A Profile of Zoom CEO Eric Yuan - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonrad/2019/04/19/zoom-zoom-zoom-the-exclusive-inside-story-of-the-new-billionaire-behind-techs-hottest-ipo <comment><USER3> As a remote worker who is on video conferencing calls most of the day, I have a lot of experience (aka strong feelings) with the tools mentioned in the article;

\- Zoom is indeed great. Reliable and clean UI. Local recording to MP4 makes for easy sharing.

\- Webex is a bit less intuitive, but still reliable. Proprietary video recording protocol makes it video's hard to share.

\- Skype Business should die in a fire. Unreliable and terrible UI. The Mac version of it is pretty much broken. A lot of folks can't find out how to screen share.

\- BlueJean. Trying too hard to be fancy with their UI. They are also very proud with their Dolby Voice, but I find it harder to properly understand people (My hearing is not that great).

\- Google Hangouts / Meet doesn't work in Safari for no good reason IMHO. High CPU usage and could use some more features, like a personal room and default meetings settings (no vid/mute by default on join, default audio devices etc)

<comment><USER4> Google could clean up in this market. Hangouts is an abomination though, very unintuitive to use.

<comment><USER5> Google has lost all goodwill in this space in my opinion. They've built, sunsetted, and rebuilt multiple solutions for video conferencing and at this point who can trust them with putting out a long-term product?

<comment><USER6> Can you explain which ones? The only product I know of is Hangouts and Google is right now rolling out updated Hangouts which is a compatible upgrade?

(Having said that, Hangouts is far from perfect.)

<comment><USER7> Hangout, Allo, Duo, Google Voice, Gtalk, Meet, Wave... (list to be completed, there's probably a dozen more which died I don't remember).

<comment><USER8> Of this list, only Hangouts is a video conferencing application, is it not? Allo's primary goal was chat, Duo's is 1-1 interaction, GTalk is simply the older version of hangouts, and so on.

<comment><USER9> Or they could have built a single application which does both chat/audio/video.

<comment><USER10> Which was/is Hangouts?

<comment><USER9> I dont know, its so confusing with so many options from Google.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Personally, I don't think it can be understated how impactful Zoom's IPO is. Correct me if I'm wrong, but Eric Yuan is the first Asian billionaire created from running an American tech company. Others have come close (Justin Kan/Twitch, Tony Hsiehs/Zappos), but Eric is the first.

And I think this really marks the start of an increase in Asian/Indian- American entrepreneurs making waves in the upcoming decades. For all the talk about overrepresentation of Asian-Americans in tech, most are limited to technical/individual contributor/engineering roles. Very little Asian representation in management/executive roles, but it's quickly rising. Andrew Chen, Connie Chan @ a16z. Jessica Lee @ Sequoia.

I'm Asian-American, grew up in SV (currently in college). An explanation for the pattern I described above is that my and most of friend's parents are immigrants from Asia. Often went to the top universities in their country, and came to US for graduate school, then work for the big tech companies.

And so for them, they weren't able to take any risk - they were there to settle down and start a family. But the new generation of Asian-Americans go to these top colleges, and are able to have the ambition to do entrepreneurship. I'm extremely excited and optimistic to see more AA representation in startups and driving real-world impact.

<comment><USER12> Some others not mentioned yet:

\- Sehat Sutardja and Weili Dai of Marvell

\- Koguan Leo and Thai Lee of SHI

\- Jayshree Ullal of Arista

\- David Sun and John Tu of Kingston

\- Min Kao of Garmin

\- Romesh Wadhwani of STG

\- Vinod Khosla of Sun/KPCB/Khosla Ventures

\- Niraj Shah of Wayfair

\- Ram Shriram of Netscape/Amazon/Google

<comment><USER13> He's not a billionaire but Steve Chen was a co-founder of YouTube.

<comment><USER14> Would definitely bet Steve Chen is near billionaire status now if he joined Google 2006 and stayed for a bunch of years. Google stock and stock market generally has done very well in that time period (minus 2009-10)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> The US made Eric attempt to get a visa eight times before he was finally successful. We should be poaching the world's talent belligerently, strategically, handing out citizenship and saying thank you for choosing our country over others. Instead, the clowns in Washington DC make the best and brightest go through hell just to come here and contribute. Only either a malevolent or incompetent government would sabotage its own nation in such a manner.

Were I briefly king, one of the first things I'd do is task the Federal Reserve to create a large 'steal the talent fund' (by another name) and set out on draining the world of as much talent as possible. I'd use clever funding programs to make it easier for the best to move to and transition to the US. A tiny bit of inflation in exchange for a massive long-term return. The rest of the world would in part pay - via the international holdings of dollars - for my program to steal their own best and brightest.

Every graduate of a major US university gets automatic citizenship. The best scientists, engineers, doctors, and so on, I'd want all of them. I'd do almost anything it takes to get them to my shores. Half of everything America is in its wealth or accomplishments, spanning two centuries now, is owed to brave immigrants that chose to abandon a life elsewhere and seek opportunity here at great risk. It's hard to comprehend the enormity of the mistake that is the US immigration system. We don't even take a neutral approach, we take a make-it- difficult approach.

<comment><USER16> " We should be poaching the world's talent belligerently" \- this is hard to identify. Sometimes not, but most often, yes.

"Every graduate of a major US university gets automatic citizenship." This basically means Universities are in the business of selling cheap citizenship. So, no.

Most importantly: " I'd do is task the Federal Reserve to create a large 'steal the talent fund'"

Wow. I hope you don't mean that! There are 1000 initiatives the gov. wants to be involved , we just don't print money willy nilly!

<comment><USER16> I should add: yes, 'getting talent' is a good initiative, of course! And it should be facilitated by the government mostly in terms of 'smart immigration reform' \- I don't think there needs to be a 'fund'. Private enterprise can definitely 'fund' that by hiring people.

I think if the H1 programme we re-thought so that it was not abused - <USER2> there were some kind of 'path to citizenship' in some cases that would be ideal. So long as it's managed properly.

I think the key here is 'intelligent policy' that works well with private enterprise, not a big spend.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> > Each time users logged on to a Webex conference, the company's systems would > have to identify which version of the product (iPhone, Android, PC or Mac) > to run, which slowed things down.

are all executives really that clueless about tech or do they say those dumb things to target investors that they know are clueless about the tech?

<comment><USER18> There was probably some error in communication on this. Or they really are talking about shaving milliseconds.

<comment><USER19> Identifying the device is probably on the order of nano to microseconds.

<comment><USER20> In present day yes, but 5-10 years ago when you went to download the client their web interface didnt know what OS you were running, it would prompt and ask you to download either the .dmg or .exe

<comment><USER21> Anecdote: Sometime last week, I was given a Skype for Business link to login from my Linux laptop. Since regular Skype works fine on my Linux laptop, I thought this would be ok. Wonder of wonders, it wanted me to download and install an MSI :)

<comment><USER22> Please note: "Skype for Business" is _an entirely different program_ from Skype. They are completely unrelated.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> I still don't understand how 1\. Companies are paying so much for their software. How much do they charge for licensing to make so much money? 2\. They intend to defend their position from competitors 3\. How they will ever grow to justify a PE ratio of 2,123.29!!!

I actually use their software and love it, but do they really have a secret sauce that won't be copied soon?

<comment><USER24> The secret sauce for Zoom seems to reliability. For some reason it just always works, independent of how many people join the call (we have calls with more than 100 people calling in independently), which OS you use (most of us use Linux, but also Android, Windows, macOS and iOS). It just always works, in the last two years I had zero problems with it, no idea how they do it.

<comment><USER25> Last I checked Zoom avoids using WebRTC in favor of using media over websockets. This should obviate a lot of the reliability problems with enterprise networks that you would normally need to solve with STUN/TURN/ICE.

I think the other thing they do is decrease the image quality when multiple people are simultaneously connected. This is a nice hack since you don't really notice the difference, and users blame bad images on the network not the product.

The biggest challenge to their business IMO is if/when WebRTC becomes stable between all browsers. There are still many kinks that need to be worked out. Everything falls apart in the P2P version when you have more than like 5 people connected as the amount of information that needs to be transferred across the network scales exponentially.[0] So you need to add a gateway and connect everyone over a single pipe.

[0]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe%27s_law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe%27s_law)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> I'm surprised at how big Zoom became. Video conferencing is a competitive market and other players in the space were spending a lot on sales to get all the big clients.

Microsoft, for example, has a lot of deep integrations of Skype for Business with the Office suite and I'd imagine they'd make it compelling for their enterprise customers (who I'd imagine is the main user of video conferencing) to use it.

How did they win the market in the face of competition from all these large players?

<comment><USER27> I think it's very similar to how Trello made an impact in their segment. After a point, simplicity is what literally what people want. You can check the customer acquisition page of WebEx and Zoom and you'd know the difference of how easy it's for someone to get started with Zoom and set up a webinar or video conference.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> > I'm surprised at how big Zoom became. Video conferencing is a competitive > market and other players in the space were spending a lot on sales to get > all the big clients.

Focus on sales is what doomed other video conferencing. Sales in such context usually means they focused on convuncing some exec to buy the product, who inevitably used it personally not that much.

Zoom seems to have focused on tech and end user experience.

<comment><USER29> Totally agree on experience--hardware competitors were $3000+ systems with terrible interfaces resembling DVRs from the late 90's. It seemed for corporate conferencing, the competition was sort of diffuse, with many being rigid and expensive hardware sets from Cisco, Polycom, and not just Skype/Bluejeans/Google Hangouts.

