Tesla Model S – Cost of Ownership vs. Honda Odyssey - <AUTHOR> http://www.teslacost.com/ <comment><USER2> I have also ran similar calculations in my head. I think what I'd want to be convinced is a thorough analysis from a mechanical/industrial engineer on how much you can expect to save from a fully electric car on maintenance. The claim I've heard from Tesla is that, since there are much fewer moving parts within an electric motor, the car will last substantially longer. While this makes intuitive sense, I would love to see a breakdown of the actual numbers. Gas savings are pretty easy to calculate.

That said, there is one more factor I had considered, for fun. If Tesla continues to deliver more cars and eventually electric cars dominate the new car market in 5-10 years, I would imagine the Model S would be worth an investment as a "classic" car. If you maintained it well, I wonder if the actual value of the car would have a chance of appreciating at a much higher rate past, say, 50 years.

<comment><USER3> The statement that electric motors have fewer moving parts so they last substantially longer is a fallacy that electric car proponents have been spreading for years. There are still many, moving parts which require servicing and can fail at a rate of similarly serviced gas engines. In fact servicing (rewinding) is quite a labor intensive and expensive operation, given the price of copper or other conductive material used in the construction of electric motor.

Should a motor fail. The cost is significant.

I like the idea of an electric car, but the truth is the motors do fail. They require maintenance in the static environment of a factory or they will fail, a car on the open road with harsh environmental factors it will be hard on them.

But the biggest lie about electric car maintenance is that is lower. Its not. 90% of a vehicle's maintenance has nothing to do with its motor. It's tires, brakes, lighting, lubricants(yes electric motors need oil changes too), and power systems. Which I suspect will be more extensive here since there will be countless OS upgrades to both the drive systems and the power control units.

Its not possible at this time to compare gas engine maintenance w/ electric motor maintenance because its not apples to apples. You can however look at replacement cost as an indication of serviceability. A 400hp electric motor costs about $24,000 vs. a 400hp gas engine at about $6000.

The gas engine is still far more economical at this point even factoring in fuel costs.

<comment><USER3> My source is an industrial electric motor supplier. Google "400hp electric motor"

I'm not saying tesla's require oil changes as a gas engine does... oil will last quite a long time when not contaminated by hydrocarbons.

But even sealed bearings need to be repacked after so much wear. To parts can't move against on another without generating heat, which will degrade a lubricant and allow wear.

<comment><USER4> The mistake you're making is assuming that the single unit price of a low volume device like an industrial electric motor in any way reflects its component costs. High tech low volume engineering is dominated by R&D costs, one off manufacturing costs and margin. You could apply your logic (it would cost me $25,000 to buy one so therefore it costs Tesla that as well) to almost any item of consumer electronics and you'd find that your cost estimation was an order of magnitude (at least) above the retail price of a completed device. Try pricing a washing machine based on the cost of its component parts online - you won't be able to do it for anywhere near the cost in store.

When you build large numbers of integrated devices (be they washing machines, cars or cell phones), individual unit costs of components are always much lower. That's why we mass produce things.

<comment><USER5> And then you factor in that Tesla produces the majority of the motor in house from raw materials.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> To help some understand why the Model S could be "cheaper" to own vs a Honda Odyssey it's important to understand a few factors:

1\. Low fuel costs - electricity is way cheaper than gas and when you factor in gas savings over 8 years, you get substantial savings (ie., $20k over 8 years if driving 15k miles a year, of course depends on gas prices and electricity prices).

2\. Low maintenance costs - there's no oil changes, timing belt, etc. It's basically tires. Even brakes you don't need to change often because of regenerative braking.

3\. High residual value due to upgradeability - the battery pack is swappable, so after 8 years (or longer) you can swap out battery packs to a bigger pack (ie., 400+ mile range). This is a great feature and will add residual value to the Model S. Also, over-the-air updates keeps the software always up to date.

4\. High residual value due to battery pack - the battery pack for the Model S is holding up well with customers so far, and after 8 years it should show minimal degradation (ie., 10-15% likely, max 20%). In other words, the battery will still hold substantial value and when a person buys a 8-year-old Model S in the future, they are not only buying the car but they are buying the battery pack (ie., fuel savings) as well. This is why the residual value of a Model S (or another EV with a large battery pack) will be substantially higher than a comparable ICE car.

<comment><USER7> It's wrong to think that the majority of service costs as vehicles age is in the engine and oil changes. Most new cars engines/tranmsmissions will go very large distances with no mechanical failure if serviced properly. Exceptions exist, but for the most part, engines are durable and have minimal service requirements.

Cars must have suspension replacements, plus fixed for lots of little car systems that can start failing with age. An example is windscreen washer systems. Usually required for safety inspections, they can stop working, and it's expensive to remove and replace them because they wind their way around multiple components. Same for hvac systems and lighting systems and on it goes.

I bring this up because the worth of a tesla will not just hinge on the ability to fit a new battery pack and go. It will also hinge of the ability of the basic vehicle and non-propulsion systems to continue to work and become economically serviceable. Most cars can get a substantial mechanical refresh for the current cost of a new tesla battery - but this is not usually done because the car itself develops many other failings and a new one is faster and easier to purchase.

So the resale value will swing on not only the battery replacement cost, but may other things besides. Only then will we know what the used value looks like.

<comment><USER8> I think the parent poster is making an "all things being equal" comparison, where all of the things you mentioned should be equal when comparing to a car with an ICE.

For example, both the Tesla Model S and a Honda Oyssey will, presumably, require suspension replacement after a similar term when driven on the same roads by the same person. Likewise for windscreen washers and other sub- systems. Given the level of engineering and attention to detail in the design of the Model S, we should expect these systems to be of equal or greater quality than their traditional motorcar equivalents.

The point is that it appears the EV components won't negatively impact residual value as many EV-naysayers have been touting all along. "Just wait till that expensive battery pack only takes half a charge in 3 years!" That's the kind of sentiment that the parent poster was refuting.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> What about ruggedness? Up here in (eastern) Canada we have stretches of weeks even months where the temp doesn't go above ... 10F? 15F? (-10 to -15 C) and frequently goes down to -20C or lower (below zero F). How does this affect battery range? Also I don't live in a big city, so who in the hell do I call when there's something wrong with my Tesla and how long do I wait?

<comment><USER10> If it's good enough for Norway it should work in Canada too, right? Well, one in every ten cars sold (10.8%) in Norway in March was a Tesla... [http://cleantechnica.com/2014/04/04/7-tesla-norway-facts- wil...](http://cleantechnica.com/2014/04/04/7-tesla-norway-facts-will-blow- away/)

<comment><USER11> Canada is a "Big Country" nation, and Norway isn't. Short or shortening range will have less of an effect on purchaser decisions.

<comment><USER12> 1\. Norway, like Canada, is sparsely populated country.

2\. I saw a Norwegian registered Model S in Zurich last week.

<comment><USER11> The distance between Oslo and Bergen is smaller than the distance between Toronto and Montreal - which are fairly close to each other in Canadian terms. Look at your population density maps of the two - Norway has most of its people clustered around Oslo, whereas Canada has a wide spray across the southeast. The distance from Hamilton to Halifax is basically equal to the length of Norway, and it's only a quarter of the way across the country.

In any case, if you speak to travelled "Big Country" drivers, you'll find a vein of amused stories at what plenty of Europeans consider to be 'long drives'. And did your Norwegian cover that distance in a day or two? Because it's a meaningless statement without knowing how long it took to get there - it could even have been shipped up there (in theory, of course).

I have a driving endurance of about eight hours and I consider myself a 'middle-distance' driver here in Australia. Plenty of folks here can drive 12-16 hours, though more are like me. The 16-hour people aren't all that common, but neither is it particularly remarkable.

<comment><USER13> Whatever. Let's focus on the real facts instead of these anectodes about "Big Country" "small country". I find this stuff fully meaningless.

Here's the full review with English subs [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ5PqPeOPT0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ5PqPeOPT0)

<comment><USER11> Apparently country size and population centres are anecdotal, dismissed with a hand-wave? Besides, your 'real facts' video tells us pretty much nothing about the differences between Canadian and Norwegian driving habits, and whether the vehicle is as suitable for Canadian conditions as for Norwegian. "Suitable for Canada" is not just "the vehicle can drive in snow".

A 300km range with a long refueling time is a considerable factor for Canadians, something the video says little about. The distance between Toronto and Montreal is about 6 hours of driving, which in turn is two times the cold- weather range of the Model S. Given that you generally want to refuel before you hit rock-bottom empty, and that battery performance will degrade over time, that means two recharging stops in the Tesla, where you'll have to wait for half an hour while the car charges. That adds an hour to your journey, and means getting out of your car (in the cold) twice when you can get cars where you don't have to do that at all.

I don't know why you're apparently put off by the idea that people in big countries with good roads have better driving endurance than people in small countries. It's no different to saying that the Norwegian public have a stronger maritime tradition and are better sailors. Far more Norwegians own or operate boats per capita than any of the 'big country' places. Should I post a video of Canadian fisherman to 'prove with facts' that there's no difference between the Canadian and Norwegian public when it comes to maritime choices?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Would you buy an eight year used Tesla for 30k? I'm a fan of Tesla and hope to be an owner some day, but I think the author is being overly optimistic here.

<comment><USER15> Well we know that Elon Musk has promised a buyback guarantee, indexed to the buyback cost of a similarly old Mercedes S class[1]. So that sets a floor on the depreciation value.

