A candy man revolutionized the sushi industry - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloombergquint.com/pursuits/2017/08/30/how-an-angry-candy-man-revolutionized-the-modern-sushi-industry <comment><USER2> Here's a fun one:

Japanese fully automated restaurant

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yICVmyySHmE&feature=youtu.be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yICVmyySHmE&feature=youtu.be)

As a side note, it's funny in that there are many parallels to this fully automated restaurant and this short thought essay that was mentioned on HN a few months ago about the slow and steady future progression of AI: [http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm](http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm)

<comment><USER3> Not _fully_ automated. They may not be "chefs" according to the video, but there are clearly people assembling food.

<comment><USER2> True - its definitely got a manual component to it. It's interesting to see the sushi rice machine in use in the first half of the video.

What's interesting about restaurant automation is that it could go either way in terms of making existing franchises more of a monopoly or enabling the little guy compete against them.

I tend to actually lean toward the later because the biggest issue with restaurants is managing/coordinating a team of people (interviewing, payroll, scheduling, healthcare, HR, diversity). But if automation can enable the independent restaurant owner to work with a skeleton crew and focus on delivering value and a differentiated product the consumer will win in the long run.

I feel that we as entrepreneurial engineers need to make robots that will help make the independent proprietor capable of competing with the larger franchisors like McDonald. Something like an artisanal grass fed beef hamburger restaurant robot to help the food truck compete against McDonalds.

<comment><USER4> > What's interesting about restaurant automation is that it could go either > way in terms of making existing franchises more of a monopoly or enabling > the little guy compete against them.

Whoever can make his restaurants 0.05% more efficient than the next guy will take over the entire market as scaling up will be so easy.

<comment><USER5> Do you believe that Burger King, McDonalds, and Wendy's are all within 5bpp of productivity of each other? Because none of them have taken over all of the market, not by a wide margin.

I seriously doubt their productivity numbers are anywhere near that tight a spread and yet we've seen no clear monopoly emerge.

<comment><USER4> I think automation will change the game though. Because the variance that comes from the human factor will be gone. If one chain is a tiny bit better, then every single restaurant will be a tiny bit better. The 0.05% advantage will not drown in the random noise of good and bad employees. And policy updates can happen immediately, the lag from having to retrain will not be there.

One source of variance that will remain is location. The local branch of Very- Slightly-Better-Chain may be poorly situated, which could put them at a disadvantage.

<comment><USER6> I'm skeptical. This "tiny bit better" might not be noticeable by customers, so it could easily be swamped by better marketing or by having a more convenient location (which will never be consistent).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Can't help but admire Japanese people who automate everything that can be automated since 1970s! Working with soft and loose material such as rice is a huge PITA for machines, but I'm not totally surprised they eventually found a way to make it work reasonably well. Perhaps this in turn imposed limitations on the water/rice ratio and cooking time, which might compromise the taste.

<comment><USER8> What is the argument against automation? We have had people putting cans on shelves for thousands of years. Where is the shelf-stocking robot?

<comment><USER9> Humans are easy to find, fully assembled, break less, and are more easily replaced. We are amazing machines.

<comment><USER10> Those are reasons not to automate, but they're not arguments against automation. If there is too much automation in an economy (across industries) then there are fewer people available to buy products that are being made. From a Marxian point of view, purchase of automation machinery is part of the cycle of capital crises, and contributes to the tendency for the rate of profit to fall for the employer of automation, because he extracts less surplus value, as machinery embodies dead labour and only has the running cost of 'replenishing' this labour by replacement of its parts or general maintenace of it, these costs coming out of the surplus value extracted anyway.

There's a wonderful little essay by Ernest Mandel on the effects of automation on the amount of wage labour employed in his own time (the 80s), why this occurs, and how capitalism deals with automation versus how a Socialist mode of production might do so: [https://www.marxists.org/archive/mandel/1985/xx/future.html](https://www.marxists.org/archive/mandel/1985/xx/future.html)

Edit: a relevant little quote follows.

"Japanese socialists [7] have tried to study the effects of new technologies especially on the automobile industry. Also stressing qualitative aspects of the changes (loss of skills, increase in accidents, emergence of new layers of workers and of skills etc.), the authors find a reduction of shop floor workers of around 10% at the most highly 'robotised' automobile plant in Japan, Nissan's Myrayama Plant, between September 1974 and January 1982, accompanied however, by small increases in white-collar personnel. Even the Japanese 'company unions' seem worried by these developments, 'life-long employment' still the rule in Japan notwithstanding (Japan Economic Journal, February 21, 1984)."

<comment><USER8> Why does this remind me of the famous Henry Ford quote about doubling his employees pay, so they could afford to buy the cars they made?

<comment><USER11> This reminds me of that time I asked in an economics class how you make money. In the case of Ford he pays his workers who turn around and give it back to him? So you need money coming in from external sources right ie. Other countries.

What I was asking about is the process of taking something that costs x and charging 3x to make the profit. Where does the 2X come from doesn't that result in debt. I understand you're paying for time that you didn't spend/resources. But it's like swishing water around in a bucket right without external input?

Probably a dumb question but also doesn't help my professor barely spoke English and I stuttered over the word "Inevitably" haha

<comment><USER12> I'm not at all an economist, and I expect I'll make some mistakes here, but I can think of two things that might be relevant to your question here. First is [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflation#Scarcity_of_official...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflation#Scarcity_of_official_money) which is that as you can produce more value for lower cost, with nothing else compensating, then things become cheaper. It's the _value_ of things that's "made" in Ford's factory, not the money. If, hypothetically, you had a completely fixed money supply, then you wouldn't get money from nowhere; instead the price of everything else in the market just goes down. There are some reasons to not prefer deflation, so to counteract this the government prints more money. For another example (I think?), look at Bitcoin, where there's been massive deflation because the growth in _value_ has far outpaced the rate of new bitcoins added to the economy by mining.

I'm less certain about the second thing, but I think that debt (and banks?) increase the (effective?) money supply. If you borrow money from a bank (or debt directly from a company for goods or services) to build a new house, then you've acquired a valuable new asset, the laborers you paid acquired new currency, so the total economy can exceed the number of bills that have been printed and are physically in circulation.

There's a lot there that I'm not sure about, and there's plenty of further fascinating questions that follow on from there that I don't know anything about, but I hope that helps you understand some things about how production and the money supply work!

<comment><USER13> From a bank's perspective, a loan is an investment/asset, so should probably be a part of what is called M2 or M3 money.

EDIT: Wikipedia seems to agree: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_supply#Fractional- reserv...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_supply#Fractional- reserve_banking)

> Whenever a bank gives out a loan in a fractional-reserve banking system, a > new sum of money is created. This new type of money is what makes up the > non-M0 components in the M1-M3 statistics.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I don't really know much about sushi, but this was a fascinating read.

The entire time I kept wondering what the difference would be between the machine made sushi and the stuff made by the guys in the documentary, Jiro Dreams of Sushi[1] Would I be able to tell the difference?

[1] [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1772925/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1772925/)

<comment><USER15> First: Yes, if you are the kind of person who pays attention to your food, you will be able to easily notice the difference.

Sushi is vinegared rice. There are 2 main types of sushi you will eat in a sushi restaurant: nigiri sushi (formed with the hand) and maki sushi (rolled in a sheet of seaweed). There are other sushi dishes, but you won't get them in a sushi restaurant.

Sushi is made by cooking the rice, simultaneously cooling the cooked rice and reducing the moisture content, cutting in the vinegar/sugar/salt mixture and then finally forming the rice into a shape. Some of these things can be done well in an automated process, some of them can not.

To make very good sushi, you need to understand the rice. Rice is all slightly different and it will contain more or less starch, have more or less bran still attached to the kernel, etc, etc. When you start you need to inspect the rice, wash it appropriately and choose the correct amount of water to cook it with. How well you do this step makes a surprisingly large difference in the end product. If you don't wash off the starch well enough, it will end up gluey. If you don't polish off the bran, you will get rancid flavours. If you don't choose the correct amount of water, you will get mushy rice. The list goes on and on (I'm by no means an expert, but I've failed to make great sushi on enough occasions to at least enumerate some of my failures ;-) ).

Generally speaking, if you buy sushi at a kaiten sushi place -- or even just a place that just isn't very good, they aren't going to get this step right because it takes experience and attention to detail. Big kaiten sushi chains are going to select a forgiving rice. They are going to wash it exactly the same way each time. And they will get a relatively consistent, but not very good result.

The next bit is cooking. This one is perfectly suited to automation. If you get the rice to water ratio correct, modern rice cookers cook rice virtually perfectly. From Jiro Dreams of Sushi, I know they use their jury rigged pressure cooker setup, but TBH, I'm a bit skeptical that it makes all that much difference. He says that he has to do it under pressure because of the rice variety, but I'm not sure why he can't use a normal pressure cooker -- probably because that's just not the way he does things.

