Statistics professor at Columbia and Georgetown banned from all Google services - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/salilstatistics/status/898906185969139714 <comment><USER2> "If you show probability work like Hillary having lower election odds, then this is new definition of hate speech."

I get that the guy is angry. I would be too if I got locked out of my accounts, but this is a ludicrous accusation -- the new definition of hate speech?

"Never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity." The idea that google is waging war on this guy because of election predictions he made 12 months ago is absurd on the face of it.

Our society has been completely taken over by Hofstadter's [paranoid style]([https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in- am...](https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american- politics/)). Everything is taken as evidence of some vast conspiracy of fascists or communists. (A couple weeks ago there was an article posted here alleging that google was suppressing anti-communist websites.)

Replace "freemasons" or "international bankers" with "social justice warriors" and we're right back in the 1950's again.

<comment><USER3> I would be inclined to believe it wasn't something very deliberate if it was only one or a few services getting shut down, but everything is fully removed. Even his [blog]([https://statisticalideas.blogspot.com](https://statisticalideas.blogspot.com)) has a "this has been removed" header.

That being said, I wouldn't be surprised if there's more to this story than what's come out so far. I think it's worth following.

<comment><USER4> And due to that removal, NYT articles like this one now have broken links to his blog: [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/19/business/the-stock- market...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/19/business/the-stock-market-has- been-magical-it-cant-last.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> > advised on polling statistics for the Trump campaign

Going out on a limb here, I'd guess it might have something to do with that? It would also be very foolish of them to ever admit it and I bet they will come back and say it was an innocent "algorithm" mistake if this blows up too much. Unless someone internally leaks the mechanism or the reason it would be hard to tell.

I think Google, Facebook, maybe Twitter and others are furiously working to fill the void left the failure of the traditional media to manufacture consent. Large traditional media conglomerates had one job and that was to make sure a particular presidential candidate won and they failed. Very quickly after Facebook and Google issued a statement how they are blaming "Fake News" and how they will be working on controlling and eliminating that.

While it all seems innocent and helpful "Oh look Google is working on eliminating hate and fake news, isn't that nice". It is also a signal to those who have billions to spend on campaigns (political, marketing, etc) saying "Want to manufacture some consent? Come to us, let us help you. CNN/NBC/NYT are too crusty and old and not effective anymore. Inconvenient statistics getting in your way, don't worry, they will be silenced".

As others have said it KGB or Stasi would have given everything to have access to the kinds of data Google and Facebook has. I think it is foolish to assume these companies will just use that data just to sell ads, share cat pictures and connect you with your old classmates. I think they will start selling "silencing" as a service (SaaS) at some point.

<comment><USER6> "Google blocked every one of the WSWS's 45 top search terms" (recent)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14975338](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14975338)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I think the Zerohedge article should have been linked directly, it provides much more information on what happened.

[http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-08-21/one-statistics- prof...](http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-08-21/one-statistics-professor- was-just-banned-google-here-his-story)

It does indeed seem he was shut down, but it's unclear as to "why" it was done. Google's standard black box in effect. That may be the most frustrating part.

<comment><USER8> It is still not clear to me what happened. The reply from Google sums up to "You angered us, figure it out. It's in the TOS".

<comment><USER9> If they reply like that when turning down appeals, it's usually for something very egregious that might have legal ramifications. Look up "thomasmonopoly" for a case at the very edge of legality that made it to HN years ago. (I'm not saying that it's the case here, but it gives you an idea of the seriousness, especially if VPs go silent.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Our email accounts are widely considered the gateway to all of our other services, particularly in light of the ability to reset passwords with access to the account's address.

It is for this reason that we consider email account security of paramount importance, and Google's early implementation of Google Authenticator, U2F token support, etc, is admirable.

But now we have entered an era in which we need to consider the capricious, political whims of our email providers as a significant part of our threat model.

</comment><comment><USER11> Do not rely on Google and its services if your public beliefs / opinions do not align with the establishment, are politically incorrect in even the slightest degree, or if you value your privacy. There are good alternatives (preferably open source).

[https://www.privacytools.io/](https://www.privacytools.io/) [https://www.prism-break.org/](https://www.prism-break.org/)

<comment><USER12> Have there been some HN articles about good alternatives to Google services?

I seem to remember Mail-in-a-box getting some support for running your own server. I've also seen kolabnow.com looking promising.

<comment><USER13> I moved to FastMail for email, it's been really great. I use it with a custom domain (multiple in fact) and its web and mobile apps are pretty good.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Google took down his blog, too: [http://statisticalideas.blogspot.com/](http://statisticalideas.blogspot.com/)

Last archive.org copy: [1] (Useless; it just displays a "Blogger gear", because the content is dynamically loaded.)

[1] [https://web.archive.org/web/20170518181642/http://statistica...](https://web.archive.org/web/20170518181642/http://statisticalideas.blogspot.com/)

<comment><USER15> _it just displays a "Blogger gear", because the content is dynamically loaded_

I wonder why Google made that particular design decision?

<comment><USER14> That probably predates Google's acquisition of Blogger.

<comment><USER15> Odd tho'. This mechanism defeats caching; it must cost them cash money to run on that architecture vs generating then serving static pages, perhaps only dynamically fetching comments. Someone at Google thinks it's worth paying for the ability to erase blogs entirely.

<comment><USER16> > This mechanism defeats caching

Wat?

<comment><USER15> Read the original comment I replied to. The content is not in archive.org because of this design. So it is probably not in any other caches/archives/backups either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Time to step up my move from gmail, I guess. Who knows what opinion I might express that might inadvertently trigger such a reaction. I'm a member of the "let them talk - they'll hang themselves with their own noose" school of thought. Google can do what they want, of course. But so can I. I've already ditched yahoo mail for fastmail and was planning on moving from gmail eventually. Guess I'll step that up.

<comment><USER18> First step for me was moving my E-mail address to a domain I control (or at least I think I do, for now). That way, at least my identity is mine, should G decide to no longer host my content. Scary to have to think about this, but an opinion that is uncontroversial today may be unutterable tomorrow, given the relentless and accelerating march of political correctness.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> At the risk of being tangential to the topic: Let this be a friendly reminder that if you, like me, use google services heavily, it may be in your best interest to do regular backups of your account state. (I have no affiliation etc; I just realized when reading this that it had been almost a year since my last backup)

Here's a link to support documenting "how". [https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3024190?hl=en](https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/3024190?hl=en)

<comment><USER20> Great I'll just throw it on my ....Google drive. Dammit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This has to be a mistake. Whenever you outright ban someone with the minimalist interaction the way Google does it, you open yourself up to accusations of all kinds of suppression. You allow the person who being banned to define why they were in the absence of any message from Google.

Now, it's all well and good to go and ban white supremacists, KKK members, hate groups, etc. It's monumental stupidity to ban an academic with proper credentials. It's even in effective. Even in the most extreme case, his careful scholarly screeds about statistics isn't exactly going to make frothing hordes of racists; not near the same way as banning him without cause, reason or explanation.

It's silly. His twitter shows him writing article headlines in provocative ways (for an academic) but, nothing even close to supporting a group like the KKK but, in this atmosphere and with Google trying mobilize probably thousands of young, probably uneducated (cheap) people review accounts for deletion, it was probably someone who saw one of these procative headlines and marked this blog for deletion without looking or realizing who this person was.

Strangely, the same thing happen to Jordan Peterson not even a month ago. Another academic but, with far more controversial views but, far more outcry came of it and Google reversed it in a few days.

All of this is embarassing for Google who for years has invested in very light touch style of customer service and it's coming back to bite them in the ass.

<comment><USER22> > It's even ineffective.

I wouldn't be so sure. Do this to a few people and thousands of others start to mince their words. It could be extremely effective if it were employed as a political strategy, because being locked out of your Google account is a major problem for most people.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> In his tweets on Aug 15th he suggests that the Charlottesville incident has not hurt Trumps popularity.

Kinda scary, but if true we should be addressing it as is instead of burying it.

Edit: it looks like Trump has actually had a small increase in popularity

<comment><USER24> That sounds like the kind of thing that would trip an algorithm.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> The irony of using the example of a statistics professor to prove a systemic conspiracy with a sample size of 1 is not lost on me.

</comment><comment><USER26> If he hasn't yet, he should submit this to [https://onlinecensorship.org/](https://onlinecensorship.org/). Curious how often this happens, I don't have a good data set but it _seems_ like this has been happening a lot more recently.

</comment><comment><USER27> caseydurfee:

> this is a ludicrous accusation -- the new definition of hate speech?

slackstation:

> This has to be a mistake. > it was probably someone who saw one of these > procative headlines and marked this blog for deletion without looking or > realizing who this person was.

redm:

> It does indeed seem he was shut down, but it's unclear as to "why" it was > done. Google's standard black box in effect.

ForHackernews:

> I highly doubt there's any political agenda at play here.

At least 4 out of 11 parent comments so far cover: the "ludicrous accusation" of the censored victim, "it was probably mistakenly banned and repeatedly denied further attempts at access", "we're not sure why he's banned", and "we're not sure why he's banned, but it's certainly not related to all of the other political censorship and outright subversive manipulation that's been occurring towards anyone who doesn't subscribe to the mainstream media narrative".

That's right, nothing to see here folks. Dismiss this crazy person for speaking the truth. Statistics should be supressed. Deny their ability to speak out against the extreme subversion that is taking place. Deny their ability to organize. Isolate and destroy. Or you're next.

<comment><USER28> Here on HN I was introduced to the characterization of our current political gridlock as a "cold civil war", which is, perhaps, manifest in this post.