Also, as btian notes below, the electric drivetrain is also much simpler than a gasoline one, so it should be in much better shape relative to non-electric cars. I'm relatively optimistic because the part that depreciates the most is the battery: and if the rest of the car holds up well, then switching the battery at a lower cost (taking into account 8 years of battery tech advancement) should make for a pretty high resale value.

[1]: [http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2013/04/02/elon- mus...](http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2013/04/02/elon-musk-tesla- lease/2047863/)

<comment><USER3> Electric motor fail on average on par with similarly serviced gas engines.

Failure of motor bearings is usually the result of improper mechanical installation causing undesirable forces acting on the bearings, or simply poor maintenance. Bearings should be inspected regularly for lubrication and uncharacteristic noises. Their life expectancy depends on factors previously cited. Most motor vendors typically recommend bearing replacement every two years, which I think will put a cramp in the Tesla maintenance scheme

What really is off-putting is that even if the car is well maintained and even parked. It will brick as from the degradation of the batteries. At some point the owner will have to invest in a new power pack. Not true of gas motors. I have a 66' galaxie in my driveway with its original motor its never had more than an oil and spark plug change and it has a life of nearly 50 years. I'd have bought at least 3 tesla power packs in the same time frame, even if the car just sat there.

<comment><USER16> How much does a new electric motor for a Tesla cost versus a new gas motor for a similar car? I'd guess it would be significantly cheaper, but I certainly could be wrong. I don't know that much about cars.

Downvoted an honest question stated in a reasonable manner? Come _on_.

<comment><USER17> $10-20,000 for a 400hp electric motor. A gas engine would cost a couple hundred bucks.

<comment><USER18> $200 for a 400HP car engine... They hyperbole is strong with this one.

The last time I had an engine rebuilt (mid 1980s) it was over $1100, and this was for a 67 HP VW Beetle engine.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Well the core insight is in there, but it's not highlighted enough:

"The model is very sensitive to the rate of depreciation."

Every TCO model for cars is very sensitive to rate of depreciation, and this rate is very hard to predict. You can rely on historical data only so much - how much in demand will petrol cars be 8 years from now? Diesel? What kind of tax incentives will we get over the next few years? And a single percent difference in depreciation rate can put one car ahead of another.

Within the last 10% or so, it's a crap shoot. And 10% basically puts all cars in the same class within a single bucket. So yeah.

</comment><comment><USER20> The Model S is a great deal compared to similar cars, but this list is just silly. He is an economist that just goes through and picks the highest trim level of 9 different cars, and then decides to compare them based _solely_ on cost to the Model S.

I contend that a $22,195 Subaru would win this contest hands down. If you want this comparison to be believable compare like vehicles. Don't just compare the car you want to _theMostExpensiveHondaICouldSpecOut_.

</comment><comment><USER21> Can some one explain NPV to me? This is the first I am hearing of this term and wikipedia does not offer an explanation that is intuitive enough. Its odd that the NPV is listed as $40K+ when the actual cost of the car is $90K+.

<comment><USER22> Net present value is a way of measuring future flows of money and comparing them to each other. For instance, which is _worth more_ :

\- Getting $100 now

\- Getting $200 3 years from now

The answer is, "it depends on your assumptions about interest rates".

In the blog poster's spreadsheet, the "net" line is the cost of owning that car in that year in that year's dollars. The PV is the cost of owning that car in that year in THIS year's dollars (a figure obviously depending on assumptions about interest rates). The NPV line is the cost of owning that car for 8 years in this year's dollars.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> I'm the author of this website/article, and I have an important update. I added this Epilogue to the website tonight:

\--

I created this website two days ago, and during that time, have witnessed 100s of comments on Hacker News, TMC, Twitter, and more. In the middle of all that, electriclove on Hacker News found an important bug in the model: The Ody PV line was adding in fuel costs from another car. (This, IMHO, highlights how valuable the Internet is for discourse and fact checking.)

I updated the model and the result is as follows: \- Tesla Model S: $40,151 \- Honda Odyssey: $37,235

The end result is greater parity between the depreciation and cash flow models; and the edge goes to the Honda Odyssey by $3K, or about $375/yr over eight years. If I had more time, I might try to quantify the value of the safety edge for the Tesla (Travis calculated this to be about $500/yr), HOV lane access, or other features. In the meantime, I double-checked the formulas on the other cars - they appear to be correct. However, I continue to invite folks to continue to look at and provide feedback on the model.

</comment><comment><USER24> Out of curiosity - what does it cost to have an electrician install a 240VAC outlet in your garage? Has anyone out there done it and can give an idea?

Teslas can charge off a 110 outlet, but they recommend using the 240 volt faster-charging unit. But most houses don't run 2-phase power out to the garage.

And what if you don't own a house? What do apartment and/or house renters do for charging?

<comment><USER25> My electrician in the Seattle area quoted me $700, including parts and permit, to install a weather-shielded 240V outlet with separate breaker on the outside of my house directly above the electric meter, next to where a car is parked, and on the opposite side of the wall where my breaker panel lives for another purpose. (I don't have a garage so it would have to go outside if I did want to charge a car.) The cost probably goes up another hour of time if a person wants something like this and the breaker panel isn't also located in the garage since wire will need to be pulled.

Apartment dwellers and renters of houses are going to be charging from 120V stations. Considering the uproar just over satellite dishes, I can't see landlords being any more forgiving about tapping into the electrical system of a unit. (And I write this as a former long-time renter.)

<comment><USER26> For what it's worth, at least renters have some protection from the FCC (on paper, at least) when it comes to antennas:

"The OTARD rule allows local governments, community associations and landlords to enforce restrictions that do not impair the installation, maintenance or use of the types of antennas described above [...]"

[http://www.neighborhoodlink.com/article/Association/FCC_Sate...](http://www.neighborhoodlink.com/article/Association/FCC_Satellite_Antenna_Regulations)

Given that many areas mandate minimum parking requirements for development, I don't find it too hard to imagine the same for charging. (And as a long-term renter, I'm sure it'll still be a pain in the ass for years to come.)

<comment><USER24> I've used OTARD against a condo board where I lived, back when satellite dishes were still new. OTARD could primarily exist because unit owners could install dishes in areas that were "common" by the legal definition, such as the exterior of a building, but "semi-private" by virtue of the unit owner being the only one to have access to it, such as a balcony.

OTARD let you install a dish on your balcony, but not on the roof of the building or the front lawn since that area was common to all owners.

I can't imagine a similar rule letting Tesla owners dig up parking lots and install charging stations for their own private use. A parking lot is the prime example of a common area that everyone can use and nobody can control on an individual basis. And the outlets on the outside of a building or in a parking lot are usually for the benefit of common-area maintenance workers, not individual unit owners.

<comment><USER27> It's quite common in many buildings to be assigned a single parking space for your use. If you have one such parking space that is "yours," you could install a high-power charger.

<comment><USER24> Not without tearing through "common" areas to install the wiring and connect to the utility. And unless you plan to connect all the way back to your unit's power meter, you will also need a meter installed in the common area that's exclusively for your use.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> The Model S was highly rated by Consumer Reports, but the predicted reliability is only average. Specifically, the 2013 had a much worse than average rating for Squeaks and Rattles and Body Hardware. This will certainly affect the price. Personally, I never buy a car unless it's rated better than average by CR.

</comment><comment><USER29> I was curious about the RAV4 EV comment so some googling turned up this: [http://www.caranddriver.com/features/throwing-money-at- elect...](http://www.caranddriver.com/features/throwing-money-at-electrics- feature)

<comment><USER30> Wow, why are the big automotive companies so bad at making a good looking electric vehicle? Or are we just spoiled with the looks of the Model S?

From the article you linked to: "GM is reportedly losing more than $40,000 on each Volt" WHAT?

<comment><USER16> Also, "Not even Tesla has made money from building its slick Model S." Smells like funny accounting.

<comment><USER30> Apparently they're adding in R&D. [http://jalopnik.com/5942352/gm-isnt-really- loosing-all-that-...](http://jalopnik.com/5942352/gm-isnt-really-loosing-all- that-cash-with-each-volt)

<comment><USER16> I just stumbled across that same info, came to post it, and saw your reply.

Stuff like this really makes me wonder about the authors of articles like this. Are they actually so stupid that they think it's reasonable to allocate the entire R&D effort to 20,000 cars sold to date? Do they know better, but are trying to make GM look bad for some reason, and think their readers are that stupid? It's just so weird.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The model seems flawed. The financing/opportunity costs are not included (AFAICT...). A better way to construct the model would be to avoid trying to account for year-by-year depreciation, and only include the initial purchase cost and eventual sale cost in the cash flow.

Unfortunately (you might be able to tell I'm a Tesla fan), this makes the Tesla S less attractive in comparison to other cars due to its higher up-front price.

<comment><USER31> They're target market initially is those with cash / who can afford it upfront, though they do offer leasing.

Once they have the $30k version then it will be attractive to most everyone, including with leasing options.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> I don't understand how the '14 model S is "AWD equivalent".

<comment><USER23> Scroll down to "Cold Weather Performance" on this page:

[http://www.teslamotors.com/models/features#/performance](http://www.teslamotors.com/models/features#/performance)

I forgot to write about this on www.teslacost.com, but one reason I didn't consider the Model S early on is b/c it's RWD and I wanted AWD for Tahoe and the like. Then I saw the above video.

<comment><USER33> There is no way a car with only the ability to power the rear wheels can compare to an AWD drivetrain.

