the portions of the upper midwest. I know some people in both MLK and Madison that have heat pumps.

As far as I understand it's hit and miss, though. Depends on the particular piece of property you're living on. And you may need an additional heat source for occasional use (e.g. the super cold winter a couple years back I know one of those folks were super glad they still had gas heating in addition to the heat pump).

 _> I hadn't even heard of a heat-pump until recently, which makes sense, since they seem to mostly be concentrated in warm, dry areas._

Ironically I'm the other way around. Didn't hear about heat pumps until moving north. Probably because heat pumps don't make as much financial sense in warmer climates where you're not blowing $100+/mo on heat?

<comment><USER16> I think we are talking about two different things. Everyone I know with geothermal heat pumps just call them geothermal. What I have heard called heat pumps are basically air conditioners that can also be used to heat the home.

Until recently I had no idea the air conditioner-like heat pumps existed, and it appears that they are only useful if you live in a place with a low dew point and relatively high minimum temperatures, since they can ice pretty easily and don't work well below a certain temperature.

Anyways, Most of the people I know with geothermal in Wisconsin have fairly large tracts of land, and still need to supplement with wood pellets or something similar. I'm not sure you could fit enough of the heat exchange loops in a typical yard in a densely populated area.

To be honest, the last time I did the math was probably about 10 years ago, but I recall vertical systems are really not cost effective if you have access to a city natural gas system unless you really like AC.

That being said, I'm renting right now, so I haven't kept close tabs on recent developments.

Edit: Also, I think heat pumps are installed in warmer climates because a dual-purpose AC that doesn't heat that well is cheaper than installing a separate fossil fuel based system, which would be overkill as well as much more expensive.

<comment><USER18> Air source heat pumps have become much more efficient at lower temperatures than they used to be. The best units from Mitsubishi, Fujitsu, Gree, et al, put out their nameplate rating down to -13 to -20F, and continue to produce >50% of their output at COP > 1 below -30F. For new construction, or if you need to replace your current boiler/furnace for some reason, heat pumps always beat gas in levelized cost unless gas is extremely cheap compared to electricity in your area.

> unless you really like AC

Given changes in climate as well as obesity rates, more and more people will really like AC as time goes on, even in the coldest places.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> At some point one has to do some regression analysis, and wonder - if there's money to be made in being more efficient, why has this efficiency virtious circle not happened - and come to a rational conclusion.

The petroleum industry has complete dominance over government policy to the point where we go to war. The Petrodollar and world reserve currency status is a mighty powerful incentive to stay dirty.

<comment><USER20> A few points:

1\. The Jevons paradox. Increased efficiency, by itself _increases_ utilisation of a resource. _If you want to reduce consumption, you need to INCREASE costs._ In the context of fossil fuels, this means carbon and other taxes, generally.

2\. Efficiency gains are typically overestimated and underrealised. More generally, more efficient systems tend to require tighter integration and coordination.

3\. Much efficiency within the US has to do with basic infrastructure and land use. Housing, commercial, and industrial building design. _Land use,_ more than anything else, which drives transportation patterns. Appliance design, education, and more.

4\. Le Chatlier's Principle probably also applies (and the Jevons Paradox may well be a special case / instance of this). Changes to a system in one direction tend to lead to compensatory response in the opposite.

5\. Many efficiency technologies or adaptations are not themselves highly lucrative, or have greater costs than the apparent economic benefits.

On that last:

Proper tyre inflation and regular tune-ups. The first ... simply has to be done regularly. Tune-ups are pricy relative to energy savings.

Replacing incandescent lights with LED ( _Do this!!!_ ). Start with high-use fixtures.

Proper insulation (easy) and weatherproofing (harder) of homes and building. Increasing ceiling insulation makes a tremendous difference. Blocking and stopping drafts and other leackages is much more intensive, and is often hampered by poor initial construction and standards.

Wrapping water and HVAC pipes and conduits. Thermal loss within the structure from water and space heating/cooling is another easy win.

Understanding your home's energy-use cycles and dependencies. In cold-weather climates, thermal stratification and hot/cold zones within the structure often lead to overheating (or cooling). Increasing insulation efficiency may exacerbate this as blower fans run for shorter periods of time, and hence _mix interior air less completely_. Counterintuitively, having high-efficiency, low-speed fans within rooms to mix floor and ceiling air, or running central blowers for longer periods of time, _even when heating or cooling aren 't being applied,_ may significantly increase overall comfort.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Phenomenal pictures!

The article makes the point that we could save a lot of energy by designing less wasteful systems. Does anyone know of general numbers on the practical efficiency of particular energy generation mechanisms as well as the consuming apps? It's obviously a lot less than the thermodynamic limits. David MacKay's wonderful 'Without Hot Air' [1] has some numbers but it's hard to relate them directly to the LLNL diagrams.

[1] [https://www.withouthotair.com/c22/page_155.shtml](https://www.withouthotair.com/c22/page_155.shtml), for example.

<comment><USER22> On the power plants side, it's about costs. I don't think it makes sense to compare different plant types.

But you could take solar as an example - is it better to use up twice as much roof space/desert if the overall design is cheaper that way? Probably. Yet, all else being equal, the more efficient design is of course preferable, less stuff to install, less material usage, so technological advances tends to push for higher efficiency, I think.

On the consumer side, just look up the efficiency in what interests you. It should be easy enough to find numbers online.

If you're in the EU, most household appliances have a mandatory rating from G to A, with the least efficient appliances having a disturbing red G, while the best have a nice green A:

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

As you can see in the example in Wikipedia, the differences between the ratings are significant. When this thing started, you could buy a G fridge - <USER2> think those may have been the norm. I looked up an internet dealer right now, and the lowest rating I could find for sale is A+, with A++ being the norm. In a year or two, A+++ is probably the norm.

It has worked like the MHz wars on PC, amazing really. As long as there's competition and someone puts energy efficiency in the spotlight, things can actually change.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> What is the exact criteria by which energy ends up as _rejected_?

That seems very difficult to define and I'm afraid this "America is so inefficient" rant is some misunderstanding of what is an imperfect measure.

<comment><USER24> Whenever you burn something to do work, you are limited by a principle in thermodynamics called the Carnot cycle[1]. It basically says that converting heat to work has a maximum efficiency (depending on the situation).

So the rejected energy in this sankey diagram is partly just the consequence of the thermodynamic efficiency limits of the situations. Also, since there are always heat and resistance losses (the real world is not a frictionless surface), the efficiency of converting energy into work is further decreased.

All in all, we're actually pretty good at covering heat into energy. The rejected energy here is simply a consequence of the situation and thermodynamics. For other situations that don't involve heat-to-work, such as wind and photovoltaics, the Carnot cycle doesn't apply, and you can have much less rejected energy.

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

<comment><USER25> You are correct, but just as a point out for people, wind I am not sure, but Photovoltaics I am positive are accumulate per panel, or per unit for newer panels redesigned as solar roofing materials, intead of panels on roofing materials, utilize inverters, which are some of the most lossy circuit designs for power conversion right now.

Until inverters are made to be more efficient, this will always be a huge bottleneck for dynamic energy input and output for the solar industry, and should be considered as apart of the losses for a solar unit.

<comment><USER26> >Until inverters are made to be more efficient, this will always be a huge bottleneck for dynamic energy input and output for the solar industry,

That seems pretty unlikely, do you have any literature on that?

Inverters do sometimes become less efficient when there's less power coming out of the panels, but getting <85% efficiency out of an inverter in any common scenario would probably just mean that the install had been poorly designed.

I guess a case could be made for not capturing the thermal energy from the sun with panels and using that, but it's a strange case to make. (Probably about as strange as getting more than Carnot limits out of petroleum. Though if the waste heat is used in, say, steam pipes for distribution in a city, maybe not so strange...)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> For a global view, projected for 2050, take a look at this tool from the UK government and others: [http://tool.globalcalculator.org](http://tool.globalcalculator.org) Select Energy (at the top) -> Sankey (on the left) and optionally apply policy scenarios.

<comment><USER20> The IEA has a drill-down / interactive Sankey diagram for all countries: [https://www.iea.org/sankey/](https://www.iea.org/sankey/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I'm assuming they aren't counting mass transit as transportation because there is no link between electricity and transportation. As a resident of NYC the bulk of my transportation is powered by electricity. All of the subways, buses, and commuter rail are electric.

<comment><USER20> Total electrical energy use in transportation is minuscule.

All energy _other_ than petroleum, natural gas, and biofuels, is 3%.