Anyway, once the rice is cooked, you need to cool it to a precise temperature while at the same time reducing the humidity. This is really hard to do well. If you get it wrong, you will either get too hard a texture, or more likely mush. However, it's the kind of thing that machines are _really_ good at.

The next step is really hard to do well with a machine, I think. While maintaining the correct temperature, you need to mix in the vinegar mixture. The technique you use to mix the vinegar, the speed that you mix it, the amount that you use -- all depends on what the rice is doing that day. It depends on the ambient temperature and humidity. It depends on how well you've washed the rice. It depends on how perfectly you got the water/rice ratio when you were cooking. If you get it wrong, you will range from crumbly, falling apart sushi to glue. Machines do this very poorly, it seems. They uniformly under-vinegar the rice. I think it's because when they are extruding the rice (in the next step), they need the rice to be firmer than you would if you were doing it by hand.

First you need to keep the sushi rice around before use. You can't really have a continuous cooking process, so you need to cook in batches. However, as the rice cools, the starch forms crystals. This causes the rice to taste dry and to have a rough texture. You need to maintain a consistent temperature -- not too high because it will continue cooking, not too low because it will crystalise. You also have to maintain the proper humidity. There is nothing that makes this harder or easier for automation, but it depends on how you are moving the rice from one place to another.

Finally, you have to form the rice. As I said, there are two main kinds of sushi that you will have at a sushi restaurant. The one that many North Americans are most familiar with is maki sushi. This one is dramatically easier to make. You spread the rice on a piece of nori seaweed and roll it up.

To understand how to do this well, you have to understand that rice has a flavour. It is a very subtle flavour, but a flavour nonetheless. Japanese meals are not like western meals. You don't have "main dishes" with fillers like potatoes and bread. Instead, the main dish is rice. Everything else is a "side dish" and is meant to accentuate the flavour of the rice. This is why Japanese food is so delicately flavoured, without strong herbs or spices. It's also why you eat the rice without salt or some kind of sauce.

With maki sushi, you have a piece of roasted nori that adds some crispness and earthiness. Then you have a filling that should accent the rice. The problem is that if the rice is mushed up together, it tastes like glue (umm... well, it literally _is_ glue at that point). To get the flavour of the rice to come out, the most important point is _air_! Each kernel of rice needs to have air around it. At the same time, you need moisture, so that it has a good texture, sticks together, and creates a kind of sauce in your mouth (mixing the nori, rice and filling together). It's that balance of rice, air, water, filling and nori that is important to getting something that has nice flavour and then dissolves in your mouth, with a satisfying, mouth feeling texture and flavour.

Like I said, maki sushi is dramatically easier to do than nigiri sushi. That's because you spread the rice on the nori. This automatically creates both places for air and water to exist. Then you add the filling and roll up the nori. The nori then protects the sushi from drying out. Machines are extremely good at making maki sushi, IMHO.

Nigiri sushi is _much_ more difficult. With nigiri sushi, you wet you hands (just enough), take a small handful of rice, form the rice into a rectangle, add wasabi (if you are going to do it) and then apply the topping (usually sashimi -- raw, sliced fish). Getting a machine to produce nigiri sushi _at all_ is a triumph of engineering. However, it is uniformly awful. Instead of making a 2 dimensional object and then rolling it (to trap both air and water), you need to make a 3 dimensional object, with water surrounding the rice kernels and air in between. It has to be compressed just right so that it sticks together, while at the same time retaining the air pockets and water pockets. Then you have to apply the topping so that it sticks to the rice, so that when you bite it, it seems like one thing as opposed to falling apart in pieces in your mouth.

Good nigiri sushi seems to melt in your mouth. The flavour of the fish mixes with the flavour of the rice and washes down your throat. There are many different ways nigiri sushi can be bad, but the main ones are "piece of fish sitting on a pile of glue" and "a bunch of random junk that falls apart in your mouth in a sticky, mealy way". Machine made nigiri sushi tends to be the latter.

Having said all that, there are some caveats. The convenience stores sell "onigiri", which are triangular shapes rice balls wrapped in nori, with some kind of filling. They are universally awesome, even though they are made by machine. There are onigiri restaurants where they make everything by hand and they are admittedly better, but not nearly as much as hand made nigiri sushi vs machine made nigiri sushi.

And finally, I've taken some friends to very, very good sushi restaurants in Japan before (I live in a fishing village and we're lucky to have a couple of good sushi restaurants). Usually they are blown away. Occasionally they are, "Meh. Fish on rice. I don't really see the difference other than the price tag". So without knowing you, I can't tell for certain that you would care about the difference.

<comment><USER16> Thanks for the writeup. What a fantastic read.

You also, implicitly, very well explain the reason why it's sacrilegious to dunk a piece of really good Sushi into a mixture of soy sauce and ersatz wasabi. If you invest so much care into the rice this is an insult to chefs studying the process for years.

I have a question, which you may be able to answer. I'm off to Japan in ten days and would like to try some good sushi, without completely breaking the bank.

The problem with top level places, apart from paying 400EUR for a 30 minute meal (which, admittedly must be out of this world) is to get in in the first place. Web sites (if they have any) are in Japanese and most such places only take reservations by phone, which, for a gajin is pretty much a deal breaker.

Do you have any tips about second tier sushi places, which serve a good product without totally killing off the budget? Where to find them, how to spot them and what to look out for? Any other important tips you can think about for a 3 1/2 weeks trip through Japan? (By train, Tokyo to the South and then up to Hokkaido)

I hope this is not imposing, but that was such an interesting and insightful writeup that I just had to ask.

Thanks!

<comment><USER15> I've gone to several sushi places in large centres, but nothing compares to my favourite place in my home town. It's kind of opposite to my initial gut feeling, but it makes sense in a strange way. In large cities, there are enough people to sustain mediocre restaurants. The top restaurants command really high prices, but you can survive if you are willing to charge less. In small towns, nobody has much money and they all eat at home. If you want to survive, you have to be amazing.

So if you find yourself in a small port town, chances are the local sushi restaurant will be amazing. The other really important thing to realise is that really, really great food is often available in incredibly unassuming places. The restaurant will be 50 years old, will be onto it's third generation of master, and will be falling apart on the outside. But the food will be incredible. So it's super hard to tell where to go.

A couple of things might help. First you should know a few kanji: 営業中 means "open for business". 準備中 means "preparing" (not open at the moment). The easiest way to distinguish it is to look at the first character. If it looks like a fat guy with his hair on fire, that's open :-)

Next, quite a lot of great eating establishments are also drinking establishments. Especially if you want to eat and drink at the same time (which I recommend highly). The thing to look for is 居酒屋 (izakaya -- bar/pub). Not sure how to remember it. Write it on your hand :-). People will be impressed if they see it! Often this will be written on an orange paper lantern outside the establishment. Stay away from things called "pub" or "snack". Those are drinking establishments, but are really hostess clubs and the food is terrible.

Another thing to look for is a noren. Here you can see an image of one [0]. When shops are in business, the noren will be displayed out like that. When they are closed, they will either be taken down, or displayed behind a closed window.

The best thing to do to find good restaurants is to ask for recommendations from the hotel where you are staying. It's important to indicate that you are looking for an actually good place and not one catering to tourists. It may be slightly difficult to communicate that. The main concern is that because you don't speak Japanese, you won't be comfortable in a Japanese establishment -- especially if you can't read the menu. If you can't manage to get an answer from the hotel staff (often they are afraid to make a mistake), the way to go is simply to have courage and wander into likely looking establishments.

Extremely good restaurants don't cater to tourists. They won't have menus with pictures on them. They won't won't won't have menus with English. They won't speak English. They spend all of their time thinking about food, not sales. You have to break down the barrier with your own courage. It'll be fine, don't worry :-) And if it isn't, they will be very polite as they usher you out the door ;-).

Some very quick useful Japanese: When you enter, it's useful to say, "Aite imasuka?", which means "Are you open?". If they cross their arms in an X pattern, it means it's no good. Otherwise it's probably OK :-) If they are willing to seat you they will say, "Nan me sama?" (How many people?). Just hold up the appropriate number of fingers. Again, if it's no good, they will cross their arms in an X pattern.

When ordering, draft beer is "Nama". Sake is "Nihonshu". Something stronger is "Shochu". But you can probably get away with ordering "Whiskey" or "Wine", etc. Carbonated fruit flavoured alcoholic drinks are called "Sawaa" (sour) or "Chuhai". If you want to stay away from alcohol, the mainstay is usually "ooloncha" (oolong tea). You can also order "cora" (cola), etc.

