Kdenlive: an open-source video editor - <AUTHOR> https://kdenlive.org/en/features/ <comment><USER2> I'm a simpleton when it comes to video editing, but I was able to make a series of professional-looking videos without a whole lot of trouble in February.

I only run Linux, so I'm not sure what I would've done without Kdenlive since I don't see what else I could have possibly used.

Huge thanks to everyone who contributes to the project!

<comment><USER3> Davinci Resolve runs on Linux: [https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/](https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/)

<comment><USER4> I tried it recently, but it just segfaulted. System was running Ubuntu 18.04. Just FYI.

<comment><USER5> I got Resolve set up on Ubuntu 18.04 this morning - the trick for me was switching to the nvidia drivers, before that it segfaulted on my machine too.

<comment><USER4> That mostly seemed to be my problem, the 18.04 OpenCL causes Resolve to segfault. I grabbed the AMD "pro" Linux drivers, installed them (which was tricky, their provided scripts bombed out so I manually had to resolve a bunch of dependencies).

Once I got opencl installed and rebooted the machine, I was able to start Resolve and get into the main interface. It couldn't find a GPU though ("clinfo" showed one), I'm guessing that it really,truly does need an nVidia card. I brought home a card from work to try, just to see if it would make a difference, but someone put a AMD card into the box of a nVidia card.

I tried Resolve on my wife's Win10 laptop with Intel GPU, and it seemed to install and work no problem. Since I'm basically going to be using the machine for just editing when I'm editing, I may just set it up with Windows and call it done.

From some of the introductions I've watched, it looks like Resolve is the software I want. Lightworks has worked well, but Resolve looks like a space age rocket ship. I guess we will see...

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Unfortunately for screencast videos where you record your desktop and maybe overlay a webcam kdenlive is really really bad compared to alternatives available on Windows and Mac such as Camtasia / Screenflow.

It's one of the reasons why I continue to stick with Windows. Kdenlive feels like it's 10 years behind Camtasia in terms of UI polish and being able to accomplish simple tasks like put a little tooltip overlay on the screen and make it look reasonable.

I think a lot of people who say kdenlive is good haven't tried Camtasia, or have created enough videos to really figure out kdenlive's shortcomings. I'm coming at this from the POV of creating 400 videos and have spent over 1,000 hours hardcore editing these videos.

I don't want to tear it down too much because it's one of the better screencast video editing tools on Linux but if your profession involves creating screencast videos, you're going to be majorly disappointed compared to Camtasia (or Screenflow). Enough to where you'll probably abort the idea of using Linux even if you're primarily a developer.

I wish I could throw money at the kdenlive devs and wake up tomorrow with a video editor that was as good as Camtasia.

<comment><USER7> If you want to record your desktop in Linux with a live webcam overlay I strongly recommend Open Broadcaster Software, aka OBS.

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

OBS lets you combine multiple sources easily including adding static and dynamic graphical overlays and is basically the what all of the streamers are using on all of the three platforms Linux, macOS and Windows these days, and aside from being able to stream live to Twitch etc it is also perfect for offline recording.

However, OBS is not a video editor, so if your use-case is to first record your screen and to then record the commentary afterwards rather than commenting while you are screenrecording then OBS is probably not what you want.

<comment><USER6> Yeah I use OBS. It's the best thing ever for streaming and definitely is one of the best solutions for recording in general.

But Camtasia is both a recorder and editor and it seamlessly integrates the 2. The main pros of Camtasia is that it's super optimized for editing screencast style videos (tooltip overlays, text, zooms / pans, really REALLY nice animations on any objects by just dragging a few sliders, etc.). The editing part is where kdenlive is way behind IMO, but that's where you spend most of your time.

<comment><USER8> Best _free_ (as in beer) thing for streaming, I'll give you. But I switched to vMix as my primary video mixing software and won't look back until OBS has significantly better audio management. vMix literally got $700 out of me because it integrated a good, ASIO-capable mixer into it.

A vMix Call equivalent that transparently wires into the audio board would also be really nice, but I don't wanna get greedy.

<comment><USER6> > But I switched to vMix as my primary video mixing software and won't look > back until OBS has significantly better audio management. vMix literally got > $700 out of me because it integrated a good, ASIO-capable mixer into it.

Fair enough but audio is a completely different animal that can be tamed in a number of ways:

1\. You can buy a hardware USB audio interface + mixer for ~$200-400ish total which can do compression, basic EQs, noise gate, has multiple inputs, etc. and now that becomes your final source of audio so you don't need to process it with software. It's just a mic from your computer's point of view.

2\. OBS has VST plugin support, so you can directly use hundreds of free VSTs to do various effects in real time without needing to mess around with audio redirection. No hardware needed except for your mic.

3\. You can use REAPER (free but you should register it, sort of like Sublime Text) which is a DAW. From here you can use various VSTs and then use Jack (or comparable software) to redirect REAPER's output as input to another app (such as OBS). This takes a bit of initial set up but technically would work with any app, not just OBS and this is what I used to do before going with #1 because I didn't want to run all of these apps every time I wanted to start recording.

In the end, you can get fantastic sounding audio with any of the above approaches and with #1 and #3 you can do it with any application where as with #2 you're limited to OBS only (which isn't a bad thing if you spend your time streaming and primarily recording with it anyways).

<comment><USER8> To be clear: I am a semi-professional A/V engineer, it's not my day job but I produce pretty large shows. So it's not about getting "fantastic sounding audio". It's about getting controllable audio that scales; when you're running a nontrivial live video show; my yearly charity event is 24 hours long and typically runs 5 cameras, and between 6 and 12 audio feeds, not all of which are coming in over XLR). Which is to say that along the way I've done each of the options you outline. They're bad. (There is one moderately better one I will cover. It's not good either.)

#1: that USB mixer acts as a mixer only for inputs that you can plug into that mixer. That may sound obvious. It becomes concretely painful when you have video inputs that also have sound attached. For HDMI captures, you might have an audio takeoff or you might use an HDMI extractor, which is...fine, such as it is, but suboptimal. If you use a professional stack--my video stack is SDI- based--this is completely inadequate. If you use NDI for video transmission over your network (and my stack has a switch in it, 24 gigabit and 2 10G SFP+, in order to take between six and ten NDI streams into the video mixer), you're _boned_ ; the only option that OBS offers, and it's a bad one, is to replace your cue/monitor output (assuming you have an extra audio out in your video mixer) with the NDI output. This means you can't practically mix NDI stream output that isn't currently on-screen because you only get one cue.

2\. This isn't a solution because the OBS mixer is deficient. Modifying levels on the fly is impractical because they're just local UI widgets that lack the usual affordances for mouse-driven audio control. And this could be fixed with hardware but far as I am aware (this one might have changed since I last used it, OBS is now just an NDI slave for me), you can't connect a MIDI slider controller to the OBS mixer in the first place. You _definitely_ can't send signals back to a MIDI controller to enable the use of motorized faders, which are one of those "I can't go back, I won't go back!" things now that I have them in my stack.

3\. Similar problem to #1, only in software. Redirection turns into a virtual patch bay and you end up having to figure out how to run things back and forth. And the tooling on both ends is very rarely automatable, so you'd better hope you don't lose your setup.

The _best_ option, and it also gets you screwed over because of UI affordances, is to use obs-asio with bassasio (and yeah, this means you're using Windows, but you probably should be anyway because #3 is better with a more serious DAW option, like Ableton Live, as your audio backend). You can pull every channel off your interface and expose them in OBS and you can squint at Qt sliders to your heart's content.

Personally, I use vMix instead and have good iPad-based applications that I don't have to write myself (like I said elsewhere in this thread, I wrote this[1] to control OBS remotely, it's not nearly as good as the stuff already available for vMix!) for both audio and video switching and I can, and do, wire up MIDI surfaces for physical controls (motorized faders, etc.).

Don't get me wrong: OBS is fine if your needs are small. I got pretty far with it. When your needs are no longer small, it turns into a Jenga stack of hacks. I hang out in the OBS Discord, I think the team is very talented, but the software has trouble scaling up even to my relatively modest needs compared to commercial solutions (vMix and NewTek VT being the best options in that space, though VT is gonna cost you both arms and both legs).

Had I infinite time, I would go take a chainsaw to the entire audio stack in OBS, but...I don't, and vMix already does it capital-R Right: multiple ASIO devices, first-class mixer inputs for everything from audio interfaces to cameras to NDI feeds to _WebRTC calls_ (seriously, vMix Call is _great_ ). And it comes with a pervasive automation suite built around multiple kinds of input devices--DirectInput joysticks/controllers, keyboard shortcuts, MIDI signals (and not just notes, but faders etc.)--with signal-returns to enable stuff like motorized fader boards (which have gotten super cheap, too). Given all that, and the lack of having to do any of it myself? $700 is cheap. ;)

[1] - [https://bit.ly/buymyapp](https://bit.ly/buymyapp)

<comment><USER6> We have very different use cases.

I'm coming at from a single person trying to record screencast videos in a controlled environment.

<comment><USER8> I understand that. But your reply seemed to minimize what I was saying in a way that read to me as dismissive. Not saying you meant to, but this stuff is stuff I take pretty seriously--and I was in a meeting so I had time to kill. ;)

And OBS _is_ in my standard kit. It's just fine as an NDI satellite. But also, for what you describe, there's a $60 1080p vMix package...and it's got most of the bells and whistles I described, too. Automation and control are easy to overlook until you don't have them!