[https://www.eia.gov/Energyexplained/?page=us_energy_transpor...](https://www.eia.gov/Energyexplained/?page=us_energy_transportationg)

<comment><USER28> You're right, it is in the visualization but it's so minuscule I didn't see it.

I guess it's just so efficient relative to the other sources.

<comment><USER20> That's a paradox of efficient or effective practices: they can simply fall out of measurements.

GDP is notorious for this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Was expecting to see American energy use compared to other countries. It's not a pretty picture per capita.

<comment><USER30> Iceland is the world champion when it comes to energy consumption per capita. And at the same time, Iceland has 100% clean energy (geothermal and hydro). That is why Icelanders keep their windows open, and why the country is trying to attract aluminium industry (very energy hungry).

I still wish that US would promote better standard when it comes to thermal insulation, water preservation, etc. I recently visited Las Vegas, and the whole city could be case study (from freezing AC'ed hotels/casinos/cars, to law being watered during the day).

<comment><USER31> It definitely does not have 100% clean energy.

They import petrol for cars at the very least.

<comment><USER32> I think parent was referring to electricity energy consumption.

It is true that this is a fraction of total energy use, but this lays the groundwork for reaching clean energy for transportation, specially if Iceland follows on Norway's trend for electric vehicle usage (29% market share for 2016, Iceland's on 4.6%).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> This report is on the US DoE and Lawrence Livermore National Labs "energy flow" Sankey diagrams, released annually. This is a modelling estimate of provisioned (rather than passive) energy generation, distribution, and utilisation. It doesn't address end-use efficiency, particularly in electrical, heating, and cooling appications.

For similar worldwide usage patterns, see the IEA's (International Energy Associaton) Sankey chart: [https://www.iea.org/sankey/](https://www.iea.org/sankey/)

David Roberts makes a large point about decreasing efficiency of US energy use since the 1970s. This may be somewhat misleading as the chart is based on overall statistics (fuel imports and production, power-plant generation statistics) and engineering models of processes, rather than direct measurements. As models change, estimates of wasted energy may also increase.

I'd pay more attention to the _input_ side, and _overall usage_ , where the story becomes more interesting. In particular, renewable sources such as wind and solar are now being broken out individually, a major change from earlier years (though this has been happening in recent years as I recall). If you look at overall energy usage trends (not immediately apparent from the Sankey diagrams), what's most telling _particularly_ since the 1970s is how the _current_ usage of energy is declining _relative to earlier projections_. This is mostly good news.

If you're interested in making sense of the numbers, or converting them to different forms, I highly recommend the GNU units utility. This is a units- aware console calculator, with some very useful and underappreciated capabilities, including the ability to conver between, say BTUs and the equivalent solar panel area you'd need to provide the same energy:

        You have: 100 quadrillion btu / (1 kW/meter^2 * 0.2 * .3 * 365 days)
        You want: km^2 *
        55759.336
        / 1.7934216e-05

That is: the solar-cell equivalent of 100 Quads of energy would require 55,760 square kilometers of solar panels, a region about 236 km on a side.

This is available on Linux, OSX (via homebrew), and Windows (via Cygwin). Note that OSX includes the _BSD_ Units utility, which does _not_ have the additional definitions provided by the GNU utility.

You can convert quads to TJ, or millions of barrels of oil, or tonnes of coal. You can compute the size of a tank or scuttle, in cubic kilometers, required to deliver this energy. You can estimate how many solar panels, or windmills, or hydro plants, would be necessary to provide the same energy. You can estimate cropland and biofuel equivalents (this ... doesn't look promising given present energy use).

More mash-notes on GNU Units here:

[https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/1x9u0f/gnu_uni...](https://www.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/1x9u0f/gnu_units_utility_and_energy_resource_calculations/)</comment>


Substack's CEO explains why we're all obsessed with newsletters now - <AUTHOR> https://www.protocol.com/substack-ceo-newsletter-obsession <comment><USER2> I was on a bit of a newsletter tear last year. I signed up for a lot of them. This year I haven't added any new ones and in fact I'm unsubscribing from most as they roll into my inbox.

For me, newsletters seem fresh and interesting for one or two issues and then they start to feel repetitive. The worst are ones where it quickly becomes apparent that the author is really writing in some attempt at engagement, whatever that means to them (usually just broadcasting).

This year, I'm back to using an RSS newsreader more regularly (NetNewsWire on an iPad FWIW) and it makes so much more sense to me. A newsletter is there for the benefit of the author whereas when you publish on the web and use RSS, you are doing that for your readers.

</comment><comment><USER3> Can anyone suggest a Gmail/Chrome plugin that would trim the newsletters on an ongoing basis? For many of the daily newsletters, if I haven't read them in 30 days, I very likely never will.</comment>


How a Radical New Teaching Method Could Unleash a Generation of Geniuses - <AUTHOR> http://www.wired.com/business/2013/10/free-thinkers/all/

<comment><USER2> _" The bottom line is, if you're not the one who's controlling your learning, you're not going to learn as well"_</comment>


How Rich People See the World Differently - <AUTHOR> http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2017/02/how-rich-people-see-the-world-differently.html <comment><USER2> There's always this:

The Rich Are Different: A Priceless Treasury of Quotations and Anecdotes About the Affluent, the Posh, a nd the Just Plain Loaded Hardcover – October 1, 1996 by Jon Winokur (Author)

[https://www.amazon.com/Rich-Are-Different-Priceless- Quotatio...](https://www.amazon.com/Rich-Are-Different-Priceless- Quotations/dp/067944386X%3FSubscriptionId%3DAKIAILSHYYTFIVPWUY6Q%26tag%3Dduckduckgo-d-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3D067944386X)

</comment><comment><USER3> Maybe empathy is not a particularly useful trait for getting ahead in the world. Being overly sensitive to other people can certainly lead to a sort of paralysis-by-analysis.

<comment><USER4> As someone who often sees themselves as overly sensitive (for the better or worse), I totally agree with the paralysis comment.</comment></comment>


No Matter Where You Went, Your Education Wasn't the Best - <AUTHOR> http://www.avidior.org/blog/2008/02/08/no-matter-where-you-went-your-education-wasnt-the-best/

<comment><USER2> The math is wrong and ultimately not even related to the point. Why include it? I would've preferred a post consisted of the 3rd and 2nd to last paragraphs.

<comment><USER3> No kidding. Trying to compute the odds that a particular hour of your life was spent in the "best" possible way is a recipe for misery, even when it's not an actual symptom of mental illness.

Somebody needs to read _The Paradox of Choice_.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> A good education is a more personal and independent experience than the article seems to imply. Rarely are the words or presentation of lectures the most valuable thing a school produces; most importantly, education often involves joining a learning community (or synthesizing one's own). This is not trivial: examples on the internet so far produced remain unusual. The video lecture is usually quite awkward: I hazard that it will always remain a limited form, unable to really support much attention or community.

<comment><AUTHOR> I think you are totally right given the current state of video lectures--they are like the first movies, just awkward translations of stage plays that don't take advantage of the ways that a film can be different and better. I'd much rather see a lecture in person today, all else equal. But I imagine as innovators take advantage of the digital media, we'll see some pretty cool stuff one day: higher production values, Second Life-style virtual worlds, more interactivity, HD, and Discovery Channel-type content that can better compete with live lectures. Right now, though, we are definitely on that second Innovator's Dilemma line where digital lectures only compete with the low end and non-consumption, the way maybe NAND memory used to.

Also, I agree that community is a big deal, and the number one thing we are missing to really take advantage of all the cool content that is coming out. (But I do think other video-based works, like Lost or Serenity or Star Trek, have been able to support both attention and community.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> His logic is that because your college isn't the best for you at each individual class, it isn't the best for you overall. That's stupid. One must be. If there are 2,000 colleges and you chose one at random, you'd have a 1/2,000 chance of having chosen the best. Not (1/1000)^35 or whatever that moron came up with.

Not to mention it's most likely that the top x are all so close to the best for an individual, if such a thing could truly be quantified, that the difference between them is negligible. Let's say that the top 5% are that way, you now have a 5% chance, given random selection. Add in the fact that people don't attend random colleges, and there's a pretty non-zero chance that you're attending the college you should. Most people probably fail, but even then not be enough that it would have been worth the massive effort required.

I'm guessing from his abominable logic that this guy went to the wrong college.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for pointing that out to me, I should have been clearer in my analysis. I've added an update to the bottom, and hopefully that helps: "...also please note that I am talking about the best _possible_ education relative to what _could be_ if you were somehow able to take a series of the best classes offered anywhere. I am sure your education was just great in some absolute sense…just like the Red Sox are pretty good at baseball, even if the All-Star team might be better."