<comment><USER28> Manifest in the thread. I am in agreement with the parent!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Result:

[https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6305625...](https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6305625404417802240/)

<comment><USER30> > Thank you all very much, in recent days, for the outpouring of support in my > Google predicament. I love you, and together we can and will always achieve > great things. Have also spoken with the leadership there, and they restored > accounts. I also don't carry any grievance towards any part of Google, and > have no intention of further comments.

That seems like a really strange reply. Why would he word it like that? The only possibilities I can think of are that either Google required such a reply in order to re-enable his account in order to not get in trouble, or he has done something wrong but doesn't want to talk about it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Contrary to some of the other comments, I highly doubt there's any political agenda at play here. More likely, this user inadvertently tripped some automated algorithm somewhere, and then failed the automated appeals process.

That said, it's their service and their rules. Don't host data you care about on free services run by capricious multinationals.

<comment><USER32> Given the importance of email and other online services - should multinational corporations be allowed to be capricious about who they provide service to, and how those users are cut off from their digital lifeline?

<comment><USER33> Yes, because it's their computers.

<comment> chroem- This is the same argument that was used to wrongfully deny service to gay couples. You are turning a blind eye because corporations are attacking an ideology we disagree with.

I do not believe that some people should be treated more equally than others.

<comment><USER34> > This is the same argument that was used to wrongfully deny service to gay > couples.

It is the argument that is still _lawfully_ used to deny service on the basis of sexual orientation in much of the country; only a minority of states have public accommodation laws under which sexual orientation is a protected class.

The balance between the state interests involvee in public accommodation laws and the free speech and free association rights they limit is a source of endless debate. The fact that the public in some part of the country has decided that one axis has circumstances which warrant such a limitation is not enough to make the case that everyone must accept that the limitation is universally justified for some other axis.

> I do not believe that some people should be treated more equally than > others.

Which can be an argument for internet companies _not_ having their free speech rights limited in order to mandate that they relay political views they disagree with as easily as it can be an argument for that imposition.

<comment><USER35> > It is the argument that is still lawfully used to deny service on the basis > of sexual orientation in much of the country; only a minority of states have > public accommodation laws under which sexual orientation is a protected > class.

> Which can be an argument for internet companies not having their free speech > rights limited in order to mandate that they relay political views they > disagree with as easily as it can be an argument for that imposition.

That argument seems in direct opposition to the argument that, e.g. Christian bakers and photographers should be required to provide services for gay weddings. If Google may not be mandated to relay political views that they disagree with, how can photographers be mandated to do so? Do multi-national megacorporations have more rights than individuals? Or is one political view simply wrong, and therefore acceptable to discriminate against?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Has anybody found out yet what this is all about?

</comment><comment><USER10> The bubble cheerleaders that dominate HN groupthink don't consider ZH a credible source, so indirect linkage was likely done to avoid the insta-flag effect.

<comment><USER36> Unless you have data, please don't post generalizations about HN as ammunition in an argument. Those are off-topic and nearly always false.

We detached this subthread from [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15066201](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15066201) and marked it off-topic.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> [http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-08-21/one-statistics- prof...](http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-08-21/one-statistics-professor- was-just-banned-google-here-his-story)

"Have worked with both the Obama administration and _advised on polling statistics for the Trump campaign_ "

as Joseph Stalin said - "no one is innocent". just have to dig deep enough.

<comment><USER38> What's your claim?

<comment><USER37> isn't collaboration with Trump enough ground for ostracism? all of progressive humanity should spit in the face of that professor and demand justice.

on a serious note: it is quite fascinating for watch US walk down this path. i see striking similarities between what is happening now - war with monuments, renaming the streets, "tolerant" left screaming for blood, witch hunt... between all of this and life in USSR under Stalin. of course, no executions, but everything else is in place. soon you will be removing pictures of enemies of the state from schoolbooks: [http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/52af668569bedd3b264...](http://static4.businessinsider.com/image/52af668569bedd3b2643dd68-1176-469/joseph%20stalin%20with%20nikolai%20yezhov%20photoshopped%20out_edited-1.jpg)

(and this is without Photoshop btw!). stroke of a pen, and confederates are removed from the history! the thing is that in Soviet Union they couldn't keep up with removing - once you start erasing the past, you cannot stop. it is very sad and disappointing to see US going down that path. of all countries...

<comment><USER39> > isn't collaboration with Trump enough ground for ostracism?

If it were, we'd be seeing hundreds if not thousands of users getting blocked. We're not, so that is unlikely to be the cause.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Vladimir Nabokov, Literary Refugee - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/02/opinion/vladimir-nabokov-literary-refugee.html <comment><USER2> This was a fascinating read, I hadn't heard about his thing with Pasternak or how they thought that the Soviets 'leaked' his novel; nowadays it seems sort of odd to see exporting culture as something furtive. Did regimes used to try to _prevent_ their nation's literature from spreading, or am I misunderstanding something?

"We are absurdly accustomed to the miracle of a few written signs being able to contain immortal imagery, involutions of thought, new worlds with live people, speaking, weeping, laughing. We take it for granted so simply that in a sense, by the very act of brutish routine acceptance, we undo the work of ages, the history of gradual elaboration of poetical description and construction, from treeman to Browning, from the caveman to Keats. What if we awake one day, all of us, and find ourselves utterly unable to read? I wish you to gasp not only at what you read, but at the miracle of it's being readable."

\- _Pale Fire_

<comment><USER3> _Did regimes used to try to prevent their nation 's literature_

The regime did not allow literature it disapproved of and Dr. Zhivago was not a work they approved of. It was not published until someone contrived to smuggle it out.

<comment><USER2> Ah, that makes a lot more sense - thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> "Nabokov set about perfecting a brand of English that had not existed before and has not been seen since." A wonderful essay by a writer who understands what the Russian Revolution actually overthrew, unlike most Americans, who only know the Soviet version. Contains a reproduction of Nabokov's U.S. immigrant ID card, with the word "without" entered in the space for nationality.

</comment><comment><USER5> His was to me the most beautiful English prose of the last four centuries, by a generous margin. There was never any trace of foreignness in it. I literally cannot imagine learning another language that fully.

<comment><USER6> It would happen automatically if you were young enough.

Interestingly, while Nabokov learned to write perfect English, he never was able to speak it.

<comment><USER5> > while Nabokov learned to write perfect English, he never was able to speak > it

Lots of interviews on YouTube suggest otherwise... [https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ldpj_5JNFoA](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ldpj_5JNFoA)

<comment><USER6> [http://www.openculture.com/2012/12/vladimir_nabokov_about_li...](http://www.openculture.com/2012/12/vladimir_nabokov_about_life_literature_and_love.html)

> To avoid speaking like a child in public, Nabokov took great pains to > prepare his every word. "Throughout my academic ascent in America from lean > lecturer to Full Professor, I have never delivered to my audience one scrap > of information not prepared in typescript beforehand and not held under my > eyes on the bright-lit lectern."

> When it came to giving interviews, Nabokov was horrified by the notion of > sitting back and having a casual chat with a reporter. "It has been tried at > least twice in the old days," he writes, "and once a recording machine was > present, and when the tape was rerun and I had finished laughing, I knew > that never in my life would I repeat that sort of performance. Nowadays I > take every precaution to ensure a dignified beat of the mandarin's fan. The > interviewer's questions have to be sent to me in writing, answered by me in > writing, and reproduced verbatim. Such are the three absolute conditions."

> So the excerpt above from a 1969 interview with the British journalist James > Mossman should be understood as a carefully prepared performance.

Note how in the interview you posted, he frequently gets stuck on his prepared lines, resulting in sequences like or-or-or-or-or-or or the-the-the-the-the. (Yes, disfluencies are common in all speakers. But those disfluencies are not typical of English speakers, and reflect a different problem.)

<comment><USER5> Neat! I hear it now! Thank you. I picked up the hesitancies but wasn't smart enough to pick up the cause.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Sometimes one wonders why the Times wanders so far afield, picking up where the New Yorker and others once thrived. Other times, like this one, the cause is clear, pure and joyous, a stab in the literary darkness of our times.

<comment><USER8> The New Yorker is still quite thriving, and is publishing stories that would also work for the Times (cf Ronan Farrow's #metoo scoops). The Atlantic has massively improved and now close to their level (cf Graeme Woods), albeit with less of a focus on literature.

It feels like these publishers are somewhat converging, doing a rather good job connecting (paying) excellent writers with the high end of readership, with not too much deference to the material being a perfect fit for their respective wheelhouses.</comment></comment>


List-less productivity - <AUTHOR> I was bored with the way all the famous to-do apps look, mostly mundane lists of things to do. Not inspiring. So I started tinkering my own vision of a better and more engaging interface: A world dark and set in the future, where planet Earth is under constant wave of meteors; human civilization has moved backwards and survives on farming and windmills for energy. The to-do items take the form of meteors falling from the sky. The best part is when a task is completed the meteor explodes into a giant ball of fireworks. A serious "bad ass" way to say task complete. On the other hand, if a deadline is missed, the meteor comes crashing with smoke and red flames everywhere. Here is what I created. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/crimson-box/id1069271059 <comment><USER2> Nice idea. I would love a version like Missile Command [1].

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

<comment><AUTHOR> I have pushed an update. It's getting closer. Here is preview. [http://www.crimsonbox.net/new-update-pushed-to-app- store/](http://www.crimsonbox.net/new-update-pushed-to-app-store/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Haven't tried the app but I did read your description. The icon needs work but otherwise I love the idea.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! This is first version and I am still working on the design.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Where can I find the android version?

<comment><AUTHOR> I am working on it. Hopefully soon.