<comment><USER6> I think my current set up is pretty automated.

I open a recording program (either Camtasia or OBS depending on what I'm doing), hit record and talk. Then I hit stop.

That's it. At this point my audio is leveled and comes out sounding good since all of the processing happens in hardware in real time. It's also sync'd with the video.

Editing is where kdenlive falls apart which is really what my reply was about.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm a musician and Linux user, so I have to lean on open source for recording and production. I use Kdenlive to do basic video creation; background music to a picture. It works really well for my purposes, in fact, I've had much fewer problems with kdenlive than with Audacity or Inkscape. Inkscape locks up my entire machine (AMD card most likely to blame) and I can't get through a recording project without Audacity crashing (been using it for years with different machines/configs, never had good luck).

<comment><USER10> If you're working on recording projects on linux, why the heck are you using Audacity? Seriously, save yourself a lot of headaches with Ardour.

<comment><USER11> I've tried using Ardour, but I've never been able to get it to work with my USB Snowball mic. It starts with audio out, but once I configure my mic, it's input only and I have to restart the program to hear anything I've done. No other program I've used has ever behaved like this. I'm sure it has terrific features, but it'd be great if they could nail the simple out-of-the-box configuration.

<comment><USER10> That's because the device is input only. By default Ardour uses the same device for capture and monitoring. The reason is that different audio devices have their own internal clocks, and using more than one devices introduces clock drift.

You get around this be setting JACK to use the snowball device for capture only (and by doing so you are using its clock) and then attach whatever device you are using for monitoring as a JACK client using zita_j2a from the zita- ajbridge tools package.

<comment><USER11> That makes a lot of sense. Speaking for the "hobbyists" out there, it'd be great to have that as an option in Ardour itself and not have to fiddle with setting up client/server/bridges just to plug in a microphone (which seems like a really common use-case!). FWIW I don't even need live monitoring where latency matters -- I just want to record, then stop recording, then play it back and edit it.

I do know that programs like Adobe Audition on Windows offer that in a plug- and-play way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Within the last month I got an action cam and have started to edit videos to post on Youtube. Mostly "HOWTO" videos, because I've learned so much by watching HOWTO videos. I'm just finishing up a major remodel of my kitchen, with youtube videos being a large contributing factor to my success.

Kdenlive I haven't tried yet, but is on my short list to try.

I've been using LightWorks under Linux and it works pretty well. I mean, I have nothing else to compare it to, but I'm doing 4K30fps video, and a friend of mine tells me that his Macbook Pro with Adobe tools isn't up to the task. I'm running on a 5 year old PC I had in the closet (870K CPU, 16GB RAM, Radeon, SSD), and it works fairly well.

The only downside of Lightworks so far has been that to export to Youtube at 4K you have to "subscribe", you can't just buy the software. You can do your editing and play with it, and export 720p video.

But to export 4K, you have to either pay $25/mo or $170/year. I wasn't sure how much I'd like editing video, so I didn't want to pay $170. so I did the $25 for a month. I'm really enjoying it, but I kind of wish I could just pay $200-$300 and be done with it. Which I realize isn't rational, because that'll buy a lot of $25 months.

Other ones I want to try: Kdenlive, Davinci Resolve (tried it and it segfaulted, $170/year), Cinelerra (looks kind of crappy), Flowblade. Pitivi looks to be abandoned. Maybe I should try Blender, but I don't want to do any 3D stuff, don't want to get sidetracked.

There's also an online NL video editor that my daughter has used for school: wevideo. She showed it to me after seeing me running LightWorks and recognizing the workflow. I'm dealing with 75-200GB though, don't think that's going to work for online. Smaller video will probably work, my daughter uses it to voice-over a series of photos turned into video.

There are a few rough edges, but Lightworks has mostly let me, as a neophyte video guy, to make great videos. Took me an hour to import an MP3 this weekend though.

<comment><USER12> Don't forget Shotcut.

<comment><USER4> I edited a video yesterday in Shotcut and it looks pretty good. I do seem to end up with a lot of glitches that I have to go back and clean up, usually repeated frames at clip transitions, though one seems to be repeated frames within a clip. I imagine it is something I'm doing, like how I drag the clips together? But I haven't had that problem in any other editor.

I think I'm sold on Davinci Resolve though. It's pretty sweet, extremely full featured, free for most uses and reasonably priced for the full kit ($300 IIRC. That adds the ability to do multi-GPU and have multiple users collaborating, plus 6K and 8K editing).

I had to upgrade my GPU though. My old one had 2GB and Resolve was like "Oh, that's ADORABLE!" It was a 5-6 year old computer though. I also put it under Windows, it just seems to run better there. I had battled for an hour to get to the point where it stopped segfaulting under Linux and started complaining about not enough video RAM. But now that Linux install is janked, something related to the AMD GPU packages. Probably not TOO hard a fix, since it was all .debs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> One of the things the Linux desktop sorely needs is a good video editor. I've heard of kdenlive before but never tried it. How is it (both for experienced users doing complex editing and for newbies just wanting to trim some footage)?

I've also seen that black magic's editor is available for Linux, but it is an _enormous_ package...

<comment><USER14> Linux desktop needs consistency and freedom (yes, open source desktop needs freedom).

Freedom of updating and installing newer versions of software without waiting for maintainer/distro half of year to build new package (outdated next week because it's STABLE package).

This is main problem of any linux desktop initiative - linux users get newer gimp after windows users.

Hope snaps/flatpack/appimage solve this problem in future (snap versions of apps look ugly now).

<comment><USER15> I personally solved this by switching to antergos (which is based on arch, but fully usable out of the box). Been running the same installation without any problems for about 5 years now, completely updated irregularly.

Using "stable" distros makes little sense for other than complete newbies and enterprise-like critical usage and such imo. If you don't need bleeding edge stuff they are a good choice though, but for average users modern rolling releases are definitely stable enough.

The freedom is there.

<comment><USER16> I've been eyeing antergos. Any hardware problems along the way?

<comment><USER17> Hardware support is pretty solid, since the kernel, like all packages, is fairly up to date. There's also an option to install proprietary GPU drivers out of the box. And when reinstalling an old ThinkPad, it was also the only distro among the few I had handy that actually came with the correct Intel wifi firmware so I could, you know, install. Two thumbs up for Antergos.

<comment><USER18> Antergos is not a standalone distro though. Its just an installer for Arch.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Has there ever been an attempt to build a FLOSS video editor pinned to a single distro and a single piece of hardware (or at least single GPU)?

It just seems like Linux cannot currently guarantee anything about the stability or even existence of GPU-acceleration on an arbitrary machine. So to start with that and then smear the software across multiple LTS versions of multiple distros seems like a perfect recipe for our current reality.

Could maybe even build a funding model off of that. Compare a fundraiser trying to gain general stability for a buggy video editor to a fundraiser for getting "Paradise Video Editor" to extend its rock solid UX to a 2nd piece of hardware. I bet the maker of that hardware would find value in such support. :)

<comment><USER20> General purpose GPU acceleration is accessible through standard APIs like Vulkan.

If you mean specialized GPU video encoding / decoding, there is VAAPI, which is also pretty much supported on all GPUs and distros. But selection of particular codecs depends on the hardware.

<comment><USER19> No, I mean limiting support to X distro on Y arch with Z GPU. Any usage outside of those constraints is completely unsupported and isn't allowed to be added to an official bug report.

For example, let's say Ubuntu 18.04 LTS on x86_64 with GPU... (dunno, choose a decent one that has a respectable open source driver).

Here's my question-- how much more stable would such a video editor be than the extant ones that ship with general Linux support?

I'm asking because I see lots of reports that so-and-so crashes because the user installed from the ancient Debian package, or the Nvidia driver is garbage, or some library doesn't play well on some distro/arch/distro-arch- combo. I'm just curious how much of the eternal bugginess of Linux video editors can be ascribed to those problems vs. the more narrow problem of designing fast-and-stable video editing software.

<comment><USER20> I see no reason to support ancient drivers and ancient distros. Supporting recent enough ones is expected. But there is no point to limit architectures as long as given setup has GPU with enough functionality to provide hardware acceleration and drivers that expose that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Shotcut and openshot crash less for me in general under linux, maybe I should give kdenlive a chance again after reading about the GUI fuzzing progress. My experience has been that kdenlive is prone to crashing and saving your project often is a must

<comment><USER22> Also for any user thinking of switching to or starting with Kdenlive, they should know that in addition to crashing often (as reported by many users) it also does not support a relatively common video editing feature as multiple timelines. In Kdenlive, in one project/file, you are only given a single timeline to do all your editing in. You cannot nest them, combine them, there are no timelines to combine, there is only one of them.

Since this will be a dealbreaker for many users, they should know this upfront.

All respect to open source software, but for many projects using Kdenlive is just not an option as of yet.

<comment><USER21> Very true and another advantage for shotcut. Layering and multiple timelines is the defining feature between "oh look it's Windows Movie Maker, except worse" and a quality non linear editor.

I've definitely grown cynical but I will try out kdenlive and see if it has matured. Shotcut has been my Linux go-to for several years now.

<comment><USER23> Make sure to try the refactoring version. It will be out for the 19.04 release schedule.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> What is it with kdenlive crashing?

There's are so many other large, complex applications on Linux, but I've never in my life experienced or seen as many reports of crashes as I have with kdenlive.

Is stability just not a priority for its developers?