Even with the ability to pulse/modulate the brakes and keep the car from spinning, it will only prevent sliding off a cliff by taking you around that corner at 8mph (notional absurdly low speed here). That is because it will only be able to use the braking + lateral portion of the front tires available grip. If there is no need for braking, just lateral grip which isn't going to be much on a poor snowy road, anyhow. The rear tires have to work doubly as hard in this scenario as well - they have to maintain lateral grip while accelerating (or simply putting power down enough to maintain speed).

A true AWD (or 4x4) would be able to use the acceleration and lateral grip, meaning, the tire can be accelerating and turning. This takes the load off the rear wheels for putting down engine power. Thus, to move at the same speed, the rear tires only have to use much less of their available grip for acceleration and can concentrate on lateral grip (not fishtailing/oversteer situation as above RWD would). An intelligent AWD system will transfer power to whatever wheel has the most grip as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> His use case for the Odyssey must be atypical from what I've seen, that is, it's used mostly for short local trips. What most people I know use their minivans for is that, plus family road trips. Not really an option with the Tesla.

<comment><USER23> Feel free to play with the annual mileage figures on the model. For my family's situation, I played around with it with mostly either 12K or 15K annual miles.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> I think it's priceless to be able to look your kids in the eyes and say we bought a car for our family that helps make the planet better for you when you grow up. And supporting a company that is trying to do that is well worth spending more.

<comment><USER36> If it makes you feel better, then great. But realize that any amount of individual actions isn't going to make a difference. We need action taken by governments.

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Did he factor in the cost of replacing the batteries eventually? Something like $10k.

</comment><comment><USER38> If electric cars are already a good deal do we still need to have tax incentives?

<comment><USER39> I'd say so. It provides long term benefit to the society as a whole if larger numbers of these cars are purchased (less emissions, lower demand for gas, better safety, raises the bar for other manufacturers, etc)

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> Your Net values for the Ody Touring Elite don't add up.

How is the Net for Year 1 for the Ody Elite $16,184? It lists Maintenance at $300, Fuel at $2727, and Depreciation at $10,500. That totals $13,527.

<comment><USER23> Good eye, electriclove - there was an error in the spreadsheet that was adding in fuel costs from another row. I updated the spreadsheet. It results in a pretty big change. I'm going to update the website.

<comment><USER40> Thanks for replying and looking into it!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Does anyone know why the Net Present Value in the cash flow model is so much different?

Depreciation Model: $39,889 Cash Flow Model: $62,874

<comment><USER23> Travis (who forked my model to create the cash flow model) and I chatted about this. It's primarily due to the effect of time value on money, when you finance the car. If you were to purchase the car outright, you would want to use the 1st tab; vs. financing, the 2nd tab.

<comment><USER41> Ah I missed that payments were being made on a loan, thanks for clarifying that.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> What's with the article's font? Very annoying to read. Looks like a printer running out of ink.

<comment><USER43> Are you running it in Chrome/Windows?

If so: Chrome's font rendering uses GDI rather than DirectWrite and it leads to some very ugly rendering with certain web fonts. This is a known issue and they are working on changing this: [https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=137692#c...](https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=137692#c109)

<comment><USER42> Yup, I am. Thanks for the info.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> what the heck is the PAX column? Feeling stupid, never heard of that, and Googling doesn't help.

Pax tires? as in run-flats?

<comment><USER40> PAX = Passengers

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> TLDR:

Tesla P85 $44,948

Honda Odyssey $56,094</comment>


Arrest Of U.S. Citizen For Assisting North Korea In Evading Sanctions - <AUTHOR> https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/manhattan-us-attorney-announces-arrest-united-states-citizen-assisting-north-korea <comment><USER2> Here are the main allegations:

1\. In or about April 2019, GRIFFITH traveled to the DPRK to attend and present at the "Pyongyang Blockchain and Cryptocurrency Conference" (the "DPRK Cryptocurrency Conference").

2\. After the DPRK Cryptocurrency Conference, GRIFFITH began formulating plans to facilitate the exchange of cryptocurrency between the DPRK and South Korea, despite knowing that assisting with such an exchange would violate sanctions against the DPRK.

3\. GRIFFITH also encouraged other U.S. citizens to travel to North Korea, including to attend the same DPRK Cryptocurrency Conference the following year.

4\. Finally, GRIFFITH announced his intention to renounce his U.S. citizenship and began researching how to purchase citizenship from other countries.

I wonder if 1-3 basically just amount to speaking in person about technology that is very well documented on public web sites?

As far as I'm aware, 4 isn't a crime or even immoral in any way.

This seems like it's basically just a real-life scenario of what people were worried about in the 1990's "crypto wars", but with a very unsympathetic defendant and an especially evil foreign power.

Although if he was paid to go there then it would seem to violate whatever commercial sanctions are in place.

<comment><USER3> Per [https://nkcryptocon.com/FAQ/](https://nkcryptocon.com/FAQ/): "For your convenience we will provide a paper visa separated from your passport, so there will be no evidence of your entry to the country. Your participation will never be disclosed from our side unless you publicize it on your own."

It doesn't appear to be paid, 3400 euro fee to attend.

<comment><USER4> > Your participation will never be disclosed from our side unless you > publicize it on your own.

Blackmail / extortion / compromise trap right there. Don't email em, don't talk to em.

If you're an American and you go there, they have dirt on you and can threaten to reveal it if you don't play ball with them.

Shame on you, North Korea!

Also that feel when the only tech smarts you can get is cryptocurrency folks

<comment><USER5> > Blackmail / extortion / compromise trap right there. Don't email em, don't > talk to em.

> If you're an American and you go there, they have dirt on you and can > threaten to reveal it if you don't play ball with them.

Perhaps, but they'd lose the ability to promise other people that _their_ relationship with North Korea was safely secret. I wouldn't worry about this; I suspect North Korea really does want to maintain its ability to have skilled foreigners come and help if they're so inclined.

I understand some people maintain two passports, one for Israel and the other for the rest of the Middle East. This is a similar thing. I wouldn't expect Iran to insist on disclosing an American's visit to the US government either.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I know Virgil. I was at the lunch in Palo Alto where he suggested "GAS" should be the name of the internal accounting unit for smart contracts. As with many of the early Ethereum adopters he was quite gifted, a bit eccentric, and leaned a bit in an ideological direction.

Offhand I can't see any reason why he would go out of his way to N. Koreans advice on how to evade sanctions, so I will look forward to some statement on his part. 20 years is a long time.

I know he was working for the Ethereum foundation recently but doubt that the foundation would go out of the way to anger the US government (although they reportedly have a lot of Chinese government involvement).

Here is his twitter: [https://twitter.com/virgilgr?lang=en](https://twitter.com/virgilgr?lang=en)

<comment><USER7> There's virtually no chance that he'll serve anything resembling 20 years, despite the almost theatrical stupidity of the crime he has allegedly committed. The DOJ ignores the sentencing rules in these press releases. Google [whale sushi sentence] for details.

<comment><USER8> Espionage cases are traditionally resolved with harsh penalties and no reductions for good behavior. The government wants a clear message sent to anyone else thinking of doing similar things.

The only way you can get off is if your trial would reveal sources and methods the government doesn't want to disclose.

<comment><USER7> First off, this isn't an espionage case.

Second, you can simply read the sentencing guidelines, which will include the statute he's charged under, and see how the sentence is actually computed. We don't have to try to reason to it from first principles.

<comment><USER9> It is 63-78 months for first offense, 46-57 if you plead guilty.

So still kinda long 5 years.

<comment><USER10> that assumes that his talk constituted a financial transaction. it's not clear that this is the case. if he was paid to speak, then it does seem plausible, but that doesn't seem to be disclosed in the press release. if he went for free (and, one would assume, would have needed to pay for the ordinary admission fee), then it's possible to consider it as non-commercial, so that would be only 15-21 months.

edit (can't reply yet): I arrived at this number by searching for USC and U.S.C in the press release, then googling IEEPA, finding [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Emergency_Econom...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Emergency_Economic_Powers_Act), then finding 50 U.S.C. § 1701, then going to [https://guidelines.ussc.gov/si](https://guidelines.ussc.gov/si), putting in 50 U.S.C. § 1705, figuring §2M5.1 is relevant, then putting 14 in [https://guidelines.ussc.gov/grc](https://guidelines.ussc.gov/grc).

<comment><USER7> I didn't look that carefully, but I don't see the set of guideline rules that get you down to 15-21; how'd you get there?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > Assistant Attorney General John Demers said: "Despite receiving warnings not > to go, Griffith allegedly traveled to one of the United States' foremost > adversaries, North Korea, where he taught his audience how to use blockchain > technology to evade sanctions. By this complaint, we begin the process of > seeking justice for such conduct."

Wow, that seems like an incredibly dumb thing to do. Isn't all that information readily available on the internet anyway? I'm sure the NK govt. has access to the web.

<comment><USER12> As you've said, a video call would suffice for that. What can NK offer that other countries can't and why this needed to travel there?

<comment><USER13> There's an adrenaline rush from going to somewhere where travel is explicitly prohibited, and it's not that expensive to boot. I've seriously considered going on my non-American passport but have decided not to for two reasons:

* Even though my birth country is on allied terms with NK, I'm unsure how my dual citizenship with the US would pan out. I do not want to be considered a spy and imprisoned.

* I do not feel comfortable contributing to a totalitarian economy, even if the individual citizens (guides, translators, etc) benefit a lot from payment.