<comment><USER4> Wonderful! Looking forward to it!</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Rate my startup - <AUTHOR>

I have been extremely annoyed about the lack of automation when it comes to small businesses (especially my dentist and accountant). They complained about not having a dedicated secretary (only part time) and as a 9-5er it was hard for me to set aside time to get an appointment from them during the day (secretaries were only there for the first part of the day).
So I had been toying around with the idea of creating a web based appointment scheduling system specifically designed for small businesses.
I just launched the public beta a week ago. This is the beginning of the road for me. It is a one man operation and I know I am missing a lot (features/eye candy) that's why I would love to get your feedback.
I know there are competitors but I believe they target a different segment of the market based on the features they emphasize and their pricing. I think the market is large enough to segment. I want to later expand this offering to cover most of the shared services that these small organizations need.
What do you think?
The url is: www.smartpointment.com <comment><USER2> I only had time to take a quick look, but I like the name a lot.

I also like the color and layout of the index page. Maybe in the green block though, think about replacing the text "micro to small size companies", with a more upbeat sounding "independent professionals". That is probably more of how your target market thinks of themselves.

Maybe somewhere put a graphic of a caduceus, Lady Scales of Justice, and a CPA logo, to catch the eye of your target market.

Also on my big wide monitor the left and right margin are not anywhere near equal. With medical offices it might be wise to keep the old narrow format for the layout hardcoded in, but when it loads in a wide monitor it is not centered, and looks a little broken because of that. You might want to fix that up.

Overall I find the index page attractive, professional, and inviting to explore further into the sight. Good job with it.

<comment><AUTHOR> This is extremely useful feedback. Thanks for taking the time to write the review. On a closer look I truly agree with the comments you have provided and I will try to incorporate them in next weeks release! Thank you :)</comment></comment>


Affordable, Rapid Bootstrapping of the Space Industry - <AUTHOR> http://ascelibrary.org/doi/abs/10.1061/%28ASCE%29AS.1943-5525.0000236

<comment><USER2> Uh, is there a version that isn't behind a paywall?

<comment><USER3> Here's the pre-print version: [http://www.philipmetzger.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/2014/09...](http://www.philipmetzger.com/blog/wp- content/uploads/2014/09/Preprint_Affordable-bootstrapping-of-space-industry- and-solar-system-civilization.pdf)

The final published version is behind paywall/subscription.

Lots of other cool papers from the Space 2000 conference :[http://cedb.asce.org/cgi/WWWdisplayrbn.cgi?RBN9780784404799](http://cedb.asce.org/cgi/WWWdisplayrbn.cgi?RBN9780784404799)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Along with rovers that build bricks.

</comment><comment><USER5> Thank you to grinich for posting a readable link.

I have great hopes for In-Situ Resource Utilization and building industrial capability in space, because I think that it has two-fold answers for the primary problem faced by the space industry right now: doing something about the money problem. In short, nobody in government is interested in spending Apollo-scale dollars on space anytime in the near future. Sure, they might like to have people _think_ that a big plan for Mars is in the offing, but when it comes to actually spending the money, it's just not happening.

ISRU answers this on two fronts. First, it allows you to do a lot more with less, by spending less on putting expensive mass into space. Second, when taken to its conclusion, it provides for the real missing link: a return on investment from space which is not just information. Informational returns from space can be easily met through smaller, cheaper, better probes and satellites, and thus don't need an industry in space. They also don't require us to have a growing space industry here on Earth either.

The debate about humans vs robots in space is driven just as much by concerns about a shrinking/stagnating industry as it is by dreams of a Jetsons future. Industrial returns from space could provide a growing demand, which informational returns do not currently provide. Note when I say 'industrial returns' that does not mean shipping chairs and tables made of moon dust to Earth; rather I'm thinking in the sense that if I spent to build a factory in Bulgaria, the return to me is that now I own a factory in Bulgaria and can benefit from being able to own a portion of the production in Bulgaria- I don't expect the return to me to be the actual factory output shipped back to my door. Without some kind of demand (in the economic sense) from space, you can't even pay the teleoperators back here on Earth, even if you already had a telefactory built up there right now.

Two weeks ago, I happen to have toured the Swampworks (modeled on the famous Lockheed Skunk Works) at KSC where the dirt work happens. It's a cool place with cool and quirky people. I also have a few grad school connections with people responsible for this work. The robots they have are very cool. They are doing Good Work.

However, I know that it is NASA's pattern to make really cool plans (up to the point of demo hardware) which then get shot down for budget reasons before it comes time to launch them. I'd hate to see this happen to them. It doesn't always happen. But it happens often enough that startups can look like less of a risk than depending upon Congress. I'd love to see them do two things: 1) drop that seed factory to a sub-$100 million cost so that it could be done as a risky private venture instead of a risky government venture and 2)do an on- Earth seed factory construction project to demo the process. I realize that would be a more expensive project than the work they are doing now, but I think that it would go a lot farther.</comment>


Show HN: Pioneer – A web app to control your IoT (side) projects - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/PiMaker/Pioneer <comment><USER2> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgngkkKM- yA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgngkkKM-yA)</comment>


SoftBank's Vision Fund Loses $17.7B on WeWork, Uber - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-05-18/softbank-vision-fund-books-17-7-billion-loss-on-wework-uber <comment><USER2> I'm just thinking about how many $500k to $1mm seeds could have helped founders get their ideas off the ground in lieu of these debacles.

17,700,000,000

17,700 at $1mm 35,400 at $500k

That's a lot of ideas getting fuel and a lot of people being put to work. Even if you filter through for high quality ideas and teams, this is still a better use of those funds.

WeWork was a bad idea from the start. Uber is a great idea without a functioning (profitable) business model.

As an entrepreneur, this kind of news drives me batty.

<comment><USER3> WeWork is absolutely not a bad idea. Talk to regus, they're running a profitable business doing the exact same thing (pre-covid).

Also, Rides had already reached profitability at Uber (pre-covid).

They are both totally viable businesses, post-covid.

The mistake SoftBank made wasn't investing in them, it was investing at a valuation that grossly overestimated the size of the opportunity, and how quickly they would see their return.

Uber & Wework aren't going to be Apple/Google market cap any time soon, if ever. And that was true pre-covid.

<comment><USER4> WeWork is a terrible idea because it has no advantages over Regus/Industrious except for yoga-babel and a much higher valuation.

It is akin to valuing Ford at 10x General Motors because Ford has a yoga instructor as CEO

<comment><USER5> I'm sure some people would disagree with you. What you value isn't the same as what others necessarily value. That doesn't make it a terrible idea in itself.

The experience of a WeWork and Regus are very different. They can both co- exist because some people like a more community type environment, and some people just want a modular space that is affordable.

WeWork tried a bunch of things that you might not find at a typical coworking space but I personally would pay 2x for a WeWork space over the same Regus space because I will get more value out of the WeWork space which is meeting people. I have spent plenty of time in my career in WeWork and Regus spaces, and WeWork has been much more fruitful in terms of the network effect.

<comment><USER6> > What you value isn't the same as what others necessarily value. That doesn't > make it a terrible idea in itself.

It does not matter what people value, it matters what market values. And for the market having a yoga CEO is not a selling point for a car.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > The drop in Uber's share price was responsible for about $5.2 billion of > Vision Fund's losses in the period, while WeWork contributed $4.6 billion > and another $7.5 billion came from the rest of the portfolio

Losing even _more_ on other portfolio businesses, like Oyo (the hotel chain) is going to hurt.

I hope this gets rid of the "out-raise your competitors and spend ridiculous amounts of money on ridiculous money sinks" strategy forever.

<comment><USER8> > I hope this gets rid of the "out-raise your competitors and spend ridiculous > amounts of money on ridiculous money sinks" strategy forever.

I don't think so. We live in a world now where incredible amounts of capital are chasing returns because of zero and negative interest rate policies. The only solution will be regulation.

EDIT: The more interesting question (IMHO) is what happens when all of that capital has nowhere to go? Is there back pressure? How do accumulators of capital react to such forces?

<comment><USER9> Why would you want to regulate it? Consumers benefit from VCs subsidising Uber and food delivery.

<comment><USER8> The collateral damage is immense, to both gig workers and in the case of food delivery, restaurants who do the actual work of making the food.

EDIT: I mean, just go UBI instead of advocating for siphoning sovereign fund dollars from ruthless dictators and unsophisticated investors like Masayoshi Son. Save us all the paperwork and bikeshedding about not being able to afford what we clearly (based on central bank monetary policy) can afford. I will certainly miss the Matt Levine pieces about these folks though.

<comment><USER10> Nobody is forced to work for Uber and the like, restaurants can also ban these services.

<comment><USER8> This is a tired argument. We live in a society, not Somalia. Government exists to regulate to protect citizens, and I'm starting to believe these arguments are put forth to give these monstrosities more time before death gasps.

<comment><USER11> > not Somalia

I'm curious why you would choose this example. Is somalia a country without a society ?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Until recently, Vision Fund proponents had been able to point to paper gains as signs of the fund's performance. The fund is now underwater [1].

Given how personally leveraged Vision Fund's employees are to the fund [2], I'm curious what morale is like there.

[1] [https://www.wsj.com/articles/softbank-posts-9-billion- loss-f...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/softbank-posts-9-billion-loss-for- year-hit-by-poor-tech-investments-11589787762)

[2] [https://www.wsj.com/articles/softbank-to-lend-founder-and- em...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/softbank-to-lend-founder-and-employees- billions-to-invest-in-fund-11566051247)

<comment><USER13> From [2], SoftBank lent billions for employees to invest. That's incredible and dubious! I've been offered to purchase stock of my employer at reduced prices if I hold it for X time, but never been offered a loan to do it.