<comment><USER25> It became much better for me after throwing tons of RAM at it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> A really interesting thing is that unlike on other tasks (programming?) open source is not that visible in the graphics/animation space.

<comment><USER27> Blender is widely used for 3D I believe.

<comment><USER26> You are right but Blender is the exception rather then the rule.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> So I maintain a list of good gpl software, and I would also like to remind people about shotcut. I see constant activity on its github. In the Foss world usually it one give you problems the other will do. (not trying to steal any limelight from kdenlive, which is also doing great, I just like to show people Foss options)

<comment><USER29> Is this list public? My biggest battle using linux is keeping a list of great software! :)

<comment><USER28> Let me get back to you on that... I have an abandoned version on github that is so sloppy it's embarrassing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> As an old bored guy, I wonder if they need some help? This is a thing I know a little about.

I wonder if they deal with closed captioning, titling, synching with a VTR, multicamera, drivers for video I/O cards, proper file parsing (depending on things like FFMPEG is not such a great idea), etc.

<comment><USER23> There is a big code refactoring going on and after that multicam is on the roadmap. There is also a project to rewrite the titler. I am sure any kind of input is most welcome. You can use the irc/telegram channels as well as mailing list to contact the team.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I have created several screencasts and used [https://www.openshot.org/](https://www.openshot.org/). I haven't used anything else yet to compare it to. But i will definitely try kdenlive!

</comment><comment><USER32> I've done a bit of editing in kdenlive, and it's by far the best open source video editor I've come across.

</comment><comment><USER33> Maybe this is a dumb question, but how is "Kdenlive" supposed to be pronounced?

<comment><USER34> I've only used it a few times, but I pronounce it along the lines of "kayden- live"

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> what about cinerella? when i researched what video editor to learn next after kdenlive it was cinerella. it seems to work fine, and i am surprised not to see any comments regarding it. seems like it is completely out of the running?

</comment><comment><USER36> Kdenlive saved us, it was the best libre/open source editor we could find, and were able to produce several professional interviews with it. You can check them out here: [https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-UMfJVuezk- YgNUNSgpv...](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-UMfJVuezk-YgNUNSgpv- fE6q5Qjokdp)

Thanks again for such great software!

</comment><comment><USER37> Hands down the best libre video editor I've used, good enough to make some fairly dank memes

</comment><comment><USER38> Why this project is not on for ex. GitHub?

<comment><USER39> You mean why they are using git as intended instead of introducing a single point of failure? ;-)

Many in the free software movement shun commercial software. To make things worse, GitHub recently got aquired by one of free softwares old enemies.

Personally I've used and even recommended GitHub before Gitlab became available and I don't shun them or even Microsoft, but I also see where they might be coming from.

<comment><USER40> Don't use "commercial" when you mean "proprietary". The free/libre software community isn't opposed to commerce, only to restrictions on liberty.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Why is KDE software almost always available only as compile only for macOS ?

<comment><USER42> Maybe software for specifically Linux is kinda KDE's whole thing. I'm just happy they go out of their way to package and test their code against other OSs in the first place.

</comment></comment><comment><USER43> kdenlive is horrible. Really. If you ever worked with professional video editing you know that for a fact.

That said: Kdenlive is, by far, the best option OSS available on Linux. openshot is trying, but is pretty unstable and not reliable for big videos.

<comment><USER44> Wow, pears are horrible for making apple pie!

kdenlive is replacement for windows movie maker, not professional video editing.

<comment><USER45> However, the homepage claims "Our software was designed to answer most needs, from basic video editing to professional work."

<comment><USER46> "Professional" just means someone paid you for the work.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Your business idea sucks, and it's your job to figure out why - <AUTHOR> http://jessicamah.com/blog/?p=864

<comment><USER3> The problem with "asking for the brutal truth" is that no one knows what it is.

At least in terms new markets and new products, you are facing the unknown. You can't work it out in your head; you can't find the right person to tell you if it's right or it's wrong. You just have to try it.

Don't be fooled when confident VCs and angels act like they know; they don't. They're just guessing (that's their job).

Far better to encourage an experimental approach: to be encouraged to try things and to be encouraged when it doesn't work. Because courage is what you need to face the unknown.

It _is_ useful to be exposed to many perspectives, for new ways to think about things. It's useful to learn facts about the space you're in (doing your best to distinguish between fact and opinion). It's useful to discuss ideas, possible problems and opportunities - but not in terms of judging your idea, but in terms of seeing what's there.

With knowledge and experience of reality, you will develop your own sense of what will work. You still won't _know_ , of course; but you'll be more confident of trying it.

<comment><USER4> _The problem with "asking for the brutal truth" is that no one knows what it is._

Users know, in the sense that they embody it. That's one reason it's good to launch quickly: so that users can tell you precisely how far along you are with the idea.

<comment><USER3> Yes. _You just have to try it._

However a specific group of users does not necessarily embody "the truth" either. An example of this is being captive to customers, as in the innovator's dilemma. Listening to the wrong group of users can lead you in the wrong direction. Sometimes you have to select who to listen to - <USER2> that users can't tell you.

Of course, who cares if it's "the truth" or not? Users are users, and approximate feedback is better than none, even if it is not precisely "true".

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I hope that at least some people see this as a genuine post -- it was inspired from a true event that happened just a week and a half ago. I don't have facts to back up a lot of what I say, but basic experience in getting business feedback will make it quite clear what I mean.

</comment><comment><USER5> I would like to start a service where you can receive unbiased criticism on demand because in my experience it is almost impossible to get. the incentive in such a business (counselors, psychology) is to tell your client what they want to hear. Even when they want to hear criticism, they want to hear the criticism that they want to hear. Thus an actual honest service would be valuable.

I fear the market is too small though.

</comment><comment><USER6> Fluff.

Can someone explain why we're taking business advice from a college kid who's working on an embryonic startup, and other than that has only worked in internships? The red flag here is that the post does not relate any relevant business experiences and has a linkbait title. Here are some others that exhibit identical traits:

* <http://jessicamah.com/blog/?p=641>

* <http://jessicamah.com/blog/?p=560>

* <http://jessicamah.com/blog/?p=417>

* <http://jessicamah.com/blog/?p=406>

My personal favorite: <http://jessicamah.com/blog/?p=372>

Hiring advice from someone who's never hired!

Maybe instead of spending time burning the midnight oil for my small business, I should post linkbait and get the red carpet treatment like this "entrepreneur" has.

Edit: It's also pretty lame to submit your own blog posts.

<comment><USER4> A bit harsh. I don't think this is deliberate linkbait (or rather votebait); I think it's mostly youthful exuberance. And she does have a point, even though she doesn't have a lot of data to back it up.

<comment><USER7> I think it's youthful exuberance too. The blog post is not bad but my guess is that she heard or read it from other people. It's not based on experience.

I remember when I was in college, we had a shortage of professors. They started hiring fresh grads and they taught courses such as project management, entreprenuer, etc. The new teachers were teaching from the book. Students never listened and we passed the course just by reading the book.</comment></comment></comment>


Firefox Add-On with 220,000+ Installs Caught Collecting Users' Browsing History - <AUTHOR> https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/firefox-add-on-with-220-000-installs-caught-collecting-users-browsing-history/#.W3SPC7zKO6Q.hackernews <comment><USER2> Add-Ons build the trust and then gives an update and do malicious thing , Mozilla/Google/IE can not scan every update I believe , so any possible solution we have right now ?

</comment><comment><USER3> "The add-on in question is named Web Security and is currently installed by 222,746 Firefox users, according to the official Mozilla Add-ons Portal."</comment>


Ask HN: As a dev, how do you get better at devops? Are AWS certs worth it? - <AUTHOR> So for the past few years, I've done some deployment/setting up my servers on AWS, but I feel like I'm just really doing the basic things.(setting up a VPC, spinning up servers etc.) I'm still in the process of thinking/coding a SaaS indie-hacker style and I feel like my skill level in this area is really lacking.
How did you get better, aside from the whole keep on trying stuff out/experimenting? I'll put in the work, just looking for some learning optimization (books, Youtube channel, whatever) if any exists.
For people who've dived into the AWS cert, or structured learning, is it worth it? The cert is not the most important thing (though I'll do my best to pass the exam if or when I take it in the future), what matters is that I gain the skillz, but I do want some sort of roadmap/structure, and I imagine some other devs think the same. <comment><USER2> In order to really get good at it you have to work in a mission critical environment that has a real requirement of 100% uptime (Defense Contractor, Military, National Security, Infrastructure, Aerospace, etc.). These types of high profile, cannot fail environments normally have enough funding and range of equipment to run you through the basics to expert (knowing everything connected and not connected on the network in depth, the details of most applications and their quirks, be able to tell what app is doing what by how they talk on the network, keep mission critical stuff up even when multiple racks or data-centers have failed, how to scale without downtime or latency to meet demands and more, creating your own software, os and kernel patches for performance, stability and security reasons, your own network and server gear for special use cases and more).

The good side to working in these environments is that it is normally a mix between AWS, and private highly secure non-public internet connected data- centers around the world and internet connected data-centers.

With time you could go from not knowing a thing to being able to effectively work at an expert level with other top DevOps Engineers in the field around the world in the most demanding of environments. You would be an expert at all the operating systems versions, databases, and modern technology stacks because you would be required to have in depth and broad knowledge to help the broad set of customers that you would be able to encounter. Wonderful thing is they will always have something new to learn that you may have never heard of before.