And there are probably many other valid reasons not to go, but those are the most immediately obvious to me.

<comment><USER14> For some people it's not an adrenaline rush but a strong curiousity about what the US gov doesn't want you to know. Like all the warnings I received about travel to East Germany even after the wall came down (I was working for a defense contractor at the time). Project security warned us that there would be spies hiding behind every bush.

When we got to Checkpoint Charlie there were just a few tourists milling about the small section of wall that remained, and an old German couple renting a hammer and chisel so you could chip off a piece of the wall yourself. When we spoke to the old couple they suddenly became alert and asked us, rather loudly, if we were Americans. Immediately, out of the corner of my eye I noticed a middle-aged woman sitting on a bench look up, and a young guy dart out of a doorway and start walking our way. We took the hammer and chisel and started chipping at the wall while keeping an eye on the locals nearby, who suddenly seemed very interested in us. An older man standing close to the wall reached into his pocket and pulled out a lighter but did not light the cigarette hanging from his mouth, an obvious signal to other members of his surveillance team.

When a German couple posing as tourists came up and asked us where we were from we recognized that they were obviously trying to recruit us to spy for the Eastern Bloc. But we were too clever, pretending that we were drunk and did not speak English, and meandered back to the train station with our chunk of the wall.

<comment><USER15> You sure they weren't all just thirsty for some free world dollars?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Meta observation : It's really interesting to view these comments as a meta commentary on the tribes that Hacker News members affiliate themselves with.

Imagine that instead of being a hacker, Griffith was a financial expert, and instead of attending a Cryptocurrency conference, after consulting with the DOJ on whether or not he could travel to North Korea to teach the regime how to best invest it's money in financial instruments abroad, they told him that wasn't allowed and he went anyway.

Would he still seem as sympathetic? Would a lot of HN comments rise to his defense because he was a financial nerd instead of the sort of programming nerd that Hacker News readers identify themselves with?

<comment><USER17> As someone who has been hanging around hackers for roughly 30 years, my social media is filled with sympathy for this guy (most of us know him personally).

I find it mildly unbelievable. I had similar reactions with MalwareTech, but at least he's somewhat sympathetic.

It should not be alarming when "Do Crimes" turns into prison time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> > _Finally, GRIFFITH announced his intention to renounce his U.S. citizenship > and began researching how to purchase citizenship from other countries._

At first I thought maybe there was some monetary incentive to going to NK that might not be unsealed, but now I doubt it.

It sounds like this guy was simply a crypto "believer", with probably a bit of an ego. To these people the inability of governments to enforce control on crypto is one of the biggest features, and I'm sure he wanted to see that used in the real world.

<comment><USER19> Yes indeed, the cold hard world order came crashing down on this dude.

It's not much research to figure out how to buy a passport from somewhere else, the BBC has a nice write-up [1].

1\. Malta wants $1.15M for a full EU passport, and Bulgaria is another popular choice.

2\. Sant Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia and Antigua and Barbuda will give you a passport for a donation of around $100K to charity or if you buy some real- estate around the half million mark.

3\. The cheapest possible if you don't mind limited travel options is the Comoro Islands, $45K all-in.

[1] [https://www.bbc.com/news/business-27674135](https://www.bbc.com/news/business-27674135)

<comment><USER20> > the cold hard world order came crashing down on this dude.

He asked the state department before leaving, he knew what he was doing.

<comment><USER18> > _At no time did GRIFFITH obtain permission from OFAC to provide goods, > services, or technology to the DPRK._

I think in this case intent matters. If you ask permission to travel as a formality, but provide some goods and services while there then that's very different things.

<comment><USER21> Intent to assist a regime obtain the currency it needs to continue running murder camps and the like?

<comment><USER18> Maybe I phrased it wrong, but I think the intent was to help them circumvent the sanctions, despite that he may have asked the government for permission to visit NK.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Well, I mean, the fact that cryptocurrencies are helping North Korea is pretty much undisputed. They've been stockpiling it to run their _ballistic missile program_. [1] According to the United Nations Security Council, they had almost $700MM back in May. [2]

The system is designed to skirt sanctions after all, it's kinda the raison d'être.

[1] [https://bitcoinist.com/un-north-korea-accumulating- cryptocur...](https://bitcoinist.com/un-north-korea-accumulating- cryptocurrency-for-weapons-programs/)

[2] [https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/N-Korea-at- crossroads/Nort...](https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/N-Korea-at- crossroads/North-Korea-stole-cryptocurrency-via-hacking-UN-panel)

<comment><USER22> Money laundering, ransoms and fraud are pretty much the only actual use cases other than speculation— which is essentially just people extracting profits from criminals in a way that makes them feel distanced from engaging in a criminal conspiracy.

<comment><USER23> No, there is lots of financial censorship being done against people have have broken zero laws.

For example, at one point, banks blocked donations to WikiLeaks, even though they were not charged with any crimes.

Financial censorship, done arbitrarily, to people who have not even been accused of a crime, is the most common form of financial censorship.

<comment><USER24> > Financial censorship, done arbitrarily, to people who have not even been > accused of a crime, is the most common form of financial censorship.

Source? I find that hard to believe considering the prevalence of fraud. In fact, dealing with fraud is one of the primary reasons transactional banking exists in the first place.

Notes and other negotiable instruments were in widespread use even when there existed universal gold- or silver-denominated currencies that made direct payments nominally simple and convenient.

<comment><USER23> Are you not aware about things like how anything related to sexual content will have their accounts closed?

I was talking about things like this, and other related situations.

<comment><USER24> The claim as I read it was that most financial censorship befalls innocent accountholders. But while there are countless examples we can find online about people wrongly censored or accused, actual fraudsters don't go complaining on Twitter.

Fraud is a _huge_ problem. The usual reason for why we can't have nice things --a high-trust civil society--is because of bad people. Because no system is perfect, our transactional and legal systems have to balance administrative efficiency and fairness. The more you try to be fair, i.e. improve your accuracy (fewer false positives), the higher your costs (less efficacy at stopping bad guys and/or more resources need to be expended); the more you aim for administrative efficiency (lower costs but better at stopping bad guys) the more fairness will tend to suffer (more false positives).

Now, it's entirely possible that there are more accounts wrongly closed than closed for actual fraud. Personally I would doubt it, but would still like to see data. That notwithstanding, it would still be wrong to characterize such a system as arbitrary simply because of that skewed result; it could just be a manifestation of a high efficiency but low fairness enforcement mechanism. Maybe it is arbitrary, but I doubt it.

I had never heard the phrase "financial censorship" before. Perhaps a better term here would be financial blacklisting. The EFF's page, [https://www.eff.org/issues/financial- censorship](https://www.eff.org/issues/financial-censorship), conflates a ton of individual issues in a way that I don't think is constructive. Everybody trying to shoehorn their issues into the free speech debate tends to obfuscate problems and potential solutions; and I suspect it will one day backfire, harming traditional freedom of speech in the process. Before I even read the EFF's issue page--and definitely so, afterwards--the very phrase "financial censorship" brought to mind Citizens United v. FEC. Keep going down that road and there's no limit--I could just as well characterize murder laws as violating my free speech.[1]

For the record, I protested in front of the Federal Building in San Francisco when Dmitri Sklyarov was arrested way back when. I do take these issues seriously.

[1] In fact, IIRC not long after Citizens United the very same conservative justices upheld the criminal convictions of people who gave to a charity and advocacy organization implicated in funding terrorist organizations. The juxtaposition of the two decisions seemed to me to evidence the inconsistency and hypocrisy of the conservative's free speech crusade; such inconsistency and hypocrisy is inevitable once you start to characterize everything that's incident to speech as speech itself.

<comment><USER23> > Now, it's entirely possible that there are more accounts wrongly closed than > closed for actual fraud. Personally I would doubt it,

Ok, then you can rephrase my argument as "one of the most common examples of financial censorship", or "common enough that it is still bad", instead of "the most common".

It still does not take away from my main point here, which is that it is still useful for people who are breaking no laws, to be able to get around arbitrary financial censorship of their perfectly legal transactions. That was my main point.

> conflates a ton of individual issues in a way that I don't think is > constructive

People who are doing the censoring, or support the censorship, usually don't want their actions to be called censorship, yes.

I think it is a good term, though. The reason is because I am specifically referring to financial transactions that are perfectly legal, and are being censored for the political content of transaction.

The examples I gave were donations to WikiLeaks, which were perfectly legal, but were arbitrarily blocked, due to the political nature of such a donation, as well as the example of sexual content related financial transactions, which are also legal, but often arbitrarily blocked.

> it will one day backfire, harming traditional freedom of speech in the > process.

I am not really sure how it could backfire, to give people more ways of making perfectly legal financial transactions, that are more difficult to arbitrarily block, due to the political content of those transactions.

If you think something is bad, and should be blocked, then make a law. Don't rely on intermediaries to block things that aren't illegal.

<comment><USER19> > It still does not take away from my main point here, which is that it is > still useful for people who are breaking no laws, to be able to get around > arbitrary financial censorship of their perfectly legal transactions. That > was my main point.

Dramatically more people, indeed the whole world potentially, stand to lose from these countries avoiding sanctions than from the handful of people who can't currently access their questionable but legal sexual content online.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> According to the complaint, the defendant:

\- went back to the US several time after traveling to the DPRK despite being warned not to by the US state department

\- had several consensual interviews with FBI agents

\- consented to a search of his phone

It's hard to read this and not think that he brought this upon himself. If you really want to do what he did, get a lawyer, don't travel back to the US, don't speak to law enforcement.