<comment><USER14> >> SoftBank lent billions for employees to invest. That's incredible and dubious!

In some ways, this is great. It shows that fund executives' interests are aligned with the long-term returns of the fund. It shows they are there for the carry returns and not just the annual admin fees. It gives execs skin in the game.

<comment><USER15> People keep saying this, but in reality all this ever seems to do is to give employees an incentive to boost the share price. If you have an employee that works hard to create long term value for the company you can review their performance at the end of the year and make a judgement that they've created long term value in a sustainable way and you can give them a big bonus or increase their salary. If you give them massive amounts of stock, suddenly you're powerless, it doesn't matter what they're doing to boost the stock price, as long as they bump the price they're going to get a good income no matter what you think of their performance.

<comment><USER14> Bonuses end up becoming political exercises. If you can keep bonuses aligned with value, that is great but I've seen otherwise many times.

Serious question - are there really many bad ways to bump up the stock price?

There is financial engineering (like stock buy-backs), you can just disallow that and remove the problem.

There is unnecessary M&A, but if the employees are running amok with unnecessary M&A, you have much bigger problems.

There are illegal things -- but we have the law to take care of that.

There are extractive measures (e.g., squeeze blood from workers, suppliers), but if that is allowed, then the "value" you see from that is likely also "value" you'd reflect on the annual bonus.

<comment><USER12> From a shareholder perspective, buybacks that raise the stock price are just fine.

<comment><USER16> Not if they company is buying back shares at an inflated valuation, which sadly too often the case.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Note that this was for the fiscal year that ended in March, so before most of Covid-19's impact.

Can't imagine what FY2020 is going to look like.

<comment><USER18> Uber is up about 20% from the end of March.

<comment><USER19> Which is just baffling

<comment><USER20> Not really. The whole market is up about 30% from its low. On top of that Uber Eats is obviously doing a lot of business right now.

<comment><USER21> And layoffs.

<comment><USER22> Layoffs are generally positive for stock prices. The bad news causing the layoffs are priced in, and the layoffs mitigate some of that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> as-j I wonder how much good vs damage SoftBank has done to tech companies, or was it just te normal consequence of the end of the tech bubble? I don't mean Uber, WeWork and the high profile ones, but the less news worthy failures. What do I mean?

SoftBank funded companies were told to grow at any cost, scale to become the market leader. A lot of companies weren't mature enough, or maybe not viable enough to do so and just burnt through cash and ended up with nothing as a result.

I wonder how they would have done had they not had such a strong drive to grow at any cost?

<comment><USER23> I imagine if Uber hadn't pushed so hard for growth most local markets would still be using their old taxi system.

<comment> as-j That's why I excluded Uber and the like, the push was for the same strategy for all sorts of their smaller invesments.

Edit: thinking companies like Wag, DoorDash, etc

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> This has downstream implications for global stability. Much of that money comes from Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, who need investment returns to replace dwindling oil revenues. Revenues which prop up an extremely generous entitlements system that has kept the royal family in power.

</comment><comment><USER25> WeWork seemed like a poor investment anyway. Pandemic or no pandemic, the economy was heading for a reset after 10 years of a good run. Why they expanded their building so quickly is beyond me, and it's left the whole business extremely open to a downturn. I've worked in a lot of the buildings in London and watched it explode since coming to the city. It started as a great idea and built on community, but it lost a lot of that with generic same same buildings. Money sinks. Something other spaces are doing far better, focusing on certain industries and startup communities.

<comment><USER26> I work in the industry (yes, the whole debacle has been fairly entertaining).

From what I've heard, Neumann was 100% convinced that the 16Bn financing round was a sure thing (and the rapid growth was how he positioned himself for it). I don't know whether he meant to ride off the sunset, or (as our ceo put it), rely on the fact that even if the business is unsustainable, tens of billions of cash means that you won't go bankrupt for a long time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> Is SoftBank the worst investment firm of all time

<comment><USER28> That, and the name of the fund ended up being hilariously wrong. They have invested in things where a 10 year old could have pointed out obvious fallacies.

Saudi investors must be really pissed off, they look like complete fools now (having just been parted with quite a bit of their money). If I were Masayoshi Son, I wouldn't step in a Saudi embassy for all the money in the world now.

Oh well if they blow up it's actually capitalism working right _for once_. Too bad they own ARM, that's more or less the only thing of value that could be lost imho.

<comment><USER29> ARM will just get sold to someone else.

They own a bunch of Alibaba too, to be fair.

<comment><USER15> I find it very difficult to see where ARM fits, it really should be an independent company. Since everyone who sees the most value in buying it shouldn't be allowed to. Can you imagine if Apple snapped it up? Or Qualcomm? Or even Intel?

<comment><USER30> > _Can you imagine if Apple snapped it up? Or Qualcomm? Or even Intel?_

Apple perhaps, but they tend to avoid generic M&A like this. They tend to only do M&A when there is a very strong fit; they'll happily continue to license ARM's IP.

The others each have offerings that compete with ARM, so on that alone, they wouldn't be able to close the sale unless regulators are completely asleep at the wheel.

<comment><USER31> There's heavy speculation of Apple ditching Intel for the ARM platform, it'd be interesting to see if it could actually happen. It has to be an opportunistic move

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> To be fair, so much of this is driven by market forces and Covid in general.

Only WeWork was written down, the rest is the market absolutely tanking. I mean if you followed the index funds, you'd be posting ~20% losses right now. Earlier it was 30%.

I definitely would not want to be those portfolio managers right now, but it's not all completely them... yet.

<comment><USER33> Might be true, but building a multibillion dollar investment strategy that falls apart during a market downturn is a very financial crisisy thing to do. Its easy to make money during a bull market, just toss money into an index fund.

Uber and WeWork were both banking on increased travel and office presence. Seems like a dumb thing to do now that COVID has plowed everyone into remote work. It might have been a dumb thing to do even before.

Crises tend to accelerate underlying societal changes. Remote work and online ordering were already at an all time high. The virus has pushed this increasing demand ahead a decade or more. Now I can even see my doctor from home, something unthinkable a few months ago. Travel is increasingly reserved for leisure. Uber might be okay but WeWork is on the wrong side of this. WeWork was a societal stepping-stone to remote work. We've blown past that checkpoint far sooner than expected

<comment><USER31> WeWork is to remote work, as Cyber-Cafes were to home computers

<comment><USER33> well said, this is exactly what I believe as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> So where is the Vision Fund getting these billions, and why do they need them laundered (squandered?) so badly?

<comment><USER35> Saudi-Arabian oil (read: blood) money. With Peak Oil around the corner (if it hasn't already hit thanks to corona), the Saudi dictatorship is in desperate need for a way to finance their lavish lifestyle and handouts, or it faces rebellion.

The only thing buying the Saudi government peace at the moment from both religious salafi extremists on one end and a young Westernized population on the other hand is extremely generous handouts which in turn depend on an oil price around 80-90$ range IIRC. But cheap US/CA fracking and shale oil have been attacking that price level for quite some time which also is problematic for the Russian economy for similar reasons, so both SA and RU are hellbent on destroying the US/CA domestic oil industry (which is highly leveraged and debt financed), which complicates matters even more.

<comment><USER36> There is no way peak oil (which I assume is peak oil demand, not supply) is going to happen anytime soon. Too much of the world has massive energy needs in order to develop (almost all of Africa, large parts of South America and Asia) and oil will be a huge part of the energy mix given its advantages. The current coronavirus situation might depress oil demand for a bit, but unless living standards get permanently stuck at low levels in the developing world oil demand is going to grow for the foreseeable future. Of course, how Saudia Arabia does depends on how long their reserves last, and many people believe they've overstated the amount of oil they have remaining.

<comment><USER35> Africa can satisfy lots of its energy needs with essentially free solar, plus Africa has lots of local oil, they don't need the Saudis.

As for oil demand: many Western countries have by now recognized their toxic dependency on oil. Plastics are being fought against worldwide, electric mobility is more or less mainstream with Tesla and ICE phase-outs across Europe, business air travel will be mostly replaced with teleconferences...

<comment><USER36> I think you are underestimating the convenience of oil relative to other forms of energy. Also, Saudi Arabia has a mostly functioning government, which is not really true of most African countries and Saudi Arabia is one of the lowest cost producers. Maybe some African countries can compete on price, but not until they increase their engineering capacity and reduce corruption.

Edit: Even if the world does go all in on electric vehicles, you still have to mine all the metals that go into their motors and batteries. That is going to be a huge shock to the mining industry. Probably on a level to the commodity supercycle that China's growth caused. I don't see any way that metals production can be ramped up heavily without an increase in oil demand.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I just finished reading [https://www.billiondollarwhale.com/](https://www.billiondollarwhale.com/) book. The book tells a story how 11Billion USD were stolen. After seeing $17B losses I hardly can believe that a big chunk of it or most of it were not funnelled to support a lavish lifestyle of connected people.

<comment><USER38> Well yeah, take a look at how Adam Neumann is spending his billions...

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> The more I read about WeWork, the more insane it is to me. I don't really blame the charlatans at WeWork, it's hard to blame people for taking money on a product. And they probably do think it's a good business plan.

No, I blame the people giving them billions of dollars. These "investors" are complete idiots. It's shocking to me how little they understand about the companies they invest in.

One look at WeWorks "business plan" and I knew it was all bullshit. It's just ridiculous that so many "smart investors" gave them money.

Ugh, such a waste of money.

</comment><comment><USER40> WeWork and Uber are two of the best "products" on the market. Thanks to SoftBank for their contribution I guess!

</comment><comment><USER41> Was anyone (with remarkable or relevant VC experience) criticizing SoftBank Vision's fund approach before all this debacle?