</comment><comment><USER3> Learn UNIX/POSIX. Linux From Scratch is a great step by step resource to understand the underlying system beyond all the abstractions.</comment>


Ask HN: Advice for internships - <AUTHOR>

I'm planning on doing a full year internship following my 3rd year of university. I would like to do one at a startup instead of a larger company. Im looking for advice on finding one, what to look for, what to avoid and what would be a fair compensation for an internship student. A slightly unrelated question, but does the area of my undergraduate matter if I have the technical skills to make up for it? Im an electrical engineer but enjoy the software engineering side. I usually do so in my spare time and would say programming and everything surrounding it is a hobby.<p>Thanks in advanced! <comment><USER2> > full year internship during the summer

...summer or full year?

> advice on finding one

I interned at a startup last year right after high school. I found them during an alumni career fair. The founders went to my high school, which is a magnet school.

I'm working for a different startup this summer. I found them through HN on a "Who's hiring?" thread!

> what to look for

Find one you're interested in.

> does the area of my undergraduate matter if I have the technical skills to > make up for it?

I'm a rising 2nd year undergraduate math student. I'm not even in the engineering school at my university. I'd say the answer is "no," but your mileage may vary :).

If you have any specific questions, my email address is on my profile. Good luck!

<comment><AUTHOR> How frictionless was the application process through the "Who's hiring?" post? Was the company nearby where you lived? Or did you work remotely!

Thank you, would you be alright with me contacting you later in the year?

<comment><USER2> No friction at all. They weren't even expecting interns, so there was no "application process." I had a chat with them at their office and they wanted me to join.

My university's in the same town, so I was planning on staying here over the summer.

I think the entire process was quite amazing, actually. This company was where I wanted to be, doing what I was interested in, and produced a service that I think has/will have a major impact.

Feel free to contact me! I can't give a lot of advice since I'm just getting started, but I think my (limited) experiences may help.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> In the summer after my first/second year of comp sci I took co-op positions, compensation was ~15/hr. Seemed to be about the lowest that companies offered. I only took something that low in order to stay in my home town and save money that way.

Edit: Wanted to add that I'm in Canada and all co-op's through uni or otherwise that I have seen are paid, may be different elsewhere.

<comment><AUTHOR> Im from Canada as well (London, Ontario to be specific). Im unsure what to expect, and I highly doubt that any startup companies will be at my universities job fair. Im not very interested in making tons of money, but I want the experience more then anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I interned my second summer of college. I highly suggest interning at a start up and a larger company, to which fits you best. I, like @misframer, also found my first internship at a campus job fair. Your college career center should have relevant information.

If you'd like any personal advice, feel free to reach out. My email address is in profile.

<comment><AUTHOR> Any advice on what to avoid? Also I feel Im at a slight disadvantage, being from Canada at a non-tech (up to date at least) oriented school.

Thank you, I may reach out to you later in the year if thats alright</comment></comment>


Tell HN: Palo Alto Hacker House has an opening - <AUTHOR>

Rent: $535/ month for a single, private room
Within walking distance of: University Ave (numerous bars, coffee shops, stores, facebook's hq) Palo Alto caltrain Stanford University (long walk - you'd probably want to bike)
Plenty of parking (private driveway & street parking) INTERNET: 30mb down / 9mb up (w00t!!!!!.1!!.) Gigabit wired network / Wireless B/G/N network NetFlix subscription with unlimited movie streaming Numerous desks (there's space for at least 6 in the main area)
Companies represented by tenants: Facebook, Heyzap, Redwood Systems, Sprowtt, SLAC, stealth startup, and a Stanford student.
If you're entrepreneurially minded, then you'll fit right in!
Available for move-in Dec 1st.
Email me at firstname.lastname@example.com if you're interested and tell me a little about yourself. <comment><USER2> There's six million jobs boards for different tech communities, but we don't really have a good housing board. Perhaps this post speaks to a need for one.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/housing> perhaps? :)

Meanwhile, I suppose submitting it as an article is inventive, if probably annoying for anyone not near Palo Alto.

<comment><USER3> I really wish this existed. As a person hunting for a good place to live in SF, such a resource would be really handy.

I've considered posting an 'Ask HN' looking for potential housemates, but didn't want to pollute the stream.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> What is your internet connection, and how much does it cost you? Inquiring fellow Palo Altans would love to know.

<comment><USER5> if they kept it the same when i left, 16mbps from comcast at $30/month (or $60, i think it went up because the promotion was a limited time thing)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Room went quickly! Thanks

</comment><comment><USER6> Cheap rent. Great location. If I had any job prospects in Palo Alto, I'd be there in a second. Hell, moving there on speculation wouldn't be a terrible idea.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Pictures and more info here: <http://hackerhouse.bluwiki.com/>

</comment><comment><USER7> How did you get rent so low? When I lived there (big bedroom by the front door), I had to pay $700/month.

<comment><USER5> i was paying $350/month when i was there because i lived in a room with 2 other guys. it wasn't too bad for our group because everyone had day jobs, so we had the place to ourself for most of the time.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> What is the 'hacker house'?

<comment><USER9> Fast internet and a large freezer.

<comment><USER5> the freezer isn't even that big. it's more like fast internet and a microwave (for your ramen noodles)</comment></comment></comment>


Software Design Review - <AUTHOR> http://philip.greenspun.com/software/design-review

<comment><USER2> Note that Greenspun is inviting comments.

I think the biggest drawback is finding good software design reviewers. If you haven't got the technical expertise to judge the work of your programmers, you're not equipped to judge the result of a software design review, or to tell apart a good consultant from a quack.

</comment><comment><USER3> Just the fact that he links to SEIA would be enough to make this the best post I have read all day.

<http://philip.greenspun.com/seia/>

This is the textbook for the MIT course "Software Engineering for Internet Applications" ... The most concise statement of the course goal is that "The student finishes knowing how to build amazon.com by him or herself."

I intend to spend the next few months reading through this book, completing the exercises, and coming as close to the experience of that course as I can without moving to Massachusetts.

<comment><AUTHOR> Good to hear! It's an excellent book.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> I don't really get how the he goes from the problem he describes to the solution he advocates.

He doesn't go into too much detail, but it sounds like the application in question was running on a grossly resource-starved system. If an application needs more RAM than is available, it ends up using the disk as swap space. This is a massive performance killer in my experience.

The fix here had very little to do with documentation and design review, it just involved buying a decent server.

Also, how can the developer not have noticed that the app took 5 minutes to display a page? Surely the developer actually loaded a few pages, right? Maybe it was faster in the development environment (my desktop is way more powerful than most virtual slices). When it was actually deployed the developer could easily have said "gee, this is really fucking slow, maybe we need some real hardware".

The incompetence here wasn't a lack of design docs or review, it was much more basic. At some point there was a failure of communication between customer and developer

Here's some missing bits of communication ...

C: "I'm planning to deploy to a virtual host, and I'll only have 256MB of ram, so code like it's 1999."

or ...

D: "I see that you are using a virtual host for production. Did you notice that each page takes five minutes to load? I think you need some real hardware. I can help you purchase that."

or ...

C: "Why does each page take five minutes to load? This app won't be successful unless page loads are no more than 2-3 seconds each."

</comment><comment><USER5> "There isn't any documentation," replied the business guy who had created the idea and written the checks to the programmer

This is so vague, that it borders on absurd as a case of point. A counter could be levied by this example that many times the business sees no value in documentation, and is in a rapid cycle to get a first version out the door and is leaning on the developer to get it out the door. As a developer who is being contracted, he is familiar with the source so documentation is not critical for him to understand or maintain the system. It not until something goes wrong and the business is looking to sever their relationship with said developer, that documentation becomes important and it is always the developers fault if it is not done. If the business did not pay for documentation then they have no valid expectation that they should receive documentation.

Conversely, the developer should stress the importance of paying the developer to document the system and help them understand the pitfalls of not having the system documented. The if I get hit by a bus speech.

</comment><comment><USER6> Mostly a case scenario when development is completely outsourced , its suggested that the tech vendor drafts a technology plan inclusive of Design & Architecture . Get the technology plan vetted by experts , plenty of tech guys would be willing to help for free. A clever way to go about it is , post a specific tech challenge / query on LinkedIn , of those answering and willing to help request if they would vet ur technology plan & get this done by 3-4 good tech Samaritans Don't go overboard – prepare for success not for failure , spending too much time on analyzing tech plans is preparing for failure. Focus on building the Biz & success. Once u have costumer traction all tech challenges can be solved . Heard of Twitter in the early days ?</comment>


Twenty Seventh Amendment of US Constitution - <AUTHOR> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-seventh_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution <comment><AUTHOR> For those wondering... I posted this because its history is fascinating, taking so long to pass something that maybe should be sort of obvious...

And because some countries really need similar laws (example: Brazil where I live has Congress continuously bump up their salaries and bonuses above inflation or minimum wage percentage raise...)</comment>


Show HN: Hacking My Tesla Model 3 – Security Overview - <AUTHOR> https://fn.lc/post/tesla-model-3/ <comment><AUTHOR> I've spent a lot of time digging into how the Model 3 works internally (not just the security aspects) so happy to answer any questions you might have! :)

The post is also available on IPFS at:

[https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/Qmea45XwFtdwaCGAPLRMxFmoUP5YLnk...](https://gateway.ipfs.io/ipns/Qmea45XwFtdwaCGAPLRMxFmoUP5YLnknc2WGCGQ3HnDP6f/post/tesla- model-3/)</comment>


Theresa May says the internet must now be regulated after London terror attack - <AUTHOR> http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/theresa-may-internet-regulated-london-bridge-terror-attack-google-facebook-whatsapp-borough-security-a7771896.html <comment><USER3> I just don't understand the UK on surveillance and free speech issues. In most ways, the UK seems more sane than the US, but they have these absurd libel laws and take any and every opportunity to cry "regulate the internet" when anything bad happens involving the internet. Notably, there was no call for "we need to increase our regulation of cars or knives" after this incident.