For food, just ask for a suggestion: "Osusume wa nan desu ka?" (What is your recommendation). Whatever they say, respond with "Hai. Onegai shimasu". ("Yes, please") It'll be great. Even if they just asked you a question, by responding with "Yes, please" you will establish that you have no freaking clue what they are saying and that they should just give you food.

As you eat, it's good to smile and remark "Oishii!" (Delicious!). Shop owners are _very_ concerned when foreigners enter because they don't know how to please you. If you are visibly happy, they will also be happy. It diffuses a lot of problems. Usually they will give you a lot of special free food (or sometimes they will give you a lot of special, expensive food that you will pay for ;-) But they will love you!) Unless you have food allergies _do not_ ask for substitutions or customisation!!!!! Japanese restaurants can't deal with this. The server's brain will melt. If you press the subject, they will sadly go back to the kitchen where the chef's brain will melt. After a very long time, they will come back and ask what they can possibly do. If you press the subject, they will probably cry. Don't do it!

If you have an allergy, say "Arerugi nan desu!" (I have an allergy) and try to describe it as best as possible (Best to have it printed in Japanese before you go so you can flash it to them).

Since you were asking about sushi, the kanji for sushi is 寿司. The best sushi restaurants will not put that on a sign because they are the best sushi restaurant in the area and everybody knows it's a sushi restaurant (which is why you need to get a recommendation). Unless you want to try kaiten shushi (conveyor belt sushi -- which is actually quite fun, despite the terrible food) say away from 回転寿司 restaurants. Again, if it has photographs of food, or English menus, it might be good, but it won't be at the top. Also, don't look for modern, glitzy, fancy restaurants. Look for "It seems to have been around since 1950 and they haven't painted the exterior once". But the inside will be nice.

Other than than, just relax, have courage and enjoy your trip! The food here is amazing virtually everywhere. On a 3 1/2 week trip you will see and do a lot of great stuff (I envy you going up to Hokkaido -- especially by train). Keep in mind that every small town is incredibly proud of its local produce and cuisine. They will want to impress you with it. Just take it in and appreciate it. If you do, people will respond with more kindness than you can imagine.

Hope that helps!

[0] - [http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/noren-at-sake-shop-at- ed...](http://media.gettyimages.com/photos/noren-at-sake-shop-at-edo-tokyo- open-air-architectural-museum-is-an-picture-id498156108)

<comment><USER16> Wow! Just wow!

      Hope that helps!

Yes, it does indeed. And just by reading your reply I can hardly wait to head off to Japan.

One of the good things is that I eat essentially everything, absolutely love Japanese cuisine (it's part of the reason for the trip) and don't mind ordering the Menu Surprise, because I anyway don't have a damn clue what I order :)

While I'm aware of some of the cultural dos and don'ts (like never, ever lose it, no matter what, not ever!) your reply is a trove of really useful advise. Like "Oishii!" to indicate happyness (which I will experience in all likeliness, so there's nothing phony about it) or to never, ever ask for a substitute in a restaurant. While I probably wouldn't have done that anyway it's really good advise.

The primer in quick, useful Japanese is also fantastic.

To cut to the tempura: I just PDF'd your reply and will keep it handy as a travel resource, while in Japan.

I can't thank you enough for taking the time and putting that up. It would be great if other Japan visitors stumble over it and find it useful. I know that I do.

Thank you so much!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> As a UI developer I feel like I am one of those artisan chefs and I dread the day automated UI will come a knocking

</comment><comment><USER18> > _he could bring the previously elite Japanese dish to the masses_

I distinctly remember reading elsewhere that sushi was poor's people street food, basically. That is, it was cheap and certainly no _elite_.

<comment><USER19> That's sort of correct. Sushi today is very different than what Japanese people ate hundreds of years ago. Before refrigeration, fish was largely salted or vinegared unless it was eaten fresh. Japanese never ate salmon sushi because Japanese salmon often had worms. It wasn't until Norway began importing salmon that Japanese began eating raw salmon. That was a long/difficult road as I heard from Norwegians who know that story. But now Japan imports a lot of salmon from Norway. Also before the modern era, tuna/maguro was not the revered fish it is today. White meat fish were, and to many sushi chefs, still is the top fish for sushi.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> "Conveyor-belt sushi" has such a terrible connotation. The worst of fast food, cardboard cuisine, mindless automation, and glassy-eyed consumers.

That said, the concept of what is effectively an automatic rice-forming machine seems pretty tame and reasonable. Compare dicing an onion by hand vs. using a _robot-coupe_.

I was particularly struck by the dedication here: it took _5 years_ to get the machine to "work". Keep that in mind the next time you are building your MVP.

<comment><USER21> Conveyor-belt sushi might sound bad but it's likely better than you'd expect. It also isn't completely made by machine, at least in the ones I've eaten at in America. It's a nice way to have lunch especially, I like that you can get the exact amount of food that you want, and the immediacy of sitting down and taking right from the conveyor is great. It usually feels like a good value for the cost too.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Looks like one of the sushi making robots costs somewhere around ~$15,000. Would be great if there was one available for the prosumer market at a lower price.

<comment><USER23> I'm not sure prosumer market exists for sushi making robot.

Tough part about sushi isn't forming rice and wrapping, but rather, cooking and seasoning rice, sourcing and preparing ingredients.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> They have a nice clean website, if the product descriptions were absent, then I definitely would not have been able to guess what the machines were used for ([http://www.suzumokikou.com/product_type/for- factory/](http://www.suzumokikou.com/product_type/for-factory/)).

</comment><comment><USER25> > Why had the Japanese government embarked on a policy to limit rice > production, effectively paying some farmers to keep their paddy fields idle?

Ah, the classic question asked of every overbearing economically-intervening government.

<comment><USER26> > Ah, the classic question asked of every overbearing economically-intervening > government.

STORY TIME!

So I come from Slovenia, the land of wine that you've never heard of. One of our things is that everyone with even a little bit of land grows vines and sometimes makes wine. There's at least a few vines growing in people's backyards even if they just eat the grapes.

People with slightly more land have vineyards and sidehustle making wine and selling it. This has two effects, 1) there's a lot of very very crappy wine out there, 2) crappy wine still gets you drunk so people keep buying it. As a result a liter of wine cost about 30 euro cents at one point.

So the government stepped in and put a stop to it. Gotta avoid crashing one of the bigger industries in the country right?

How do you do it? You pay people to cut down their vineyards. Cut it down and we'll give you X0,000 euro.

Now people have a choice, if they're making less than that much by selling their wine, they can take the government subsidy, cut down their vines, and go do something else with their life. This is a lucrative opportunity for all small-time wineries. Many people took it.

As a result, people who were making more than the amount of the subsidy, didn't cut down their vineyards AND they can now sell their wine for more than they could before. Very lucrative situation for them as well.

We now have a stronger wine industry, less crappy wine, and fewer pesticides and stuff making it into nature. Hobby vineyards tend to overspray because they really really really care about every little vine.

We still drink most of the wine ourselves though, so you are not likely to ever hear about Slovenian wine outside our country. My French girlfriend says it's the best she's ever had.

<comment><USER27> Your girlfriend is in love... congrats! ;)

<comment><USER26> I also gave her the most expensivest bottle I could find to taste ;)

And she had to say she likes grandpa's wine. No other option there.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Video of how one works.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=95&v=-ocpbJ0aZTk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=95&v=-ocpbJ0aZTk)

</comment><comment><USER28> somebody had to say his name thrice</comment>


Technical Interviews aren't merely technical - <AUTHOR> https://nicolodavis.com/blog/interviewing/ <comment><USER2> I honestly enjoy take-home assignments more, because they (well, at least the proper ones) mitigate many of the risks that are listed in the post.

My experience is that the interviewer can pretty much make or break a technical interview.

I've had interviewers that used them in like they should (get a feel how you solve problems and think, how you communicate, etc.), and I've had garbage interviewers that read a script, with problems they themselves didn't understand.

I know the view on take-home assignments is very polarized, but you know what? The net time spent is usually far, far less than the prepping game for technical interviews. You see people grinding leetcode for hundreds of hours, memorizing problems and solutions, trying to get every edge-case they can - just in case the interviewer throws something obscure at them.

At least with assignments you get a well-defined problem, where you get time to think and reflect, and can work/learn enough to have a meaningful discussion.

<comment><AUTHOR> > My experience is that the interviewer can pretty much make or break a > technical interview

Yep, that's exactly what I've tried to communicate here.

I like the idea of take home assignments as well. Maybe the industry will get to a state where these can be done completely remotely (and even graded automatically) in order to determine whom to bring onsite, where you just have a general discussion.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I agree with the points outlined here as both a former candidate and as an interviewer. They are not really technical but the questions I ask to candidates are relevant to the job and I always look for honest individuals that have substance in their experience.