Maybe a web analogy will work better. There is one blog (or group of blogs) today that's the most informative for you. It's a great blog, it's updated frequently, and you like it a lot. Which blogs you read is not random--you've checked out a lot of them, and you know what you like. But what if we could create some sort of blog aggregator that posted links to the best posts of the best blogs? That could be a cool thing, right?

<comment><USER5> Also it depends on how you look at it. By some metrics of "best" there are clear leaders. For instance, if your goal in college is to land a job running a hedge fund afterwards, it's pretty clear you should get a Harvard MBA. The title and connections you get from there are far more important than any classes.

<comment><AUTHOR> Agreed. For good or ill, much of the (monetary) value of education is from what others think of it. You are totally right that if someone has a specific job like that mind, where the education is more a filtering and networking service than anything else, those odds (if you can really calculate them anymore, it's almost just pure recruiting stats at that point) get cut way down.

For those coveted private equity/VC/hedge fund jobs, if you can get in to the Harvard MBA program, you are probably getting pretty close to certain that HBS is the single best school for that (Stanford/Wharton may disagree), all else equal. The individual professors, classes, your learning style, what you actually learn, and any other individual preferences, almost wash away as non- factors in light of the credential. Good point. We may have to distinguish between an education and a degree though?

I probably should have been clearer on that as well--I was just narrowly focusing on the actual knowledge-gaining/learning aspect of education. Worth noting the other side though as we abstract away from pure learning.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> unless it's harvard <http://rccse.whu.edu.cn/college/sjdxkyjzl.htm>. then you win. or something.</comment>


Words that don't translate into English - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/27/10-of-the-best-words-in-the-world-that-dont-translate-into-english <comment><USER3> Language Log have been demolishing this ludicrous nonsense for over a decade now[1]. You'd think people would learn.

[1] [https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2741](https://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=2741)

> But what is the notion of untranslatability here? It seems to have been > confused with "lack of an exact one-word equivalent". Who on earth ever > argued that translatability only exists when source text words are mapped > bijectively to target words, each with exactly the same shade of meaning as > the corresponding source word? Does French jeune fille fail to translate > English girl, and ne … pas fail to translate not? Does English fall down > fail to translate French tomber, and look at fail to translate regarder? > What kind of madness is this?

<comment><USER4> Nothing was "demolished", nothing can be "demolished" in this regard, as many of the people who speak and read two or more languages fluently will attest.

For one thing, many of the swear words/expressions cannot be translated, not even by using more than one word/a few words, there are languages where one can fill entire books with swear-words/expressions (one of them is Romanian, which I speak natively, I've heard the same thing about Russian or Hungarian) and there are languages where swear words/expressions are a lot less diverse (English is the example I know best).

Of course, one can try to naively translate the "băga-mi-aș pula în morții mamii tale!" into the English "I will insert my dick into your mother's dead people", but this naive translation doesn't (can't) catch the word inversion "băga-mi-aș" (from "mi-aș băga") which makes the whole action sound a lot more dynamic and direct in Romanian, plus the word "pula" has a lot more meanings and context in Romanian compared to the simpler uses of "dick" in English, and last but not least the Anglo world seems not to care about one's dead people as much as we Romanians do (and I think we're not the only ones), and as such mentioning some other person's dead close relatives in a derogatory way is seen at most as quaint (while "morții tăi!"/"your dead people!" in Romanian is oftentimes used as a swear expression all by itself, I know I use it frequently).

And this before we get to all the diminutives/suffixes that can be added to any word that is part of a swear expression (and not only) in a language like Romanian, a feature that is absent from most of the English language. For example the mentioned above example can very be easily changed into:

> "băga-mi-aș pula în morții mămițicii tale!"

with the "mamii" to "mămățicii" change (basically from "your mother" to "your little mother", where "little" actually means "more loved"/closer to the person being addressed) giving the whole swear expression a new other, even more personal feeling.

<comment><USER5> My Hungarian friend has often complained about how poor English is in comparison to his native Hungarian as a language for swearing. From your example, I'd say Hungarian swearing is stylistically similar to Romanian.

He also told me about his favorite untranslatable Hungarian word, "bezzeg", which has to be handled on a case-by-case basis when translating into English.

<comment><USER6> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZkb4TPI- Lo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZkb4TPI-Lo)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> _Shoganai_ translates very easily into the English phrase "it can't be helped", with very little lost in the translation.

By contrast, I think a great, useful Japanese phrase that I wish we had in English but is very hard to translate is _otsukaresama_ (お疲れ様) and its variants. It's what you say to someone at the end of the work day, or after finishing something challenging like a hike, or just to acknowledge that some task is being put away for now.

The closest thing might be "good job", or "good work". But _otsukaresama_ has no implied assessment of someone's performance. Which is good, because it means anyone can say it - a peer, family, superior, junior. You can say it to be comforting even after someone gives up for the day having failed to solve a problem, where "good work" might sound sarcastic. A literal translation might be "with respect to the tired", or something like that.

<comment><USER8> Would "let's call it a day" come close?

<comment><USER7> That works well for some uses, but you sort of both have to be colleagues, and finishing up at the same time to use that. You can say "otsukaresama" to your colleague who is leaving before you to pick up their kids, or to your spouse when they get home from a long day, so it's a bit more flexible. It's just a nice, non-judgemental way to acknowledge someone's efforts.

<comment><USER9> Does it have to be a single word or phrase for all uses?

That's the thing I fail to understand with these words/phrases that are hard to translate. Sure, if you need to work it into a pun or joke you almost by definition need to have a single word for two different situations, but for everyday life, I don't understand why not two or three similar phrases suffice, one for each context.

<comment><USER7> No, it can have multiple translations...

It's just that, I've had times where I'd have a strong urge to say _otsukaresama_ to someone, and trip over myself for lack of any appropriate way to say it. Usually those would be cases where none of the translations listed here work; not "let's call it a day" because I'm still working, not "good effort" because it's clear in the context that I have no knowledge of their level of effort and anyway that sounds like what a coach would say after practice. It just sometimes doesn't have any good translation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I've always found the idea of words that can't translate to miss the mark, especially in the context of articles like this that provide a translation. It's really just that we don't have a singular corresponding word, not that they can't be translated.

It's kind of like how people say Eskimos have 50 (or however many words for snow). Any word they have for snow can be described in a corresponding way in English using adjectives, but for them it makes sense to boil down each of those concepts to a common word, since Eskimos have a more frequent need to describe snow than most English speakers.

What's interesting to reflect on is why some cultures need a singular word for something while others don't. It's why I love the word schadenfreude - not for what it means, but for the fact that Germans so readily identify with the idea of taking pleasure from another's misfortune that they coined a word for the term.

<comment><USER11> After living abroad for 10 years I think one of the biggest things I've learned is that translations don't quite work. The problem is the context and emotional framework in relation to the words.

For example "Viel Glück" can translate to "Good Luck" but what exactly is meant from this and how someone feels about me wishing it to them is quite different from Canada where I grew up.

At home it's a polite and kind of nice way to wish someone luck in what they're doing. Here it's often seen as a little sarcastic or teasing as there's a tiny culture implication that it means they didn't prepare enough.

There are massive amounts of this context or slight shading around the words which can completely change the contextural meaning of an exchange without changing anything about the literal translation.

Also, as to schadenfreude I really don't think German people identify with the idea of taking pleasure from another's misfortune. In fact most of the German speakers that I know would feel quite hurt or offended by the insinuation that they take pleasure from other's misfortune. It's more an acknowledgement that it happens, and a way to bring it into the conversation than something anyone would be proud of or want to do. Interestingly enough it's one of the most common borrowed words in English from German and is helpful to describe many situations. (Edit spelling)

<comment><USER12> > Here it's often seen as a little sarcastic or teasing as there's a tiny > culture implication that it means they didn't prepare enough.

I have always thought the same thing about "Good for you" which I think would commonly be translated as "Schön für dich". You cannot possibly say that without sounding sarcastic.

Regarding "Viel Glück", I usually use "Viel Erfolg" when I'm being sincere.

<comment><USER13> "Good for you" I think sounds ridiculously sarcastic in British English, fwiw.

<comment><USER14> Even in American English you would have to be incredibly chipper and sincere for it not to sound sarcastic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I've read multiple articles like this, and always find them interesting. These words, of course, can be translated to English. They just can't be translated to a single word or phrase, but must instead come with a couple of paragraphs explaining their cultural significance. I've never seen articles going the other way, however. What are some examples of English words or phrases that are so loaded with cultural significance that they are difficult to translate?