<comment><USER26> Or that he was entrapped.

<comment><USER27> Entrapment by what, reverse psychology? He didn't walk into a sting set up by FBI agents; he went to a real conference in the real North Korea despite official warnings not to do so.

<comment><USER26> Why is reverse psychology not an effective method of entrapment. I'd expect it's a standard component actually.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> At first I was concerned that the US was overstepping it's bounds a bit with cryptocurrency. But then I read the charge, and he apparently literally traveled to North Korea to advise them how to evade sanctions -- pretty stupid if you ask me.

<comment><USER29> I don't have any real wish to defend this guy since he likely did some really boneheaded things, but "advise them to evade sanctions" could easily just mean "explained to them how to install a crypto wallet on a computer."

<comment><USER30> Why the "but" ? If you explain to someone how to install a crypto wallet on a computer knowing that this installation will help that person do tax fraud, then you're an accomplice to tax fraud; and if you explain to someone how to install a crypto wallet on a computer knowing that this will help DPRK evade santions, well, that's a crime on its own. Telling others how to do simple things (that they could find on the internet on their own) and providing trivial, simple help may be a crime depending on the intent.

There's no requirement to provide some unique, significant, irreplaceable insight or service, knowingly providing _any_ help whatsoever is sufficient. Helping a buddy wash his car is a simple, nice thing to do; but helping a buddy wash blood off of his car before the police gets to it is a crime.

<comment><USER29> I'm not making any legal claims about his situation, I'm just pointing out that the language being used may be intentionally misleading.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> When you have traveled to the DPRK despite warnings of the Department of State, visiting the US is not the best decision to take.

<comment><USER19> Certainly not after they made US passports not valid for travel to the DPRK in the wake of the Warmbier... situation.

<comment><USER31> How's this enforced? You'd think that the enforcement would have to be done by the host country, making this restriction impossible to enforce.

<comment><USER19> I'd imagine in three ways: (1) the host country refuses to admit you (2) the host country stamps your passport and you're totally SOL at the border on your way back in, or commit some sort of fraud if they ask you where you went and you don't answer truthfully which brings us to (3) exactly like this haha.

<comment><USER25> in this case, the defendant got a visa detached from its passport.

from what I could gather from the complaint and his social media ([https://twitter.com/virgilgr/status/1161217917427470337](https://twitter.com/virgilgr/status/1161217917427470337)), he just never tried to hide it.

<comment><USER32> I think this is the norm for some of the more "controversial" countries. I went to Cuba (with permission from the State Department) before Obama eased sanctions and I was quite disappointed that they didn't stamp my passport. Instead I got a little slip of paper that was about the size of a page in my passport. It was my understanding that the Cuban government had designed the visa system this way on purpose to allow Americans to more easily skirt the sanctions.

And once I got past border patrol and saw all of the items coming out with the luggage (car parts, toilet seats, televisions, a grill, etc.) it was clear that this system allowed the wealthier families to avoid most of the inconveniences of the US embargo.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> He is also the author of WikiScanner, the project revealed FBI and CIA computers used for editing Wikipedia pages.

<comment><USER34> OK, he can forget about parole...

<comment><USER35> He wouldn't get parole anyway, since the federal justice system no longer grants parole.

> For persons convicted under civilian federal law after November 1, 1987, > federal parole has been abolished [1]

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

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> This is ridiculous.

Both that this US Citizen ignored direct warnings from the US Federal Government not to attend and teach at the Pyongyang Blockchain Conference, and then volunteered to travel back the United States.

And that the US Federal Government is worried about North Korea getting their hands on the WMD-level technology that are Ethereum Tokens.

I suppose they'll be rounding up the people who built [https://ethereum.org/developers/#getting- started](https://ethereum.org/developers/#getting-started) next?

<comment><USER21> > And that the US Federal Government is worried about North Korea getting > their hands on the WMD-level technology that are Ethereum Tokens.

There's significant evidence that North Korea has been using cryptocurrency to evade sanctions and prop up their murderous regime, so I don't see what seems ridiculous to you about that.

<comment><USER37> We're going to stop murderous regimes by creating a totalitarian centralized global financial surveillance system, and imprisoning anyone who uses financial channels that don't comply with it?

Opposing murderous regimes is worthwhile. Doing it by criminalizing financial privacy and creating surveillance systems that are more expansive than anything the world has ever seen and that everyone is strong-armed into using them, is not.

Mandates to comply with an Orwellian warrantless surveillance system in Xinxiang are, according to the Chinese government, justified by the threat of terrorism. This is how these kinds of totalitarian impositions are always rationalized. There's always a good reason for them, to advance public safety and national security, according to their advocates.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> The complaint[1] leads with the allegation that the State Department denied him permission to travel to DPRK and attend this conference. How does that work? Did he seek permission from State and receive a denial, then go ahead and do it anyway?

Edit: 15(c) alleges that he did in fact seek prior approval. Well, I guess it's no mystery why he's in deep trouble now.

[1] [https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/press- release/file/1222646...](https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/press- release/file/1222646/download)

</comment><comment><USER39> Maybe I am the only person that watched the show. But I guess he was on the first season of King of the Nerds. It was a reality show on TBS.

<comment><USER39> [https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor- project/2016-May/...](https://lists.torproject.org/pipermail/tor- project/2016-May/000355.html)

Not sure what to think of this. But it is there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> > ... announced today the unsealing of a criminal complaint charging VIRGIL > GRIFFITH, a United States citizen, with violating the International > Emergency Economic Powers Act ("IEEPA") by traveling to the Democratic > People's Republic of Korea ("DPRK" or "North Korea") in order deliver a > presentation and technical advice on using cryptocurrency and blockchain > technology to evade sanctions.

And he thought he'd get away with this how? Jeez..

</comment><comment><USER41> > Finally, GRIFFITH announced his intention to renounce his U.S. citizenship > and began researching how to purchase citizenship from other countries.

Maybe Virgil should have renounced his US citizenship _before_ aiding NK. He should of seen this arrest coming from miles away because of strict sanction laws. Not sure how much they paid him to go to NK to make this all worth it.

</comment><comment><USER42> "Virgil Griffith, also known as Romanpoet, is an American programmer, known for being the creator of WikiScanner. He has published papers on artificial life and integrated information theory." WikiScanner exposed edits that Diebold and CIA employees were making to Wikipedia pages.

</comment><comment><USER43> I get that people hate US monetary policy so much they tried to bypass it with crypto currency and the like. But this strikes me as another reason for the US government to step in and regulate crypto currencies.

<comment><USER44> They already do. See IRS letters sent to CryptoCurrency Owners, 2019.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> Why on earth did he agree to those FBI interviews where he admitted all this?

<comment><USER29> Maybe he realized he was in deep s __t and thought (wrongly) that cooperating would help his situation.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> I'm not sympathetic. You're talking about a regime that essentially enslaves people. History will not be on his side.

</comment><comment><USER47> ```The cult hacker Virgil Griffith combines geekdom with a James Bond-like suaveness.```

</comment><comment><USER48> Better title for HN:

Arrest of Cryptocurrency and Tor expert [...]

</comment><comment><USER49> OT: My immediate reaction was wondering whether his name was a Berserk reference.

</comment><comment><USER50> This submission title is a train wreck. Paging @dang!

<comment><USER51> Fixed now. The submitted title was "US Citizen, a Ethereum Staff, Arrested for Assisting N Korea in Evading Sanction".

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> "An Ethereum staff" ?

<comment><USER53> Yes, but HN isn't exactly a bastion of correct grammar. Also, it shouldn't be capitalized.

</comment></comment><comment><USER54> This is like a pure distillation of ancap crypto hacker egoism. See where it might land you, kids?

<comment><USER55> Not sure how actively aiding a rogue totalitarian state qualifies as remotely ancap.

<comment><USER56> Because someone dislikes both of those things which makes them the same.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER57> North Korea has killed or tortured over 1 million in death camps and threatens nukes at the whim of 1 man who recently used anti aircraft guns to kill his uncles. In my opinion this moron deserves life in jail

<comment><USER58> While the leaders of North Korea have, without question, done a lot of horrible things, the anti-aircraft-gun story has appeared repeatedly in conjunction with numerous people, many of whom have reappeared alive afterwards, or who have been confirmed executed by other, more ordinary, methods. It's not clear if these anti-aircraft gun executions have ever been carried out, or if it's simply a recurrent rumor.

[https://www.38north.org/2016/09/aabrahamian090216/](https://www.38north.org/2016/09/aabrahamian090216/)

<comment><USER57> Different intelligent agencies have confirmed numerous deaths as well as reputable journalists from multiple witnesses. I'm sure some are exaggerated and run wild with but there is too much evidence to suggest ALL are fake

<comment><USER58> Some of the deaths have been confirmed. As far as I'm aware, though, none of the ridiculous methods of execution reported in the media (shot by anti- aircraft guns, torn apart by dogs, etc) have been confirmed. Moreover, the recurrent nature of these rumors suggests that they're long-running myths about North Korean execution methods that get attached to whichever official is rumored to have been executed recently.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> Well deserved. There isn't much else to add. And on top of that he has the audacity to set foot on American soil again.

</comment><comment><USER60> No matter how you look at this, this indictment now shows that we are not free to travel as we wish.

<comment><USER61> I don't understand the waves of down votes in this thread. Not very HN-like.