In my experience, as a former candidate, I have met bad interviewers who deliberately focus too much on syntax and like nitpicking candidates knowledge on libraries while they attempt to implement or solve a problem for which they openly admit afterwards that they do not use and go far to secretly record candidates struggling. I even met some 'engineers' claimimg that they are senior in C++ and I brought up LLVM in the conversation and they had no clue on what that was. Likewise for 'JavaScript experts' having no idea about JavaScript engines such as V8, JavaScriptCore and SpiderMonkey.

I don't usually go technical in these interviews but only when asked and before that, I research their open-source contributions to ask relevant questions. Unfortunately, Most of these engineers had little to no open-source contributions or have only private (Obviously work related) which is very unfortunate.

As an interviewer, I have ultimately done away with take-home projects unless candidates are expecting something out of it (I used to pay all second stage candidates for their projects) otherwise it becomes a waste of their time if they are not considered.

Instead, I ask them about relevant open-source contributions to significant projects which is more or less a straight-forward free pass to a on-site interview and at the same time already eliminates beginner/intermediate level candidates. Which I go slightly technical on those patches as if I was conducting a code review. If the candidate is honest and everything matches up, I'll hire them on the spot and that is it. If I find that the candidate is suspiciously dishonest, That is the only time I will give a problem to solve without interrogating them.

By doing this I don't even need to waste money on Hackerrank/Leetcode/Codility tests which are useless in finding competent software engineers.</comment>


Ask HN: Cato's Hike - Programming for Kids on iPad and iPhone - <AUTHOR>

Not many games take the player out of the game and make them think about it abstractly up front rather than controlling the player directly which is why this is so special!  Cato's Hike teaches kids, teens (and adults) basic coding and programming using a fun card-based interface.
The biggest problem I have is how to reach kids through the game.  I've added a manual, tutorials and more levels.  Does anyone have any suggestions?  Should I create video tutorials?  Write more articles?  I feel everytime that the first things kids do is skip the tutorial and go straight to the game and get lost.  When I'm around to help they get it, if they read a bit they get it as well.  Anyone else figure out how to deal with this in a game setting?
The current update added a manual and more UI tweaks, but I'm really excited for the next update which will add support for goto's as proxy for procedures :)  I think at that point I will have covered enough concepts!
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/catos-hike-programming-logic/id574335479?ls=1&mt=8
http://hwahba.com/catoshike <comment><USER2> Hello Hesham,

What a great idea and execution of this idea. Kind like a visual lego mindstorms. Maybe the kids get better introduced if you show both screens at the same time, so they can better relate the action with the reactions ;-).

This concept and game really relates well to our own product/platform we're creating, letting children learn by doing and using visual building blocks to teach how software works.

we want to ensure no one is left behind in the digital world and we don't get a new social divide between the makers and users of the digital world.

if you're interested we have a few more details on our website and blog mostly working under covers and with education institutes (schools, government, universities)

<http://www.trnk.com> <http://blog.trnk.com>

</comment><comment><USER3> This is a pretty good write-up on imagining the first steps of the first level that can help the player understand the elements of the game.

<http://www.auntiepixelante.com/?p=465>

I am sorry that I haven't had a chance to try out the game, so you may have already implemented some of this. The screenshots look good, though. Good luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! Great read! I have tutorial levels but none as subtle as this :) I hope that if I ever make a sequel or any other type of game to put that kind of thought and detail into the first level. Certainly I tried with the tutorials, but I'll see what I can do to edit the first levels of each "world" :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I'll give it a look and write a review in whatsoniphone.com (I'm "editor" there, in addition to the other million things I do for this and other sites.) Drop me an email so I can send you feedback directly, if needed!

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I'll definitely ping you. While I realize that it does do the initial things I wanted to get across I need to find a way to encourage their engagement and going beyond simple solutions. Feedback will definitely be welcome :)

<comment><USER4> I (well, it's our goal in the editorial team, but I try to do my best to go the extra mile) try to do my best to encourage quality games and apps as much as I can with free reviews, promotions, interviews and whatever we can come up. Anything that gets kids to program definitely gets my approval! I'll install it later (now is lunch time) and give it a few go's.</comment></comment></comment>


Bugatti has broken the 300mph barrier - <AUTHOR> https://www.topgear.com/car-news/bugatti-has-broken-300mph-barrier <comment><USER2> It's pretty impressive.

In terms of a daily driver, I think the fun comes from the acceleration, and thus the torque a car can produce.

My daily driver is a Mazda 3 / Mazda Axela, which comes with 200 Newtonmeter torque at 6400 rpm. It's ok, it's fun, but yeah.

So the other day I drove a 2013 Nissan Leaf (BEV), which gives you ~250 Nm torque right at the beginning. This was so much fun to drive.

So for me, a car doesn't need to have a ridiculosly max speed - I need max torque from the start.

<comment><USER3> I ride bikes and from a practical standpoint, along with small size and manoeuvrability, the acceleration (a result of torque) is one of the most useful attributes. Much moreso than top speed, or even speeds significantly in excess of the posted limits.

Bikes don't tend to have high torque in general, but their light weight and gearing are designed to maximise what torque they do produce. This means there are quite a few that will do sub 3 seconds to 60, and sub 5 seconds is practically the norm.

What this means is that you can more easily get past, and through, traffic because you can safely take advantage of gaps that no car can. Also, that sense of having your arms ripped out of their sockets and hanging on for dear life is fun.

Still, there's something to be said for going really fast as well: the feeling of the world blurring past you, and the road or track flowing and snaking underneath you like mercury, is hard to beat (if sometimes a little terrifying).

<comment><USER4> Bikes like Harleys and BMW twins have plenty of torque, where bikes like Kawasaki Ninja's major on power (peak torque at high revs). Hence Harleys and BMW's are first off the line at the lights (no need to build revs) but the Ninja's will come steaming past seconds later.

There are some fun youtube videos demoing bike performance, e.g. Ninja H2's doing 0-250MPH in 26s [0], outdragging a Bugatti [1] and outpacing an F1 car and an F16 fighter at the same time.

[0] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_n7ru1e-rg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_n7ru1e-rg) [1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gi5_GQ78wM8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gi5_GQ78wM8) [2] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ESq00zi7bU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ESq00zi7bU)

<comment><USER5> You cannot compare just engine torque numbers, without adjusting for gear ratios, wheel size and sprockets.

As another commenter said, you rev a Ninja (just like a sports car) and launch it using the clutch.

<comment><USER4> I believe I did point out that on Ninja's (I have one) you need to build the revs; you can't just dump the clutch and go like you can on a BMW Boxer or a Harley (which I also have). Hence the Ninja is generally slowest away when the lights change (but is by far the quickest bike overall).

In fact _bicycles_ are fastest off the line, since they produce max. torque at 0rpm (just keep weight on a pedal, release the brakes to go). But acceleration is modest, so motorbikes and cars will soon go past.

And of course electrically-driven vehicles are also capable of producing torque at 0rpm, hence their acceleration advantage.

<comment><USER6> > _In fact bicycles are fastest off the line, since they produce max. torque > at 0rpm (just keep weight on a pedal, release the brakes to go)._

I doubt a bicycle would actually cross the starting line before a high end bike or car would surpass it. A 180lb rider would produce about 90lb of torque at most (assuming 6" crank) and that's only for the instant that the crank is parallel with the ground.

A high end car would deliver significantly more than 90lb of torque instantaneously by dumping the clutch (or using launch control).

<comment><USER7> You can produce torque in excess of your weight by using pedals that clip in and pedaling "circles" instead of "squares". When I was in good shape I figured I could produce torque much closer to my weight than half of it.

<comment><USER6> The average rider probably cannot produce more torque than their weight that way. A quick search indicates that professional cycling sprinters can generate slightly over 100 ft-lb of torque. The average rider won't be producing anything close to that. (Hard to find anything definitive, though.)

If you aren't standing up sprinting, you're definitely not going to be getting anything close to your "body weight torque".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> It's futile to actually have road-legal cars that go this fast because you can't do very much useful with the speed.

This is much too fast for the human operator (driver) to safely react to things outside the cockpit, which is why for example Britain owns trains capable of 140mph in service but deliberately limits them to 125mph. Tests suggested drivers couldn't be relied on to reliably observe and react to a lineside signal (showing e.g. double amber, "Prepare to find the next signal at: Prepare to find the next signal at: Danger") passed at 140mph. The "obvious" upgrade is to put the signals inside the cab with the driver, and that's how high speed trains work. But a car doesn't have in-cab signals either, and it has a LOT more external signals to respond to, including several signs we see in that video.

<comment><USER9> Pretty much all modern cars will go faster than is useful and/or safe. Only a small set of public roads allow cars to go their top speed. I have a 1991 Corvette that will go 153 mph, and I've only done it twice. It scares the crap out of me. Top speed is a cool thing to boast about, but most people won't ever see it, and a few stupid people will hurt themselves with it. That's okay on the balance, because millionaires are spending their money and supporting the economy. Buying one of these cars probably funds an engineer's salary and likely a few others supplying materials to Bugatti.