<comment><USER16> I don't know about other languages, but when a friend asked me this question for portuguese a long time ago, I came up with "pet, "firetruck" and "sitcom" as examples. The first two translate to a noun plus an adjective ("animal de estimação" and "caminhão de bombeiro", respectively) and are not that interesting, but the last one has no translation whatsoever as far as I know, primarily because the very existence of sitcoms is sort of predicated on high variety of TV channels, whereas in smaller countries, there usually is only one or two very dominant ones.

<comment><USER17> The UK has had sitcoms on the radio since the 50s and TV since the 60s, when there weren't many channels. I think it's more down to what the controllers of the channels want to put on it. Sitcoms can be extremely popular - Only Fools and Horses was watched by around 40% of the UK population at its peak.

<comment><USER16> Oh, that's a great point, I hadn't thought of that

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The one thing I love about Chinese is, it's just like English use the canonical 'the' instead of German 'der/die/das' \- it rarely classifies things.

For example, 'someone is doing something' would be like 'someone current do something' in Chinese. There's no 'ing' postfix, instead, you add 'current' or 'now' only when it matters.

There's almost no redundancy of information, thus there are fewer chances to specify illegal statements. When Chinese find out Finland or German native- speakers sometimes also make grammar mistakes when speaking their own languages, it was mind-blowing...

Sadly, I'm not sure if it is influenced by other languages, there are more and more classifiers in modern Chinese:

1\. Though gender is not classified by oral Chinese language, it was classified in the modern written Chinese language.

2\. The infamous quantity classifications as the article mentioned. Non-native speakers would find these pretty hard to remember. A 'tiao' of fish, A 'duo' of mushroom, doesn't really exist in the old Chinese, they were just a fish or a mushroom. It was only mandatory when it's needed, like a bunch of fish.

<comment><USER19> > A 'tiao' of fish, A 'duo' of mushroom, doesn't really exist in the old > Chinese

I'm not sure about those words specifically, but counters/classifiers in Chinese go back centuries and beyond. Linguists will often say Korean and Japanese are language isolates, but quite a bit of their grammar heavily inherits from Chinese in some way with little to no change. They use oftentimes identical classifiers in the same way even when referring to one object.

e.g., 個/个 is ge/gae/ko in Chinese/Korean/Japanese respectively. They're used for catch-all classifiers. 台 is tai/tae/dai and used to classify machines.

<comment><USER18> You're right about the counters/classifiers do exist in ancient Chinese.

If there no classifiers there would be no straight forward way to specify if it's "a cup of water" or it's "a bucket of water".

With that being said, there's not many usages of catch-all classifiers, unless it is stretched to balance the number of characters in poems. Usually, there would be no classifier if there's no ambiguity:

"一人一桌一椅一扇一抚尺而已" \--《口技》("a man, a table, a chair, a fan, a fuchi and that's all") -- 'The beatboxing'

The classifies usually are used in listing of things, and they would be postfixes, instead of being used as prefixes like in typical ways:

"...金碗二对,金抢碗二个,金匙四十把,银大碗八十个..." \-- 《红楼梦》 ("...golden bowls: 2 pairs, golden qiangwan: 2 units, golden keys: 40 grasps, large silver bowls: 80 units...") -- 'The Dream of the Red Chamber'

<comment> Al-Khwarizmi As a Chinese learner, this is really interesting.

The question is, if ancient Chinese had solved the problem in a more straightforward way, why did it then evolve to the more complex form where classifiers are mandatory?

Typically languages tend to evolve to be simpler.

<comment><USER18> Frankly, I don't know the answer. Here is some common knowledge for Chinese you might be interested in, and possibly remotely related to this issue. But I'm by no means an expert, so please take a grain of salt.

> why did it then evolve to the more complex form where classifiers are > mandatory?

Simple is not necessarily easy. The ancient Chinese is compact but not easy to learn.

The Chinese, especially the literary/classical Chinese[0] (as opposed to vernacular Chinese[1]) was very scholar oriented. It's pretty bizarre to the rest of the world because historically the government and scholars actually have strong influences and even controls over the language itself.

There were even many times like 'Hey, you know what? We believe the language is not good enough, and we're going to fix it!', and officers and scholars were assigned to refactor the language. The recent one leads to the traditional and the simplified Chinese diverse from each other. According to the legend, Cangjie[2] invented the Chinese characters, and it more or less becomes traditions, or at least the legend could help the government claims to refactor the language.

The ancients scholars tried to make the language compact and precise. However, the cost is the language is pretty cryptic. If you know a lot of idioms (usually 4 syllables), you would find they don't really make any sense unless you know the whole historical events/stories behind them.

Scholars from Korea, Japan, and Vietnam knew and love Chinese. Many of them tried to evangelize the language to their own people. But they never made it to the average people, though the were many strong influences till the modern days.

> Typically languages tend to evolve to be simpler.

Also, interestingly, the redundancy of the Chinese language actually largely increased over time. My personal take is it tends to be easier rather than simpler.

Some linguistics split Chinese into 3 periods: the old Chinese[3], the middle Chinese[4], and the old Mandarin[5] (the translation is 近代汉语 - is 'the near modern Chinese' if we translate it directly back to English). The middle Chinese period starts from the Northern and Southern dynasties (start from 420) to the Tang dynasty (end at 907).

In the beginning, during the old Chinese period, Chinese people tend to create new characters/syllables over new words (which might combined characters). And that's why the Chinese have so many characters nowadays. But the trend is not sustainable. To be frank, Chinese people may remember thousands of Characters, but they might not remember hundreds of thousands if the trends persist. Also from the syllables perspective, there would be not enough combinations.

So the middle Chinese period, the trend stopped and people started to combine two characters/syllables together for a word, this is especially common in vernacular Chinese. The vernacular Chinese during the middle Chinese period is actually pretty close to the old and modern Mandarin.

Also, Chinese people more or less having OCD on making characters/syllables in the same length so they would sound perfect, especially look perfect (Yes!) - poems usually have 5/7/9 syllables for each sentence. Words and idioms usually consist of 2 or 4 syllables. If a lot of words are made with 2 syllables, they rather make them all 2 syllables.

So the original common words would have a lot of redundancy, for example, 房(house)屋(room), actually refers to 房(house).

Back to the original question, my personal guess is there was no standard way of classify things, once classifier was more and more useful (because there were going to be more 'cup or bucket' issue as the society develops), the OCD Chinese people want to add fallback so it can make the expression balanced just like how they squeeze sentence 5/7/9 and words to 2/4 syllables. So it would be like 'two pairs of gold bowls, and forty grasps of golden keys'. But that's only my guess :)

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_Chinese](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_Chinese) [1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Written_vernacular_Chinese](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Written_vernacular_Chinese) [2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cangjie](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cangjie) [3] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Chinese](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Chinese) [4] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Chinese](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_Chinese) [5] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Mandarin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Mandarin)

<comment> Al-Khwarizmi Even if you are not an expert you are much closer to it than I am, and I found your information very insightful! Thank you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> It's not just lexicon, but sometimes also syntax which doesn't translate cleanly.

Japanese has a really interesting piece of syntax in the ditransitive adversative passive, which is similar to the English passive construction but with a second object which can be used to denote that someone was adversely impacted by it.

There is an example on Wikipedia[1], it's definitely a difficult thing for native English speakers to get used to.

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_voice#Adversative_pass...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_voice#Adversative_passive)

<comment><USER21> Can you give an example? Google is drawing a blank for that.

My favorite piece of Japanese syntax is that adjectives can be conjugated for tense and conditionals, meaning that "It was delicious" has to be expressed as "It is delicioused" ( _oishikatta desu_ ) and you can say "if it had not been red" with a single word ( _akakunakattara_ ).

<comment><USER20> I found an example, which I've added to the parent post.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> One of my favorites is the Tagalog word "daw" pronounced "dao".

You put it on any phrase where you don't accept the burden of truthfulness.

"mom said dinner is at 6 daw"

If it's not at 6, that's too bad, not my fault.

It's so fascinating culturally and really fun to use.

<comment><USER23> Same as Arabic "inshallah," Spanish "ojalá."

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Ah I was hoping for some different ones in Spanish. I've got a running joke with my American friends: "if I say I'm taking a siesta it feels like I'm being lazy, but call it a power nap and suddenly you are a young energetic entrepreneur even if they are the same"

We also have five named eating events, here with their times:

\- Desayuno (8-9): breakfast

\- Almuerzo (11-12): second breakfast? Normally a sandwitch or light snack.