<comment><USER62> Yes it is. Libertarianism is not a welcome here

<comment><USER51> People with opposite politics have the opposite picture:

 _HN often aligns with more Libertarian ideologies_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21316611](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21316611)

 _There is a definite right-libertarian bias on HN, whether you want to acknowledge that or not. Everything not toeing that line is attacked and downvoted_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21432833](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21432833)

 _Hacker News has become a forum for uber nationalistic right-winged libertarians_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21231654](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21231654)

 _There 's a lot of very neoliberal or libertarian politics going on in the comments round here_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21186128](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21186128)

 _hacker news is a bubble of mostly middle class white male libertarians_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20637454](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20637454)

 _If you go against any kind of socially conservative or libertarian perspective it will get down voted and very likely flagged. It 's always been this way._ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20643695](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20643695)

 _It 's totally expected. This is a heavy technolibertarian site_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19230037](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19230037)

 _the techno-libertarian norm around here_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18671955](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18671955)

 _Hacker News has a libertarian leaning ideology among both its community and site-runners_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16019694](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16019694)

 _Because it 's HN, where opinions other than "hooray libertarian technocracy" are frowned upon_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15307091](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15307091)

 _this site is a haven for alt-right and libertarian people who believe this stuff_ [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14205262](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14205262)

There are just as many claims of the opposite; see [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21449589](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21449589) and [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21245485](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21245485). In reality, HN is a large pluralistic community, with more than enough material to support any impression of bias that you're primed for. The comments you notice and dislike make a stronger impression than the comments you agree with, building up a feeling that the community is against you. This can't be a function of HN, because HN is the same for everybody. Rather, it's in the eye of the beholder: an afterimage of the things they ran into and disliked here. The phenomenon is so consistent that you can not only predict what someone's opinions are, but also how intensely they hold them, from their image of the community's bias.

<comment><USER61> I appreciate that you are passionate on the point @dang, but I read those comments you link as confirming there is a perception among users that folks are flaming and downvoting on HN to pursue a political or ideological agenda. They flame and downvote each other, I guess. I love HN, but I'm not impressed by the quality of this discourse or by labels like 'flamebait', anecdotally it's getting worse, and I'm not even convinced the activity even is _that_ authentic or organic.

<comment><USER51> I don't see a disagreement here? Yes, politically committed users flame and downvote each other, and the quality of the discourse when they do that is unimpressive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER63> Hacker arrested for sharing information.

<comment><USER31> what he's essentially doing is aiding/abetting.

<comment><USER64> Be careful with that.

So in-person talks is aiding and abetting?

What about videoconference?

What about emails?

What about a semi-hidden webpage meant primarily for them?

Or how about a general developer FAQ that would get anybody dev-minded up to speed?

Where do we draw this line of "aiding and abetting"? Material good? Information? Congratulations? This appears to be strongly a 1st amendment issue of speech. Not that I like NK, but that point is a distractor. Why is it a crime to talk about cryptocurrency and monetary censorship of countries?

<comment><USER65> Attorney here! (Not providing legal advice - seek licensed counsel in your jurisdiction if you need legal advice.)

Any act that would provide material assistance is sufficient. Criminal law is pretty liberal about what constitutes an "act" in furtherance of a crime. If it concerns you, stay far far away.

But merely publishing information in a book or on a publicly-accessible website for all to see is not generally going to get in you trouble (subject of course to copyright, publishing classified information, etc.).

<comment><USER62> >>But merely publishing information in a book or on a publicly-accessible website for all to see is not generally going to get in you trouble

They Tried that, but that pesky 1st amendment got in the way. Research the CyptoWars (which is seems are heating up all over again) and the PGP Source Code Book.

The US Government has been attempting to censor speech for as long as it has been in existence. the latest attack on crypto by the US Government for "national security" reasons is just the latest in the long line of abuses

<comment><USER66> What happened wasn't an attack on crypto at all.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> Traveling somewhere the government doesn't like and teaching things to people there should not be a crime in any reasonable, civilized society.

<comment><USER68> So hypothetically, traveling to North Korea, and teaching them how to build ICBMs and nuclear weapons should be something anyone is be allowed to do?

I think you will find most people disagree with you here.

<comment><USER67> Be careful with that "them"; most people living in North Korea are even more threatened by the DPRK government than you are.

I have the belief that most human beings, in all places, are good, peaceful, and decent. Giving the people in North Korea all the help and resources they can will doubtlessly accelerate the downfall of their terrible, criminal leaders. It would be working in the USA except for the similar systems in place here to control easy access to information.

I do not think that peacefully teaching any subject, to any group of people, in any place, should be illegal, as no one is victimized by the act of teaching.

<comment><USER7> Sure, but the allegation is that Griffith traveled to the DPRK at the behest of its government, not its people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> >>> GRIFFITH and other attendees discussed

hmmm it will be interesting if he uses the 1st amendment as a defense, he all he did was discuss idea's and technology then it should be a clear 1st amendment violation for the US government to censor him, even against if he is talking to the DPRK

This reminds me of the PGP Source Code book case where the government attempted to proclaim Phil Zimmerman was exporting technology with PGP Book, they failed because of the 1st amendment.

</comment><comment><USER64> So, it's illegal for me to explicitly talk about things that could be illegal?

That seems to fly in the face of the 1st amendment. He was teaching about a skill that could be used to break law, but also be used in legal transactions.

Seems more like thoughtcrime, than actual crime. And if talking about implementation of technology is a crime, it shouldn't be.

<comment><USER69> He traveled to North Korea to teach them how to evade international sanctions. That's "thought crime"?

<comment><USER64> I still see nothing wrong with that. It's words, either spoken, written, or on a screen. It matters not that he's in person, or remote.

They could derive that from the multitude of developer FAQs, Stack Exchange, or other sources.

Long story short, this is the US government throwing a fit about a US citizen in NK. Have to set an example.

Now, if he gave them cryptocoins or other assets, then there might be a legitimate case of breaking international law. But you know, there's this pesky thing called 'proof'.

<comment><USER70> > It matters not that he's in person, or remote.

It matters very much, both legally, and morally (unless, of course, you support the humans rights abuses going on in the DPRK[1]). The law differentiates between words put in a book and the same words said to a criminal in order to further a crime[2], and it's pretty obvious that Griffith was intentionally providing assistance to a country that commits human rights abuses that are crimes under the legal systems of many, many other countries.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_North_Korea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_North_Korea) [2] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21666553](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21666553)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER61> Is the logical endpoint that any U.S. person with a "technical" blog might need to block IPs from NK, Iran, Venezuela, etc? At some point the rule swallows the exception in an open, democratic society.

<comment><USER31> AFAIK intent matters. There was a story from a while back where a seller of "secure" android phones got busted because he was knowingly selling to criminals. "knowingly" as in, his customers told him that they were going to use it for illegal activities, but he sold it to them anyways. It's the same principle why sellers of cannabis paraphernalia explicitly label their products "for tobacco use only".

<comment><USER61> Looks like from a prior HN discussion, maybe if he published a book and mailed it to the conference, it would be ok?[1]. But export of electronic code is not ok?

I also am under the impression the case is about unlawful export, but perhaps they're concentrating on a different theory.

[1] [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7885238](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7885238)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> The intent of the law is to prevent individuals from harming each other. Exactly who was harmed, or risked being harmed, by this person talking to North Koreans about crypto currencies? This is a case about the state abusing the law to suppress free speech.

<comment><USER72> He asked state dept if it was ok, they told him no it would be a crime, he did it anyway... how is anyone surprised at the result here?

<comment><USER62> I did not realize that the State Dept was the ruler of US Citizens and that we are their subjects

Pretty sure my copy of the constitution says "We the people" form the government not "The State Dept" forms the government

<comment><USER50> The State Department didn't create the law that made this a crime, they merely informed him of such. That's literally their job.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> Can we examine for a moment how ridiculous the concept of state sanctions are? That they can lock you up for going somewhere and teaching people things, simply because some of the people in the government of that place commit human rights abuses?

That does nothing but punish thousands, or, in this case, millions of people who are themselves suffering under that country's government.

I've been to North Korea. I've spoken to the people there and seen directly the fear and suffering in their eyes. The DPRK government is _terrible_. The people there need all the help, love, information, and compassion we can give them.

The real crime is making it illegal to go there and do that.

Could you imagine other, more civilized countries e.g. in Europe jailing their citizens for coming to the US to peacefully speak or present? After all, we run indefinite detention torture prisons all over the world (or, more specifically, human rights criminals in our government do). We (criminals in our government) tap the phone lines and emails. We (criminals in our government) assassinate citizens without trial. We have had thousands of government officials fail to seek justice against our leaders for war crimes. Nearly every accusation that can be leveled against the DPRK government can be leveled against the US government, if at a smaller scale in most cases. How do we do the mental gymnastics to punish normal people simply traveling and teaching because of criminal acts committed by others they have never met?

I agree that the DPRK government is bad, just that I agree that the US government is bad. But a country is absolutely not its government, and punishing normal, peaceful people by the millions who happen to live with the misfortune to be trapped in such places where the leaders are criminals or tolerate criminals amongst themselves, or punishing people who travel to these places to teach and speak is madness.

<comment><USER73> How many non-complicit-with-the-government North Koreans do you think have safe, unmonitored access to computers and the internet, and so can safely (or even unsafely) use cryptocoin? If the number is not 0 it is very, very close to 0.