<comment><USER10>
      a few stupid people will hurt themselves with it. That's okay on the balance, because millionaires are spending their money and supporting the economy.

I fail to see how that is ok.

<comment><USER11> As a society we generally seem to be OK with allowing a few people to be hurt or killed in exchange for a type of entertainment. For example if you are a race car driver, you are certainly increasing your risk of dying, and increasing the risk of killing spectators or other people on the racetrack, but we accept that because it is entertaining. Now I think it is a problem if people are driving a Bugatti recklessly on the roads and endangering others who are just driving around, but I think you are just as dangerous in one of the many cars which can go almost 200 mph as you are in a car that can go 300mph, since it is pretty difficult to approach 200mph on a public road.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I'm sad that, on HN, I had to read thru 50+ comments about how impractical 300 mph is, before I found any discussion of the engineering challenges.

<comment><USER13> HN has become extremely negative in the last couple of years.

I came over here when I got sick of Reddit's negativity in ~2013. What's the next alternative?

<comment><USER14> I agree. I want to know the answer to the same question. Pseudo-intellectual sophism seems to be abundant here.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> For those interested in the science and physical limits of acceleration (not just top speed), this video talks about the physics behind the fastest 0-60 runs: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAvIVGGhEis](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nAvIVGGhEis)

He works at it starting with tire limits during ABS braking, and throws in real-world examples like Tesla and the Dodge Demon.

He covers a bunch of other car engineering topics. For example, the Atkinson cycle: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z45fM2N-4C4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z45fM2N-4C4)

</comment><comment><USER15> The milestone of reaching faster speeds with combustion engines seems to be a wrong goal in this day and age. Climate change is a fact, and the burning of material based on oil/coal is a major driver of this. The effects have been known for decades, but only now major impacts can be seen and felt.

In German, there is this phrase, which describes the time period after a certain success/enjoyment/well-being. Literally translated it meanss the fat years are over ("Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei."). It's usually used in the context of forced savings vs voluntariy expenditure, but it fits with the current state of our environment as well. The times of making faster cars and enjoying high speeds are over, if we don't want to demise as a species. Environmentally safer beahviour should become more fun.

<comment><USER16> I think you are missing the forest from the trees. If we want to truly reduce climate change we should start by reducing international shipping, consumerism, and non-essential air travel for both pleasure and business.

A 300MPH speed run in an ultra low production Bugatti car is more or less insignificant in the fight against climate change.

<comment><USER17> You write we should reduce: international shipping, consumerism, and non- essential air travel

Sure you can but it will be heavily inconvenient (at least for many in the west). But do you know what reduces the carbon footprint by about 75% in a country like Germany? 1.) Electric cars/trains 2.) Electricity from renewables 3.) Heating using electrical power from renewables (heat pumps)

Of the last 25%, there are 20% from industrial production and in the last 5% you could include air travel (2%) among other things.

Heating and driving and getting power from renewables makes your lifestyle about 0% different from what it is now. Buying goods that last longer even means giving life a touch of luxury. A better, more luxurious lifestyle that produces about 75% less carbon dioxide. Impossible? In a growing number of countries, this will be possible soon. Of course, not flying, not consuming gives you that "holy" feeling of "having done something". But done right, a sustainable lifestyle makes the life we have now even better. It takes a bit of political willpower, of course.

<comment><USER16> I am not disagreeing with electric cars at all, I think it is important.

But the carbon footprint created within the West is just a small amount of the carbon footprint that the West contributes to. We can't just reduce our own carbon footprint if it simply pushes that carbon footprint onto other, less developed countries.

I think it will be very unlikely that we will continue to live with the same luxuries that we enjoy today while still aggressively reducing climate change. It won't be a case of "we have electric transport, but I can still buy a new iPhone once a year". It will be a case of aggressively cutting back everywhere and and ultimately growth and our economy will suffer in the short-term for long-term sustainability.

<comment><USER17> If you freeze the economy to today's state and technology, there will be no growth any more, sure. But at least in our lifetime, the move to a sustainable economy will create more growth and opportunities than will be cut in unsustainable industries. I do not what happens in 150 years, but for the next 50 years I do not worry. As we need more intelligent technologies than we used to have, the value ofhe output will rise, thus economies that are able to adapt will profit.

Using solar, wind and water to create power will, by the way, not push the carbon footprint somewhere else. It will, to a great part, vanish. And those economies who, in future, produce their own energy instead of importing them, will have a higher GDP and less dependence of foreign markets.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Does anyone have any insights to if this brings any interesting science to the table that is applicable outside of this context? I personally have zero interest in a fast car going fast, but it's always interesting to see how these sorts of difficult feats help humanity in more general ways.

<comment><USER19> For the Veyron I know they developed special tires with Michelin to be able to handle the extreme high speeds.

Such development might help "normal" tires improve in durability.

I can imagine this is something that happens in a lot of area's. Pushing every part to the extremes might help make them more reliable under normal usage.

Ultra high speeds also require efficient aerodynamics, which in turn helps reduce drag/fuel usage.

<comment><USER20> It wasn't just tires, but rims as well. If I recall correctly for the original at top speed the useful life of rims was about 30min, tires about 15. You on my had 12 min of fuel at that rate though. Rim + tire replacement was something like 100k USD. Not that anyone was going to be able to put many top speed minutes together in practice.

<comment><USER21> I recognise James May's delivery of those numbers! [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO0PgyPWE3o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO0PgyPWE3o)

<comment><USER20> I didn't remember that but it must have been what stuck it in my head!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Non-production car, not replicated in both directions. Impressive, but not any sort of record. Looking forward to them doing it in the forthcoming production car.

</comment><comment><USER23> In the video the car accelerates from 300 to 400 kmh in around 10 seconds. It says "raw footage" at the bottom.

Remarkably quick.

</comment><comment><USER24> That car looks remarkably non-aerodynamic for that insane speed.

<comment><USER25> Many things that look very aerodynamic really aren't, and vice versa. Much of fluid dynamics is non-intuitive.

<comment><USER26> Yeah, one of the lightbulb moments for me when learning more about aerodynamics and talking to my dad (former aircraft designer, workedon concorde) is how often what's happening at the back can be more important than what happens at the front, or how air leaves a surface can really bump up your drag in unexpected ways.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Incredible! A celebration of silliness in all its absurd glory. I was not expecting Bugatti would do a top speed run at least for a few more years for the tyres to become available so I think we all expected Koenigsegg to be the first to 300mph. Massive achievement for Michelin as much as VW.

</comment><comment><USER28> I'm not sure what record they have here. There have already been multiple road-legal 300 mph cars as well as a stock road-legal 300 mph car for sale (Koenigsegg Jesko).

The article says that this is the first from a series manufacturer. Why does Koenigsegg not count, or was this the first?

<comment><USER9> They don't have a record yet, but the record they are aiming for is for the fastest "production" car. The car they used was modified from stock so it doesn't count for the record yet. But this will almost certainly lead to a small batch of cars with the same configuration from the factory, which they will use to (re)claim the fastest production car crown.

<comment><USER28> Alright, that makes sense, and I suppose the title doesn't claim they're the first to build a road-legal 300 mph car (as they're not).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> I remember when Top Gear took out their first Bugatti, they pointed out that the tires were... I can't remember if they £10k apiece or per set, and at top speed their range diminished drastically. At top speed the life of the tires was measured in hours, and not many of them, not unlike a race car. So wear and tear to 'open her up' was astoundingly high.

What's the range on this one, I wonder?

</comment><comment><USER30> 300mph is a milestone, not a barrier.

</comment><comment><USER31> It's kind of interesting to look at the first car to go 300mph in 1935 [https://craighill.net/2012/09/03/september-3-1935-sir- malcol...](https://craighill.net/2012/09/03/september-3-1935-sir-malcolm- campbell-exceeds-300-mph/) vid [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcM740YDgzs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcM740YDgzs) Not sure if it doesn't look cooler than the 2019 version though probably it would be harder to park at Sainsbury's.

</comment><comment><USER32> Full cage and likely doesn't pass the sleeping Bobby test would disqualify it according to a certain unnamed host of Top Gears past.

Cool anyway, but will be cooler when it's a true production car.

<comment><USER33> Can you explain what this means?

<comment><USER32> A welded in / bolted in roll cage isn't something you find in a production vehicle, I'm not even sure if they're allowed.

The sleeping Bobby test is the ability to go over a speed bump (so names because it's like a policeman laying down).

These two metrics were often used by Clarkson to disqualify certain cars from the lap time leaderboard.