\- Comida (2-3): lunch

\- Merienda (5-6): third breakfast? tea party? It's an evening snack, mostly eaten by kids

\- Cena (9-10): dinner

<comment><USER25> Our germanophones are boring but punctual: their extra meals are Znüni (the 9am) and Zvieri (the 4pm). As far as I'm concerned, it's a oxymoron to eat merienda according to a clock...

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> I once had to ask a friend whose first language is English, if there is one word to convey 'feeding someone a liquid'. Because one of my friends asked me and I didn't know.

In Sinhala[1], my mother tongue, there's a word for that. Povanava (poh-vur- nuh-var) පොවනවා.

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

<comment><USER27> In Finnish as well: _juottaa_ is formed from the verb _juoda_ , "to drink", but interestingly it is just a case of a _general grammatical construction_ that allows one to turn any verb from "to do something" to "to make/have one to do something". You can even apply it recursively to verbs thus formed, so, for example, _juotattaa_ would mean "to have someone else feed someone/something liquid"! In principle the grammar allows arbitrarily long constructions, but in practice double applications are already rare although perfectly understandable.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Interesting. Where I come from in Brazil, "sobremesa" is used to describe a dessert, direct translation.

I'd also add the Portuguese word "saudade", which is a sense of yearning or of missing someone/something - often hard to convey in English.

<comment> frosted-flakes How does "saudade" differ from nostalgia?

<comment><USER29> How does nostalgia differ from wistfulness?

<comment> frosted-flakes Wistfulness is a general feeling of sadness and yearning towards something not present, whether or not you've experienced it before. "He was wistful about the life that could have been his if only he'd said 'yes' when he'd had the chance."

Nostalgia is a distinct feeling of want for something in your past, often from your childhood. "His nostalgia for the video games of his youth coloured his perception of how bad they really were."

Since you brought it up, and now that I've thought about it for a while, "wistful" seems like it might be a better fit for "saudade", but I'm sure that that word has all sorts of meanings that wistful doesn't have.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> My native tongue is neither Finnish nor English, but wouldn't "sisu" be translatable as "grit"?

<comment><USER31> "Grit" is a good translation.

English-speakers who try to translate the word usually try something like "courage" or "guts", which isn't quite right. "Sisu" is not really about daring; it's more about tenacity and capacity to endure hardship. "Grit" is better.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> The "polderen" one is a bit weird, but I think if I said "poldering" everyone where I live (the Netherlands, but I'm from an English speaking country) would know what I meant.

The Dutch term for the process is "poldermodel", and in English we use "polder model", and everyone here knows it. Basically, once you've told someone "people meet and hash things out until a consensus is formed" then the English term is stolen fair and square.

The actual Dutch term is pretty recent, from the 1980s or so I think.

<comment><USER25> If the English equivalent to "meet and hash things out" is "stolen fair and square", that might explain a lot about the Empire :-)

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I think a more difficult Italian one would be "proprio". It's sort of like "proper" but the exact meaning seems difficult to pin down and depends on the context.

<comment><USER29> Given that a lot of ways of using it seem to parallel "own", consider a sentence that is said to use it to mean "proper":

"Non è questa la sede propria per parlarne"

The original source translated it as "This isn't the proper place to discuss it."

You could say this means "This is not the place that _belongs_ to talk about it". That's stilted English, but in my opinion, better than proper or appropriate, it captures the relatedness of "own" with the different senses of something belonging. The word "proper" confuses things because it is spelled more like the Italian word, but functionally it's more specialized.

I went and read about this because "proprio" made me think of the English word "proprioception" which was coined in the early 20th century based on the Latin "proprius" meaning "own". And then French "propre" comes to mind.

<comment><USER34> You can also say something like "sei proprio uno stupido" which means "you are actually stupid".

<comment><USER35> Also "precisely". "Questo è proprio quel che serve" -> "This is precisely what we need"

<comment><USER36> Or - reversed - "non proprio" means more than anything else "not exactly" (meaning something that is similar, almost, but not quite what was expected) BUT "non è proprio il caso" means "absolutely not" or "definitely not".

Nuances in languages are tough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Some journalist invented a few years ago that there is this mysterious, untranslatable Italian expression "bella figura" (or its opposite, "brutta figura"). Which in fact simply means "good impression"\- as in "let's make a good impression". This article goes at it again. It even translates it correctly when presenting it in an anecdote, but then reverts to a literal, wrong translation to make it sound more exotic.

<comment><USER8> That's because the article attaches to it a special aura of "italianess" as if Italians were obsessed by their looks in a unique way (which might be true or not, but I don't see how this translates to the untranslatability of the word itself, rather than just being the side effect of capitalizing a trope)

<comment><USER36> Also, bella (o brutta) figura is in Italian much more related to behaviour/politeness/education/culture, than to appearance.

Though you can say that something (or even someone) "fa figura", if it looks better than what it is really made of.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> The least translatable idiom from Italian in my head is "Ti voglio bene". It _could_ be translated as "I love you", but that loses a lot of nuance. The literal translation of "I love you" is "Ti amo".

So in Italy you have two different expressions that are rendered by the same one in English. But the two are very much not interchangeable. "Ti amo" has a romantic connotation, whereas "Ti voglio bene" does not. What's more, you can _also_ use "Ti voglio bene" in a romantic context, to mean that you love the other person, but not only from the point of view of a romantic relationship though. In a romantic relationship, especially between younger people, it can happen that one says "Ti voglio bene" well before "Ti amo", which has a heavier implication. On the other hand, "Ti voglio bene" can be used with a sibling or a friend, often abbreaviated TVB, whereas "Ti amo" would not be used in this context. As you can see, it is quite difficult to even translate the difference, but it is something well present in the head of italian people.

<comment><USER35> TVB is weak, got to be at least TVTTTB ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> Anyone serous about philosophical concepts should have the incredible Dictionary of Untranslatables (2014) on their shelf.

[https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691138701/di...](https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691138701/dictionary- of-untranslatables)

It's an updated translation of Vocabulaire Européen des Philosophies (2004)

</comment><comment><USER40> I would say it is not so much that the words don't translate into English as the words encode cultural experiences and emotions that many English speakers haven't experienced.

And I think this is true even in words in the same language. For example "police" means something very different emotionally to a young, urban, black man than an older, suburban white woman.

I think there is a food analog as well. There are some foods that I don't think anyone can cook as well my mother. Objectively, if you tested my mom's version of the food against in taste test with - 100 people versus a professional chef, most people would pick the chef's version as tasting better. But for me, the exact smell and taste of my mom's version brings back those emotions of happiness and closeness from when we would eat the meal together as a family growing up.

So I don't think it is so much differences in language, but differences in experience.

</comment><comment><USER41> The Austrian equivalent of the Dutch "polderen" is "Sozialpartnerschaft". Also not translatable to English. It's consensual backroom politics between the classical antagonists, industry vs labor unions. It does exist in Ireland also, called "social partnership" or better "Pairtíocht sóisialta", but this not what it is. In Germany it's called "Social Dialogue" but this is far from the Austrian, or Dutch or Irish model.

See for example the translation attempts at [https://www.linguee.com/german- english/translation/sozialpar...](https://www.linguee.com/german- english/translation/sozialpartnerschaft.html)

</comment><comment><USER8> A nice Italian word that might be hard to translate is "ni" which means "yes and no" (literally first letter of "no" and second letter of "si", which means yes).

Often I hear English speakers use the answer "It depends." where an Italian would use "Ni."

<comment><USER42> We use a similar word in Portuguese: nim (n for nao/ no and im for sim/yes)

<comment><USER43> I never heard it here in Brazil, is it a thing in Portugal or in parts of Brazil other than the South/South East ?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> bella figura has little to do with appearance, is a combination with tact and etiquette, and is mostly used sarcastically anyway.

oh and the exact translation is good impression, which can also can be used sarcastically in the same way.

so at least my language section was poorly written and poorly researched.

<comment><USER45> Yeah, I really don't get how they arrived to that conclusion. The meaning of bella figura is good impression, it really isn't ambiguous at all.

<comment><USER35> _> I really don't get how they arrived to that conclusion._

It's a cliché in UK. They correctly diagnose the Italian obsession with high standards of appearance, but they liberally use "bella figura" to describe it in contexts we would not consider as such.