I remember a lot of articles praising it and basically claiming that their boldness and aggressiveness were going to create never seen returns / disrupt the VC industry forever.

</comment><comment><USER42> There's tossing gasoline on a pile of cash and then there's tossing gasoline on a pile of cash.

<comment><USER43> And then there's tossing gasoline on a pile of cash made on selling gasoline.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> It pains me to see such massive amounts of money wasted on a real estate ponzi scheme and a ride sharing company with a weak revenue model.

If they're going to call themselves a "vision fund" that focuses on moonshots, and has the risk appetite to lose large sums of money doing that, at least invest in _actual_ moonshots.

Biotech, green energy, new forms of transportation like Hyperloop and improved supersonic jet designs. There are so many breakthroughs that need lots of funding and can be quite profitable if successful.

I would love to see funds like SoftBank invest more in the SpaceX's of the world less in the WeWorks of the world.

</comment><comment><USER45> The Vision fund is heavily invested in businesses that are negatively impacted by COVID-19. Are there any bright spots in the portfolio? Was diversification not possble?

</comment><comment><USER46> Change your perspective: this is not SoftBank losing money, this is the middle class gaining a free lunch. It's a massive redistribution of wealth from investors to consumers.

<comment><USER22> Some of this is also just hitting the undo button. Softbank had a murky habit of leading back to back rounds, so they were effectively dictating the market for their own investments. It's like if you invest in my business at a $10 valuation, and then a year later you invest at a $30 valuation, and a year after that your accountants force you to carry it at the original $10 valuation. You're undoing previous paper gains, but nothing really changed.

</comment></comment><comment><USER47> So, if $17.7B were lost on one side, it would be interesting to trace the money and see in which pockets most of the money went

<comment><USER22> Valuations are not zero sum. On a cash flow basis, I think that's pretty simple: consumers via subsidies. But on the mark to market side, if I invest $10 at $100 valuation and the company lists on a stock exchange where investors only value the company at $50, I've lost $5 and nobody has gained anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER48> What's with GetYourGuide? Will they recover after COVID?

</comment><comment><USER49> Vision

<comment><USER50> Meh I like his vision: taking insane amounts of dirty Saudi money and giving it back to the people</comment></comment>


Gander: Meteor-based email app, faster email triage for the busy - <AUTHOR> http://www.ripariandata.com/blog/announcing-gander-the-meteor-based-mail-app-that-lives-in-your-inbox-so-you-dont-have-to

<comment><USER2> tl; dr Email that abstracts away device distinctions between mobile and desktop, letting them share what email's open so that when you sit down the email you were looking at on your phone is on your desktop

Critique: weighing of -> weighting of</comment>


Computer Games That Teach Assembly Language - <AUTHOR> http://spectrum.ieee.org/geek-life/reviews/three-computer-games-that-make-assembly-language-fun <comment><USER2> Have had a lot of fun with TIS-100. It's a very weird architecture, but it does teach the fundamentals of low-level coding, like using a single working register, manipulating data in a simple way and using goto statements and branches for loops.

A lot of the problems are problems due to the architecture though, not necessarily hard to implement in more conventional architectures.

The article quickly goes over it, but for those who still wanna know more about the architecture, the TIS-100 is composed of nodes that can store a small number of lines of instruction code, have a working register, and have 4 I/O ports, UP, DOWN, LEFT and RIGHT. If asking for input, they will block until input is received from the specified adjacent node, and if passing output, they will block until the specified adjacent node asks for input. There are also memory nodes, introduced later in the game, to store more data.

These nodes are on a grid. Some of them are disabled, and the memory nodes' placement differs from program/puzzle to program/puzzle. Thus, careful selection of nodes and I/O ports is required for completion. I don't know if anything similar exists in actual hardware.

There's also a built-in "debugger" which simply allows you to run the program step by step and view all values, blocked nodes, and current instructions, which really helps, and possibly teaches players how to generally debug actual machine code. The programs run on a set of unit tests, and you can see which ones fail and why.

In classic Zachtronics fashion, there's graphs explaining your performance in the end, in terms of time, and space. Users not familiar with actual hardware architecture principles won't probably be able to figure out themselves how to get the best time, because most problems require use of pipeline-like instructions, due to the blocking nature of the nodes. So while it teaches tricks and fundamentals, I don't think it teaches more advanced and important stuff. And that's not a bad thing, it's a great game.

Would recommend to anyone.

<comment><USER3> > I don't know if anything similar exists in actual hardware.

GreenArrays GA144 has a few similarities. It's an array of tiny Forth- optimized cores, with some of them having specialized (mostly I/O) hardware. Apart from a few cores that are hardwired to boot from I/O pins, most need to be initialized via a neighbor. I don't remember where I saw this, but I remember reading that a rite of passage in GA144 programming is to write a "crawler" that loads itself into all of the cores.

> Nodes numbered in green have one or two GPIO pins. Those in blue have analog > I/O. Those in orange have digital I/O with specialized purposes: 001 and 701 > have high speed SERDES; 705 has four pins which may be used for an SPI bus; > 217, 517 and 715 have a GPIO pin whose read line is connected to one or more > analog nodes for sample synchronization; and nodes 007, 8, and 9 together > control two 18-bit parallel buses and four GPIO pins that may be used to > control external memory chips. These and the SPI bus are of course available > for other uses if desired. All nodes are suspended after reset, prepared to > execute instructions coming from any neighbor node via a comm port. Six of > these are also waiting for incoming signals on their pin(s) which will be > interpreted as boot frames. 001 and 701 SERDES will execute instructions > received; 200 listens for high speed 1-wire protocol, 300 for 2-wire synch, > 708 for RS232 framed async, and 705 can boot from an SPI flash memory > device.

[1] [http://www.greenarraychips.com/home/documents/index.html#arc...](http://www.greenarraychips.com/home/documents/index.html#architecture)

<comment><USER4> GA144 gets mentioned occasionally, but has anyone actually played with those chips? Apparently they are available in a hobbyist-friendly form bundled with a break-out board, which is nice. It might be neat idea to try to build a homebrew computer around the chip.

Has GreenArrays scored any major sales (publicly), do we know if they have any future? It would be bit shame to see them go under.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> No thread about games that teach assembly can be complete without a mention of Core War -- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Core_War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Core_War)

It is perhaps _the_ game of the genre.

<comment><USER6> Man I spent a lot of time playing that back in the day...

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Somewhat off-topic:

For you parents out there...what has been your experience with/advice for teaching your kids a programming language? It's definitely something I want my kids to get comfortable/familiar with early but I get concerned about over- exposing them to too much "screen time" at a young age and the deleterious effects that might have (even ones we don't know about yet).

Don't have kids right now, or any on the way, but that's something on the horizon for me so I've been thinking about it.

<comment><USER8> The guy who taught his son programming langs from early days and that son was largely responsible for the Clojure Instaparse project. The duo discussed it on the Cognicast. That topic is the bulk of the interview.

[http://blog.cognitect.com/cognicast/122](http://blog.cognitect.com/cognicast/122)

<comment><USER9> Very interesting, thank you! The father (Mark Engelberg) also designed a mass- market programming board game/puzzle, Code Master [1], which seems neat. I just grabbed a copy at Target.

[1] [http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code- master/](http://www.thinkfun.com/products/code-master/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> [https://microcorruption.com/](https://microcorruption.com/) is maybe not quite a game in the same way as those mentioned in the article but I enjoyed playing it.

<comment><USER11> Is this a recruiting tool for Square? It looks great, by the way.

<comment><USER12> It's pretty great to learn about basic security concepts and putting them to use.

Though the registration seems like it's done by a human, manually approving registration requests, so don't be surprised if it takes forever to get an account!

<comment><USER13> Thanks for the warning; I went ahead and signed up from my phone so I don't have to wait for the registration later!

<comment><USER13> (Got my registration link just a few minutes later.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I always wonder why there is no 0x10c'ish game yet (it was a game prototype set on a space ship where you could program the computer), as there was a lot of hype around it and the idea seemed really nice ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0x10c](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0x10c)).

There are some games that explore that direction (e.g. space engineers has some kind of programmable block), but no successful ones in the spirit of the original 0x10c vision (which was pretty vague and maybe the hype and high expectations killed it). I still think that one could build a great game around the main idea, but probably it is hard to balance the game mechanics between "real" programming and actual game play without alienating users that want to get into programming and actual programmers that want to play a game.

<comment><USER15> Notch cancelled it. [https://notch.tumblr.com/post/58707926941/so-thats-what- im-g...](https://notch.tumblr.com/post/58707926941/so-thats-what-im-going-to- do) is the cancellation post. He wanted to work on smaller games that could fail rather than massively hyped games where every off hand design decision comment becomes a major news cycle item in the gaming world. The attempt for a community driven game appears to have stalled out ( [https://www.reddit.com/r/trillek/](https://www.reddit.com/r/trillek/) ).

<comment><USER14> Yeah, I knew that he canceled it (it's also in the wiki link), but I thought it would have been picked up by other developers. And yes, Trillek seems dead unfortunately.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_man_computer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_man_computer) is a simple computer model for education, from the 1960's. I built an emulator for it, which you can find here: [http://paulhankin.github.io/lmc/lmc.html](http://paulhankin.github.io/lmc/lmc.html)

It's not a game, but I found it fun to write simple programs; the machine code is so limited you need to find tricks to do anything non-trivial. For a challenge, try to write 1: a program that multiples two inputs, 2: a sieve of erastothenes, and 3: a program that can sort input.

The spec for the assembler is on the wikipedia page.

</comment><comment><USER17> Human Resource Machine is really fun. It's also available on tablets like the iPad. I think it's a great intro to programming.