Cool car, but it'll be cooler when anyone can theoretically buy a road legal 300mph from the showroom.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> "The 300mph project will inevitably result in a production Super Sport version of the Chiron". Can't wait to see that happen.

</comment><comment><USER35> The article says that the speed is a record, but besides 'supercar' (which is what?) it does not say for what kind of car on what kind of track for what distance. Can anyone here explain it to me?

</comment><comment><USER36> I love reading about stuff like this: I just wanna see that 300 mph speedometer in the car!

But, in my little Nissan Rogue that can barely manage 90mph, I don't need a 160mph speedo, LOL.

</comment><comment><USER5> Sadly not 500km/h. Really impressive though.

</comment><comment><USER37> Once again the IC cars manufacturers underperform. This is non-production car and very late to the party. Meanwhile Tesla Roadster, an EV car, is doing cool 4513 mph - or 15 times faster, with insane fuel economy of ~0.03 l/100km.

Source: [https://www.whereisroadster.com/](https://www.whereisroadster.com/)

Joking aside, a really nice car I wouldn't mind owning!

</comment><comment><USER38> Wow, congrats! They almost hit 500km/h! That would be the next "easy" goal I guess.

</comment><comment><USER39> gives me similar chills as to spacex boosters landing - what an achievement!

dual walled exhaust is peculiar - is there an air feed into the gap?

</comment><comment><USER40> Not a barrier.

</comment><comment><USER41> That's 482km/h for those using modern units.

<comment><USER42> Information is fine but please keep the flamebait away.

<comment><USER41> How is it flamebait. Was something I said untrue?

<comment><USER42> I answered this here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20861098](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20861098).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> "Sometimes it's a little better to travel than to arrive" ― Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

I'm a bit surprised this book doesn't come up more often in tech circles. Has quite a bit of overlap with the philosophical questions we face daily.

</comment><comment><USER44> It's too bad that the state of roads in most countries is aweful and can't support anything approaching high speeds, let alone this insane 490 km/h.

<comment><USER45> Yes it is such a shame that the roads are such that when I am on the road with my family some crazy daredevil can't drive 490km/h near us.

The roads are for getting from A to B, not racing. If you want to go 490km/h, go to a race track.

<comment><USER44> Wouldn't you like to reach your destination in a much shorter time than usual? I certainly would.

<comment><USER45> Yes, because people who want to go 490km/h want to do so because it gets them to B quicker, not because they want to have fun.

Also, no, I'd rather be safe from my own and other's mistakes, which are far more likely to happen at that pace and I'd rather have lower emissions from all cars. I am happy to sacrifice speed for that.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: Icecream – Program using emojis - <AUTHOR> http://devpost.com/software/icecream <comment><USER2> Horrible. This seems way more difficult to learn, because the chosen symbols don't always make sense. Why is "let" a cat and "var" a dog, for example?

And since probably more symbols are chosen arbitrarly, the Hello World example just seems impossible to understand, as long as you don't memorize what the emojis mean. Is this really more intuitive than let x = "Hello World" ?

It would be fun if emojis were used for different purposes, maybe like > let pigs = 2 (pig emoji)</comment>


The brave new world of DIY faecal transplant - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-27503660

<comment><USER2> I was diagnosed with crohn's disease in 2008. Thankfully mine is under control with 2.5mg naltrexone every second night - I have mildy active disease now but am asymptomatic and have no ulceration visible on a 'scope. Before I started LDN, I'd have happily done this, and my symptoms were pretty mild compared to many. Everything that can be done to make this easier, safer and a more wildly offered option should be done ASAP.

</comment><comment><USER3> I am a fecal donor for FMT (in addition to a microbiologist and epidemiologist) and am willing to answer any questions you might have, an AMA if you will.

<comment><USER4> Has this procedure been investigated to ensure proper gut colonization in new borns after labor that involves antibiotics? Either via a transplant to the mother or child?

<comment><USER3> Not that I know of.

An interesting aside - as you may have read, FMT is being investigated as a treatment for autism. The thinking here is as follows. Babies are born with a certain level of Clostridium species (not necessarily C. diff). Clostridium are very good at producing toxins (botulism and the toxins involved in C.diff). Normally the level of clostridium in babies drops on its own. It's believed that in some babies, this drop never happens. These babies are then therefore continually exposed to toxins from these clostridium bugs, some of which may have neurotoxic properties and can result in autism. The goal of FMT is to alter the gut flora enough to get rid of these Clostridium species and stop the toxin from reaching the brain. There has been success in young children. What we need to keep in mind though is that autism is a spectrum of not only symptoms, but also a spectrum of causes as well, so FMT won't necessarily work for everyone.

<comment><USER4> Fascinating. What are the symptoms or diagnostic tests that would lead a doctor to consider this?

<comment><USER3> It would mostly be a parent investigating it on their own I would say.

It's well known that children with autism have frequent GI issues (diarrhea etc). You'll find that many parents have their autistic children on special diets (gluten free, dairy free etc) all of which attempt to alleviate the GI symptoms. They may work, but it's likely because they are changing the gut flora, rather than removing the gluten protein for example.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> There seems to be a growing interest in this field, but there is a lot we don't know yet.

Human feces hasn't been an area with much prestige (and money to be made), so few used to care about it. But, if I remember correctly, the growing interest has partly been caused by geneticists who were initially studying the genome of e.g. humans, but who switched target as the original work was done much quicker than anybody though was possible.

From what I know about the research so far, it seems like our bacterial flora, especially in the gut, is tightly connected to quite a few diseases. However, for many of them, it is still unclear what is cause and effect: Does the altered flora cause the disease, or does the disease cause the altered flora? External factors like stress is known to alter gut flora. On the other hand, bacteria in your gut may affect your mood and personality. Figuring out what is what is tricky, and I suppose there can be feedback loops here as well.

There is much more research to be done. You should be careful with experimenting, as there is risk involved: You may get bacteria that you don't want, and you don't know what the changed flora will do to you. An acquaintance of mine is a researcher in this field, and he does not recommend taking probiotics for e.g. IBS, as he think we still know too little about what types of bacteria to take, dosage, and potential negative long term effects. "Good" strains can do bad things in some contexts, and interaction/symbiosis between different strains (and us) may complicate things. That being said, afaik, probiotics is generally thought to be safe (although I am not sure all manufacturers are trustworthy).

Personally, I think this field has the potential to really change the way we think about health, disease, and medicine. Another field, which I think is related, is diet and fasting: food, and lack of food, alters our gut flora too.

<comment><USER6> "...the growing interest has partly been caused by genealogist who were initially studying the genome of e.g. humans..."

Do you mean geneticist rather than genealogist?

<comment><USER5> Indeed, I do. I've corrected the text. (I blame too little coffee, and I've corrected that as well.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Not for the faint of heart... the picture of the blender was a little too much for my taste!

<comment><USER8> It is an interesting approach. One thing I don't understand is why they are blending the faecal matter. Most of the organisms in the gut are strict anaerobes which are killed on contact with oxygen. Blending is going to introduce an enormous amount of oxygen.

If I was doing this I would put the faecal matter in a ziploc bag containing saline, expel all the air, close the bag and gently massage it to get the nice "soup". This would stay anaerobic and save my blender too :)

<comment><USER3> Microbiologist here - the name anaerobe is a pretty broad term. Within the gut there is going to be obligate anaerobes (killed by atmospheric O2) and facultative anaerobes (can survive in both oxygen rich and oxygen deplete environments).

In a blender, the obligates will likely die but the facultative will remain.

<comment><USER8> I am also a microbiologist (my Ph.D was in molecular microbiology). I didn't work on obligate anerobes, but the lab next door did. They had to go to a lot of trouble to keep oxygen out of all their experiments by using aneroboic chambers and the like (a total pain).

The problem is that most of the organisms in the gut are obligate (strict) anerobes. Sure the faculatative anaerobes will survive, but this is going to create an imbalance in the populations being transplanted. If the aim is to restore tha balance present in a healthy individual why introduce oxygen when it is easy to avoid.

<comment><USER3> Two things, you aren't necessarily trying to achieve the identical balance. Most of the research in this area is finding the particular bacteria that are important to repopulate the ill gut. The aim is to eventually transplant only the important bugs or just grow the important ones and skip the fecal donors all together.

The other issue is that it would be very hard to get a fecal sample that hasn't been exposed to O2.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> My company published a guide to C Diff last year. The author, a GI doc and C diff researcher, had this to say about hospital-initiated transplants:

 _Stool transplant, also known as a fecal transplant, is a unique therapy. At our hospital, we recommend stool transplants only if all else has failed. Specifically, if a patient has had recurrence of C. diff, even after pulse- tapered Vanco treatment, or multiple bouts of Vanco, Dificid or Flagyl, it's time to consider a stool transplant.