We already know that the North Korean government is using cryptocoin tech to evade international sanctions to fund their missile and nuclear programs.

How many North Korean non government officials do you suppose were permitted to attend this conference?

Actions like this absolutely enable this terrible regime to perpetuate itself and its horrific actions, they do little or nothing to aid any ordinary North Koreans.

<comment><USER68> Adding to this, the website of the conference says

"exclusive environment of confidentiality and contacts with the highest government officials and engineers"

[https://nkcryptocon.com/](https://nkcryptocon.com/)

Somehow I doubt the aspirations of this conference were to liberate the North Korean people.

With respect to internet restrictions in North Korea

"Whereas the real Internet is reserved for a select and trusted few, everyone else in North Korea gets access to a national, walled-off intranet, a "pseudo Internet," available for public use called Kwangmyong. "

[https://money.cnn.com/2014/12/22/technology/security/north-k...](https://money.cnn.com/2014/12/22/technology/security/north- korean-internet/index.html)

There is no chance this conference was anything except a tool for the leadership to exploit cryptocoin.</comment></comment></comment>


How Command and Conquer: Tiberian Sun punished the computers of the day [video] - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/02/video-to-make-tiberian-sun-westwood-had-to-find-the-right-pathfinding-system/ <comment><USER3> Great games..... I really feel that peak gaming was in 90s/early 2000s.

You had C&C, Total Annihilation, Age of Empires, Quake 1/2, Half Life, Pro Evo Soccer, and so many more in the PC side, and probably a SNES or a N64 around. Super Mario (all of them), Golden Eye, Mario Kart, Street Fighter 2, Final Fight and more

Online gaming was crude but fun (Age of Empires, Quake, Unreal Tournament, Half Life, had a great online implementation). LAN gaming parties were coming in my dorm.

Games had a well defined start, end, and progression that was dependent on your skill.

Now games are just a way for you to spend money in loot boxes, dcls, and cosmetics, or 'upgrades' so you can escape the artificial grind. Tutorials everywhere, handholding to the point that destroy any type of mystery or fun of the game.....

Or maybe I am just getting old.....

<comment><USER4> While the gaming industry has turned huge and inevitably is much more about money then when it wasn't really taken that seriously by the broad public, thanks to the indie scene there is still great games being released today in any genre and subgenre you can possibly think of. There has definitely been a game released during the last 12 months that you'd totally like if you only knew about it.

But the "getting old" part definitely plays a role too. When you're a kid or in your teens everything is just more exciting and impressive to you. A teen today might think the latest Wolfenstein installment is the most awesome thing they've ever seen while to you it's just another first person shooter or doom clone, with somewhat better graphics. Now you could say "but doom _was_ new and groundbreaking", but even if there had been a dozen identical games before, if doom were the first one you played, it wouldn't have mattered. Graphics is another thing I stopped caring about. In the late 90s and early 2000s I was blown away by new graphics demos released every year showing off what the next gen of gfx cards were capable of. Nowadays I'm so out of the loop. Graphics from 5 years ago look no different than today. Although I must admit the latest unreal engine tech demos actually did manage to impress me.

<comment><USER5> That's the thing about getting old, you end up seeing enough examples of everything that you generalise and everything fits in your model of the world. Which also means some of the magic is gone, and possibly also your ability to recognise something genuinely new.

<comment><USER6> > ...and possibly also your ability to recognise something genuinely new.

I think we can still recognize something new: I found that playing "Vader Immortal" on Oculus Quest to be a genuinely new gaming experience. And I've been gaming on PC since 8/81 (when PCs were first released) and on Apple IIs before that, and IBM 5110s before that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I have to say, apart from nostalgia, the main thing I miss from that period of gaming is the death of RTS.

I think everything peaked with supreme commander forged alliance, and after the strategic zoom, i couldn't go back and play things like StarCraft without feeling like I was watching a genre defined by fighting the interface and hotkey mashing obsessives rather than playing the game or worrying about grand strategy. I know in all these games at the top levels you do have to worry eventually about hotkeys and commands, but after supreme commander on dual monitors, all the rest have been like viewing an art exhibit through a toilet roll.

These days there's barely a handful of games anymore in the RTS genre, and maybe publishers like paradox, will focus on longer running strategy, but nothing that quite meets that old feeling of sitting down for a 30 - <USER2> minute epic match of actual wits and thought and ability that supreme commander (and the C & C universe before it) contained. We lost something with the death of Westwood and when blizzard moved Warcraft from its roots, and no real successor to the old total annihilation, which is so sad considering how powerful computers have gotten in the meantime and how hard these games were pushing them back in the day.

(PS, if anyone can post me a working tute on getting SC:FA multiplayer working on Linux, I might sell you my firstborn).

<comment><USER8> Supreme Commander FA, WarHammer 40k Dawn of War 1, Company of Heroes 1, AoE 2, SC1, and, of course, Total Annihilation are the quintessential strategy games imho.

<comment><USER9> I never understood why people didn't like AoE:3 as much as AoE:2. With the unit bonuses (ie spears bonus against cavalry, etc), multiple attacks per unit (some units have both ranged and melee attacks with different stats that can be toggled, ie musketeers could be put in melee to deal with horses) and seriously different civs (ie up to 30% of units available might be different) it was a much more strategic play. And the interface was arguably more advanced than SC2, so it was more relaxing to play.

Is it because they picked the wrong era to set it in?

<comment><USER10> I think the problem is more that it came after AoE 2. While 3 was a fairly good game by itself, it didn't quite live up to nr 2.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> This is one game that always impressed me as a child.

Things I loved about the game:

\- Destructible terrain, buildings, and vehicles.

\- Ambient lighting.

\- Exciting story with known actors.

One thing that always frustrated me was on the back of the box it showed the ability to create light towers but I don't think that was ever possible in the game without mods.

<comment><USER12> Yep, Westwood got a lot of flak for that one image on the back of the packaging back in the day. Especially since they basically lied about shipping a 3D engine during development when Tiberian Sun was actually using Voxels.

<comment><USER13> Having written a voxel renderer for ts models I can confirm that it's definetely a 3d rendering engine. It's not just polygon_based (nor are they hw accelerated)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> In case anyone wants to know what happened to C&C, I heavily recommend this documentary [1].

[1]: [https://youtu.be/OlIkGlTMUNE](https://youtu.be/OlIkGlTMUNE)

</comment><comment><USER15> This is one of the few games I re-bought when they ported it to the Win7+ set of OSes from Microsoft. This game, Dark Reign, Descent 2, all consumed so much of my entertainment time. It wasn't until World of Warcraft dropped that I didn't have a 'lan party' rig that I could pick up and carry to a friends for a great time.

</comment><comment><USER16> How exactly is pathfinding an NP complete problem?

Surely a simple Dijkstra search across all grid squares would do the job?

Edit: Perhaps it's 'find an optimal strategy for everyone to get to their destination while nobody collides with anyone else'?

I didn't think real time strategy games normally did much collision avoidance between units though... The number of times I've seen an army just walk through another...

<comment> eric-hu The RTS games I know definitely do collision detection. StarCraft 2 disables collision detection in a few cases: workers harvesting resources, adept shading, and the colossus walking over ground units. To see what no collision detection would look like, see how the air units stack and move across each other.

I think collision avoidance might be overkill. It's fine if two units bump into each other while going in the same direction. Collision is bad if some units are moving through a choke point and the units in back turn around to take a different route because there's no open grid squares to walk forward through.

I'm currently playing through the StarCraft 1 campaign and the pathing differences with 2 are huge. Imagine being in line at Disneyland and every ten seconds, the people in front of you decide the entrance is blocked and turn around to try finding another way in. Then they bump into you and turn around again. Or maybe they just keep bumping into you for a bit.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> You can download the game for free at [1] and still play it online.

[1]: [https://cncnet.org/tiberian-sun](https://cncnet.org/tiberian-sun)

<comment><USER18> Oh man, this is awesome. I have very fond memories of playing the original C&C. My copy of C&C had a Tiberian Sun ad that I always thought looked amazing, but I never did play it. From the Ars Technica video, it looks like it ought to feel modern enough to play today and have fun. And there are Linux builds. I'm gonna try it. :)

<comment><USER19> I don't know if it's still available, but a few years ago I bought all 17 games in the C&C series for $5 on Amazon. Downloadable, not CD/DVD, but it works. Some of the games crash occasionally on Windows10, but C&C:Generals runs very well on an Intel NUC with Win10.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I played a ton of RTS games, but I still remember fondly Tiberian Sun for the art style.

It has a very, very distinct feel from anything else back then, and anything that followed.

For me it's a combination of many factors. Voxel units looked _great_ at small scale compared to any polygonal type that came after that. The infantry and landscape is 2D and hand-crafted. It's gorgeous. I think this was the last game in the series where this was the case. Dynamic and scripted lighting, esp nearby tiberium, added a ton to make some of the landscapes really look alien and alive - but did so without changing the vibe of the game. The soundtracks were very fitting as well, although not as memorable as C&C RA.

I'm not nostalgic here. I really did like subsequent games in the series. RA2 was great. I had lots of fun with Generals too (which I always thought looked stunning).

But Tiberian Sun has really a _distinct_ feel to it encompassing everything. RIP Westwood.

<comment><USER13> Yes, the difference in style really caught me as well. But ts was developed by another studio independently from cc / ra if Im not mistaken.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> Some great anecdotes here about the development of pathfinding in starcraft 1:

[https://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/the-starcraft-path- finding-...](https://www.codeofhonor.com/blog/the-starcraft-path-finding-hack)

> But the biggest thing holding back StarCraft was unit path-finding.