For example: when dressing to go buy a bit of milk, we wouldn't describe it as an activity that requires "bella figura", we just don't want to look like homeless people and our "not looking homeless" is at a certain standard; but they would say that, by dressing appropriately, we are paying attention to "bella figura". That's because people here can go VERY low on standards of appearance in circumstances like that, while we just won't.

<comment><USER44> but that section is singed

> Angela Giuffrida in Rome

which makes the whole thing extra weird because even if she might not be aware of a direct translation being available she should know how it's used in italy.

it's perfectly fine for a finely dressed gentleman to spill a drink on his wife's boss on a party, which is a perfect occasion for a "proprio una bella figura hai fatto" > "yeah, such a good impression you made" and it's so common of an usage I can't fathom how it got related to fashion in the article part she penned.

<comment><USER36> Sure and "figura" can also be "self standing" negative/sarcastic, i.e.: Ha fatto una figura ... means that he/she did a terrible impression.

And a (negative) figura can be "brutta" (literally ugly) but also "caprina" (caprine).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> For anyone who's interested in these I have a book that I like to flick through occasionally: They Have a Word for It by Howard Rheingold

My favourite is Yugen - a Japanese word that encapsulates awareness and appreciation for nature and the universe.

[https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/424092.They_Have_a_Wo...](https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/424092.They_Have_a_Word_for_It)

</comment><comment><USER35> Beyond philosophical debates on untranslatability, I think it's just nice to note specialized words that have no direct single-word equivalent in others.

Some of my favourites are the Italian verb _apparecchiare_ (setting up the table before a meal, adding cutlery etc) and its opposite _sparecchiare_. To have precise words for this activity signals a culture focused on food and urbanity, which the Italian one definitely is.

</comment><comment><USER47> It must be a minefield for French people learning English as we have incorporated a so many french words and assigned more specific meanings to them. I might have this example wrong as I don't speak much french, but there must be quite a few like this:

English -> French

Body 'A human body (alive or dead)' -> Corps

Corpse 'A dead body' -> Cadavre

Cadaver 'A dead body prepared for burial or medical research' -> ?

</comment><comment><USER48> The most common Greek word that doesn't translate in other languages is "filotimo" (φιλότιμο). More than a word, it's a virtue that's at the core of our culture. You can read more here [[http://helleniccomserve.com/filotimo.html](http://helleniccomserve.com/filotimo.html)] and elsewhere on the web.

</comment><comment><USER49> Something I appreciated about Indonesian which doesn't translate well to English (or many other languages that I'm aware of) is their two forms of "we", inclusive and exclusive. "Kami", excludes the one being spoken to, "Kita" includes them. In English this difference is typically only implied by context and can be ambiguous.

</comment><comment><USER50> Regarding Spanish language, I'm surprised that they didn't include "estrenar", that means to use or show something for the first time. Sometimes it can be translated as "release" or "launch", but there is no single English word with the same range of meanings.

</comment><comment><USER51> I was expecting the Dutch word "gezellig" to be on the list. I found "polderen" instead. Interesting, "gezellig" is much more used in day to day life than "polderen". I am not even sure most Dutch know what it means.

<comment><USER52> It's a word that's hard to explain, but everyone does know what it means - <USER2> invokes a feeling, memories of specific moments, that kinda thing.

I'm glad "swaffelen" didn't end up on the list though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> If you're interested in this, you may enjoy the subreddit r/DoesNotTranslate.

</comment><comment><USER54> Seems like it didn't made he list unfortunately : [https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/dor#Romanian](https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/dor#Romanian)

</comment><comment><USER55> I suspect one of the most common German words without translation is "Ansatz" as used in math. I find these specialised/technical wordsand their usage in very specific field quite interesting.

<comment><USER56> Is there a simple descriptive English equivalent to eigen-?

<comment><USER55> Good point, self or own are both similar but not quite the same.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> Here's one I find interesting from Swedish: knullrufs: (slang) sex hair, disordered hair that comes from having sex.

Some times, it's possible to say a lot from one single word.

</comment><comment><USER58> Fun fact that always amused me - Russian language has the word for a stronger flavour of "hopelessness/despair":

безнадежность->безысходность

Roughly translated as "endless despair"

<comment><USER59> "Exitlessness". Not sure if that sounds English...

<comment><USER32> It's not really a usable English word. But "[feeling of] no way out" is perhaps idiomatically close.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER60> France: bon apetit (dig in?)

Japan: yoroshiku onegaishimasu, tadaima, itadakimasu, genki, otsukaresama deshita, ganbatte ne, ...

Laughable subtitles for all these, every time.

</comment><comment><USER61> I was watching an episode of Arrow and one of the characters said "There is no Russian word for optimist"

quick web search says there might not be a native word?

<comment><USER62> Well, English does not have a "native" word for optimist either.

</comment></comment><comment><USER63> I'd say "cunning" is a decent approximation of "esperto". An odd choice for Portuguese...

<comment><USER64> It can be cunning, but it can also be smart, knowledgeable or clever, depending on tone and context. And can also mean "paying attention" (in parts of the country - "tá esperto"). I believe the original meaning is closer to knowledgeable (from "expertus")

</comment></comment><comment><USER65> It turns out the sobremesa is the perfect word for my own definition of hell on earth.

"few pleasures are greater than sharing a table and then chatting nonsense for a hefty portion of what remains of the day."

The author must be a masochist if they think this is pleasurable.

<comment><USER66> I generally wouldn't go for such nonsense either, and I typically share the usual US sentiment at a restaurant of getting in, getting fed, and getting out. But I have to admit that on a trip to Spain a couple years ago, where our two guides for the day had booked us a table at a little restaurant for lunch and I then insisted they come eat with us, before I knew it 2pm became 5pm from us just easily talking about nothing. It was actually quite lovely.

<comment><USER67> I remember a week of work in Madrid, where a Spanish company, a US company and an Australian company were working together on a bid for a job.

The US people suggested breakfast meetings at 7 in the hotel. The Spanish and Aussie people flatly refused.

The Spanish wanted lunch from 2 until 4, the Aussies preferred 1 until 2, the Americans 12-1.

Dinner was 7 for the Americans, 8-9 for the Aussies, and 9-12 for the Spanish.

We didn't win the bid, but as an Aussie, I much prefer the Spanish daily schedule.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER68> Is there a word for ostensibly punctilious lists that somehow also epitomize cultural diversity?

</comment><comment><USER69> Missing word: załatwić from polish language.

<comment><USER70> "Sort out" is a pretty solid translation IMO

<comment><USER69> To sort out is equivalent of uporządkować or zająć się czymś. Załatwić is something different.

<comment><USER70> "Uporządkować" can be "sort out" too, though I'd more often translate it as "tidy up"; "zająć się czymś" is roughly "take care of something", maybe you could use "occupy yourself with something" if it's more in the time-wasting sense.

I stand by "sort out", or even just "sort" as a good translation for załatwić, especially in British English, where I would use "sorted" as a single word sentence similar to "załatwione". There's other possible translations too, I could e.g. imagine using "score" when it's specifically about obtaining something physical, or "get it done" if it's about expediency or perseverance; if anything there's too many ways of translating it!

<comment><USER69> Everything makes perfect sense. But i find sort to have different culture meaning in english than załatwić in polish.

When someone sorts something out, he goes and solves something with available methods.

When someone goes "załatwić" something, it means he solves something that is impossible to solve or gets something that is impossible to get.

To sum it up, i think english vocabulary for sorting something out synonyms ends at some point english speakers can not pass. And than "załatwić" kicks in.

<comment><USER70> I guess, and I say this as a native speaker of both languages, agree to disagree ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

<comment><USER69> As a native speaker of polish language and a person who learns english for 20 years and actively uses it every day with native speakers - i can say the same :) agree to disagree</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Dumbass Home 2.0: IoT, How to Automate Your Rented Box Today - <AUTHOR> http://vas3k.com/blog/dumbass_home/ <comment><AUTHOR> Oh, I see now that there was a recent discussion here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19394366](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19394366)</comment>


Minimum Viable Pants - <AUTHOR> http://minimumviablepants.com/

<comment> Tuna-Fish What's funny is that the "minimum viable pants" in question have sold ridiculous amounts in summer heat. Perhaps (or, hopefully?) not for the demographic shown in the illustration though.

</comment><comment><USER2> I understand that this is meant to be comedy, but the most important part in MVP is the "viable".

A feather is not a viable pillow.

</comment><comment><USER3> hey guys, this started as an office joke at GrowLab, glad to see some others amused. If you have any Minimum Viable P---- ideas tweet us @MVPants - we've got a backlog for at least a month of dailies but would be happy to draw up any community cleverness when that starts to run dry (with attribution of course).