Zoom had great value, they took advantage of existing tech so that companies could set up reliable conferencing gear for a fraction of the cost, using a cheap PC, an iPad for the remote, a Bluetooth speaker, and a generic webcam.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> It's shocking how FAANGS have not utterly dominated what should be a utility market by now. Shame on them - not for 'not doing a good job' but for arguably getting in everyone else's way with crap. I'm thinking of you Skype. It really goes to show how inefficient things can be when there is not product focus, and tons of money coming in from some other division.

<comment><USER30> Part of what makes FAANG so profitable is ignoring the supposedly not- profitable segments.

Combine this with the dominance of Cisco and Microsoft and you have big giants who don't see enough money to complete with other giants.

So the insurgent player is the only one who breaks through.

btw, doesn't Amazon have a similar software (Chime?). So they are competing but only really recently.

<comment><USER16> I think there is definitely enough money to interest MS and Cisco, as we see with MS's move to compete with Slack.

MS, more than any company is very well positioned for this - they have the relationships and sales force.

Cisco has that, but in kind of another way.

Google has the tech, but they need 'Enterprise Oriented Product Management' \- which they don't quite have, and a kind of Enterprise Sales, which they don't quite have.

Their Cloud offer has suffered due to this, granted, that's a much bigger nut to crack, with other kinds of overlapping issues.

I think if Bezos, or another CEO decided it should be a focus, it would be.

I don't think Salesforce is hot on this area yet, but it wouldn't surprise me if eventually they did, as Benioff seems to be keen to extend horizontally, and they are good at integrating stuff.

Good on Zoom though, I hope VC's take note and back quality efforts in classical markets.

<comment><USER30> No I'm saying FAANG (ie, not Microsoft or Cisco) don't want to jump in to compete with MS/Cisco who already have strong offerings.

Amazon have an offering, but it's relatively recent (last year?).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Zoom is a great example of how it is possible to enter a saturated space with big players and carve a growing slice of the user base by providing better UX and technical execution.

Inspiring.

</comment><comment><USER32> Is there any competitive comparison on what underlying technology and codec/compression the various video conferencing players use? Does one have better quality/datarate than others?

<comment><USER33> I do not have the metrics / data required but in my very limited experience, I can confirm zoom does the video conferencing / remote troubleshooting better than webex. That, while Webex is also good at what it does, zoom feels slightly better.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> The only issue I have ever had with Zoom is that sometimes dial-in audio users have terrible audio quality and drop outs. I was never able to get their support to resolve it.

</comment><comment><USER35> Zoom is a useful tool, competition is always healthy!

</comment><comment><USER36> Recently switched from Zoom to Jitsi. FLOSS and much, much simpler.

<comment><USER37> Jitsi is buggy. CPU usage is unnecessarily large. I dislike everything about Jitsi.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Time for a change or JFDI? - <AUTHOR> I want to get started working on a startup idea and will be the primary developer. My webdev skills are a little dated (I'm currently using Backbone.js + Python). I'm considering re-skilling before attempting this new project but am concerned that will cause me to lose momentum..<p>Wondering if anybody else has pushed forward with an less than ideal technology stack and regretted it? Success stories also welcome.. <comment><USER2> The less than ideal technology stack isn't the one you master, but the one you don't.

Learning to do the basics in a different way can be exciting and fun for a while. You read blog posts and tutorials that have beautiful layouts and are made by people who write snazzy things on Twitter. Clearly this is a project where cool people hang out.

Then you have to get to work, and suddenly you're having to google everything you previously knew how to do. So maybe someone from the cool gang can help you? You get into a rather fascinating discussion about framework internals, and even start considering that you could perhaps contribute something to this project...

Meanwhile in the real world, you had an actual project to do, but tinkering with the new stack has taken all your time so far. I've seen this play out too many times. Wanting to learn the new thing is 99% about trying to avoid the real work which will inevitably be boring at some point.

</comment><comment><USER3> What is it that you think is wrong with your current stack?

If it is just that it is no longer fashionable, that is not a good reason.

For everyone who has trouble using older tools, there is somebody who tries something new and goes through hell because of that.

<comment><AUTHOR> Mostly backbone.js and my frontend development workflow. I've not really kept up with the grunt / yeoman / bower side of things.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> You will have a lot of other things on your plate that don't involve an unfamiliar stack. Experience is more important to delivering reliably. If you're grabbing at new stuff without a hard requirement, the external conclusion is that you are trying to self-sabotage by distracting from business problems.</comment>


Show HN: I've always wanted an Uber Android widget - <AUTHOR> https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.factorialproducts.uberwidget

<comment><USER2> it would be cool if you could set a time in the future that you want an uber and it will alert you when one is really close</comment>


Developers talk about how they use Mithril.js - <AUTHOR> https://carlmungazi.github.io/sourcecodeadventures/posts/rasmus-interview <comment><USER2> Great talk, best Js framework!</comment>


Ask HN: What's the best way to reach niche audiences with a budget of $30? - <AUTHOR> I'm working on a fiction writing software, an idea which a few different fiction writers have independently identified as something that would really help them when writing their stories.
However, before I commit to building it, I want to reach a wider base of fiction writers to figure out whether this is something that would sell, and also to get feedback on early mockups and beta versions so that I'm building the right thing.
Communities generally have an anti-advertising policy, which is great, but obviously inconvenient for me.
If anyone here is a fiction writer, you can check it out at https://tapestryhq.com. You can reach me at my first name (habib) at the domain. Get in touch if you'd like to be an early user; I'm willing to give a large discount in exchange for feedback (although pricing is undecided at this point). <comment><USER2> Here are some immediate thoughts:

\- $0: Sign up for Bing and Google free adwords credit - There is usually some promotion or other that gives you $$$s. Research SEO, long tail keywords etc. and forming a comprehensive list of keywords to test (before rinsing the credit). Target the early adopters for a beta program with it.

\- $0: Give 6 months free to Youtubers that are willing to give an unbiased review - I.e. 'influencers'. Repeat for any specific bloggers you can find. They often have valuable feedback.

\- $0: Create examples yourself with the platform (or convince other people to test it out). You can engage people a) by showing the value of the system or b) with the story itself. You need to get some high-quality content generated on that platform to entice people in. The people that will stick with you and provide constant feedback will also be your first customers and your biggest fans.

\- $0: Find all of the literature and writing subreddits and communities. Message the administrators asking if you can a) ask for feedback and b) self- promote. If a and b is ok, then promote in that subreddit. If only a is ok, then use that subreddit first for gathering feedback before self-promoting elsewhere.

\- $0: Find all of the 'promotion' subreddits (e.g. /r/shameless plug), websites etc. This might net you one or two users, but it is not the most valuable avenue

\- $0: Stay active in as many relevant communities as possible, just being a valuable part of the conversation. This might result in leads or other valuable stakeholders being found

\- $0: Write articles (genuinely insightful content, not blog spam) on the theory behind the software, share on social media, ask for feedback.

\- $~~: Attend meetup.com meetups for literature and writing in your city, and exchange ideas. This may result in improvement suggestions, or actual customers.

\- $30: Donate it to a literacy or eyesight charity

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you.</comment></comment>


A person has died from a vaping-related condition - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2019/08/23/vape-lung-has-claimed-its-first-victim-and-the-cdc-is-investigating/ <comment><USER2> I'm guessing that if this really is associated with vaping then it's likely due to the limited regulation of the ingredients. Bad batch of VG/PG/nicotine? Some problematic flavouring?

I think the best article I've found is at the BMJ: [https://www.bmj.com/content/366/bmj.l5228](https://www.bmj.com/content/366/bmj.l5228) \- sorry, paywall. Very much inconslusive at the moment completely in the public health triage stage.

Good idea to regulate it properly. I just stopped vaping after a 20 year intermittent tobacco problem + 5 years of vaping[1]. Stopping vaping is massively easier than giving up cigarettes in my experience.

[1] for almost that entire time I just went unflavoured. Less hassle and less potential for contaminants.

<comment><USER3> Similar story here. Smoked for ten years. Actually found it easy to replace smoking with vaping (strong menthol). Stopped vaping after 1 year because I was suffering from GERD and suspected that vaping was an attributing factor. Since I stopped 5 years ago, my GERD symptoms have more or less disappeared.

I really enjoyed vaping, probably more than smoking, but somehow it did not seem to have the same addictive effect on me as smoking had. I did not find it that hard to stop cold turkey.

<comment><USER2> I stuck with it for 5 years because I was paranoid about relapse to cigarettes. Spent a couple of weeks in countries where vaping is illegal as a dry run, earlier this year, and then just waited for the juice to run out.

The addictive effect of nicotine seems much enhanced by the addition of a monoamine oxidase compound (ie related to the early antidepressant drugs) - which is present in burning tobacco - which seems to take nicotine from approximately as addictive as caffeine to more addictive than heroin (citation available).

<comment><USER4> Not trying to call you out, but would you mind sharing? That coincides generally with what I've read.

<comment><USER2> there's references elsewhere on this thread.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> So I've been saying something like this for years now. HOW do we know something is not going wrong without any long term/clinical data (ESPECIALLY around these custom flavours that people sometimes roll out themselves)?

I think it's completely presumptuous when people tout vaping as being much safer than cigarettes. We didn't all wake up one day knowing smoking was bad - it was a long road filled with politics, science and data.

Vaping is in its infancy and already people's mantras sound like old Camel commercials.