Any UK resident have insight on why the UK is so backwards on these issues? It is pretty obvious to anyone with a cursory knowledge of computers that terrorist "safe spaces" (assuming that big internet companies knowingly provide them, which I find dubious) are kind of impossible to remove or regulate. The ability of the internet to provide encrypted, point-to-point communications is a pretty core feature.

<comment><USER4> Rights that don't fully exist in the UK anymore:

* Free speech (see prohibitions on "hate speech" and "extremism")

* The right to remain silent (your silence can be used as evidence of guilt in court)

* The right to a jury trial (the UK now allows majority, 10-2, verdicts. The right to a jury trial can also be removed in cases where the government suspects jury tampering.)

* Habeas Corpus (up to 14 days detention without charge of terrorism suspects. it was 28 days until 2011)

* The right to be secure from unreasonable search and seizure (in many situations the standard of evidence has been lowered from "probable cause" to "reasonable suspicion" and is increasingly at the discretion of police/government instead of courts)

* The prohibition on double jeopardy (the government can petition for a new trial after acquittal if substantial new evidence comes to light)

* The exclusion of illegally gathered evidence from court (the UK never had an exclusionary principle)

* The right to self-defense (there is no castle doctrine in the UK. In every US state except Vermont, you can use lethal force with impunity against an intruder to your home. See the UK case of Tony Martin, who was convicted of murder for shooting robbers who were in his home)

* The right to assemble

* The right to keep arms (I realize this crowd may not be a fan of this right, but nevertheless it used to be a right Englishmen and Americans both enjoyed)

<comment> k-mcgrady Well that's a load of nonsense. How about backing some of it up? We do have a right to a jury trial. Self-defense is an important defence in several laws. There are assemblies/protests in central London every weekend pretty much. Regarding the 'right to remain silent' when arrested in the UK you do not have to say anything. As for the right to keep arms - we don't want it. If our police force believes they can do their job without all carrying firearms (and last night where they tracked down and killed the attackers within 8 mins of the first call to them proves they are right) the general public doesn't need them either.

<comment><USER4> For self defense, see the case of Tony Martin, who was convicted of murder for shooting intruders in his home. Castle doctrine would have protected his actions in all US states except Vermont.

The right to remain silent in the US (and previously in the UK) means that your silence cannot be presented as evidence of guilt in court. In the UK, such evidence may be presented and the the jury is instructed that they may make negative inferences from your refusal to speak with the police.

The right to a jury trial has been limited by changes that allow juries to reach majority (10-2) verdicts and by removing the right to a jury trial in cases where the government suspects jury tampering.

I'm not trying to get into a debate about guns. But any list of rights no longer enjoyed by Englishmen wouldn't be complete without mentioning it. Whether it's for the better or worse is another issue.

<comment> k-mcgrady Re: Tony Martin

He used an illegally held weapon to 'defend his property'. He lay in wait for the burglars and shot at them in the dark and again shot at them (killing one) as they attempted to flee.

How in any world is that self-defence? As they were fleeing he was under no threat and therefore such deadly force is completely unreasonable and no longer being used in defence of anything anyway.

Unless you want to live in a world where people are shot dead for accidentally wandering on to another persons land the concept of necessary and reasonable force is a fair one.

<comment><USER4> I agree that the right to self-defense is something that must be limited by tests of necessity and reasonableness, in general. But within your home, I think castle doctrine should be the guiding principle. Castle doctrine doesn't apply to people wandering across your land, it applies to people illegally _inside_ your home.

<comment><USER5> There are a surprising number of officials who might have reasonable grounds and lawful basis for entering your property, possibly without your knowledge or consent. Emergency services responding to something like a fire or a call saying someone was hurt would be an obvious example. A more subtle example might be something in your home generating noise or radio interference that is affecting everyone else in the area and needs to be turned off.

So, maybe a blanket law saying you can cause essentially unlimited harm or death to anyone entering your property without your consent isn't such a good idea? There are at least two main legal foundations in England for what we casually refer to as a right to self defence, but both of them rely on a test of reasonableness if force is used. Also, it's already acknowledged that someone's idea of what seems reasonable won't be perfect if, say, they are half-awake at 3am and find an intruder standing in the dark outside their child's bedroom, and so there is already an element of benefit of the doubt being given in such situations. Going beyond that would have to be based on either an argument that the current law isn't clear enough to make someone confident to act reasonably (which is a legitimate concern) or an argument that we want to legitimise the deliberate use of grossly excessive force (which, IMHO, is not).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> In allmost all terrorist attacks in europe(also 9/11), the police had alarming data about the attackers before and in some cases even recieved explicit warnings about the attackers - yet the attacks still happened.

But still every politician demandes MORE surveilance, even though they allready had all the data. So maybe they need more personal. But not more surveillance.

It would not surprise me, if this case is similar.

<comment><USER7> Conclusion: they don't want the surveillance to stop terrorism. It's against someone else.

<comment><USER8> It's refreshing to know I'm not the only one who can see this obvious thing.

<comment><USER9> It's not exactly an obscure or novel view.

<comment><USER10> Tell that to the British electorate.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> What? This was a relatively small incdent and police killed the attackers within eight minutes of being called ( [http://news.met.police.uk/news/attacks-in-london-bridge- and-...](http://news.met.police.uk/news/attacks-in-london-bridge-and-borough- market-statement-by-commissioner-244608) ). How dare any politicians use this to promote their agendas?

<comment><USER12> Small incident? This was a coordinated attack by three terrorists. More than 40 injured. Truck and knives used as weapons on Saturday night crowds.

Look at the intended carnage. Police response time has nothing to do with evaluating the seriousness of the crime. Think about the organised networks behind these attacks, and the "routine" nature they are becoming, and then perhaps contribute ideas to help prevent them.

<comment><USER13> How many people died last week in the UK from fentanyl overdoses? How many from alcohol involved traffic accidents? More than this. Why is terror more terrible than unexpected death by other means?

<comment><USER14> Put simply, it's much easier to argue that you must sacrifice all liberty for protection against terror than against drunk driving. Terror serves your oppressor's needs better than anything else.

<comment><USER15> If you want to know why political and religious violence is worse than drug overdose and why we have to resist it, look at Iraq, Syria, Libya, Afghanistan. Although we can say it was Bush then Obama who destabilized the country by removing the tyrants, in the tyrants' absence, religion-influenced political struggles (ie. Sunni vs Shiite, Islam vs Kurd) blew the countries apart, and continues to blow the countries apart.

So drug addictions can be bad, but religously-motivated wars are worse because they will destroy everyone. Even stable countries like Saudi Arabia is not immune, and people are worried that the more radical elements there will take power if the country loses its wealth, wealth which is used to pacify the population.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> cirrus-clouds A lot of people in the UK don't know what surveillance powers the government has enacted into law. Nor do they know the plans the government has in their 2017 manifesto.

I created a campaigning site to dissuade people from voting for the Conservatives in the election - I know that will be frowned up on here, but I wrote an entire section on the site to explain (in laypersons terms) what surveillance powers have been legislated and proposed by the Conservatives:

[https://www.dontvoteconservativeuk.com/#security](https://www.dontvoteconservativeuk.com/#security)

<comment><USER16> It does look like either the Labour or the Tories favour surveillance heavily. It makes me wonder, do the leaders of these parties actually believe that such surveillance can ensure security ? Or, is it that most of the common people see surveillance as a good security measure and the political parties are just appeasing these people. I can't help but extrapolate this situation to the scenario depicted in "V for Vendetta".

<comment><USER17> The public aren't asking for any of this. They only use these cases as a sort of opportunity window to introduce laws that ban various types of porn

<comment><USER18> There is also the opposite problem. The public aren't asking for it not to be done either. Internet surveillance isn't a hot button political topic either way. However, terrorism is. Hence the problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> > _The Prime Minister said introducing new rules for cyberspace would "deprive > the extremists of their safe spaces online" and that technology firms were > not currently doing enough._

We had widespread uncatchable for years (or decades) terrorism in the 60s and 70s (from RAF in Germany and Brigate Rosse in Italy, Action Direct in France, to Carlos, and tons of others) without the internet. Hundreds of bombings, kidnappings, executions, etc.

Where does the BS idea come that if you track the internet you will stop modern terrorism?

<comment><USER20> To play devil's advocate....

Saying that we've 'had terrorism for ages' is like saying that we 'had war for ages' and so firearms didn't change anything.

I have no idea what the 'official' idea is around trying to lock down 'safe spaces' on the internet, but the idea that the reduction of the availability of certain material may reduce the impact of certain material isn't beyond the realms of reason.

We legislate against all sorts of things that should have no effect if everyone were a level-headed rational actor.

In days of old, the only way you could recruit people to your cause was likely in person. Now you can do this in a much more distributed way over the internet.

When a certain (admittedly vanishingly small) proportion of the population is susceptible to certain arguments, for whatever reason, with lethal consequences, then is suggesting that those arguments should be suppressed a bad idea?