<comment><USER4> It looks like you've got "Minimum Viable Pun" covered already.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Because there's more 'then' just a Minimum Viable Product to consider..

<comment><USER3> grammar less important than humour? ;) Thanks, will fix as soon as we find out who has the password...</comment></comment>


Adobe.com: Release Adobe Fireworks to Open Source - <AUTHOR> http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/adobe-com-release-adobe-fireworks-to-open-source

<comment><USER2> It makes perfect sense to do this. If they're not continuing on with development they should either open source the code or sell it to someone who is willing to continue its development. Surely someone is interested in continuing on with the development of this amazing application?

<comment><USER3> There's still some probably non-significant value in them retaining FW for at least another year or two (after all, CS6 is still less than a year old).

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> As much sense as it seems to make, I would sooner see pig fly than something like that happen. Not counting the probable usual issue with code licenses.

</comment><comment><USER5> They won't be able to do this, for the same reason they couldn't open source Flash - too much proprietary code and licenced stuff.

<comment><USER6> Flash is also a runtime for code and supports video decoding. Fireworks on the other hand is a utility application built around the PNG graphics format (which is not patented, but Adobe/Macromedia has extended it for Fireworks metadata).

But even if it is a more suitable candidate to open-source, I just don't think there's much in it for Adobe. It'll just cost a lot of money with the lawyers involved and the whole code-base will need to be reviewed.

<comment><USER7> yup, Adobe has been in the business of buying up competition for years. They aren't just going to give away a system that will take share away from their products.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What technical stuff should a technical founder know? - <AUTHOR> Full question: What technical stuff should a technical founder know before starting a software technology company? <comment><USER2> Obviously this is impossible to answer with any real specifics as it varies from company to company. The skills needed for a founder at a technical company selling B2B are very different to the skills needed to build a consumer app. However, a good ability/understanding of the following would _really_ help;

 _Being able to say no to adding more features._ This is probably the most important skill. It's really easy to say yes to more and more things, and every time you do you make it less likely a user will ever see your app.

 _Deployment._ Regardless of what you're making you need to be able to get it out there reliably.

 _Code quality._ Spending time revisiting code to fix issues is wasted time, so writing high quality code you can understand and fix _fast_ is key.

 _Testing._ The easiest way to lose a user is for them to see a bug right away, so you need to be able to test well.

 _Security._ Obviously.</comment>


People who Changed Graphic Design forever - <AUTHOR> http://creativerepository.com/2009/11/09/10-people-who-changed-graphic-design-forever/ <comment><USER2> Interesting how the people portrayed in the article look nothing like the hip cafe latte drinking types that are normally associated with designers.

<comment><USER3> Creative people have only one thing in common: They create to their own standards. The result is that the best creatives look uniquely themselves.

But there's more than one creative stereotype. What about the hippies artiste? Or the goofy generation throwback? The dissheveled coffee addict? It's all part of the wide collections of stereotypes, which tend to reflect all the people in the field.

More elaboration on stereotypes for your enjoyment: Graphic designers are stereotypically much nerdier than other creatives. Not as artistic as fine artists, too nerdy and unkempt as advertisers.

<comment><USER2> Very true, I just couldn't help noticing it.

<comment><USER3> Definitely something that struck me when learning about Ogilvy, Burnett, Bernbach, etc., when learning about great advertising legends, was how very few of them looked like a stereotypical advertiser. Leo Burnett in particular worked with my ad prof.'s father, and was described as a short ugly man whose garble was incomprehensible. But the man was a genius (I wish more people knew advertising legends, because they're truly fascinating). Taught me that the best advertisers are smart enough to see through a lot of their own stereotypes. Certainly the people I know studying advertising are nothing like what I'd have expected.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> No Susan Kare (<http://www.kare.com/>)? She's iconic (!!) in the history of user interfaces.

<comment><USER5> I would place Keith Ohlfs ahead of SK.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Is the header graphic meant to be ironic?

<comment><USER7> Looks like he stuck a header banner on someone else's theme? The css is called freshnews.css but inside is called "creative theme".

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Missing Neville Brody. Not sure why the big focus on techs either.

</comment><comment><USER9> Where's Donald Knuth and TeX?! ;p

</comment><comment><USER10> A whole article on graphic design without any mention of the Futurists? For shame!

</comment><comment><USER11> How 'bout Max Miedinger?

</comment><comment><USER12> \+ Herb Lubalin

<comment><USER13> Yes. And if you are interested in Graphic Design check this longer list of hall of famers:

<http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/medalists></comment></comment>


Why Google Fiber will never come to Seattle (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://crosscut.com/2014/12/29/business/123222/google-fiber-never-come-seattle-broadband-internet/

<comment><USER2> To summarize, the article mentions four roadblocks:

1) Process: "Can you imagine the Seattle City Council keeping a secret like this and then acting on it in just one day? Of course not. We'd need to have endless community meetings and hearings and public floggings of Google Executives."

2) Pole Attachments: "At these rates, building a network on 100,000 poles to serve every home and business would cost Google up to $2.8 million just to rent the pole space."

3) Permits: "Attaching fiber cable to a pole in Seattle may require a pole attachment permit, a street use permit, and land use and environmental permits, among others."

4) Build-out requirements: "But the company has to agree to build out and serve every premise in that area. This is a lofty goal because it means all neighborhoods, rich and poor, get served, although it increases the overall cost because the company builds cable on streets with few customers."

None of these are unique to Google Fiber. These are hurdles ISPs, including incumbents like Comcast, face in nearly every large city. Google is just the 800-lb gorilla that refuses to play along. They'll only install fiber in cities desperate enough to sign a contract with Google without extensive public proceedings, who will allow bypassing permit requirements that apply to everyone else.

What the article really highlights is the _real_ reasons for the lack of ISP competition. People imagine shadowy cabals conspiring to keep out competitors, but in most cities, it's the result of rules that aren't facially unreasonable. Rules like build-out requirements, which apply to incumbents and competitors alike, make deploying fiber economically unattractive, sometimes even for the incumbent.

Contrast the telecom industry with say the cell phone industry. It'd be illegal for an ISP to do what Apple did with its first iPhone: target rich buyers, then trickle down the technology to everyone else as it recouped capital costs. The rule is deploy to everyone, or don't deploy at all. Unsurprisingly, companies usually choose the latter. Except Google, which has the clout to demand exceptions to the rules, and the luxury of not actually being in the ISP business and only deploying in smaller municipalities willing to bend-over.

<comment><USER3> >deploying in smaller municipalities willing to bend-over for them.

I think you mean municipalities with the foresight to realize that their residents would never get fiber under any other circumstance? iPhones for rich people and for everyone else a few years later is much better than flip phones for everyone.

If things were regulated like last mile Internet like you want, the smartphone/mobile boom would never have happened. Requiring deployment to a big portion of the market that doesn't want something is idiotic.

<comment><USER2> > I think you mean municipalities with the foresight to realize that their > residents would never get fiber under any other circumstance

That's one spin on it, but at the end of the day, it's a decision borne out of a lack of other options. Incidentally, it's also one reason countries like South Korea and places in eastern Europe lead the way in fiber deployment. They were/are underdogs, looking for ways to make themselves more economically competitive. Places like New York or San Francisco don't think the same way. They're prosperous enough to be able to fight over things like how ugly the fiber cabinets are.

> If things were regulated like last mile Internet like you want, the > smartphone/mobile boom would never have happened.

I don't think we should regulate last mile internet, for precisely that reason.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't really have a problem with engaging the democratic process. Bringing fiber to Seattle is a long term infrastructure project that will last for many decades. In the grand scheme of things, expediting the permit process hardly makes a difference.

The author seems to really hate citizen participation. I'm sure people don't understand fiber very well and there are a lot of opinions and concerns out there which aren't necessarily valid, but that's going to be true of anything new.

Cutting the public out of the debate about innovations doesn't seem like a good path to take. The solution is to provide a more effective forum for this debate to happen, not to put a stop to it.

</comment><comment><USER5> I wonder if they could at least bring it to the east side, where their Kirkland office and Microsoft in general is located. I bet there are lots of high tech workers who would be more than happy to dump Comcast for Google Fiber over there.

<comment><USER6> The east side isn't seattle, and many of those small cities lack the poor neighborhoods that would make universal service so unecononimical. So why not? But man, living in Bellevue feels a bit depressing. The cooler but smaller Google office is in Fremont right?