<comment><USER6> We have to weight a complex set of circumstances:

\- smoking is an exceptionally harmful habit, so just by coming up with any other activity at random one is likely to end up healthier

\- this also means advising smokers to switch to vaping even without knowing the health effects of vaping makes sense \- marketing vaping to non-smokers should be severely limited though

\- marketing vaping to kids like juul does, should be downright illegal

<comment><USER7> > marketing vaping to kids like juul does

do/did they actually do this? I did a quick Google search and I can find a lot of articles making this claim but the only evidence given is that they have twenty-somethings and bright colors in their ads. if this is "marketing to kids", then that bar seems awfully low.

<comment><USER8> > Last summer, with public concern about teenage vaping growing, Juul Labs > paid a charter school organization in Baltimore $134,000 to set up a five- > week summer camp to teach children healthy lifestyles.

> The curriculum was created by Juul — maker of the very vaping devices that > were causing the most alarm among parents, health experts and public > officials.

> In April 2017, a Juul representative visited the Dwight School in New York > City to meet with students — with no teachers present — and told them the > company's e-cigarettes were "totally safe."

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/25/health/juul-teens- vaping....](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/25/health/juul-teens-vaping.html)

<comment><USER7> >> In April 2017, a Juul representative visited the Dwight School in New York City to meet with students — with no teachers present — and told them the company's e-cigarettes were "totally safe."

this one is pretty damning, but it's only one occurrence. I doubt NYT would have held back if they had any more such anecdotes to offer.

as for the rest of the article, the education programs seem a bit sketchy, but they could just as easily be a poorly conceived PR campaign.

<comment><USER9> > but they could just as easily be a poorly conceived PR campaign.

We have decades of experience with terrible tobacco and alcohol companies and that's pretty persuasive that Juul knew what they were doing and didn't care.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> > As the mechanism is unknown, it's unclear what the actual danger is. Is it > some byproduct of the nicotine cartidges, or THC ones? Is it the vapor > itself? Is it only at certain temperatures or concentrations? Is it directly > affecting the lungs or entering the bloodstream? No one knows yet — all > they've seen is an sudden uptick in respiratory or pulmonary issues where > the sufferer also uses vaping products.

We've seen a few studies suggesting certain flavoring agents may cause significant problems, has this been investigated as a possible cause?

<comment><USER11> Another vector of harm to consider —

Keep in mind that "vapor" is used to disguise that, in all cases whether nicotine or pot or etc, people are heating up a substance to its smoke point and inhaling that smoke. They use "vapor" because it sounds like "water vapor" - which is harmless - but it's definitely not that.

Marijuana cartridges use marijuana oil or MCT oil as a base, for example. Nicotine uses glycol or other substances.

We have very little data on consuming glycol and/or MCT oil smoke. It's possible that it clogs up the lungs in a way that takes hours to heal _per inhalation_ , and so we're simply seeing smoke inhalation deaths as we would from an oil factory burning for weeks or something.

(We have limited data on marijuana extract smoke - cold-processed oil is a new-ish innovation, compared to resin which is high in impurities and not easy to consume in significant quantities like marijuana oil apparently is.)

<comment><USER12> > Keep in mind that "vapor" is used to disguise that, in all cases whether > nicotine or pot or etc, people are heating up a substance to its smoke point > and inhaling that smoke. They use "vapor" because it sounds like "water > vapor" - which is harmless - but it's definitely not that.

This is not true. It's producing an aerosol, partially by condensation of vapor produced by heating the glycerine and propylene glycol mixture to its boiling point.

It isn't combusting, at least not when everything is working the way that it should, and so is not properly a "smoke".

<comment><USER13> There are also "coils" that vibrate to create vapour which happens at room temperature.

<comment><USER14> This is interesting. Do you know what this technology is called?

I also wonder whether it's more efficient in terms of battery use.

<comment><USER15> _> Do you know what this technology is called?_

Ultrasonic atomization. It's used widely in manufacturing for applying thin- film coatings, because it provides a very consistent and controllable spray of very fine droplets. The technology has been applied to vaping by Usonicig, but it's not hugely popular - most people prefer warm vapour.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> "Vaping" can often mean people filling mod boxes (not Juuls) with any sort of juice containing anything. Articles and studies often include any random juice in any random shop, so there are endless unknowns.

Juuls and many other pens contain limited ingredients, namely nicotine and propylene glycol. We already know what nicotine does.

Propylene glycol is food safe and is also used in albuterol asthma inhalers.

<comment><USER17> Vaping fumes trigger my asthma, there is all sorts of stuff in the second hand smoke. The smoking ban in the UK basically stopped me being admitted to hospital every few years and I appreciate that most bars/clubs have banned vaping inside (certainly in London).

<comment><USER18> I vape and I'm with you in that we cannot just assume it's benign. You do have to be careful of some studies which have shown things like Formaldehyde though as the conditions (far too hot, burning cotton, etc.) we just wrong.

That said, would excessive water vapor trigger an attack? Water based fog machines have been known to[1], but are harmless for most people. The flavorings can add all sorts of bad crap though.

[1]: [https://acaai.org/resources/connect/ask-allergist/fog- machin...](https://acaai.org/resources/connect/ask-allergist/fog-machines-and- asthma)

<comment><USER17> I don't really know about fog machines. I've certainly had asthma in an environment with fog machines but people were also smoking and that's a definite trigger.

I was on a train a few years ago and had a very weird rapid-onset asthma attack while sitting down. I could feel something weird in the air and taste something very bitter. I looked around and someone was vaping behind me. You're not allowed to vape on UK trains so I guess they turned the "smoke" down? There was no visible cloud. Could easily be a coincidence but the lack of regulation for the "carrier" chemicals is a bit worrying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Meh. Even if they kill 100,000 Americans per year, that would probably be one of the greatest public health wins in history.

<comment><USER20> And suppose it's 1 million lives per year after a 10-year ramp-up period?

<comment><USER21> Just like smoking it's important that those 10yrs have context around the deaths, assuming they ramp up, it's not just all vape usage = high risk. It's how you use it too.

I personally quit smoking cigarettes and moved from 24mg->3mg of nicotine over a few months (with zero withdrawl symptoms). 3mg is about as low as you can go. You can't do that with smoking cigarettes, "light" cigarettes is mostly just a flavour profile with only small differences in health and nicotine levels.

With cigarettes there were plenty of people who smoked a pack or two a day, those people on a 20yr span are at a higher risk. You see some people who smoke these massive vape clouds and they smoke constantly with high nicotine counts + high heat. Those are all voluntary options and the devices/juice is getting better with time.

Currently nicotine salts are taking over in vape shops, which are smaller devices, smaller amounts of liquid but higher nicotine-liquid ratios, and they have a much smaller exhale clouds which I find easier on the chest and way less anti-social when outside (the exhaled cloud is 10-50% of the size of a normal cigarette, and way smaller than traditional vapes).

Finally, there's second-hand smoke. There was a study showing vape smoke creates extremely small or non-existent second-hand transmission compared to cigarettes. Cigarette smoke stays in the air in a inhale-able state far longer.

> According to Drexel University toxicology expert Igor Burstyn, while the > contents of e-cig vapor inhaled by users "justifies surveillance," there is > so little contamination in exhaled vapor that there is unlikely to be any > risk.

[https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1...](https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2458-14-18)

^ This is a big deal for anyone who grew up with a parent who smoked around them like I did.

<comment><USER22> It's hard to get enthusiastic about something deadly and noxious just because it's less noxious than something truly awful.

Walking behind someone who was vaping recently is one of the least pleasant experiences I've had for a while.

<comment><USER21> A whole lot of society and social policy is about lesser of evils. It's about being realistic and practical. Which is something far more policy should be conscious of, instead of some idealistic perfect world you wish to impose on other people.

Not to mention people could just as quickly harm themselves going to a 7/11 every day to eat carbs or driving a motorcycle or drinking alcohol or engaging in 'extreme' sports. But we people do those things anyway even though there's plenty of science to show it's dumb.

Especially if those 'evils' are a) entirely non-violent and voluntary only affecting the individual and b) are not going away ala drugs and the giant shift towards harm reduction.

People seem to be mixing up the growing pains of a extremely fast-growing new industry and the long-term realities once the legal, health, business, and administrative systems mature and adapt. The rush to immediately ban everything, well before we fully understand it and/or have experimented with less freedom/fun-destroying strategies, while also accurate measures of usage and risk, doesn't help anyone.

I will admit though, the 'think of the kids' people are making quite an effective stir.

<comment><USER23> > Not to mention people could just as quickly harm themselves going to a 7/11 > every day to eat carbs or driving a motorcycle or drinking alcohol or > engaging in 'extreme' sports.

Motorcycling feels odd in that list of otherwise self-inflicted harms.

Sure, one can run into brick wall in a solo accident. But, often it's someone else that kills the motorcyclist.

<comment><USER24> Technicality. You're still putting yourself into a situation that's known to have a high likelihood of resulting in your serious injury or death.

You're talking like if you were to run across a live gun range and get shot it's not really your fault, but instead it was the shooter that killed you.

That may be technically true but you knew the risks were basically a certainty and chose to do it anyway.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I don't smoke or vape. I think the world is way better off vaping than smoking. I certainly do hope whatever caused this is discovered. I would hate to see more cigarettes light up again.

I'm guessing (and hoping) that more regulation will come down on the vaping industry to make sure whatever oils or additives are controlled so that we can prevent this from happening with future additives they discover.