(note: this is not the position I hold)

<comment><USER19> > _Saying that we 've 'had terrorism for ages' is like saying that we 'had war > for ages' and so firearms didn't change anything._

For the comparison to be apt, firearms should play the same role in war that the internet (or lack of it) plays in terrorism.

Which I don't think is the case.

My point is, even without access to modern telecommunications at all, terrorisms could be as effective, if not more, back in decades past. So suddenly tapping the internet would stop them?

> _I have no idea what the 'official' idea is around trying to lock down 'safe > spaces' on the internet, but the idea that the reduction of the availability > of certain material may reduce the impact of certain material isn't beyond > the realms of reason._

Well, it has worked wonders for alcohol (the prohibition), drugs, pornography, and everywhere else this concept has been tried.

> _In days of old, the only way you could recruit people to your cause was > likely in person. Now you can do this in a much more distributed way over > the internet._

Which doesn't matter much, since you still need lots of in person checking out the person, plus meetings give them physical equipment they'll need (guns or whatever). Unless they fed-ex those...

<comment><USER20> (again, only playing devil's advocate :-) )

> For the comparison to be apt, firearms should play the same role in war that > the internet (or lack of it) plays in terrorism.

I used the example of firearms as it's a force multiplier (and yeah, it's not a great analogy I admit). This allows a single person to have a potentially much larger impact by reaching more people, some of which may be susceptible to the message.

The internet allows lots of people with similar opinions/interests to communicate (and find each other) which either would not have not been possible in the past, or very difficult. You see this played out in all sorts of places where there are communities built up online that wouldn't have been possible before, in all sorts of niche interests.

> Well, it has worked wonders for alcohol (the prohibition), drugs, > pornography, and everywhere else this concept has been tried.

Did less (in number) people drink during prohibition than before/after? Would less people do drugs if they were legalised? Any reasonable argument would suggest that you obviously can't prevent all 'bad' communication, but you want to try and reduce the ease of availability of propaganda.

Although I admit there is an obvious parallel with the 'gateway drugs' argument that's frequently made :-)

> Which doesn't matter much, since you still need lots of in person checking > out the person, plus meetings give them physical equipment they'll need > (guns or whatever). Unless they fed-ex those...

For a good number of recent attacks, this isn't necessarily true. Attackers use everyday items (vehicles, knifes etc.) and you don't need to 'check anyone out' because it's not a conversation, it's just a 'go out and kill people' message.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> You know it's not really about terrorism when stopping people from viewing pornography is also part of the proposed agenda.

<comment><USER22> True. What does viewing pornography have to do with terrorism? I find it despicable that she's using a horrible event to push forward her own agenda.

<comment><USER23> Obviously, porn weakens the moral fiber, thus making people more susceptible to other immoral plans, like terrorism.

/s

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> For those who want to read her exact words, full transcript:

[http://time.com/4804640/london-attack-theresa-may-speech- tra...](http://time.com/4804640/london-attack-theresa-may-speech-transcript- full/)

Quote:

> We need to work with allied democratic governments to reach international > agreements that regulate cyberspace to prevent the spread of extremist and > terrorism planning. And we need to do everything we can at home to reduce > the risks of extremism online.

Other interesting quotes:

> "While we have made significant progress in recent years, there is - to be > frank - far too much tolerance of extremism in our country. So we need to > become far more robust in identifying it and stamping it out across the > public sector and across society. That will require some difficult, and > often embarrassing, conversations."

> "And if we need to increase the length of custodial sentences for terrorist- > related offences - even apparently less serious offences - that is what we > will do."

<comment><USER25> > We need to work with allied democratic governments to reach international > agreements that regulate cyberspace to prevent the spread of extremist and > terrorism planning. And we need to do everything we can at home to reduce > the risks of extremism online.

It may appear that terrorists are planning something but in reality it is probably unplanned copy-cat behavior.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Theresa May is the politician behind the nasty snoopers charter and is likely to win the upcoming election. She is particularly dangerous to internet freedom in the UK

<comment><USER27> And internet freedom in the rest of the world, by extension. If they go through with this nonsense, a lot of EU politicians will push for similar things, with the excuse that "if the UK can do it, why can't we?".

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> _The Prime Minister said introducing new rules for cyberspace would "deprive the extremists of their safe spaces online" and that technology firms were not currently doing enough._

...

 _" We cannot allow this ideology the safe space it needs to breed - yet that is precisely what the internet, and the big companies that provide internet- based services provide," Ms May said._

Is it fair to say that the seeds for these attacks were first sown well before the emergence of the technology companies she's criticising? I remember reading of a private suggestion by someone in (US?) foreign affairs that this broad wave of terrorism is "birds come home to roost".

</comment><comment><USER29> I'm a bit out of the loop on these sorts of discussions so apologies if this is retreading old ground, but... let's asssume I want to engage in some form of population monitoring or profiling. Based purely on available facts, what actually is the best indicator of propensity to commit terror attacks? Is it being Muslim, spending time on Islamist websites, being a marginalized single man, something else, or is there in fact no pattern distinguishable from random noise?

Surely this must have been studied extensively?

</comment><comment><USER30> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quran_and_violence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quran_and_violence)

<comment><USER23> "

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)

This article uncritically uses texts from within a religion or faith system without referring to secondary sources that critically analyze them. (May 2015)

This section needs attention from an expert in Islam. (October 2015)

This article has been nominated to be checked for its neutrality. (October 2015)

This article's lead section may not adequately summarize key points of its contents. (November 2015)

"

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Has she specified anywhere what 'the internet must be regulated' might mean? There's a huge difference between having Facebook-and-Twitter type organisations share stuff with the police, and trying to manage every possible means of communication.

<comment><AUTHOR> I assume that's what "Tory manifesto 2017" is about?

[https://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-policy/2017/05/tory- manifesto...](https://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-policy/2017/05/tory- manifesto-2017/)

</comment></comment><comment> UK-AL I thought the whole point of these sorts of attacks is that they arn't organised online.

<comment><USER32> It is. But that doesn't stop people from playing on fear to get what they want.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Didn't take her long.

May seems to really hate internet freedom for some reason.

<comment><USER34> Not even a day after the killings. The opportunism is staggering.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> If it was possible to regulate the internet for the average person, would it be right to regulate it?

From what I read, the police arrived within 2-5 minutes after the attack started. The only way to pre-empt it would be to have information about the terrorist's plans beforehand. Encryption on phones is widely available to the average person, and this makes it very difficult to stop terrorists from planning attacks.

In the grand scheme of things, terrorist attacks do not kill very many people. However, they brutalise public discourse. Every time this happens it draws us closer to authoritarianism: loss of privacy, mass internment, ethnic cleansing. The conversation after attacks seems to be becoming more and more sarcastic and bitter on one hand, and counter-establishment/authoritarian on the other. For example, photos of Sadiq Khan telling the population that these attacks are 'part and parcel' of living in a major city; and the mockery of people saying "we don't yet know if this is a muslim".

I'm pro-free-speech and pro-encryption, but I am not sure whether grinning and bearing it is really an effective weapon against terrorist activity, considering its ratcheting effects on public opinion. So, if we don't ban encryption, what are we going to do?

<comment> k-mcgrady >> I'm free speech and pro-encryption, but I am not sure whether grinning and bearing it is really an effective weapon against terrorist activity, considering its ratcheting effects on public opinion. So, if we don't ban encryption, what are we going to do?

I'm in the same position. It's getting harder to stick to my principals. The way I'm trying to think about it though is this: banning encryption and destroying privacy will not fix terrorism. Governments should be focusing on actual solutions to the root cause. Maybe we should stop blowing up the middle-east. We need to work for stability in those regions. Ban encryption and the terrorists will find another avenue to communicate and we'll lose freedoms for nothing.

<comment><USER36> I just think of this quote :-

> Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary > Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. - <USER2>

If the price for living in a free society is that the same freedoms are abused by a vanishingly small minority of people then I'm ok with that, I'm not ok with what those people do but I think the loss of freedom for 60m people is a greater problem than some brainwashed idiots going on a rampage once in a while.

<comment><USER35> What about a loss of freedom for the 20k or so people on the terrorism watchlist?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> Legislators sure seem to assume that legislation can fix anything but it's a dangerously ignorant attitude to have about technology. There is no single governing body, no single country and usually not even a single _access point_ for Internet data. Even if a country seems to create what sounds like a decent law for _that country_ , there is _no way_ to apply that law to everybody. It's also particularly ironic when a restriction is proposed for dealing with people that are probably already untouchable anyway.

Also, "the Internet" is not just what you can see on a web page, and screwing with traffic invariably damages _everything else_. (Ever see HTML returned in places where it wasn't supposed to be there? Thanks, ISPs.) If your law can't even reach the people it's supposed to reach and your implementation is shoddy on top of it all, you've just caused a problem that you didn't have before due to paranoia.

We should probably think of the Internet like the ocean: it connects everybody, maybe there are areas we can control for added safety, and in the end _we all know_ in International Waters there are some shady things going on that we can't do anything about. That's life.

</comment><comment><USER38> It's _still_ high time to withdraw any and all support from the people who have to gain from terrorist attacks. The likes of Theresa May and the war criminals she probably hands with, the "security industry" that is working so hard to make the world less secure for the innocent and more secure for those who want to hide their guilt.