<comment><USER18> I found HRM quite boring, but that is because it is just a simplified assembly language. The solutions were always obvious and there clearly was a single solution for size or speed categories. But TIS and Shenzhen I/O are much more interesting for people already familiar with assembly, because it is a different systolic architecture and because the solution design space was much larger and interesting.

I would only reccomend HRM for someone who has never done assembly.

<comment><USER19> Having never done assembly, but other languages, I'm really enjoying HRM. The first bit I got through really quickly, and am seeing some of your points, but it is definitely getting me thinking in a different way.

<comment><USER18> I definitely recommend HRM for someone who has only dealt with high-level languages and wants to get a feel for thinking in assembly.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> BOX-256 is a free web-based assembly language game: [http://box-256.com/](http://box-256.com/)

</comment><comment><USER20> It's kinda ironic that I bought TIS-100 when it first came out, played for a few hours, lost interest, and never really touched it since. But then, later I found great fun writing actual x86-64 assembler.

<comment><USER21> This is the issue I have with Zachtronics games - while I like playing them, sooner or later I start feeling like I might as well be working on real code.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> TIS-100 is a lot of fun. It's quite interesting what you can do on a limited architecture.

Similar posts pop up occasionally here, such as:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13566247](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13566247)

A couple more lists of programming games:

\- [http://steamcommunity.com/app/375820/discussions/0/481115363...](http://steamcommunity.com/app/375820/discussions/0/481115363863361128/)

\- [https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/11/09/best- programming...](https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/11/09/best-programming- games/)

</comment><comment><USER23> If this tickles your fancy, check out [https://godbolt.org](https://godbolt.org)

</comment><comment><USER24> I've had some fun solving very simple problems in brainfuck. This would be an interesting choice for a programming game because how simple it is. You can learn it in like 5 minutes. And also it's very easy to visualize the state. You can watch the program move around the tape and increment and decrement cells. Try it yourself, write a program to reverse an input string.

</comment><comment><USER25> Is there any benefit to learning assembly now, or is it just fun to see what it was like then?

<comment><USER26> It's a niche skill, there are applications in e.g. embedded and hardware development, security/malware analysis, performance hotspot optimization, where sometimes you'd want to go below C to asm or machine code.

On the other hand, learning some assembly helps even when you're not using assembly - it increases the understanding of how things work under the hood and helps your reasoning about performance and security considerations even when working in much higher level languages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> TIS-100 looks cool but the keyboard didn't fit on my iPad. Downloaded a few other games from the provider and all has oAuth issues. Too bad - they looked good.

</comment><comment><USER28> HRM was a lot of fun; I wrote an interpreter in C# to test the scripts and test them on a pc; thought about creating a website where people could posts new challenges and create optimal solutions; some changes to hard levels take forever in the game; I could just edit a few things and have near instant results.

</comment><comment><USER29> Any recommendations for games that teach other programming languages? Obviously there's Swift Playgrounds. I'm an adept programmer in several languages, but would love to learn some others, but find learning from documentation very tedious, and would much rather play games to learn.

</comment><comment><USER30> Related previous discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12660253](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12660253)

</comment><comment><USER31> Stop playing games and just write some damn assembly.

</comment><comment><USER32> any good resources on 6502?

</comment><comment><USER33> assembly is awesome yet scary

<comment><USER34> it's really a simple language

i can help you start (amd64), if you want. TIS-100 is a decent start as well</comment></comment>


Math Invented for Moon Landing Helps Your Flight Arrive on Time - <AUTHOR> https://www.nasa.gov/feature/ames/math-invented-for-moon-landing-helps-your-flight-arrive-on-time <comment><USER2> About the significance of the Schmidt-Kalman filter (from a related abstract):

>In most target tracking formulations, the tracking sensor location is typically assumed perfectly known. Without accounting for navigation errors of the sensor platform, regular Kalman filters tend to be optimistic (i.e., the covariance matrix far below the actual mean squared errors) ... The Schmidt- Kalman filter (SKF) does not estimate the navigation errors explicitly but rather takes into account the navigation error covariance provided by an on- board navigation unit in the tracking filter formulation. By exploring the structural navigation errors, the SKF is not only more consistent but also produces smaller mean squared errors than regular Kalman filters.

</comment><comment><USER3> Kalman filters are useful for much more than that :)

I'm barely acquainted with them, but this[1] seems to be a good introduction that doesn't shove math under the rug.

Schmidt's modification of Kalman filter allowed for a practical implementation of it on the Apollo computer. The history and the motivation for the changes are excellently described in a survey paper co-authored by Schmidt himself in 1985[2]:

>Dr. Kalman's original formulation would have required an on-board crew to make a continuous sequence of optical measurements equally spaced in time throughout the lunar mission, an impractical scenario. Therefore, to implement our measurement and course-correction schedule, the original formulation had to be revised.

This paper, [2], offers amazing historical tidibtis (especially relevant on HN): computational challenges, project running 6 months behind schedule, why it was better than least-squares methods (computation time!), numerical stability, implementation details that allowed for use of floats (single precision) vs. double precision, FORTRAN implementation vs. specialized hardware, etc.

I find it amazing that nearly 60 years later, we are still dealing with the same issues in machine learning and high-performance computing: from single vs. double precision and numerical stability down to, well, using Kalman filters - and yes, FORTRAN and specialized hardware. And projects running behind schedule.

(Last time I had to touch FORTRAN code was.. a month ago. Also guess what powers all your shiny NumPy/SciPy computations: a lot of FORTRAN.)

[1][https://towardsdatascience.com/kalman-filter-an-algorithm- fo...](https://towardsdatascience.com/kalman-filter-an-algorithm-for-making- sense-from-the-insights-of-various-sensors-fused-together-ddf67597f35e)

[2][https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/198600...](https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19860003843.pdf)

<comment><USER4> > I find it amazing that nearly 60 years later, we are still dealing with the > same issues in machine learning and high-performance computing: from single > vs. double precision and numerical stability down to, well, using Kalman > filters - and yes, FORTRAN and specialized hardware. And projects running > behind schedule.

On the other hand, I don't find this amazing at all. Numerics are fundamentally difficult, the people who worked on them at the beginning were very smart. Projects have always been behind schedule. It doesn't surprise me at all that we've been stuck on at least a local maxima on many of these things....

<comment><USER3> The amazing part to me was that people had reached those maxima so fast: by 1960, barely after the computers have been invented, and with such limited resources.

<comment><USER4> Perhaps think about it this way: precisely because we had such limited resources at the time, smart people were highly motivated to find those (local?) maxima. These days in many contexts it is easier to say "eh, good enough" and move on to the next thing.

<comment><USER5> To add to this topic: the fast hardware adder, patented by IBM in 1957, now in some forms present in all fast CPUs, was already invented by Charles Babbage between 1820 and 1830, before the middle of 19th (!) century as he designed his _mechanical_ computing "difference" engine:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry- lookahead_adder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry-lookahead_adder)

Apparently, he was proud of that invention, only almost nobody was able to appreciate it then.

From "Passages from the Life of a Philosopher (1864) by Charles Babbage"

[https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Passages_from_the_Life_of_a_P...](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Passages_from_the_Life_of_a_Philosopher/Chapter_V)

"The first idea was, naturally, to add each digit successively. This, however, would occupy much time if the numbers added together consisted of many places of figures.

The next step was to add all the digits of the two numbers each to each at the same instant, but reserving a certain mechanical memorandum, wherever a carriage became due. These carriages were then to be executed successively. "

A 3D model:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2EDE8Srdcw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2EDE8Srdcw)

by the author of:

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

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The paper by McGee and Schmidt (1985):

[https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/198600...](https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19860003843.pdf)

"Discovery of the Kalman Filter as a Practical Tool for Aerospace and Industry -- Leonard A. McGee and Stanley F. Schmidt"

</comment><comment><USER6> Are they just talking about the extended kalman filter? If so it is funny that there was such a big conceptual gap between the linear and linearized versions (i.e. a few years gap). Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

<comment><USER7> Nope, as far as I can tell, the schmidt-kalman filter is a way of reducing dimensionality in a KF. You split the states between those you are interested in and those you aren't. Sometimes those states you don't care about (e.g. sensor biases) are still important for estimating those you do care about (e.g. position). Adding a state to a typical KF for each of these dimensions is one solution, but it's expensive (covariance calcs scale quadratically with dimension). The Schmidt-Kalman filter is another solution.</comment></comment>


Sudo appears to have only one core developer - <AUTHOR> http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo?revcount=1000

<comment><USER2> I was going to say this:

"And? It's a simple tool. It's not exactly the most complex thing in the world - it's not as though it _needs_ multiple developers, as if/when the current dev drops the project another can easily step over".

And then I started flipping through some of the code. Man, sudo is complex. Much more so than one would naively assume.

<comment><USER3> I started to have that same thought and so looked at the code and of course my next thought was along the lines of "Well...I mean it isn't like it changes that much, right?" and realized that I probably use such a tiny subset of what sudo can do.

There is a lot more in the man page than I expected not to mention options I can even fathom needing (for myself, yet).

<comment><USER4> You inspired me to read the sudo manpage, which I don't know if I've ever done.

Found "sudo -e", so convenient.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm not sure this is quite right -- it looks like all commits have the name of the maintainer, but two of the most recent 5 commits have in the comment that they're from someone else: [http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo/rev/33267d6243aa?revcount=1000](http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo/rev/33267d6243aa?revcount=1000) is "from Steven Soulen" and [http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo/rev/a246f9054395?revcount=1000](http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo/rev/a246f9054395?revcount=1000) is "from Frank Denis".

I then went back 25 commits, and there aren't any others marked this way.