</comment><comment><USER26> It's waaaaaaaayyyyy early to blame this on "vape lung". Always be skeptical of people who have an agenda to eliminate something.

<comment><USER27> Radium. Cigarettes. Asbestos.

We've seen it plenty of times when a product comes out and people with an agenda to make money off it say "buy this, it works" and then decades later it is discovered to have been toxic or harmful in some way.

Especially given the nature of this product, skepticism should be the default position.

<comment><USER28> Remember when the news constantly threw out countless articles about cell phones causing brain cancer? Remember, fear sells ads, so we should also be very skeptical of articles like these.

<comment><USER27> Because skepticism turns out to sometimes be unwarranted we should be skeptical of skepticism?

You can't have it both ways.

<comment><USER29> Parent poster is talking about fearmongering. Fearmongering isn't skepticism.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I'd worry about the excipients (e.g. PGA). Several molecular weights are deemed GRAS ("Generally Recognized As Safe") thus their use is unregulated (of course as bulk polymers, "molecular weight" is really just the fat part of the distribution).

The problem is at point of use: the vehicle is vaporized by a simple heated nichrome wire. This fractionates and agglomerates the polymers resulting in a completely different distribution of polymer weights. The results of which aren't being analyzed.

</comment><comment><USER31> I'm less interested in speculation and more interested in the CDCs claims once it's investigation has been concluded. Please do note that the claim specifically posits _there exists a cluster of illnesses associated with vaping_ and that one person has died from it- not that only one person had ever had this disease. This makes it interesting. I hope the cause can be founds soon, given The popularity of vaping in teens.

</comment><comment><USER32> "We do know that e-cigarettes do not emit a harmless aerosol," he explained. "There's a variety of harmful ingredients identified, including things like ultrafine particulates, heavy metals like lead and cancer causing chemicals. And flavoring used in e-cigarettes to give it a buttery flavor, diacetyl, it's been related to severe respiratory illness."

"People often assume that these e-liquids are a final product once they are mixed. But the reactions create new molecules"

</comment><comment><USER33> I smoked cigarettes for about 25 years and switched to vaping about 5 years ago. My anecdata is it's the flavorings which are most harmful. I had a pretty consistent cough from cigarettes which got a little better after switching to vapes, but it really depended on the flavor. Some flavors were much more harsh and the cough would return. It didn't go away until I switched to completely unflavored juice.

</comment><comment><USER34> However you look at this the take away from it all should be: Get a vape and liquid from a large reputable supplier (keep receipts) and should we suddenly find that this is the next product to have warning and danger signs slapped all over due to health concerns, you have a large reputable supplier you can sue, ala the original tobacco scandals.

<comment><USER35> I perceive that this is the take-away: don't, just don't.

<comment><USER34> Indeed, a qualifier of "If you are going too..." was a given, but yes, the don't do it holds.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> How about putting a ban on smoking of all sorts? Seems pretty straightforward.

<comment><USER37> Awesome, can't wait to replicate the resounding successes of alcohol and drug prohibition. Alcohol usage dropped to zero throughout the 1920s and there were no unintended consequences right?

<comment><USER36> Strawman fallacy. Just ban smoking outdoors (like how it's banned indoors in public places).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Is vaping using things like DynaVap safer than other types of vaporizers?

<comment><USER39> Likely nobody can say with any amount of certainty.

There are vaporizers and liquids to treat very cautiously. Many materials you could make a vaporizer and especially the heating assembly would include hazardous offgassing.

Likewise you would want to be very careful about knowing the source and content of liquids. They are essentially unregulated.

Strangers on the internet selling you ingest to make a small amount of money are not particularly trustworthy.

<comment><USER40> The DynaVap is a dry herb vaporiser. No liquids involved. As such, I'd assume it's as safe as whatever you put in it.

<comment><USER39> The materials it is made of will still vaporize themselves a bit and what they are and how it is constructed still can have health impacts. Not that they will or won't, but that they could and it's hard to trust anyone.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Worth noting that the author makes a significant claim without any citation:

> That vaping works as a way to quit smoking... seems clear.

Studies have been fairly limited so far, given the recency of e-cigarettes (relative to science's timescale). And the studies that we have seem pretty mixed: some showing benefit over other accepted smoking cessation methods, some not. Some showing higher relapse rates in the e-cigarette group. Nothing about that seems clear to me.</comment>


Bejeweled in HTML5 - <AUTHOR> http://bejeweled.popcap.com/html5/0.9.12.9490/html5/Bejeweled.html

<comment><AUTHOR> both Canvas or WebGL depending on your browser.</comment>


The Real Hazards of E-Devices on Planes - <AUTHOR> http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/30/f-a-a-rules-make-electronic-devices-on-planes-dangerous

<comment><USER3> I found this 2005 paper from NASA's Langley Research Center [1]. The report says that the data "confirms this expectation [of interference] with alarming clarity", though it is completely based off crew reports _attributing_ a problem to a device in use. It also uses data from 1986-1999, both airplanes and devices have improved a lot since.

In addition, most of the incidents in the annual report on electronic devices [2] are of the kind "passenger X refused to turn off his mobile phone / [random problem here] crew suspects passenger in the bathroom using his laptop as culprit".

Why can't gov. agencies or airplane manufacturers create an test that mimicks real-world conditions and put a definitive end to the question?

[1] [http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/2005023...](http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20050232846_2005233838.pdf)

[2] <http://asrs.arc.nasa.gov/docs/rpsts/ped.pdf>

<comment><USER4> _Why can't gov. agencies or airplane manufacturers create an test that mimicks real-world conditions and put a definitive end to the question?_

Agreed. Just to a broadband jamming experiment to see what leaks in. A mil- spec style shielding might be expensive (this is the argument a pilot made to me- as if planes are cheap), but we could at least _test_ , and possibly approve some designs.

OTOH, turning off devices for a few minutes isn't really a big concern for me. But I dislike the "it's ok to be ignorant" attitude by the rule-makers.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> The FAA is being ridiculous about this.

However...there's literally nothing I find more aggravating than flying - because of other passengers. Every flight, there's always a handful of people who refuse to follow the simple rules. Their carry-on is too big. They switch seats or use the lavatories when they are supposed to be seated and buckled- in. They don't re-adjust their seats when landing. They grab their carry-on while the plane is taxiing.

I always feel horrible for the flight attendants. It feels like they are running a day care. Why are people like that? Are they stupid and don't understand the rules? Or do they think the rules don't apply to them?

<comment><USER6> > _Why are people like that? Are they stupid and don't understand the rules? > Or do they think the rules don't apply to them?_

Speaking for myself, I have no respect for authority that does not stem from experience, knowledge, wisdom, etc. Air hosts/hostesses have none of those attributes - they are merely parrotting rules handed down to them, without putting any thought into them.

A case in point is the electronic devices rule - clearly nonsensical and stupid. I take it as a good sample of the sense in the other rules being imposed, and therefore revert to my default mode of operation, that applies in most circumstances, unless overridden by someone who appears to deserve to have the power to tell me what to do. In other words, I do what I think is sensible, reasonable.

Therefore, yes, I do check my emails before the plane has finished moving and even (gosh!) before the passport gates. I do grab my bag at the first opportunity (though it's usually pointless to do so before the plane has stopped moving - but then it's reason that's stopping me, not rules). I do fit as much as I can get away with into my bag (which generally weighs more than 5kg - but is usually compact and easy to stow because I value those attributes).

In other words, I act like the free, responsible human being that I am, and no, I don't care one whit for "the rules" except where I have analysed them and deemed them sensible myself.

Here's some good news for you: "the rules" don't apply to you either - <USER2> unless you want them to.

<comment><USER7> And this is why we can't have nice things. "The rules," as you so aptly scare- quote, are not there solely to govern the actions of a single human being. They are there so that the system, as a whole, functions. A word exists for this: society. Unless the rule is unjust, you are not the final arbiter of whether or not a rule should be followed. What you find sensible and reasonable may not actually _be_ sensible and reasonable beyond first glance.

Yes, this rule appears to be monumentally stupid. However, another person in this very thread has raised a good (though possibly misinformed) point regarding frequency intermod. Sometimes we simply can't test all circumstances and the FAA has made a (potentially dumb) judgement call in favor of overwhelming paranoia for safety instead of letting people fling colored birds at green pigs below 10,000 feet.

Being free does not give you license to discard that which you, in your own self, deem insensible when you are existing in a space where anyone but yourself exists. You operate in a world with billions of other humans, each with competing goals and diverging motivations. The least you can do is play by the rules that we, as a group, have decided are the compromise.

As a bit of site commentary, I notice your post getting more and more grey as people remove points because they disagree. In this instance, I added a point because, though I disagree, I think that your post is a useful addition to the commentary.

<comment><USER8> I'd personally love it if society had more people like swombat, rather than fewer.

Of course, there is a risk when choosing to ignore rules that you are ignoring them because they you are an inconvenience to you but are generally good for society. Government incented/enforced vaccination would be a good example of such a reasonable though possibly annoying rule. I totally concede that point, and hence, individuals need to be especially mindful about their own self serving biases when choosing to disobey rules.

But on the other hand, imagine if rules that effected tens of millions of people all had scientific studies about their tradeoffs, their risks, and their efficiency. How much less bullshit would we have to deal with?

I think lots of big innovation is done by rule breakers. It's exactly what pg talks about in point 4 about wanting founders who are naughty.

[1] <http://www.paulgraham.com/founders.html>

<comment><USER9> > I'd personally love it if society had more people like swombat, rather than > fewer.