Te real way to curb terrorism and other crime is to have more sane parents who have more time for their kids, more affordable education, that sort of thing. War, poverty, etc.; what happens today determines the tragedies of the next 30 years. We'd need to be very different, much better societies for at least a few decades for any real change.

But the people like May don't want that. They want _more_ of what uproots us, and they want power that can be used nilly-willy, both against criminals and anyone else. Notice how you can't use "honest parents who give their children hugs and answer their question" against innocents the way that "fights crime". Don't tell me it's about resources, it's about intent which in turn results from dysfunction and psychopathology. They need to control the narrative because a mirror would kill them, that's the gist. Be the mirror.

<comment><USER23> It's not just individual conditions like upbringing, poverty or education. There is a problem with segregation. Not any form of mandated segregation, but emergent segregation due to social constructs.

Racism, latent or otherwise, makes minorities feel more comfortable with people of their own ethnicity. Whilst that same racism makes the majority want to move away from the minority.

Obviously, this segregation isn't the only issue. There are more minorities that appear to have self-segregated than just the Arabic/Muslim. In the UK, e.g. Indians, Eastern-Europeans, perhaps black people. Those minorities seem to have a lot fewer terrorists, if any.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> We should be regulating 2-ton steel boxes hurtling down the road 2 feet away from pedestrians at 50mph, not the fucking internet.

<comment><USER40> And regulating DIY stores selling knives? Our local one here could provide for a brigade of militias. This is not the solution. I doubt the murder squad in London thought they'd have much a chance to get away and in general these ISIS-style assassins are fully prepared to die for their belief so how about an examination of what that belief is, where is comes from and on what authority? Sensitive stuff! And we can be pretty sure this won't be happening.

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Deliberately weaking public security is entirely the wrong approach.

Banning encrytion makes the British public more vulnerable not less.

And whitelisting all posts and uploads quells the utility of criticism, opinion and opposition.

It seems the government don't trust the population.

Teresa May is entirely wrong in her approach and one suspects utterly ill advised.

</comment><comment><USER42> May's policies around the internet are boarding on authoritarian. Not sure how you will stop people from driving cars in the capital city...

Nevertheless, its interesting to see this flame bait by independent so quickly. Who owns that paper anyways? It has a .co.uk domain?

</comment><comment><USER43> What if the terrorists start using plain old mail? Or the telephone? Or just meeting up in a cafe? Do all of those things need to be regulated? Should they open everyone's mail and read it? After all, you could be writing bad words. Should we just have everyone in the country "check in" every week to make sure they aren't doing anything unusual? Where does it stop?

I thought the UK was very forward looking in their responses so far to the violence. Things I've seen on TV have lead me to believe that standing up and not being afraid is the best medicine for this type of action. Maybe I was wrong.

</comment><comment><USER22> Theresa May should educate herself before making statements like that.

Any person with half a brain and has some knowledge about how the internet works, knows that it's not possible to regulate it entirely.

For example, any image can be made to contain an encrypted message, without anyone ever knowing it's there [1]. This will just be another blow to everyone's privacy if she gets her way.

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

</comment><comment><USER44> I'm worried AI will start killing everyone if it trains on this data. It's going to see:

\- video games cause violence

\- the internet causes violence

\- guns cause violence

\- drugs cause violence

\- etc

And draw some conclusion like food causes terrorism. I jest; but only a bit...

<comment><USER45> At this point, I am pretty certain that deciding to have children is unethical, due to the various types of suffering they are nearly certain to endure.

<comment><USER9> I have yet to find a good answer to this argument, which is quite depressing.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> I'm sorry to break it to you Theresa, but the internet didn't attack anyone. I wish people didn't lose their ability to think rationally in these moments.

</comment><comment><USER47> I don't know about the internet being regulated, however it is clear to me that our politicians idiotic utterances need a serious amount of regulating.

</comment><comment><USER48> And I thought they used a car...

She may have been a competent operative, but as a politician she is bottom of the barrel..

</comment><comment><USER49> "New international agreements should be introduced ..."

The governing 'muppets' worldwide agree with her. The ruling clique is in mortal fear of open communication between the global serf class. They all agree on that, 'entertaining' muppet conflicts notwithstanding.

</comment><comment><USER50> So they exceeded all the possibilities to make "security" tighter in the UK and now try to force their paranoia on the rest of the world?

I wonder how the internet will jump down the camera to stop a car.

</comment><comment><USER51> Can someone explain to me why this link has such a low ranking on HN, already? It's pretty fresh and has lots of upvotes. I was trying to post it, because I didn't see it yet.

<comment><USER52> I was wondering the exact same thing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> This is the party that is also open about wanting to ban encryption.

</comment><comment><USER54> Using "safety" as an excuse for surveillance and censorship is a popular action from the Fascist Playbook. I just hope that those in the U.K. don't fall for it.

</comment><comment><USER55> I fear the US isn't behind. Both Trump & Clinton called for Internet censorship during their campaigns. Scares the crap out of me.

</comment><comment><USER14> I can't wait until AI finally deserves that name and completely replaces human politicians. It can only be an improvement.

</comment><comment><USER56> Given a choice between a free net and a failed state, I will choose the net every time.

</comment><comment><USER57> So what if someone thinks that GTA multiplayer has enough ways to communicate each other without transfering a word (for example driving a taxi means tuesday and changing a weapon you can direct message to ceratin person in team). This can be done in any video game that has multiplayer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Related:

[https://www.propublica.org/article/world-of-spycraft- intelli...](https://www.propublica.org/article/world-of-spycraft-intelligence- agencies-spied-in-online-games)

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/09/nsa-spies- onli...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/09/nsa-spies-online-games- world-warcraft-second-life)

</comment></comment><comment><USER58> Can we please not vote this fucking boot back into power?

</comment><comment><USER59> It's not the internet, internet propoganda is the final chapter in the process, the bed of thorns is laid by the Mosques in the UK and the dumbest ones are then influenced.

</comment><comment><USER60> I mean good luck I guess Theresa.

</comment><comment><USER61> Is this insight based on your sound science-backed research?

<comment><USER62> It is more or less obvious: everyone of these criminals belong to a very specific subset of people.

The probability of me or any of my relatives going out and blow people up is 0.0 <lots of zeroes> x.

The probability of someone in that subset doing the same is small but absolutely non-zero.

I feel sorry for friendly Muslims.

<comment><USER63> Being Muslim is not a necessary pre-condition. A lot of Europeans and north- American joining ISIS are not of Muslim background.

Trying to understand what leads human beings to kill and die for fuzzy causes might help. I suspect a perfect storm of mental issues, undesirable social status and support from the wrong people at the right time.

I also suspect we don't want all the answers, because we wouldn't want to expose how we convince our own young military not to walk out when sent to unjustified wars.

<comment><USER64> > A lot of Europeans and north-American joining ISIS are not of Muslim > background.

That's chocking news to me, I though you had to be a muslim to join them.

<comment><USER63> They convert as they join, but a lot of them did not grow up as Muslim. Being Muslim (as per ISIS definition of what muslim means) is part of the ISIS rhetoric, and people convert to be part of ISIS.

OP says that only people part of "a subset of people" can be part of ISIS and propagate terror. implying that only people who grew up as muslim can become terrorists.

<comment><USER62> _implying that only people who grew up as muslim can become terrorists._

OP here. I did not say that.

<comment><USER63> OK. So what "subset of people" then?

<comment><USER62> >>>implying that only people who grew up as muslim can become terrorists.

>>OP here. I did not say that.

>OK. So what "subset of people" then?

Two corrections:

You talk like I mean general terrorists.

I'm talking only about the types of attacks we are talking about in this thread (attacks primarily target against civilians by attackers that do not expect or even attempt to get away alive).

It is written above: "everyone of _these_ criminals belong to a very specific subset of people." (emphasis added).

>So what "subset of people" then?

Only the subset that are or are about to become muslims.

Again, until someone enlightens me I have yet to be aware of any of _this_ kind of attacks by neither Christians nor Atheists.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Top Smart Ideas, in Free Energy Generator - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JP7WG_0PnDI <comment><AUTHOR> This video presents devices in a controversial subject area, that of "Free Energy" or "alleged Free Energy" as the case may be.

Disclaimer: I'm not saying that any of these devices work, and I'm not saying that any of these devices do not work...

That's the fun part of all of this, YOU the individual get to look at this video, and decide for yourself! <g>

This video is submitted for entertainment purposes only!

Nothing is, nor should be implied by any of this content! <g></comment>


Why Capitalism Creates Pointless Jobs - <AUTHOR> http://evonomics.com/why-capitalism-creates-pointless-jobs-david-graeber/ <comment><USER2> Capitalism and Corporatism are different and competing ideologies. I think this article would be far more effective if the author clearly defined the difference and then did some find/replace.</comment>


Allstate uses social media to check claims - <AUTHOR> http://www.tearsheet.co/data/allstate-is-watching-you-how-the-insurer-uses-social-media-to-check-claims <comment><USER2> > The tech company [Carpe Data] [0] looks at anything publicly available on > social media

Keyword being public. I've never understood why people get so upset about this sort of thing. You are responsible for anything you choose to post publicly.

My feelings would be different if it involved fake accounts friending users and seeing items meant only for their "friends."

[0] This article is basically an ad for Carpe Data. May as well link to their site: [https://carpe.io/](https://carpe.io/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Just today I was going to go skiing but my foot hurt so I'm home. Let's pretend it was something bigger and I've been home and being paid on an insurance claim. My family makes a new facebook post of last years trip with all of us in the photo and no description or anything. Carpe does the happy dance and sends it to Allstate. Allstate says we are not paying your claim and canceling your policy for fraud.