<comment><USER6> I don't know about the ldap patch.

But the second one is a patch I sent to OpenBSD. Apparently the portable version of sudo keeps an up-to-date copy of this file.

Sudo is a super useful tool, and Todd has made a wonderful job at maintaining it for the past 20 years or so.

Most opensource projects have only one maintainer. This is not necessarily a bad thing; it oftens allows them to iterate quickly. And it doesn't mean the code is only read by one pair of eyeballs either. In particuler, sudo is part of OpenBSD, and other OpenBSD developers take a look at the changes when a new version gets merged.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> ... and sudo is insanely complex. Maybe a funding drive should happen like for gnupg...

<comment><USER7> Is it "insanely complex"? sudo seems like the sort of tool that could (and should) be kept extremely simple.

<comment><USER8> You can browse it: [http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo/file/777dc5a17bf3](http://www.sudo.ws/repos/sudo/file/777dc5a17bf3)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Looks like a healthy project to me, where the author cared and stayed. Not like other projects which got dumbed down by their contributors or takeovers. One is the best you can expect.</comment>


Docs Without Borders: Sync Google Docs to Your Dropbox - <AUTHOR> https://www.docswithoutborders.com

<comment><USER2> Super helpful! Quite literally the "missing link" we have all been waiting for</comment>


Mystery ancestor mated with ancient humans. And its 'nested' DNA was just found - <AUTHOR> https://www.livescience.com/mystery-ancestor-mated-with-humans.html <comment><AUTHOR> >Mapping gene flow between ancient hominins through demography-aware inference of the ancestral recombination graph

[https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/jo...](https://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1008895)</comment>


Taxi industry lawsuit against Uber transferred from state to US court - <AUTHOR> http://www.universalhub.com/2013/taxi-lawsuit-uber-crime-syndicate-hates-poor-peopl <comment><USER3> I felt I got burned by Uber the first time I used them during Hurricane Sandy when I was charged a hefty fee because of their dynamic pricing. I gave them another try a month back and now find myself using the service no fewer than 5 times a week. It literally eliminates every thing I hate about calling a cab. I love it now and almost rely on it at times.

I make sure to ask every single new driver about their experience with Uber and I have heard positive things across the board, save for a few minor complaints (usually about how the cut drivers get aren't _that_ much higher than what they'd get at a traditional cab company). Most say they love it, many say they make extra cash using it on their off-times, and some say they have entire fleets running on Uber. Overall, from my experience, the drivers love and rely on it too.

I think the secret to their success is that they've simplified and streamlined the process elegantly for both drivers and passengers. A few taps and I'm on my way without worry of if I'll even get a cab (although, to be fair, it is at times difficult to find Uber cabs in Brooklyn), and whether I brought cash/credit. But what's really interesting is how they've seemed to simplify the process just enough for drivers. They tell me that _everything_ is provided for them, down to the dashboard mount for the included iPhone. The software itself is simple enough to work and isn't wrought with rules and requirements, and that let's drivers find their own way to make the most out of the software in ways I'm sure the creators didn't expect. For example, one driver actually ended my trip early while I was still in the car, meaning I got charged less, because he didn't want to miss any potential pickups waiting for him at my destination, which I thought was a clever trick.

My point is that Uber is providing a service that both drivers and passengers seem to universally love. No one, as to my knowledge, is getting screwed for the benefit of another. That's why all these lawsuits seem like desperate attempts to take down a company whose service they know is better on all fronts.

<comment><USER4> Yes, I've also gotten universally positive feedback from all of the Uber drivers I've talked to (Uber Taxi, UberX, and Uber Black in SF). Whenever I take non-Uber cabs, I ask about Uber, and the response is also usually positive. Some of them say they have already applied to Uber and are waiting to hear back.

The one negative thing about Uber that I've heard is from a non-Uber cab driver who said that Uber is bad because it cannot be anonymous. He then told me about all of the people he has driven who are committing crimes and marital infidelity, which are not the best examples to use. To be fair, I can think of much better examples where anonymity is valuable.

I am a HUGE Uber fan and regular user, but he did make a good point about the loss of an anonymous travel option for those who need it.

<comment><USER5> Unless Uber manages to actually kill off the taxi industry, which seems extremely unlikely, then the anonymous travel option has not been lost.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> One thing of many in Uber's favor is that its customers are of relatively high socio-economic status, and the company treats them well. When they hear that the company is being sued by the taxi industry, they take note. It's personal. Taxi service has been bad for years, and everyone's been a victim of the absurd regulations which have lead to this sorry state. Elected officials have been accustomed to taking advantage of regulated industries through corrupt actions (anything related to building or zoning permits as an example) without significant blow-back via news coverage or loss of reputation. This time, it's different. Look at how Washington DC's attempt to draft anti-Uber legislation lead to a national response via phone calls and emails. The proposed legislation was dropped. I suspect Uber will eventually prevail in most of its markets, but the politicians will take awhile to realize that the public is taking interest in seemingly esoteric taxi regulations -- the sorts of laws which have been used for years to transfer money from the pockets of the electorate into the hands of those close to power. I feel like I'm supporting democracy and freedom when I hit the "request taxi" button in the morning -- it's an action more powerful than my vote.

<comment><USER7> Umm i think regulations came because the of the sorry state of taxis. I don't know how many times i've been ripped off in a taxi. I assume people complained and the taxi industry got heavily regulated. Just look outside the US for comparison.

<comment><USER8> Nope, the medallion systems exist to block new competition. Sure there are some regulations that seem to favor consumers-- such as price controls-- but these are a short-term benefit, and at the cost of reduced innovation. Far better to allow competition, and customer service will improve through market action rather than government rule-making.

<comment><USER9> Unregulated innovation often innovates fraud and crime when you're talking about unmarked, unregulated cars driven by unknown people, picking people up off the street.

If you go anywhere in the world with less strict taxi regulation, you'll run into this. In Prague, my wife and I hopped into a cab only to find that the meter seemed to exist in a time bubble that ran 10x faster than the rest of the known universe.

I appreciate being able to _hail a random car on the street_ and know _exactly_ what I'm going to get. Safety and fraud issues are exactly why the industry was regulated in the first place.

<comment><USER10> I can agree with what you're saying though I want to share an anecdote from Moscow where there is pretty much no regulation and pricing varies by car company. Instead of having a meter you negotiate the price in the beginning.

To help users out with ordering cabs Yandex released an app that actually let's you order cabs and shows you pre-negotiated prices, you can pick whichever one you like (economy, premium, luxury). They include user ratings and some sort of due-diligence for taxis to get accepted to their network.

But apart from that, a Lyft-like system has existed in many cities for years. In Moscow just holding up your hand on the side of the street prompts anyone to just drive over to the side of the street and offer you a ride. Most of these are full-time or part-time drivers, but also people getting home from work who don't mind a small detour for a bit of extra cash. At a fraction of the price this is the most popular way for people to get around, although some cars look like they date back into the USSR era.

This is a perfectly acceptable scenario and I think with modern technology the market will start to regulate itself.

<comment><USER9> I can share an anecdote from the reverse perspective. When traveling in Morocco, I didn't speak any local languages (eg, French or Arabic). I also was entirely unfamiliar with the city, the distances between points, or even how much something should cost. If there was a Yandex app, I wouldn't have known about it (... although the last time I was in Morocco predated smart phones by about 10 years).

This meant that negotiating a price was pretty much out -- I paid what they asked, and had no real way to gauge whether that was reasonable other than asking a local. I also had no recourse if they overcharged -- what was I going to do?

Information asymmetry is a potent weapon for taking advantage of people, whether it involves taxi rates, or just how clean the restaurant's kitchen is, or how fresh the ingredients are. This is why we have regulations that attempt to provide some of the symmetry required for fair exchange.

<comment><USER6> "This is why we have regulations that attempt to provide some of the symmetry required for fair exchange."

In the case of Ebay, Uber, Airbnb, etc., technology can replace regulation as a means of providing power to the previously disadvantaged party. And, technological solutions almost always are more efficient than the regulation they replace.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> In New York, cabbies are not allowed to refuse you ride a particular neighborhood either.

I never announce where I want to go before I get in (I have some friends in BKLN).

One time I did get a driver who bitched about having to take me somewhere. So I made an overt stretch to look at his details posted inside the car, and then pretended to be taking a note of it. He VERY quickly complied. I didn't have to say a word.

<comment><USER12> This kind of sentiment comes up a lot, and I am sorry, I find it kind of revolting.

There is this notion that cabbies are discriminating against the downtrodden, but in reality, they _are_ the downtrodden. They are low-income, immigrant people who, unlike you, actually live in those outer boroughs. People who need money so badly that they will drive a cab for a living.

You, on the other hand, are a wealthy dude. A dude with so much disposable income that you can throw $20-$40 at a cab instead of taking the subway for free. (Free as in, you already have an unlimited metro card, yes? And $20-$40 is just one way, yes? And you do this every weekend, yes?).

So you, the wealthy dude, have the law on your side. Apparently, your need for low-cost on-demand, luxury transportation trumps the basic human right to free will. Apparently, mostly white, wealthy people need to be protected from being discriminated against by mostly brown, poor people. Apparently, when a laborer refuses to take on dangerous work or insufficiently compensated work ^, we must bring in the government guns and show him who's boss.

(^) It's always money or personal safety. Discrimination has nothing to do with it and I find it rather humorous that cab takers project their own racist attitudes onto cab drivers, seeing as I don't recall a while cabbie _once_ during my 15 years in NYC.

<comment><USER13> Cabbies used to routinely discriminate against whomever they felt like, mostly black and brown people who needed to get uptown. That is why the laws prohibiting refusal to take you were you want to go were instated in the first place.