You might feel differently if you lived next to a rule breaker who had no concept of noise nuisance.

 _"The Collector Collector"_ (Tibor Fischer) is a fun read; relevant here because he describes quite nicely the sense of entitlement that some criminals feel.

<comment><USER6> > _You might feel differently if you lived next to a rule breaker who had no > concept of noise nuisance._

I'm sure he would. As it happens, I am not typically a noise creator - but you are, today, downvoting my post and then replying to it within a minute of me posting it. I've kindly returned the favour.

<comment><USER9> I did not down the post you replied to. I did downvote the your post that first replied to. I up voted the post where you said that you're not rude to airline staff.

EDIT:

> _replying to it within a minute of me posting_

Timestamps disagree with you.

<comment><USER6> s/a minute/a few minutes/

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There are two issues going on simultaneously.

I suggest the following experiment. Take your hand-held two-way radio transmitter to Dayton Ohio during the annual ham convention there. Tune it to a 2 meter frequency, and just listen for half an hour. You will hear vast quantities of intermodulation--signals that aren't really there, and signals that are there that are hopelessly garbled.

This is happening because there are hundreds of similar transmitters all over the hamfest that are transmitting simultaneously. The intermodulation distortion comes about because when a radio receiver, half of your two-way radio, receives multiple signals these signals combine in the receiver and produce distortion signals that are the sum and difference of two frequencies. So with many multiples of frequencies that are rather strong, there are a host of fake signals going to your earphone.

Each device, such as an iPad, iPhone, android device, has multiple radio transmitters. Some of them are deliberate radio transmitters, such as the wi- fi or the cellular radio. Others are the side effect of the receivers that are built in to the devices, such as the GPS. Receivers themselves actually transmit, albeit at a smaller level. Similarly, if you have a transistor am/fm radio receiver, it generates (transmits) a signal as well.

Other unintentional transmitters are the clock for any CPU that might be there.

So on an airplane, if there are tens or hundreds of devices, you get a real mass of interfering signals.

How does this affect the avionics of the airplane? Well, you won't hear a heterodyne, as there is no audio output--just some instrument reading. What happens when the avionics hears intermodulation distortion?

As to the idea that two hundred ipads are just like one, the claim that _"Electromagnetic energy doesn't add up like that," said Kevin Bothmann, the EMT Labs testing manager_ doesn't square with simple physics. Another article quoting this lab study suggested that he was confused by the difference between decibels and power levels. I argue that it adds up worse. Check out Dayton.

The article says _None of those episodes have produced scientific evidence that a device can harm a plane's operation. Reports of such interference have been purely speculation by pilots about the cause of a problem._ The thing is, that speculation about problems in the air by experienced aircraft operators is the only clue that we have just up to the point where people die. As was the case in the Tenerife air disaster, _three second long whistling sound (or heterodyne)_ blocked a very key bit of information.

The way we learn if a pilot's suspicion is true is for people to die in aircraft accidents.

So the second problem is for the cellular phones. Keep in mind that cellular phones depend upon line-of-sight. If you are walking down Jackson avenue to meet a friend at Intellegensia for coffee, your line of sight to the cellular towers is limited. So how far is the line of sight away if you are at 20,000 feet? Quite a ways. Possibly the next state. For every cell tower that your phone can "see", there is the possibility of a connection. Not a good idea to tie up that many cellular tower channels.

It will be interesting to see how this battle plays out. If the current FAA rules are right that passengers should not be transmitting during take off and landing and the social pressure causes the rules to change, the only way we will know is when a plane falls out of the sky, since we aren't giving pilots complaining about heterodynes any credibility.

<comment><USER11> >So on an airplane, if there are tens or hundreds of devices, you get a real mass of interfering signals.

I'd wager large and ridiculous amounts of cash that many people just stash their devices without actually turning them "off" or into any kind of "airplane mode".

So where's this danger?

What about devices that don't have an "off"? I've gotten into more than one argument (and nearly ejected from a plane) over a Kindle, since even when "off" there's still text on the screen. It took the words of about 4 other passengers to convince the FA she needs to educate herself about e-ink.

The ire here is because the FAA's rules have no intelligence behind them.

"Electromagnetic interference"

Science doesn't add up. Try again.

"Distraction"

You don't stop people from reading books.

"Danger in case of turbulence or sudden movement"

Again you don't stop people from reading books.

I, and a great deal more air travellers, would have more respect for the rules if they showed the slightest inkling of having any kind of common sense or conistency to them. When a five year old can point out something wrong with your rule, you are doing it wrong.

<comment><USER10> >The ire here is because the FAA's rules have no intelligence behind them.

Well, I suggest that the ire is more that "I think the rule is ridiculous and I want to use my device anyway."

They do have intelligence behind them in the form of raw physics.

>Science doesn't add up. Try again.

Sorry, but science does in fact add up. Radio signals are important for an airplane to navigate. iPads and other PEDs can cause interference. How do you explain that to the typical passenger? Perhaps they take a different tack to get the different behavior.

<comment><USER9> > How do you explain that to the typical passenger?

You get some video cameras and start filming. You take some avionic displays. You take a bunch of cell phones and iPads. You turn the cell phones on, do some normal activities, and record the distortions to the avionics devices.

You then show that video to passengers.

I believe that pre-GSM analogue phones probably caused considerable interference.

And, because they are not close to cell towers modern GSM phones will switch to highest-power mode to get a better signal. Having a couple of hundred of those phones bunched up together in a plane might cause problems. Listen to the burbling noise you get with a phone near any radio. (And the electronics are not all in the pilot's cabin - there's stuff all over aircraft.)

But it's obviously controversial, and causes confrontation between bolshy passengers and staff who have _no option_ but to enforce the rule; so if they're going to continue to have the rule they should justify it with science and research and evidence.

Do the studies. Show the harm. Publish the results.

And if it's not harmful, well, great. Change the regulations and concentrate on all the other stuff that can cause death and destruction.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Well, the Mythbusters showed that the reason is that old planes without shielding on their wires and instruments did get interference from cell phone calls[1]. But no modern plane should have that issue.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MythBusters_(2006_season)#Episo...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MythBusters_\(2006_season\)#Episode_49_.E2.80.93_.22Cell_Phones_on_a_Plane.22)

<comment><USER5> Best. Show. Ever.

Wouldn't make an important decision based on them. They are good, but a lot of what they do isn't nearly rigorous enough to risk lives.

<comment><USER12> In this case the interesting part was that they actually showed that a cellphone can cause interference with some instruments. They dug up some old instruments, put them in a Faraday cage, called a cellphone and the needles in the instruments moved like crazy. So we now know the root of the problem.

Then they showed that in a modern plane that shouldn't happen. And that wasn't scientific at all. But the point is that we know what the issue is and how to solve it (shielding), that modern planes already implement the solution and that the only thing left is to explore the issue a little further and publish it in a way that both the public and the regulatory agencies can digest and apply.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I don't think I've ever been more appreciative of any single Senator than I am now for Claire McCaskill and her comments in this article.

A plane I was on just last week had a flight attendant that made the claim that he could check some sensor and tell us which mobile devices were on within the plane at any time. After the flight, I checked in with my family (Two teenagers, myself, and my older parents) and discovered that every one of us had taken that as a challenge and left our devices on.

</comment><comment><USER14> There are two main classes of electronic devices:

1\. Devices that are unintentional radiators 2\. Devices that are intentional radiators

The concern is that people may not know which class their device falls into, and also that they may not know how to fully disable their device as well. The problem with intentional radiators is more obvious - it could potentially jam other circuits by producing energy at specific frequencies. However, many people seem to ignore the other class of unintentional radiators. Many circuits require the use of clock generators and phase-locked loops, which can actually radiate a fair distance away if not designed correctly. One of the problems with this is that noise generated by a PLL could intermodulate with the PLLs in the plane's navigation systems (i.e. GPS or ADF) and cause the pilot to use an inaccurate position report in determining the location of the plane.

An example of one such interference case: Someone wanted to launch a high- altitude balloon with onboard GPS and an amateur radio transmitter. They added a small keychain camera manufactured by a Chinese company, but when the camera was powered on, it completely disabled the GPS from locking on to any satellites.

</comment><comment><USER15> I have always wondered what the FCC must think of the FAA for this policy. I don't know a lot about the FCC certification process for electronics that contain radios, but I know that it involves both minimizing the amount of harmful emissions and operating safely under some harmful emissions. That the FAA could cite interference from radios as a reason to ban their use seems to this layman as a textbook example of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. Typical contradictory policy making that we've come to expect of large governments.

</comment><comment><USER16> I think the FAA is acting like an idiot, here, but it'd be good to look at this from their side.

This falls under the "stuff that might make me look bad" category. You can be the guy who _prevents_ electronic devices on planes for 50 years and it doesn't matter. But if you're the guy that approves them and then there's a crash? Better get your Senate suit out of the cleaners, because all of those politicians writing you letters to "do something" will be the first ones asking you the tough questions on national TV. They'll be first in line to take credit if the result is good, but it's all on you if the result is bad.

It's very difficult to set up a politically-derived organization that can deal with risk effectively. Instead on manageable risk, it's much safer and easier to push for situations with no risk at all -- take the TSA, for instance.

No bureaucrat gets fired for being too careful. This is an issue that might very well end up requiring legislation to fix.