> It wasn't that the path-finding was totally broken; in most cases it worked > quite well. But there were enough edge-cases that the game was un-shippable.

> Game units would get stuck and stop on the battlefield. Often they would go > through elaborate efforts to find paths, inching forward or looping around > but not making progress, and sometimes getting wedged and unable to move > further. Entire task forces would get bogged down in what looked like the > afternoon commute.

previous HN discussion: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5252003](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5252003)

</comment><comment><USER22> Since the detail on path finding is a little sparse, I'll link this very exhaustive treatment for anyone interested [http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp/GameProgramming/AStarCompa...](http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp/GameProgramming/AStarComparison.html)

</comment><comment><USER23> "pathfinding is actually a murderously complex programming challenge—one that, depending on the path, might be NP-complete."

The article is crap, the actual interview makes a lot more sense. Fond memories :)

</comment><comment><USER24> Ah just seeing C&C getting brought up brings back nostalgic memories. I remember Red Alert 2 being the best game ever.

I revisited this game with a friend of mine during high school years ago, we had to pirate the game and install some 3rd party LAN software to get RA2's online mode working. Once installed, we were surprised to see a good amount of people still playing the game. Good times

</comment><comment><USER25> I feel blessed that I grew up during the late 80s and 90s. I got to see and play games in arcades, and I owned my first computer in 2001. So I played games mostly at friends houses.

Nobody else will go through what we did, though I suspect my generation might hit the beginnings of good VR tech (hoping so anyway).

</comment><comment><USER26> I'm old. Dune 2 was my childhood. Thank you Westwood.

<comment><USER27> You're not old if Dune 2 was your childhood. Trust me. Vic 20 was my childhood... _waits for someone else to go back further..._

<comment><USER28> Another VIC-20 alum here. At the age of 10, I remember trying to write a version of Donkey Kong in BASIC and was flabbergasted when I ran out of memory before I could even get barrels rolling! Ah, the good ol' days!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Nah man, Total Annihilation punished computers of the day.

<comment><USER30> The modern version - planetary annihilation kills modern computers still.

<comment><USER31> Ooooh, the dumpster fire that is Planetary Annihilation.

If they spent a fraction of the effort on _the actual bloody game_ that they spent on making it Twitch and E-sport friendly, the game might not, you know, suck.

<comment><USER30> >the dumpster fire that is Planetary Annihilation.

huh? I enjoyed it. Mainly played AI skirmishes with mods though

<comment><USER32> What mods do you recommend?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> Did anyone else here find the rules.ini file and modify it? This controlled power levels and distance of weapons. You could modify a bazooka guy to have a weapon as powerful as a nuke.

[https://cnc.fandom.com/wiki/Rules.ini](https://cnc.fandom.com/wiki/Rules.ini)

</comment><comment><USER34> Has anyone been able to get C&C Generals to work on Win10?

My Win10 box doesn't seem to want to read my original discs (I've tried 2 drives, they both appear to hang). Excepting that, is there anywhere to get working ISOs if you have CD keys? Didn't look available on Gog.

<comment><USER35> Up to you, but I'd say you are in a situation where piracy is justifiable. You already bought a copy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I don't understand what is challening about pathfinding specifically. Are there just a huge number of vertices and edges so known algorithms don't perform well? How big are the grids? Is it making the path finding look a certain way to humans that's the hard part?

<comment><USER21> Consider the scenario of doing "select all; move over there past a bunch of obstacles and choke points" for 300 tanks.

if you're not playing a starcraft , you probably want them to trundle in the right direction and avoid ending up in a huge traffic jam.

if you are playing a starcraft , bad pathfinding is an opportunity for a skilled operator to worsen their RSI while lovingly micromanaging each tank's route

</comment></comment><comment><USER37> Did they ever publish their path algorithms? I'm building a simulation that will soon need path finding, and something that is good and doesn't appear to be doing obviously stupid things (but not necessarily the best) would be a perfect fit

<comment><USER38> Starcraft 2 has excellent path finding algorithms, which they did discuss quite a lot prior to release. I don't think they published the algorithm but maybe you can find it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> I taught myself BASIC programming on a ZX81 to create Star Raiders clone back in the early 1980s. My version was terrible, but it was games that brought me into the world of computers. And it is games that keep me interested today.

</comment><comment><USER40> I used to play this on my old P200 just fine. It was a great game and I loved the electronic soundtrack and artwork. It was very immersive.

</comment><comment><USER41> Pro players of DOTA 2 still complain about pathfinding.

</comment><comment><USER42> > _Pathfinding is actually a murderously complex programming challenge—one > that, depending on the path, might be NP-complete._

> _The "eureka!" moment came when Castle and team realized they didn't have to > build perfect—or even really great—pathfinding. Rather, they had to build > pathfinding that didn't look stupid to the player._

> _The most interesting thing, at least to me, is that pathfinding is still a > difficult problem even for modern games, and simply throwing more CPU power > at the problem doesn 't really help that much—such is the curse of NP- > complete problems._

It reminds me of my experience of some pathfinding bugs in OpenRA (free and open source _Command & Conquer_ clone): one day I was playing OpenRA on Linux, and I find the game was running extremely slowly like a snail, the more I played the more slow it was. So I decided to check GitHub, it turned out that AI has built a huge number of soldiers, but unfortunately, due to geography features of the map and the battles, a lot of them have trapped inside "islands" with no available path connected to the rest of the world, or they want to attack targets inside "islands". One example is isolated waterways, another is land with destroyed bridges.

But edge cases like these were still not handled well in the OpenRA engine, the AI would keep ordering those units to move and attack. OpenRA uses a variant of the A* algorithm, and those AI orders will force the engine to run a huge number of A* pathfinding attempts on every second and exhaust most of your CPU time.

The solution should make the AI to detect these endless attempts and "bail out". The developers have already fixed some of those edge cases, but there are still a few to hunt down.

* [https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/12435](https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/12435)

* [https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/7694](https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/7694)

* [https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/12938](https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/12938)

* [https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/12435](https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/12435)

* [https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/10860](https://github.com/OpenRA/OpenRA/issues/10860)

</comment><comment><USER43> Just for nostalgia, some other gems from that era -

Silent Hill, Residential Evil, Unreal Tournament, Wolfenstein Enemey Territory,

*Edit, commas.</comment>


Lessons from launch: help us learn how you track time - <AUTHOR> http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3133-lessons-from-launch-help-us-learn-how-you-track-time

<comment><USER2> I don't understand the comments from people on the blog wanting them to rush this feature and get it in ASAP. Like they mentioned, you still have Basecamp Classic. There's nothing forcing you to move to the new Basecamp before they take the time to get time-tracking right.

<comment><USER3> I found that surprising too. 37signals presumably are supporting both products side by side to prevent people from having this reaction. Im not sure if those people are yelling loud to make sure time tracking gets in to Basecamp Next or because there are just rude and obnoxious people on the internet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> > How and why...

I can't comment on the "how", but the "why" is easier. 37signals is a product company, and a modern one at that. By "modern" I mean that they do things differently from traditional product companies. Not tracking time probably works well for 37signals and many other nimble organizations.

But it doesn't work for everyone.

When I picture a 37signals customer, I tend to picture a company... well... like 37signals. But Basecamp has a large user base. And it is not homogenous.

Large corporations, smaller traditional companies, freelancers, and consultants all use your product.

Anyone who bills by the hour needs time tracking.

Anyone who is accountable to a "cost center" needs time tracking.

People who want to improve estimation in a project over time need time tracking.

Skunkworks "rebel" projects embedded in a larger organization still have to give cost reports to their superiors. They need time tracking.

Do I need to go on?

I won't fault 37signals for omitting a feature they did not understand, but they shouldn't have been blindsided by it. It demonstrates an underestimation of the diversity of their users.

Okay, maybe I will add my thoughts on the "how":

You're 37signals. Don't you like to keep things simple? Why not start with two input fields on every task:

1\. Estimated time

2\. Actual time

Roll these up in any "aggregate" view of more than one task. A little "estimate vs actual" sparkline would be cool, too. Provide deeper access via API so the data can be integrated with existing tools the client has.

My opinion is that would be better than nothing. And it would stay out of the way.

</comment><comment><USER5> I appreciate this post's lack of snark. It's nice to see them responding to a need that they (37 signals) obviously think is useless, but that their customers think is important. That's a hard line to draw when creating a tool.

</comment><comment><USER6> Why the focus on time tracking? There are plenty of other Basecamp features I'm sure other people want to be ported too. For example, my company relies on the Textile writeboards to provide pretty tables and lists. It was much disheartening to see our carefully constructed pages get devoured into an ugly mess of unversioned code when moving a project to the new system.

</comment><comment><USER7> >...we didn't anticipate such a strong visceral "no time tracking is a deal breaker" reaction. This was definitely a blind spot for us.

>...Plain and simple, this is why time tracking isn't in the initial release of the all new Basecamp. We simply don't understand it well enough.

huh?</comment>


Modern "slaves" at Apple shops [german link] - <AUTHOR> https://www.golem.de/news/buch-apple-intern-die-behandeln-uns-wie-sklaven-1703-126777.html <comment><AUTHOR> There is a somewhat related article in The Guardian: [https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/dec/03/claps- and...](https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/dec/03/claps-and-cheers- apple-stores-carefully-managed-drama).</comment>