<comment><USER7> There's one in Fremont, another in Kirkland.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> A tiny isp (USI) in Minneapolis has been laying buried fttp for years. They just announced 100gbps (synchronous) service too. Google, feh!

Sure, it only serves a few neighborhoods, but it's progress, and more importantly, not Comcast.

</comment><comment><USER9> > _When Google announced its launch city for Google Fiber – Kansas City – it > was a sensation. And the very next day the Kansas City Council authorized a > contract with Google for the service._

Kansas City is desperate. If Google comes calling, they will sign a contract, whether or not it's actually good for the city, they'll figure "Hey, Google's coming and asking, it's _Google_ , we won't say no!"

This is not really a good thing. This particular contract may be great for KC, but it's not because you can just always trust Google and sign whatever they put in front of you. But many desparate cities will.

<comment><USER10> There are two Kansas Cities, and they compete tooth and nail.

Kansas City, Kansas agreed to Google fiber (possibly to due its benefits possibly due to lack of competition) and put up with Google's requirements.

Kansas City, Missouri refused. Once the announcement was made it was a big ruckus and looked like a black eye for the city and they rushed to do anything they could to get in on it because every citizen was interested. The last thing they want is to be seen as falling behind the Kansas side and losing more jobs and businesses.

<comment><USER9> Exactly. "The last thing they want is to be seen as....", it's got very little to do with the terms of the contract of whether it's good contract for the city or the citizens. It might be in this case, but it doesn't even matter.

My thoughts on this come from my experience with an analagous case on a smaller level -- I have worked with a university that signed a contract with a vendor (not Google in this case) for digitization of some library content, because "the last thing they want[ed] is to be seen as falling behind" other universities that signed such contracts with that or other vendors (including Google). That any vendor was even interested was seen as an honor. In fact, the contract was terrible for the university, they got little benefit from it and had to expend university resources basically for the vendor's benefit. But for a year or two, it seemed exciting and made them appear not to be "falling behind".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> "Overland Park, Kansas, apparently has its own version of the Seattle process. It spent nine months arguing the Google Fiber contract..."

Overland Park's haggling likely had more to do with the fact that Sprint is headquartered there.

<comment><USER12> OP resident here. Probably not, as Sprint does not sell local ISP services. Could have been Time Warner though. That article is dated though, as Google is now building in OP. It actually worked out for the better as both Google and AT&T are laying fiber in OP; competing 1000/1000 services. My ISP (CCI) just bumped me from 30/5 to 100/5 for free. I can't wait to dump them though. Some areas of OP will have three competing 1000/1000 services; Google, AT&T, and CCI. My area was wired 10 years ago by CCI so it's just hybrid fiber-coax.

The real fuck-up is Leawood, KS though; just next door. Google pulled out recently when they were told no "new" ISP lines could be run on existing poles. It had to be 100% buried, despite existing cable ISP on poles:

[http://www.govexec.com/state-local/2014/11/google-fiber- leaw...](http://www.govexec.com/state-local/2014/11/google-fiber-leawood- kansas/98462/)

<comment><USER10> It's been interesting to watch. I remember someone sending me a map of which areas of Kansas City agreed to Google's conditions to try and get Google fiber, and the city of Overland Park was a big obvious missing block.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Frustrating as this might be, CondoInternet is going building to building to provide gigabit Internet to apartment dwellers and even building neighborhood- scale fiber service to Eastlake, while CenturyLink is laying gigabit service to other neighborhoods, one by one. Even if we were on Google's shortlist, by the time they came to town they'd have competitors. Competitors who _don 't_ have a business model of monitoring people's web usage so they can target ads at them.

<comment><USER14> Says you. After it came out that Verizon is actually changing request headers in Internet traffic to inject tracking tokens, I wouldn't trust any company to not do/track anything. In fact, it's in their best interests to track your usage - they can sell that information to advertisers and make more money from you.

Not trusting Google but trusting some unknown competitor is strange to me.

<comment><USER15> Using businesses that support your preferences is the only real economic power that most people have.

Stick with Verizon and Verizon recognise that they can do/track anything without consequence.

On the other hand, leave Verizon for a competitor who is not currently doing/tracking anything and this becomes a selling point for the competition.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Faced with those kind of problems with poles, can't they dig?

<comment><USER17> That's not any simpler. You still need all kinds of clearances to run cables underground, and it's a lot more work tearing up streets.

<comment><USER18> And digging is much more expensive to do initially (think two or three orders of magnitude), though it's often cheaper in the long run due to less maintenance and repairs.

<comment><USER19> The problem with digging is that in case of faults, it's far more difficult to service. Also, future upgrades (e.g. fibers with better optical properties, or more fibers) require re-digging.

<comment><USER20> When done properly, conduit is laid that fiber is then run through. You don't re-dig to lay new media, you simply drag it through the existing conduit. That's why "dig once" is such a big deal.

[http://www.muninetworks.org/tags/tags/dig- once](http://www.muninetworks.org/tags/tags/dig-once)

[http://www.sfexaminer.com/sanfrancisco/san-francisco- seeks-t...](http://www.sfexaminer.com/sanfrancisco/san-francisco-seeks-to- speed-up-fiber-internet-expansion/Content?oid=2908441)

[http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press- office/2012/06/14/execut...](http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press- office/2012/06/14/executive-order-accelerating-broadband-infrastructure- deployment)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Verizon's FIOS fiber hasn't been profitable, and they've stopped building it out. Google would run into the same problem if they actually built enough that it had to make money, instead of only doing cherry-picked demo projects.

Technically, you don't need fiber to the home to get gigabit rates. Coax from the end user to the DOCSIS node at the pole is more than enough. Within 100 meters, such as in apartment buildings, CAT 5 is enough. The fiber connection to the DOCSIS node at the pole, the DOCSIS node, and the back end have to have more bandwidth.

The cable industry has a plan for slow migration to gigabit services:

[http://www.cedmagazine.com/articles/2012/07/an- evolutionary-...](http://www.cedmagazine.com/articles/2012/07/an-evolutionary- approach-to-gigabit-class-docsis)

One unit at a time, in the chain from head end to end user, equipment can be swapped out for faster, but backwards-compatible, units.

Of course, in the end it's still Comcast.

</comment><comment><USER22> related: [http://apps.fcc.gov/ecfs/document/view?id=60001011462](http://apps.fcc.gov/ecfs/document/view?id=60001011462)

</comment><comment><USER23> ... because it would help Microsoft too much!?

</comment><comment><USER24> This was published in March 2014 so we put "2014" in the title.

<comment><AUTHOR> Usually takes me a month to realize it's a new year :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Here in Seattle there seems to be this fear that not getting Google to install Google Fiber™ means we'll just have the crappy offerings from Comcast and CenturyLink for the next 50 years.

In reality, I believe not selling ourselves to a provider immediately will allow a better market to develop where we get real competition and the possibility of a city run fiber network. It may take a few more years than having Google build out the whole thing at once, but I think the alternative will be better and other municipalities will have wished they had waited too.

<comment><USER5> I've been living in the Seattle area for 10 years, and my only option for high speed internet has been Comcast. So where has the magic of the free marketplace been for that time?

<comment><USER7> Same. I also find it very strange that there's not DSL offering in either of the places I've lived. I'd rather have slow and steady DSL than erratic cable :(

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> "an you imagine the Seattle City Council keeping a secret like this and then acting on it in just one day? Of course not. We'd need to have endless community meetings and hearings and public floggings of Google Executives. Every citizen in a tinfoil hat who thinks fiber is just another cereal ingredient would have their three minutes in front of the Council. "

Ah, I see - _democracy_ is a bug, according to the author.

Actually, reading further, it appears that anything short of kneeling and begging at the feet of corporations is somehow supposed to be terrible...

Seriously - here's the conclusion:

"Could we simply agree to pay for all the pole replacements and permitting as a city, and hire a few extra employees to expedite the process? Couldn't we just hand over title to a few strands of the 500 mile fiber cable network we've built to Google Fiber?"

Translation: "Couldn't we just spend taxpayer dollars to subsidize profits for one of the world's largest corporations?"

<comment><USER27> There's a choice - spend taxpayers dollars to prevent Google from laying fiber or spend taxpayer dollars to enable Google to lay fiber (and yes, make the profit in the process). I think the latter is preferable. I'd prefer no taxpayer dollars participation at all, but in the current environment it's not really an option, right? There's an option of having fast internet or having slow internet and unperturbed bureaucracy. Seattle chose the latter. I hope they enjoy their bureaucracy.</comment></comment>