<comment><USER12> Your point that there is a historic basis for the law is well taken. However, history is not an excuse, _especially_ when it comes to forced labor (cough, slavery, cough).

Also, when you say "used to routinely", you are projecting. The press made it into a banner issue, but really, think about it. "Uptown" used to be very, very poor, and poor people don't take cabs.

<comment><USER13> I'm not sure what you are talking about at this point. You are mad because taxi drivers are supposed to follow the law, because of slavery? Seems a bit incoherent.

<comment><USER12> Slavery bad. Law bad when law say slavery good. Rich man make slave work because bad law, very bad.

Is that better? I tried to use shorter sentences.

<comment><USER13> Yes, much clearer now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Boston cabs have been refusing rides to other neighborhoods forever-- drivers just keep their doors locked and ask you where you're going. If they don't like the answer, they drive off. Blatantly illegal, but it happens all the time.

Funny that they didn't seem to have a big problem with this behavior until Uber got involved.

<comment><USER15> In New York, you can file a complaint online in about 10 seconds. Then you have to phone into a hearing scheduled at your convenience. The driver rarely shows up, and they hand out $200 fines like candy.

<comment><USER16> When I've tried to do this in the past, it required appearing in person. Have you actually phoned in?

<comment><USER17> I filed an online claim and didn't have to do either (the driver pled guilty). I imagine that the requirement cuts both ways (i.e., the driver has to actually appear to contest the claim, in which case they require testimony - if they can't/won't appear they have to pled guilty).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> This is just a side note, but on april 2 _every cab_ in my city was suspended from service for safety violations.

[http://www.wmur.com/news/nh-news/All-Manchester-taxis- suspen...](http://www.wmur.com/news/nh-news/All-Manchester-taxis-suspended- after-failed-inspections/-/9857858/19564702/-/i0ya2az/-/index.html)

The taxi industry is not a good thing to leave unregulated. If you think uber wouldn't operate just like the rest of them because they're a trendy startup, you're delusional.

I acknowledge the call for regulation is over travel destination, but in general I sense some free market idealism here that needs to be squashed.

<comment><USER19> Your example is a clear case of regulation failure. The cab companies knew of the inspection but took no action to comply with the regulations.

In smaller cities like Manchester where there are only 19 cabs there is very little market pressure. Competition in large cities will put more pressure on companies. The risk of a significant lawsuit is also significant pressure to maintain vehicles.

<comment><USER18> How is it a case of regulation failure? If there were no regulation, all the defective cabs would still be on the road right now.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I love the comments in the article: people from East Boston saying that it's the only way they can get a cab.

I took an Uber in Boston today. I never call cabs any other way. It's faster, more convenient, they're more accountable, and when I'm in Cambridge it allows me to get a Boston cab as opposed to the horrible, horrible Cambridge cabbies.

The drivers seem to like it too- every Boston cabbie I've taken an Uber with has told me they get lots of money from Uber rides and that it's way better than Dispatch. Some even stopped paying for dispatch and rely entirely on Uber and driving around.

<comment><USER21> I think this is the core of why everyone disagrees about Uber. In certain cities (Boston, SF) it is a lifesaver. Here in NYC it's a waste of money- yellow cabs really aren't that bad or scarce. There are times of day when it's difficult to get a yellow cab, but that's the exact same time that it's difficult to get an Uber cab- either that or you're paying 2.5x the already expensive price because they switched on surge pricing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> So much cheaper than a medallion...no wonder they are mad. Everybody gets mad when they have to pay a bribe and then find out they are the only ones that paid.

</comment><comment><USER23> These guys are making some serious disruption in a terrible market. Good for them.

I wonder what this lawsuit would look like 10 years from now, when Uber Drivers are replaced by Uber leased "Google Cars" that pick you up?

</comment><comment><USER24> People talking about the dangers of completely unregulated cabs are missing the point. Unregulated cabs that you hail randomly on the street are dangerous because you have no way to verify that the cab is actually from the company it claims to be, and no way to punish the driver if he lies to you (or worse). You are completely at the mercy of the driver.

Uber is completely different from randomly hailing a cab on the street, because you can verify that the cab is from Uber and you can punish bad drivers with bad ratings. If you have a bad experience in an Uber cab, it reflects badly on Uber's brand, so Uber has a strong incentive to punish bad drivers. That's why services like Uber don't need the same regulation that regular cabs do.

</comment><comment><USER25> Hmmm... Industry disruption met with resistance is solid evidence that you are on the right track. The biggest innovation was the move from Checker Cabs to Prius ! Ha. I was a brand manager at Chevrolet and teamed up with Joe Boxer to run van taxis in NYC with a portion of fare going to charity. Chevy didnt want to go beyond test even though the customers LOVED it. Sort of TOMs of taxis. That could be a next innovation in the space...social give back or "free" Uber rides where the passenger could add on an amount that goes into a pool for low income folks to get to the store, etc. Anyway - NONE of that coming from the traditional taxis....

</comment><comment><USER26> Coming from Paris, I know that dealing with cab companies is a huge pain. And that's why there are a lot of initiatives that try to deal with what we call "la petite remise" which are private cars. The legislation is far less strict with them. The only problem is that up to now, there's a numerus clausus for them. But it is said that they're going to increase this number in the few next years, so it's still a big opportunity.

Still, taxi drivers hold a strong negociation power against governement: they're strongly unionized and they don't hesitate blocking trafic in case a new law might harm their business...

</comment><comment><USER27> Can someone explain uber to a UK reader who does not understand what the fuss is?

I can see its some sort of aggregation service for taxi cabs, but I generally like using one particular firm, that I know vets its drivers well. Some (men & women) I know stick to women only driver firms and so forth.

A nice UI is good but I dont get it?

<comment><USER28> The attactiveness of Uber varies with regards to locality in the United States. Many cities have taxi systems which are _deeply_ non-functional:

a) So few taxis on the roads (because the laws forbid anyone from adding more) that it is virtually impossible to hail one, like San Francisco.

b) Drivers who habitually discriminate against customers by race, desired travel location, etc.

c) Routine fraud conducted by drivers over e.g. whether a payments mechanism which is legally required such as, say, the credit card machine is actually functioning or not. (Taxi drivers in the US prefer to be paid in cash because it makes fraud easier.)

By comparison, Uber is "You push a button. A car picks you up and drives you to your destination. You do not get cheated." This is a _severe competitive threat_ to taxis in many US cities, even at a hefty premium to what taxis are charging.

<comment><USER27> Hmmm, I am a big fan of Addison-Lee cabs, a firm that runs its own fleet, and well, just turns up. You can have an account or pay cash, they turn up, will drive my dad 30 miles into town or me 2 miles across.

They basically have been a severe competitive threat to local mini cab firms in London, and, well, no-one sued, they just upped the game or got out. I have not got into a cab recently that I did not book on the phone and where cabbies have a sat nav, a smartphone and never use the radio, just get jobs from their dashboard.

Is it just me being a bit astonished that it seems only one firm in the continental USA has thought "I know lets be better"

P.S.

An (ex-) Londoners perspective on your other points are amusing - <USER2> cabbie wants to be paid in cash, they are _famous_ for racisim and and you will _never_ get a taxi south of the river at this time on a Friday mate)

But the system works. As an infrequent New Yorker it seemed to work there.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> > The companies also charge the company discriminates against cancer patients > because it does not accept city coupons for discount rides for them.

Wow... nice play on cancer issue there. Very dirty too. One could argue that city discriminates against non-cancer patients by discounting only on specific illness. Since city is not controlling Uber, they are not forced to honour any city-issued coupons.

</comment><comment><USER30> I find it so depressing that traditional taxi company's wish to stifle inovation (which, as far as I can tell, is much loved), simply because they have failed to innovate themselves. IMO this is similar to the music industry and hollywood, where companies are 'stuck in their ways' and will desperately try to keep the status quo at the expense of the consumer. Where's the love?.

<comment><USER31> And cable companies and garbage collection and all the other industries that have been captured by organized crime, fraud, and cry like little babies whenever their comfy fiefdom is encroached upon. They're like siblings who whine, "Mommmmm!! Billy's on my side of the back seat!" Sheer territorial corruption.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> The only downside of Uber? Hailing a normal cab and walking out as if it's already paid for. I've done that twice since I started using Uber a few months ago. Embarrassing but funny stories :)

</comment><comment><USER33> Uber must be doing something right to get this kind of trouble.

<comment><USER34> The taxi regulators were always going to put up a fight and use whatever lobbying they could to nip them in the bud. The reality is that Uber have done a great job of ploughing on regardless. In Ireland and the UK, Hailo have managed to keep the taxi regulators on side and the taxi drivers love them. A bit like Spotify vs Napsters approach to the labels. Seems like the carrot works better than the stick!

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Why RICO? That is the part I don't quite get ...</comment>


Happy 1000 days to HN - <AUTHOR>

Thanks everyone, esp. pg, for all the great links and learning. I'm not sure we'd be on our development path without this backbone of like minds. To 1000 more days! <comment><USER2> Isn't 1024 days a more appropriate anniversary?

</comment><comment><USER3> Just as I looked forward to the "proper" millennium of 2001, I look forward to the "proper" "1000" celebration 24 days from now.

</comment><comment><USER4> Totally agree. This community is amazing. It is still the perfect place to separate the noise from the outside world. I hope to learn more from everyone here in the future.</comment>


Cryptography Behind the Turing Imitation Key (TIK) - e-sushi http://crypto.stackexchange.com/q/36966/12164 <comment><AUTHOR> I don't understand why a Stack Overflow question is posted here without any answers. What are we meant to see?</comment>