ADD: One more note. Every day there are millions of passenger miles flown on airlines. Surely the law of large numbers says that _we're already performing an experiment on electronic device radiation and the cockpit_. There's no way you can get 100% of the devices off. Somebody left their phone in the carry- on. Somebody's PC refuses to shut down. Somebody forgets to turn his kindle off. Dozens, if not hundreds of times each day, planes are flying in difficult weather with all kinds of electronic devices transmitting all kinds of garbage. Yet we've never seen a flight failure due to electronic interference.

And of course the pilots are up front using all sorts of consumer devices as well.

We've already done the experiment, at least in smaller numbers. Whether or not there's a problem when hundreds of devices are on is certainly an open question, but whether or not a few of them are going to take down a plane is already settled.

<comment><USER17> > One more note. Every day there are millions of passenger miles flown on > airlines. Surely the law of large numbers says that we're already performing > an experiment on electronic device radiation and the cockpit.

I couldn't agree with this more. At one point, I was flying very frequently for work, and I used to make a hobby out of watching to see what people did with their electronics when prepping for take-off. Laptops usually got turned off, but rarely did I see someone turn their phone off completely. I'd see a lot of people switch to airplane mode, then put their phone to sleep (a short press on a button). I'd even see a lot of people who simply put their phones on silent (usually when I'm sitting next to them; this is difficult to observe from a distance). Behavior on landing is pretty telling as well. When you see people texting and making calls immediately after landing, you know that their phones weren't off completely. When you watch the person next to you take out their phone and begin texting immediately, you know that the phone wasn't even put in to airplane mode.

These scenarios were far more common than observing someone actually power down/up a device.

I'd imagine that it is possible to get an estimate of the number of RF emitting devices within range. I really wish the FAA would do a study of what _actually_ happens on planes, rather than what the rules say _should_ happen on planes, because I suspect the results will be much different than they expect.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Two days ago I flew VIE-MXP. I didn't turn off my iPad, nor my I put my iPhone on flight mode. Yet, I'm still here typing this.

<comment><USER19> An asteroid didn't destroy civilization yesterday. Therefore, it follows that an asteroid will never destroy our civilization.

I'm not a fan of "turn off all electronics" policy either, but your statement is just plain silly.

<comment><USER18> Did you read the article? They cite reliable sources that say this ban on electronics on airliners is nothing but baloney.

Anyway, I'm honestly curious... Where's your favorite place, under your bed?

<comment><USER19> Did you read my comment? _"I used an iPad and I'm still alive!"_ is just about the worst argument possible (for anything), for similar reasons that saying an asteroid won't destroy the earth because it hasn't yet is a terrible argument.

It had nothing to do with the article (which I read) and my personal opinions (which, you'll notice in my comment, I express agreement with the article).

This is just turning pedantic now, so apologies. I should have just down-voted your comment instead of replying.

<comment><USER18> No harm, no foul. Happy new year! :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I don't think I've ever turned my phone off/to aeroplane mode during a flight.

<comment><USER21> That's the ridiculous part (well, one of many). If wifi, or cellular signal could detrimentally interfere with an airplane's operation, shouldn't a more thorough check be done to make sure all devices are "off" rather than the current polite warning? After all a terrorist could be watching YouTube...on purpose!

<comment><USER22> Of course it is harmless. But don't do it! It is part of a disinformation campaign/honeypot. The flights to area 51 are full of people secretly renditioned for watching youtube on commercial flights...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Linkbait (original) title, a relevant quote right from the beginning of the text is "The F.A.A. has no proof that electronic devices can harm a plane's avionics, but it still perpetuates such claims."</comment>


My guiding principles after 20 years of programming - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@alexewerlof/my-guiding-principles-after-20-years-of-programming-a087dc55596c <comment><USER2> I have one principle, after over 30 years of programming and a decade in "Software Archeology": Consider the poor sod who will have to deal with your work in 30 years.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a quite good list of recommendations!</comment>


Ask HN: Engineers, what is your opinion on Oak Ridge National Laboratory? - <AUTHOR> I am a research data scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and I am trying to get some insights into what the level of awareness/perception that the software engineering community has about ORNL and the national lab system in general. Particularly when it comes to applying for jobs.
The national labs are well known within the science community, through post-docs and the standard academic channels, but it seems to me that when it comes to software engineering that awareness (or interest?) is much lower (with possible exception in HPC). This difference manifests itself in the hiring process. For research-based science positions there are tons of qualified applicants, however for software engineering openings, it's a struggle to get even a hand full of reasonably qualified people to apply.
What I am trying to figure out, is why that is the case?
We do a ton of cool, globally impactful work using all the latest technologies and have thousands of smart people from all over the world (~5,000 employees). In a blind resume, I would think ORNL would be somewhat of an attractive place for a software engineer to work.
I would love to get everyone's thoughts/experiences on this. Some prompting questions I have, feel free to answer all or none…
If you have ever thought about applying to software engineering position at ORNL (or another national lab) and didn't apply, what was your reasoning? Have you even heard of ORNL? Or know where it is? Did you know that ORNL hires non-research track software engineers that don't have to write research papers? Did you know that ORNL's computing and engineering positions aren't limited to just Super Computing (Titan/Summit)? Did you know that ORNL builds and deploys software to partner platforms? Did you know that the national labs are not on the GS pay scale? Did you know that ORNL encourages and rewards developing and releasing open source software?
Any feedback would be helpful.
Thanks! <comment><USER2> Physicist here, so of course I've heard of ORNL, as well as been there. I did not know that ORNL was not on the GS pay scale, which is interesting.

I think you may get more responses if you change your headline to something like "Ask HN: Software Engineers, your opinion of Oak Ridge NL?". The software folks may not be aware that you are asking them. You could possibly even call them developers, but I'm not sure which crowd you are aiming for.

<comment><AUTHOR> Very good point. I may wait a view days and try again with your title suggestion. I originally had "Ask HN: Software Engineers..." but I ran out of room.

Thank you for your feedback

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I have never heard of ORNL. In general I would assume national labs are low paying and run by PHD researchers, so less upward mobility with my BS. I would rather make more money in an engineering led company. And I personally try to avoid companies with more than 200 employees, since they tend to have too much bureaucracy.

<comment><AUTHOR> The salaries are actually pretty comparable (that's why I mentioned that NLs aren't on the GS scale) no stock options of course but you are correct that PhD researchers run the lab from mid level management on up and traditionally a PhD is expected for upward mobility. I can see where that would potentially be a concern from your perspective.

Thanks for your reply.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Thanks for posting.

I'm curious about job security and tenure. Are there similar amount of layoffs as at commercial enterprises or are almost guaranteed a job once you're in. Are most people there "lifers" or only there a few years.

The answers to these questions might be attractive to certain people.

</comment><comment><USER5> Rough impression: "national lab" type places are largely career dead ends that are suitable for post docs and other academic types. Non tenure track engineers will be treated as third class slave labor, likely poorly paid relative to industry. Non transferable skill set development, work on non interesting non impactful stuff. Maybe unfair but basically accurate.

</comment><comment><USER6> I have heard of ORNL but couldn't tell you were it was located without looking it up. That said, I'm really glad you posted this as I always thought that national labs were on GS pay scale and tried to avoid them. I've been teetering with applying to Argonne or FermiLab but was afraid of taking a big pay cut. I'll have to look in to that more.

</comment><comment><USER7> One thing I have observed is that engineering roles at national labs tend to have a lot of paperwork needed for an interview. I can understand a faculty role requiring recommendation letters, a long application form to fill up but an engineering role requiring all that makes it rather annoying.

Not sure if Oak Ridge does this tho. :)

<comment><AUTHOR> In my experience that is probably a true statement. Typically the application process is a little verbose, but I think ORNL isn't the worst of them. Combine that with the inhumane SAP interface and I can see where a lot of people wouldn't even bother.

Thanks for the feedback!

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Is there any possibility to apply as a foreigner who currently resides outside US (as one can do with H-1B or other visas in the commercial world)?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Also I was ran out of room in the original post, but wanted to add even just commenting, "I've never heard of ORNL" is probably the most insightful of all :)

</comment><comment><USER9> The "View open positions" link on the ORNL site takes me to a blank page.

<comment><AUTHOR> If it did work for you, it would be even worse. It's a brutalist SAP interface that would scare away anyone with a hint of creativity</comment></comment>


Don't let proprietary digital voting disrupt democracy - <AUTHOR> https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/dont-let-proprietary-digital-voting-disrupt-democracy <comment><USER2> FL/OSS digital voting is bad news.

Proprietary is nightmare news.

Maybe just don't do digital. While it _may_ be possible to create a secure system that an expert could understand, is it possible to create one a layperson can understand? If not, how do you prove that it is trustworthy to the laypeople who make policy?

<comment><USER3> I genuinely wouldn't even entertain the idea of a secure system being made hypothetically. If it were possible, there'd be an unbreakable DRM, unpiratable software, anything else that could benefit from completely secure client-side security. I'm aware there's not literally such a thing as provably impossible, but discussion of "There are societal problems outside of the tech" can unintentionally bolster the progressive layperson's idea that the tech problems would be solved "if we just get our experts on it".

<comment><USER2> I hate to call things impossible, but there is truth in what you say.

While I think it could hypothetically be possible, it is not worth the danger of people who don't understand deciding that "tech will fix everything". I think this actually applies to a lot of domains.</comment></comment></comment>


Bauhaus at 100: the revolutionary movement's enduring appeal - <AUTHOR> https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/jan/20/bauhaus-at-100-the-revolutionary-movements-enduring-appeal <comment><AUTHOR> The BBC recently ran a story about Bauhaus that had less background information but more photos of a variety of Bauhaus inspired photography from around the world.