The idea behind a stool transplant is to "reseed the lawn," so to speak. After exposure to weeks or months of antibiotics (including Vanco) the normal bowel flora — the organisms in your colon that help prevent infection — is weakened. They simply can't keep C. diff out. In other words, the normal barrier function of the colonic flora is gone, and C. diff gets right back in. So putting in some normal flora from a healthy donor is like reseeding the lawn — it restores the barrier._

The author was aware of the DIY movement, as well as the rise of holistic medical practitioners who are offering transplant treatments.

He also noted that transplants are still relatively rare. Not many PCPs know much about C diff and recommended treatments; patients usually are referred to specialists in gastrointestinal and infectious disease.

<comment><USER10> One thing that I'm curious about: the GI tract is long and wiggly. Stuffing a transplant in one end only gets flora so far. Probiotics in the other end may help too. So what happens about the rest?

Is anyone making coated capsules to deliver flora further down the gut?

<comment><USER9> To your first question: In the hospital, they use a device similar to that used for a normal colonoscopy. Then:

 _When the scope reaches the top part of the colon, the doctor injects through the scope a feces suspension prepared from a healthy donor, usually a family member or close friend. … The scope is slowly withdrawn. As it is withdrawn, and more fecal suspension is put in from the top to bottom of the colon._

Not sure of the answer to the second question.

<comment><USER9> The book is _C Diff In 30 Minutes_. If anyone is interested in learning more: [http://cdiff.in30minutes.com](http://cdiff.in30minutes.com)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> As I was glancing down the front page, I read the title as "DIY facial transplant".

<comment><USER12> I did the same thing. I was rather disappointed even though I knew in my mind it was far-fetched to begin with.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> For me, the most interesting part of this article was recognizing that you can actually indirectly die from taking antibiotics. Of course sometimes you need to take it, but it shouldn't be the default thing to do when you just have a cold.

<comment><USER3> Many C. diff patients have recent history of dental procedures or surgeries. Dentist's often prescribe an inappropriate amount of ciprofloxacin to the patient. The cipro is pretty broadspectrum and knocks out majority of the gut flora but leaves the C.diff in tact (~10% of population have c.diff in their gut but it doesn't case harm). When they finish their 2 doses of cipro (inappropriate dosing by the dentist) the C.diff is left with this nice clean gut, free of competition. The c.diff flourishes and causes CDI(CDAD) C.diff Infection (C.diff associated diarrhea).

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> "90% of cells in our body are bacteria - organically, our bodies are only 10% human" That would be amazing, but of course those ~3 X 10^12 cells only weigh about a kilo, so yes, 'organically' (whatever that means in this context) bacterial cells outnumber ours by a large ratio, but in terms of mass or volume, they are only a few percent. Not to say they aren't extremely important.

<comment><USER15> Take it the other way around: if you think a 50 kg human is just as much "a human" as a 250 kg one and extrapolate from there to counting "living things", it is 3E12 bacteria vs one human. Makes the 'human' part negligible.

But of course, a drop of water on your skin would be over 1E20 molecules of H2O, so it would be dead things:living things > 1E7 (give or take a few orders of magnitude)

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> The Freakonomics Podcast has an episode on faecal transplants:

[http://freakonomics.com/2011/03/04/freakonomics-radio-the- po...](http://freakonomics.com/2011/03/04/freakonomics-radio-the-power-of- poop/)

</comment><comment><USER17> HN being the one website that I can normally read while having breakfast this left an - for want of a better term - bad taste in my mouth. I misread 'faecal' for 'facial' (serves me right for not having my reading glasses on...).

<comment><USER18> This is what I also read initially, but a DIY facial transplant would probably look even worse..

<comment><USER19> it's the British variant of "fecal".. i thought it was odd at first and it made me do a double take too...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> How hard would it be to extract the useful stuff and throw the gross stuff away? I'm sure that would make the procedure a lot more attractive to patients and doctors.

<comment><USER21> I think the useful stuff +is+ gross. Bacteria is stinky!

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Followed by the brave new world of DIY hepatitis.

</comment><comment><USER23> As someone who's father died from rapid, late-onset Ulcerative Colitis, this is really fantastic and makes me wonder what could have been.</comment>


China Tries to Extract Pledge of Compliance from U.S. Tech Firms - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/17/technology/china-tries-to-extract-pledge-of-compliance-from-us-tech-firms.html <comment><USER2> Give the Chinese some credit for this one. At least they are being open about the demand. This pledge seems a bilateral acknowledgement of the situation. China can demand backdoors and so can the US (calea). Such things are legal in their respective countries. Companies, especially those that are publicly- traded, must appease local governments if they want to keep shareholders happy.

Our anger should instead be focused on solutions to surveillance that do not rely on trusting corporations. F/OSS tools and client-side encryption is the path forwards, not extracting unenforceable promises from trillion-dollar tech giants.

<comment><USER3> I disagree completely. If corporations do not make a stand on surveillance and censorship then official demands are only going to get more brazen and receive less public attention and scrutiny.

FOSS and client-side encryption alone are not going to solve this problem. If governments can openly demand and enforce whatever they like, then users of these technologies can be threatened with draconian punishment and be prosecuted as terrorists and pedophiles.

There needs to be counter pressure from consumers, consumer groups, experts and corporations in order for client-side technologies to remain a viable option for people outside the Ecuadorian embassies of the world.

Corporations are not in the business of appeasing local governments. Corporations are in the business of pleasing consumers so that they make a profit. They appease local governments only to reach consumers and they can't do it in a way that causes consumers to distrust them as that would be self defeating.

Also, what is in the economic interest of a corporation is not self evident. It's the people at the top of these companies who make these judgements. I'm sure many of them value their privacy more than the average person and their judgement is going to be influenced by that. The same goes for shareholders.

It's always going to be a balancing act for global internet companies so let's make our weight felt!

<comment><USER4> > I disagree completely. If corporations do not make a stand on surveillance > and censorship then official demands are only going to get more brazen and > receive less public attention and scrutiny.

You're describing a world where corporations represent you, the consumer. But you're not a constituent of the corporation, you're a resource. Corporations want to keep you happy in the same way that dairy farmers want to keep cows happy, so they'll keep on producing money or milk. The constituents are shareholders.

The ones representing your interests are the elected parts of the government. Which, I know, is laughable in the US. But still, corporations are not it.

Your comments on open source and consumer counter pressure describe something hopeful.

<comment><USER5> > The ones representing your interests are the elected parts of the > government. Which, I know, is laughable in the US. But still, corporations > are not it.

a bit off-topic, but is there a country that is not laughable and the general public actually trust and believe the government have their needs in mind?

<comment><USER6> (Parts of) America, before it was run over by illegal immigrants from Europe and Britain.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Now this is the sort of thing that should have been in the Transpacific Trade Agreement - prohibiting countries from requiring backdoors.

In some areas, the US prohibits cooperation with the laws of other countries. The Arab League requires vendors to agree not to do business with Israel, and the US has a law forbidding US companies from complying with that. So there's a precedent for this. That's been enough to more or less break the Arab League's boycott.

<comment><USER2> 1) The Arab League is not a country. It is a group of representatives from several countries, few of which really get along with each other. Statement and edicts from the league are not law to be obeyed by people but by countries (they need to ratify by passing local laws). The league cannot directly require anything of any vendor.

2) Lots of laws in the arab world are not enforced. Outsiders often find these and assume they mean something. They do not. In totalitarian states what matters is what the ruling group wants to do. The existence or non-existence of a written law is very much beside the point.

<comment><USER8> The existence of laws that are not usually enforced is the basis for arbitrary enforcement if and when there is a 'need' to persecute somebody. Facile attitudes towards evidence are further enablers. The Rule Of Law is as much about parsimony of laws as it is of uniform enforcement.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> >store Chinese user data within the country

The rest is expected but this to me is the most interesting one of the lot. We've seen these requests come up now and again, but I think we will be seeing the importance of "where" data is stored more and more in the upcoming years.

As a US citizen, I know that Google/Apple/Facebook/etc. have tons of data on me and acknowledge that the US gov't can generally get some of this data, but I'll be damned if those companies let Chinese/Russian/etc. governments access that data. More to the point, I don't think the US government wants information on its citizens stored elsewhere, and readily accessible to government inspection.

So let's not be naive and ask how dare China ask for the same thing. Of course they would ask that.

<comment><USER10> Over here in europe we're asking for pretty much the same thing from US companies.

And the microsoft case regarding data stored in ireland[1] just adds more fuel to the fire.

[1] [http://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/1.2186247](http://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/1.2186247)

<comment><USER11> > Over here in europe we're asking for pretty much the same thing from US > companies.

However, the reasoning is _quite_ different.

The EU wants data stored in the EU so that it is nominally _protected_ from hostile country intercept and is subject to EU protection laws.

Whereas, China actively intends to use the locally stored data _for_ intercept.