Now I have to prove the claim, can't get insurance cause I'm on a blacklist and hell knows what else due to an inaccurate photo scraped by a company without official access.

You don't see a problem with that?

<comment><USER3> Pretty much everything digital has metadata tagged on it including the time at which the event occurred. Its very easy to prove the timing of the photo in this hypothetical case.

Insurance is a good that adds to the overall wellbeing of society IF it can be properly priced - meaning both fraud as well as incorrect denials of claims damage the insurance companies to properly price coverage and provide protection for everyone.

Why would we dislike more complete information? Economic systems always work better with fully informed players.

<comment><USER4> Adobe Lightroom, default options for exporting to JPG:

\- "Remove All Metadata"

\- "Remove Location Information"

\- "Remove Person Information"

_All_ of these are removed by default and you explicitly have to enable them.

<comment><USER5> I seriously doubt that most people using social media are running their photos through Lightroom before posting them online..

<comment><USER6> Which posting sites don't strip metadata?

<comment><USER7> Flickr, for one.

I also doubt Facebook throws away photo metadata when an image is uploaded.

The image that gets returned in your browser may have none but the original, with all its camera-identifying, time-stamped GPS located gold mine will be intact.

<comment><USER6> _Flickr, for one._

Yeah, I imagine the putatively photographer sites like Flickr preserve it. My assumption is that Facebook saves it, removes it, then allows the image to display. ISTR years ago some controversy about EXIF stalking on FB, but it may have been another service.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> A friend of mine worked as a private investigator for years after his dream of entering law enforcement didn't pan out. His job was mostly investigating insurance claims. He would actually drive his car and park near the home of the claimant for days and take photographs of any activity that would tend to support or disprove their disability claim. He's moved on to another career now, mostly because the career path in that field was not great.

I'm not seeing how this is more invasive. I mean, people are making certain content public. Having a PI parked up the block in a car with tinted windows seems much more invasive and that is business as usual and legal for the insurance industry.

<comment><USER9> Maybe they do both now?

Also, I assume you can't PI every case. So social media may help as a pre- selection step for PI-work.

<comment><USER10> You PI chronic back pain disability claims.

They are expensive to pay out and often real chronic back pain is not easily differentiated from fake chronic back pain by a physical. The diagnosis is made based on patient reported pain.

The easiest way to confirm the diagnosis is observe if the claimant is behaving in a manner consistent with debilitating back pain.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> We use facebook all the time in my bank to check on fraud/claims of stolen credit cards. Once a customer claimed a stolen card but it was used every day at a specific parking lot. Said customer would post "Checking into work at xxx" every day on facebook where the specific parking lot was xxx's parking lot.

Needless to say I don't have a facebook account or post anything using my full name anywhere public.

The scary part will be when the insurance companies buys a direct feed into private posts from facebook or google sometime in the future.

</comment><comment><USER9> Soon:

"AllState wants to be friends on Facebook (accept/reject)"

<comment><USER12> No, it'll be "connect your Facebook to your Allstate account to receive discounts".

<comment><USER13> And install a tracking device in your car so we catch watch your every move and second guess everything you do while driving.

<comment><USER14> I've had a few friends volunteer for this already; in my limited experience they are typically used only for a period of time (weeks not years) and are typically marketed as "use our tracking device and get a safety discount."

It strikes me as creepy, but I might think differently about them if I needed a discount.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> A good faith effort might be to provide two parallel offers: One based on using the social media meta data coefficient and its commensurate reduced fraud rate, a second tier without social meta data coefficient and obviously without the reduced fraud discount.

</comment><comment><USER16> Blank page with third-party Javascript disabled. Boycott Web sites that do this.

<comment><USER17> works fine with first party js enabled</comment></comment>


Google hopes to escape Galaxy Nexus sales ban with software patch | The Verge - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2012/7/3/3136102/google-samsung-software-update-galaxy-nexus-infringement <comment><AUTHOR> pushing out a (possibly) non optional update that dumbs down a phone that a user owns. there's something wrong with that.</comment>


Trotify: make your bicycle sound like a horse [video] - <AUTHOR> http://trotify.com <comment><USER2> Almost two mins of video without the sound of the product (where the product is the sound generated by the device)?

<comment><USER3> There's a video further down the page that shows a prototype working, with accompanied sound. When I saw that, it became clear why the sound of the product isn't in the top video:)

<comment><USER4> Clear? How so? The product's sole purpose is to make sound. Why would they not put the _sound_ in the advertisement video?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Let me be the first to say: I don't get it, why is this a thing and why is there an entire company built around this product? Which apparently requires I screw a coconut to a self made device and then put it on the front of my bike.

Is this just satire of modern startups or are things actually this ridiculous?

<comment><USER6> Same reason there's a company that will make you a hand drawn picture of a cat: <http://iwanttodrawacatforyou.com/>

people love novelties!

<comment><USER5> Sure, but all that took was someone making a website and the ability to draw on paper. This site is much more involved and they actually CNC'd a real product, so I assume they're somewhat serious about this, which makes it all the more bizarre to me.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The video made me giggle a lot but whyyyyyy is there not any sound of the device working in it? I mean really. We should have been hearing it after the device was assembled.

Yes there's the little tiny video of a prototype way down on the bottom of the page. That's not enough. That main video needs to have the actual sound of the actual product in it; I want to see a close-up of it doing its thing while hearing sound that seems synchronized to the motion. I want to know that yes, this really does what it's advertised as doing, and claps the coconut halves together in a "horse trotting" pattern.

</comment><comment><USER8> Wow. The video was cute but I wish it convinced me that the product would make a bike sounds like a horse. The music was mixed too high to hear it.

edit: There's another video on the page that does this, but it's tucked away at the bottom behind a button!

<comment><USER9> Agreed. The prototype video got me far more excited about the product than the meme filled promo. It should be featured more prominently.

<comment><USER10> Great idea! We've defaulted that to be visible on the page. Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Very ice cream gloveseque: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkuOuxRD1Bc>

</comment><comment><USER10> Thanks for posting this! Glad you like it.

</comment><comment><USER12> Is this real? If so, it's dumb and I'll take two.

</comment><comment><USER9> Any chance of making the DXF file available for cheap to people with access to their own CNC machines?

Unfortunately, while I am both a geek and a horse-person, I'm not much of a biker. The target audience is small, but hopefully with only 1000 takers needed, you'll meet your goal.

<comment><USER10> Welcome to the long tail :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I saw the second video, which shows the sound and that is pretty cool. I don't really understand what the point of this is though. Why exactly would you want to sound like a horse while riding a bike, wouldn't that get very annoying? Also, the main video on the page is seemingly random and does not really display the purpose of the product or give any rational reason for buying one. Another thing that is strange to me is the fact that anyone would ever be inclined to attach one of these to their bike. It seems flimsy and bulky.

All of that said I do think it is a pretty funny, interesting product, and would maybe, maybe, consider buying one for something such as a beach cruiser, if I were to have a bike like that.

</comment><comment><USER14> A lean creative socially responsible startup like this deserves as much social media capital as they can muster. The coconut husk was ripe for productification and I'm glad they've done it.

</comment><comment><USER15> Pretty cool. But the coconut should be included. IMHO. I can see how a whimsical/retro thing like this might appeal to some.

<comment><USER16> Including the coconut for those who live in a temperate zone and don't have a large swallow population to rely on would definitely have been a nice touch.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> You've got a wondeful, funny product, and I hope you sell a million of them. I want to see my neighborhood filled with happy people making cloppy-clop sounds on their bicycles. If it gives the trolls apoplexy, so much the better. It's a win/win situation. Geezer.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is a complete disruption of the equipercussive human transport space.

</comment><comment><USER19> I don´t get why they don´t sell the coconut too. How am I expected to get a coconut?. The coconut should be included. Or at least post a link to swallow transport company.

<comment><USER10> Is it very hard to get coconuts where you live? In these parts they sell them in all the supermarkets.

<comment><USER19> No it´s not really a problem ;), it´s just to add on the monthy python´s meme.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> If it's for the sound make a gadget made of an mp3 player with speakers, where you can choose any sound. If it works out make a store where you can buy more crazy sounds.

</comment><comment><USER21> This tendency is why UK English had to invent the word "twee".

</comment><comment><USER22> Only reason to forward this to people who ride bikes is to heap further scorn and ridicule upon them.

</comment><comment><USER23> If I see someone riding a bike with one of these things attached to it, I'll call the police. I find it unacceptable for people to make lots of noise for no good reason.

Try doing this at night in a residential neighborhood, you'll find out soon enough what people think of this 'invention'.

<comment><USER24> I'm sure you must have written that in the satirical mood of the video, because otherwise you're totally nuts :) Can you imagine what the police would say if you called them to report a bicycle passing your house with this device???? They'd likely have you Section 5150'd for wasting their time.

<comment><USER25> Starting with "Dear Sirs" would have been more on the spirit...</comment></comment></comment>


Crank.js a framework for creating JSX components with functions and generators - <AUTHOR> https://crank.js.org/guides/getting-started <comment><USER2> pedantic complaint for this quote "Crank is best used with JSX, an XML-based syntax extension to JavaScript."

JSX is generally described as XML-like not XML-based.

/pedantry

<comment><USER3> Well noted! I will update the docs to reflect this.</comment></comment>