[https://www.bbc.com/news/in-pictures-46863364](https://www.bbc.com/news/in- pictures-46863364)</comment>


The Plot to Kill the Open Technology Fund - <AUTHOR> https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/jgx5z3/inside-the-plot-to-kill-the-open-technology-fund <comment><USER2> Removing funds from the OTF in combination with the EARN-IT act, and lately the LEAD act, will probably leave the US and the partly the world in shambles when it comes to security and privacy online. It seems like the current adminstration really wants to destroy our freedom and hand it to the oligarchs, the autocrats and the malicious tech monopolies worldwide.

</comment><comment><USER3> See also last week's Economist article "Decapitating America's state-funded media" [1] :

"To those who rely on the American news agencies, it all seemed dismally familiar. In Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary or Russia, the sequence is routine. An independent news outlet is taken over by allies of an oligarch or political party. The editors resign or are fired. Next comes an abrupt shift to a government-friendly editorial line. Can the same happen in America?"

[1] [https://www.economist.com/united- states/2020/06/27/decapitat...](https://www.economist.com/united- states/2020/06/27/decapitating-americas-state-funded-media)</comment>


Microsoft wants Samsung to pay it $15 for each Android handset - <AUTHOR> http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2011/07/06/microsoft-wants-samsung-to-pay-it-15-for-each-android-handset/

<comment><USER2> _Samsung is reportedly looking to lower the payment to nearer $10 per handset in exchange for an alliance which benefit the creation of new Windows Phone devices_

Suggests (certainly doesn't prove) that Samsung agrees they're using MS IP, and they're just haggling over price. We have no idea from the article what the patents are for - it could be a hardware patent for all we know. Unlikely, yeah, but unless we know what the patent's for its tough to pass judgement. Tempting and entertaining, but tough.

<comment><USER3> Well, they did have cross licensing agreement with Microsoft back in 2007, but that didn't cover telecommunications.

[http://news.cnet.com/Microsoft%2C-Samsung-in-patent-swap- dea...](http://news.cnet.com/Microsoft%2C-Samsung-in-patent-swap- deal/2100-1014_3-6177381.html)

Maybe the they'll choose to go to court this time, as Samsung is well armed patent wise. MS' objective is clear: to make the cost of Android greater than the cost of a Windows phone license, so the "free" advantage is no longer is valid.

<comment><USER4> These patents have already been tested in court by other Android handset manufacturers and MS won. Samsung would only be increasing the cost, reducing the likelihood of a favourable partnership deal and postponing the inevitable.

<comment><USER3> Do you have links/sources?

I only know of Barnes & Noble and Motorola fighting against MS, afaik everyone else immediately settled.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Samsung should go to court with them, and they should also cease any plans to launch WP7 phones. Microsoft is like a leech in the smartphone industry. They saw they can't make money with their own product, so they try to scare the little guys into paying up, to make it seem that they are right on this, and then go after the big guys, too.

Even if using Android costs manufacturers the same as using WP7, why would they use it over Android, when Android is a _very_ proven product in the market, while WP7 is not at all and it sits around 1% market share right now, and dropping.

Does Microsoft think this will make consumers more likely to buy their phones? I think they are much more likely to get a lot of bad PR over this, because there are a lot of Android users and only a few WP7 users. This bad PR will focus negatively on their future products, like Windows 8. They are creating a _negative halo effect_ around their products.

<comment><USER6> _Samsung should go to court with them_

What happens if a judge rules in favor of a Microsoft injunction against selling Samsung-made Android phones? The trial could last years—or decades—and the whole time Samsung couldn't sell it's phones in the US.

<comment><USER7> I'm pretty sure that Samsung has enough patents to sue Microsoft in counter case and actually force them to negotiate.

<comment><USER4> You think a hardware company has a lot of patents Microsoft are currently breaching?

<comment><USER7> MS is also doing hardware with Xbox and their mice.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> When the Nortel patent deal is approved they would double up on the $15.

Wondering what counter strategy other than pay up are Samsung and other Android handset vendors pondering.

At this point it just sounds like the OHA will have to do patent pooling and go head to head against leeches to either get a very favorable deal or not have to pay anything at all. Google+TI+Samsung+Sony and the 80 others (ZTE has LTE patents for e.g.) must have enough patents to realize something like this.

It would be terminally bad for Android if instead of paying the ever increasing royalties to MS, vendors just chose to ship WP7 instead. And WP7 is fast getting near more than good enough. The game could change in Microsoft's favor with Nokia at MSFT's disposal sooner than we think.

EDIT : S3 was bought by HTC, and they have a successful claim against Apple. Hmm.

</comment><comment><USER9> Pretty crap what MS is doing. The $10/15 per handset seems so high, what exactly is this patent that they're referring to?

<comment><USER10> It appears to be multiple patents, virtually all obvious and with significant prior art:

• 5,579,517: Common name space for long and short filenames

• 5,758,352: Common name space for long and short filenames

• 6,621,746: Monitoring entropic conditions of a flash memory device as an indicator for invoking erasure operations

• 6,826,762: Radio interface layer in a cell phone with a set of APIs having a hardware-independent proxy layer and a hardware-specific driver layer

• 6,909,910: Method and system for managing changes to a contact database

• 7,644,376: Flexible architecture for notifying applications of state changes

• 5,664,133: Context sensitive menu system/menu behavior

• 6,578,054: Method and system for supporting off-line mode of operation and synchronization using resource state information

• 6,370,566: Generating meeting requests and group scheduling from a mobile device

• Give people easy ways to navigate through information provided by their device apps via a separate control window with tabs;

• Enable display of a webpage's content before the background image is received, allowing users to interact with the page faster;

• Allow apps to superimpose download status on top of the downloading content;

• Permit users to easily select text in a document and adjust that selection; and

• Provide users the ability to annotate text without changing the underlying document.

[http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/10/microsoft- sues...](http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/10/microsoft-sues- motorola-citing-android-patent-infringement.ars)

[http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_on_the_issues/archive/2...](http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_on_the_issues/archive/2011/03/21/android- patent-infringement-licensing-is-the-solution.aspx)

I really hate software patents and the trolls that abuse them.

<comment><USER11> i hate that these bullet points are patent-able. i dont think the system was ever intended for this sort of granularity. we should protect big ideas, not functions necessary to run any modern mobile operating system.

<comment><USER12> I understood that patents are for the opposite: not to patent ideas, but a particular invention.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> > Microsoft has leveraged its intellectual property rights in recent weeks, > utilising its IP licensing program to extend rights to smartphone vendors.

What a remarkable sentence. I think my favorite part is "extend rights", but there's a lot to enjoy and it's hard to pick just a few words.

</comment><comment><USER14> Even if there are patents, I'm not sure how they explain the $15 value as part of the phone price (10% for smaller handsets?)

<comment><USER15> They don't have to explain it. They don't have to license these technologies under reasonable terms. They could, rather than seek royalties, seek injunctions. Or they could seek $500/unit in future payments (which would basically be an injunction). Although for past units shipped they'd get, at best, what one would consider reasonable.

<comment><USER14> That assumes patents are not for being sold as a product in a market, but for extortion.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> All these companies getting harassed by Microsoft should pool their patents together for defensive purposes.

</comment><comment><USER17> As much as I hate to use the word tax in this instance, it seems like it, and it hits your pocketbook my friend. The cost is passed onto you and I and it's nothing but a fictional tarrif. Smart people don't shell out $700 on a new device or get tangled up in a 3-year contract that puts a $2100 dent in your budget over 36 months. They curtail the hit by shopping thrifty. Additionally, market atmosphere that feeds off of luxury goods bragging rights tends to pull shit like this all the time. Create hype, add marketing and hysteria, cover all legal ends by patenting, cross-licensing, charge $COST + $MARGIN + $FEES. Galaxy SII campaign is a good example.

Now, there's no intention of sounding anti-capitalist, what have you, but the mobile market seems like a giant red herring.

<comment><USER18> _Smart people don't shell out $700 on a new device or get tangled up in a 3-year contract that puts a $2100 dent in your budget over 36 months_

If you're going to use your phone anyway, why wouldn't you get "tied" into a contract? Contracts aren't made to screw you over - they're made to retain customers over a certain amount of time. Considering the heavy regular by the FCC in the US and the CCTS in Canada, you can't really even get screwed over.

This is completely aside from the point I'm trying to make, but you're never really tied into a contract if you're smart. Customer service reps at all the major phone companies are so poorly trained, that forcing a mistake is extremely easy. There are also other regulations in place, that makes escaping a contract without a fee, very possible.

<comment><USER17> Correct on many fronts, but the regulations you speak of are local to whichever market you're in. Here, in Canada, a person will be nicked $20 x number of months left plus I think $10 x number of months left on data plan. Altogether, it is capped at around $300 - $400 just to leave.

That is insane when you compare it to what it actually gets you.

<comment><USER18> I'm in Canada, and I've filed CCTS complaints for both Rogers and Bell. Bell refunded me about $500, and cancelled my plan for free. Rogers had a different issue, but fixed all my problems as well. It's just that most people don't realize there are regulating bodies, and thus do not pursue injustices.

In the US, Verizon's executive office called me with an apology, and fixed up the problems as well. Verizon took about 15 days to respond. Bell took about a month, and Rogers took about 5 months. In the end though, they compensate you as if they would've responded right away.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> The timing of this is interesting, they must feel emboldened after getting a cut of the Nortel patents. May they die a thousand deaths.