Now, one can argue that the local EU governments _also_ want to intercept the data. Nevertheless, until we see The Great Internet Wall of Europe I'm willing to give those countries a little more slack that they might actually be trying to do the right thing.

<comment><USER12> I'm sure the chinese government is genuinely concerned about foreign powers spying on their citizens, just as the US is concerned about the same thing. I don't think the fact that they both spy on their _own_ citizens, as well as foreign citizens, makes that less relevant.

As for GFW, yeah it's evil, but I don't see how that means that the chinese government is not concerned with others spying on them.

EDIT: Just to clarify, I hate all this spying with a passion. Just saying that the motives are the same for everyone here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The big thing is that these things are law in China. The chinese government is basically making the tech companies sign a document saying they will comply with the law. The laws in China are insane and if tech companies want to do business there they must accept them or pack up and leave like google did.

Hosting data for chinese users within china has been part of law for a while now, all servers hosting content that is licensed to be displayed in china must also be hosted in china. There are tons of rules that allow the government to control tech companies. If the law is not there and some tech company does something the government wants to control they can pass a law the next day if they wanted to. Laws are pretty arbitrary in china because there is only one party and they vote practically unanimously on anything the leaders propose

</comment><comment><USER14> China has always reserved the right to shut you down, copy your service and acquire your userbase. Not much has changed

<comment><USER15> agreed. unless this agreement goes both ways and ensures IP protection, I can't imagine this is going to get much traction with these companies.

<comment><USER14> If your company is not abiding by the set rules and is kicked out, will your patent still be valid? Would you be allowed to defend it in court?

Would a Chinese judge stand up for your business to the letter of the law? Or follow orders coming from Beijing?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> It will be interesting to see if the US Government, who wants backdoors, will condemn China for wanting backdoors.

<comment><USER12> > It will be interesting to see if the US Government, who wants backdoors, > will condemn China for wanting backdoors.

Where have you been for the last 10 years? The US regularly condemns China for backdoors in their equipment, they even do it with a straight face after the Snowden revelations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> When the US and other countries tries to do it, it is some how portrayed as "those pesky government people" but when China wants to do it, its all ":O"

<comment><USER18> Pretty sure most people who oppose one, oppose the other as well. Personally, I think the only "principles" technologists should be signing with regards to this sort of thing are these: [https://projects.eff.org/~barlow/Declaration- Final.html](https://projects.eff.org/~barlow/Declaration-Final.html) (yes, I am being hyperbolic, but only up to a point)

<comment><USER19> Not at all. I endorse both restricting location of data to safer places and security review of products. The specifics vary considerably from country to country. The consensus is that a Swiss ownership/company offering services in their country evaluated by INFOSEC professionals would be ideal. If any L.I. exists, it would have low likelihood of abuse. Iceland may not have L.I. or crypto regs but it's unknown how they will handle future U.S. pressure. Swiss handled it pretty well and aren't NSA SIGINT partners unlike most of Europe.

Then, there's Europe with its data protections of unknown effectiveness for me as an American. Then, there's America where the sue happy, LEO's, and courts can get away with a lot. Your actual trade secrets, source code, etc are more protected here plus stronger patents. Then we have China and Russia where some employees and external parties on the network will be hacking the crap out of you while the government protects them when caught.

So, quite different situations in different countries even for same topic.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Any company who moves essential business data to China in order to do business there is a fool.

Unfortunately, the CEO who authorizes this kind of stupid action is rarely the CEO who gets bitten when China steals the business data, trade secrets, and the cuts the company out of the loop for a domestic company.

<comment><USER19> Exactly. I've been telling them that for years. The country's M.O. is:

(a) sucker businesses over there with lure of cheap labor

(b) steal their intellectual property

(c) combine that I.P. with domestic activities to steal market share

(d) try to dominate the market with combo of cheap labor, domestic R&D, and freshly stolen I.P.

It's a dumb game for American companies to get into in the long-term. In short- to mid-term, there's plenty of money to be made while you have the I.P. and market. And, like you said, someone else takes the hit in the future. An externality.

<comment><USER11> This is part of the reason for the server demands as well as spying.

When a business has things on a server somewhere and a relatively dumb client, it's _REALLY_ hard to pirate, steal, copy, modify, etc. You can bake your "crown jewels" into the server and it never gets into the hands of the client.

One of the phone chipset manufacturers used to run service where they would compile your code for you. But they would _NOT_ give you the compiler.

I was really annoyed as a developer, but I also understood the reasoning as it effectively kept the Chinese from cloning their kit.

<comment><USER19> That is a strategy people try but it's usually weak. The Chinese have stolen TB from clients and servers across industries. One still has to protect the server from attacks from the client, other servers, or networks. Whole problem remains.

The main benefit of that architecture is to protect against non-technical insiders and others who have less opportunity for physical attack. The compute nodes are stored in a hopefully-secure location with files similarly centralized. Additionally, if the mechanisms are technology agnostic, there's potential for further hardening, monitoring, obfuscation, recovery, etc.

Doesn't eliminate a Chinese-style threat, though, if it's connected to a network in any way and doesn't use high assurance components.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> The more of these articles I read about US tech firms being asked to kowtow to the political whims of the countries they operate in, the more I'm reminded of the fight in the Middle Ages between church and state. Each is dependent on the other so they can't fight an all-out war, but the politics can get pretty nasty.

<comment><USER21> Right up until 1789.

<comment><USER22> Hmmm ... there was no church in the French revolution. The state/church war was mostly during the Holy Roman Empire and the 30 year war. But by the time Richelieu has finished with it - the papacy was no longer a determining factor in the continental politics.

<comment><USER23> That is just not true. The Church was front and centre in the French Revolution. The whole problem was that the first two estates (Church and Nobility) didn't want to cede power to the third estate (the Commons). Removing the King was the only path the Commons found to get their share of the power (the King was actually well-loved by his subjects, at least at the start of the Revolution, in 1789). Many churches were severely vandalised during the Revolution, and Church-imposed taxes were banned.

So yeah, without getting into the weeds, the Church was very much one of the major causes of the Revolution, and it lost plenty of it's authority as a result of the Revolution.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Well, we are doing the same thing so we can't even stand up against it. What are we going to say? Don't do what we do? Tell our companies that they will have to risk having their Chinese markets shut down over night for non- compliance?

</comment><comment><USER25> It is the same or at least similar in Germany.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you mean that Germany requires tech companies to sign a similar agreement?

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Not sure about others, But this isn't news to me.

And now pretty much standard ( or going to be standard ) in every country.

</comment><comment><USER27> > The Chinese government, which has long used its country's vast market as > leverage over American technology companies, is now asking some of those > firms to directly pledge their commitment to contentious policies that could > require them to turn user data and intellectual property over to the > government.

This first paragraph seems to be an egregious and willful misrepresentation of the document[1] by the New York Times. Most of these promises appear to be good and reasonable ideas without an ulterior motive. The only part that I don't quite understand is #6 where they talk about the "supervision of society".

Farther down the article:

> The letter also asks the American companies to ensure their products are > "secure and controllable," a catchphrase that industry groups said could be > used to force companies to build so-called back doors — which allow third- > party access to systems — provide encryption keys or even hand over source > code.

I don't see that phrase anywhere in this document, though the individual words do appear several times. Moreover, I don't see how anyone can reasonably argue that anything in the document implies third-party access to secure or proprietary information.

[1]: [http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/09/16/technology/doc...](http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/09/16/technology/document- the-pledge-china-wants-tech-companies-to-sign.html)

<comment><USER28> _This first paragraph seems to be an egregious and willful misrepresentation of the document by the New York Times._

No, if anything it is an understatement of how problematic this pledge is.

 _The only part that I don 't quite understand is #6 where they talk about the "supervision of society"._

"Supervision of society" is what the modern government of China has moved to as an quasi-alternative to traditional communist "Command and Control" planning[1].

It encompasses both the type of business regulation that is more familiar in the West (business licenses, safety regulations) along with comprehensive state surveillance of both financial/economic indicators as well as what many societies would consider "private speech".

[1] [https://books.google.com.au/books?id=TfHGAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA74&lp...](https://books.google.com.au/books?id=TfHGAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA74&lpg=PA74&dq=%22supervision+of+society%22&source=bl&ots=lKoOJqAJkd&sig=c4I870VZSgZlBCr_bOsg28R9MUg&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=%22supervision%20of%20society%22&f=false)</comment></comment>


How do we tell truths that might hurt? (Edsger W.Dijkstra) - <AUTHOR> http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655-S00/readings/ewd498.html

<comment><USER2> "APL is a mistake, carried through to perfection. It is the language of the future for the programming techniques of the past: it creates a new generation of coding bums."

Interesting discussion of why Dijkstra hated APL so much: <http://www.mail- email@example.com/msg00137.html></comment>