</comment><comment><USER20> Another question when a company signs a patent royalty agreement is there any contractual language that limits what they can say about the agreement in terms of terms of motivations? Yes, I know they have limits on whether they can mention the patent or patent specifics, etc..I am just wondering if Samsung cannot than make a PR campaign maligning MS for their patent trolling..

<comment><USER15> _I am just wondering if Samsung cannot than make a PR campaign maligning MS for their patent trolling_

I'm sure they could, but business is not like an episode of Degrassi Junior High. Samsung wants as many partners as possible. If a carrier wants WP devices, they want to be the one to make them. Android, they want to be there too. While Apple is suing Samsung, I'm sure Samsung would take more Apple orders if possible.

If anything, Samsung may push MS to collect royalties from other vendors, to level the playing field. And this is probably why MS is on a roll. If one company is going to pay royalties, they want to make it easier for MS to collect royalties from the next company. So they're more likely to provide collateral, in various ways, to strengthen Microsoft's claims. MS can use this to then go down the street to LG and say, "Samsung and HTC just openly admitted that this technology infringes. It appears you use it to."

I'm not a fan of the patent trolling, but I must say that I tip my hat to the guy in the MS IP group running this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> A question...lets say at some point the MS patents under the royalty agreement get invalidated can than Samsung ask for its money back?

<comment><USER6> No. They sign a contract that probably covers that unlikely outcome.</comment></comment>


Mirrorless Cameras: A Buying Guide - <AUTHOR> https://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/photography/buying-guide/mirrorless-cameras <comment><USER2> When I was a photographer, I was a B&H customer. But now? Never.

\- B&H sued for systematic discrimination 2016 [1] \- Unsafe workplace, injuries, employing illegals, discrimination. 2015 [2] \- Tractor trailer fire at their yard 2014 [3] \- Sued and settled for discrimination 2007 [4]

I'll stop there, just search it and see if you're curious.

[1] [https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2016/02/29/us/bh-photo- lawsuit/index...](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2016/02/29/us/bh-photo- lawsuit/index.html)

[2] [http://america.aljazeera.com/multimedia/2015/10/bh- workers-c...](http://america.aljazeera.com/multimedia/2015/10/bh-workers- claim-discrimination-unsafe-standards1.html)

[3] [http://bklyner.com/fire-in-progress-at-the-brooklyn-navy- yar...](http://bklyner.com/fire-in-progress-at-the-brooklyn-navy-yard- fortgreene/)

[4] [http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/archive/10-16-07.h...](http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/newsroom/release/archive/10-16-07.html)

</comment><comment><USER3> I've been considering whether a mirrorless would be a good fit for me for some time. I recently set out backpacking and ditched my DSLR for a much smaller 35mm rangefinder. While there are times where I think "I wish I had my DSLR so I could use <lens X>", I've been getting by just fine. Similarly a friend just came back from a trip to South America and Australia on which he took a small Sony point-and-shoot (with very nice results).

Ultimately it's the person behind the camera which makes most difference, but I must say I've been tempted to sell my DSLR and replace it with an entry / prosumer mirrorless simply for the size.

</comment><comment><USER4> > Phase detection takes advantage of the mirror in a DSLR camera > Mirrorless > cameras, on the other hand, use contrast detection

Now even some phones (i.e. iphone 6 which is released 2 years ago) has phase detection autofocus. Seems that article is slightly outdated. Lack of phase autofocus was primary reason to choose SLR over mirrorless for lots of people some time ago.

</comment><comment><USER5> I thoroughly enjoy my E-PL5 Olympus PEN despite it being a few years old. It's a quality piece of kit, and I've been very happy with it.

If you're looking for a mirrorless micro four-thirds system, you could do a lot worse than check out the PEN range. I believe its up to about E-PL8 now as the most recent model.

</comment><comment><USER6> i have been using fujifilm xe1 mirrorless camera for 2 yrs now.</comment>


Could we use ML to detect Covid-19 infection? - <AUTHOR> One of machine learning's best tricks is in classification.  We use it for everything from image search to automated driving.  This makes it a classic fit for infection detection as there's only 2 options: infected or not.
What I'm thinking is that we could train a model against the hundreds of thousands of testing kits now in circulation with known results, wire that model into a web API, and then patch a device like this one:
https://www.owlstonemedical.com/products/reciva/
into said API.  You send a breath/spit sample to the server, and the server would respond with a yes/no based on the model.
We could use this to test more people, more often, effectively for $0 24h/day.  Doctors can be tested throughout their shifts, attendees for events could be tested before allowing entry, people could be easily vetted for exiting quarantine too.
I'm a web developer, and am confident that the web API part would be easy and anonymous, and from what I know about ML, training a model like this probably isn't difficult... if you have the data.
What I don't know much about is how easy it is to convert biology to data: getting testing kit information into a model, and converting breath/spit into data.  I don't know how easy this is, but if it's doable, we may have something seriously helpful.
Can someone with domain knowledge in this area chime in with their point of view? <comment><USER2> The device you linked detects specific VOCs, not viruses or even proteins. I don't believe this would be appropriate for infection detection. Or at least not a _specific_ infection detection without a known baseline.

The cost also seems suspicious. Every patient needs their own mask - you can't reuse those. Also, with the 4 cartridges per test, as recommended, that's unlikely to be $0.

FTR: Current coronavirus testing uses either an RNA match from a saliva sample, or a specific antibody reaction test - both are very specific to that single virus.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'm less concerned about which device would be used (this is just one that came to mind that tries to translate breath into data), and more concerned about whether it was possible to translate breath into data at all.

A breathalyzer might be just as good a comparison and is more reusable: if we can detect & capture breath/spit from enough infected & uninfected, surely a pattern would begin to present itself that could be used to diagnose, no?

Current testing is very specific, yes -- so would this system. But where current tests look for something specific: RNA or specific antibodies, this would simply look for "is this sample sufficiently like an infected case or an uninfected one?" Presumably there's more to what's going on in an infected person's lungs than just the existence of the antibodies. Could not ML help find these patterns and identify them as markers of infection?

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Not really - if you can collect enough data to use as input to an ML algorithm, you can most likely diagnose the virus directly ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_diagnosis_of_viral_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laboratory_diagnosis_of_viral_infections)). ML seems redundant in that case.

And if ML wasn't redundant, you have no training set containing the relevant bio-markers and a binary variable indicating COVID-19 presence.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hmm. I think I see what you're saying. Presumably if one of the markers you'd want to capture is "presence of antibody for covid-19", and if the device you're using can do that, you wouldn't need ML -- obviously.

But I was thinking a little more macroscopically. We don't have any device that can see antibodies or anything as obvious in real time. Instead, we have to collect samples and test them separately in controlled environments while we look for specific markers we know to be signs of infection.

What ML does well though is see patterns in data we don't. Rather than find specific markers, I was thinking we could feed a series of different values into a model to see if a pattern emerged. We can't observe the virus directly, but we can measure the percentage makeup of different chemicals in someone's breath and see if there's a pattern in those we know to be infected vs those we know aren't -- the training set would be the pile of tests already conducted. Then we can apply that model to new data and test the results.

<comment><USER3> > see if there's a pattern in those we know to be infected vs those we know > aren't

You don't know who is infected and who isn't. That was my second point about not having a training set.

<comment><AUTHOR> But we do know. Thousands of manual, slow tests are being run every day. The idea would be to collect those samples and their results for use in the model.

<comment><USER3> > Thousands of manual, slow tests are being run every day.

Yeah - separate labs spread all over the world, using different protocols collecting different data points on different populations and answering to different companies and/or governments each of them with their own laws and regulations. You can't just "get all the data" in this case.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What Are the World Biggest Problems or Opportunities? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Health care in the US - I keep reading about health care bankruptcy in US, and worry about implications in UK as our politicians are pushing this model

Politics in the information age - linked to fake news

University costs - university needs an overhaul. I mean all these unis pushing courses online with covid for the same price. There has to be opportunity there

<comment><USER3> I'd generalize the politics comment as failing of educational systems to teach useful life skills, such as logic/philosophy of argument.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> One source of thoughts on this topic:

[https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/global-issues- ov...](https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/global-issues-overview/)

</comment><comment><USER5> Problem: Global warming

Opportunity: Find safe and stable sources of energy that scale

</comment><comment><USER6> Ageing.

<comment><USER3> How so?

<comment><USER6> Mortality is what causes over population and depletion of resources.

<comment><USER3> I think that would be delayed mortality and possibly the opposite of what they mean if discussing the depletion of resources.

Anyways, most of the regions where demographics are shifting to a larger proportion of older persons also have much lower birthrates.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> space

</comment><comment><USER8> Capitalism

Imperialism

Poverty</comment>


Why I am finally switching from chrome to Brave - <AUTHOR> https://hackernoon.com/why-i-am-finally-switching-from-chrome-to-brave-e803495b3375 <comment><USER2> Also, unlike browsers that use ad blocking extensions, when you go to a website with 3rd party ads using Brave, you don't get those annoying pop-ups that say "I see that you're using an ad blocker blah blah blah".

</comment><comment><USER3> Doesn't this browser replace ads with their own?

<comment><USER2> Brave doesn't have its own ads yet, those are being tested now. In order to see Brave's ads, which are based on things you view via zero knowledge proofs computed on your device, you would have to opt-in.

If you opt-in, you'll get paid in Basic Attention Tokens to view these ads.</comment></comment>