Did Whites Flee the 'Digital Ghetto' of MySpace? - <AUTHOR> http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/guest/25474/

<comment><USER2> >during the period beginning in 2006 when teens began to flock to Facebook, teens' preference for either MySpace or Facebook appeared to fall along lines of race and class.

The obvious answer to this is that Facebook was closed to the general public until September 2006. In 2004 to early 2005, you had to be a college student at a top-30 or so school to be able to use Facebook. Throughout 2005, that loosened to all colleges. In Sept. 2005, they opened to "invited" highschoolers.

So let's flash-forward to September 25, 2006. MySpace's population is drawn from the general public, and Facebook's population is "college students, recent college grads from top schools, and high schoolers who are friends with college students". The next day, Facebook opens to everyone. If you don't have many friends who are "college students, recent college grads from top schools, and high schoolers who are friends with college students", you have little incentive to join Facebook.

</comment><comment><USER3> Don't conflate class divisions with racism. Whites did not flee the 'digital ghetto' of Myspace. College-educated young adults fled the 'digital ghetto' of Myspace.

<comment><USER4> As whites and asians disproportionally make up the college body in the US it's quite possible these two are the same.

<comment><USER5> Grammatically, "disproportionately" would have been a better choice for your utterly ridiculous statement.

<comment><USER4> Thanks for correcting my grammar, and thanks for explaining why you think my statement is "utterly ridiculous".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> could it just be that MySpace gave its users too much freedom in page design and it turned into an ugly, blinking, unreadable, music auto-playing pile of s#it?

And then people left?

<comment><USER7> Maybe. Aesthetic tastes differ, and the paper does provide some anecdotes suggesting that MySpace's profiles appealed more to certain racial and socioeconomic groups.

However, social networks do a pretty good job at segregating - as long as your friends are bourgeois and share your bourgeois design sensibilities, you can use MySpace without bumping into too much 'profile bling'.

Instead, it seems that some white and Asian kids of high socioeconomic status joined Facebook because it was associated with elite universities and therefore reflected their aspirations - and once this process started, people went where their friends were, self-segregating along racial and economic lines just like they do in high school (and throughout the rest of society.) Aesthetic tastes became a socially-acceptable _justification_ for that move, but I don't think they were the primary cause.

That said, a good knowledge of the aesthetic preferences of various social groups could be valuable. Could a startup trigger a similar 'white flight' in an established service by intentionally appealing to the most economically valuable demographic? Can we build good niche businesses by creating things like race-specific Twitter clients?

<comment><USER8> _Can we build good niche businesses by creating things like..._

Yes. And they'd be "niche" in the sense that Fox News is "niche." (Best comment on Fox ever: "They discovered a previously untapped market niche: half the country.")

Half the country, literally, is so far off the radar screen for most software companies it is embarrassing.

There are dating sites for every conceivable slice of the demographic pie. This applies to many other sites too, although I think a lot of folks don't realize it. (You guys know Demand Media because of their SEO strategy, not because they are dominating the Internet of interest to your demographic.)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Did white college kids actively flee MySpace, or were they never on MySpace? Targeting college campuses could very likely have had the effect of attracting a lot of users who had never used social networks before. Flight implies presence in the old location.

</comment><comment><USER10> I don't know, but I've been describing twitter as a 'digital ghetto' for months now.

If they don't put a stop to the spammers, and build some better tools to filter users they're gonna get MySpaced in a big way.

 __EDIT __This stunning bit of prose just came across my feed: "LOL NIGGAS IS SO FUNNY .... FUCK IT !"

I don't want to see this, anymore than they want to see me talk about agile software development.

<comment><USER11> Why did you follow that person?

<comment><USER10> I followed them back after they followed me, so in a way it's my fault... In another it isn't. The whole follow me, and I'll follow you thing is effective from a marketing point of view, which is why the place is filled with useless affiliate spam.

They could stop allowing that sort of behavior, but they know that a large part of their user-base consists of 'self marketers' and other less subtle spam.

Why can't I sort or filter any of my incoming tweets in any meaningful way? I can have favorites. I can make lists. I CAN'T just type in 'F _ck', and stop my feed from showing me the tweets with the word 'F_ ck' in them.

I can search for tweets about 'Ruby On Rails', but I can't just add those people to a list called 'Ruby On Rails' without clicking each one of them... Several times.

To top it off their API is so limited that just retrieving a list of the people I'm following means I get blocked for an hour before I can do anything with it, and bypassing their silly API is against the TOS. So writing my own tool to filter properly is straight out.

I wanted to write a simple naive Bayesian filter app to separate the wheat from the chaff for me, but they make it damned near impossible to do so without being sued.

<comment><USER12> > I followed them back after they followed me, so in a way it's my fault... In > another it isn't

In no way is that not your fault. None whatsoever.

I do agree that a filtering mechanism would be MUCH appreciated, however.

<comment><USER10> You are a coder, aren't you?

Let me restate it more precisely: The fact that my needs are not being met is their fault. The fact that I have those needs is mine.

My use case, and those of many others, requires the ability to 'follow' others and still filter their 'useful' postings from their 'non-useful' postings. This is 'my fault', in that I require more from the service than they are either willing or able to provide at this time.

Twitter has reduced my ability to use the service, in the way that I would most like to, by limiting their API and preventing screen scrapers from functioning in a legal and non-harmful way. None of this is any way my fault.

I still think my original phrasing was more concise, if not as explicit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Ughhh I hope something comes around and people leave Facebook behind. Companies like Quora scare the hell out of me: I don't have either twitter or facebook account, so apparently I'm "out of the loop". If this goes on people like me are risking complete isolation (or faking it, which isn't appealing)

</comment><comment><USER14> I loved MySpace originally, then I left MySpace.

1) Craptastic, browser-clogging pages 2) Audio player that kept changing and getting worse 3) Mail full of VOTE FOR ME!!!!!1111 spam 4) Everyone basically begging you to frikkin BUY something of theirs 5) The Walled Garden: Hellish trying to link back to it

There was no direction, no sense that anyone was in charge. This is the second online catastrophe for Murdoch. He has the Kiss of Death for digital.

EDIT: And during my time there, there was never a racial component to anything. It's really a tragedy too. There was music there I never found as easily anywhere else.

</comment><comment><USER15> For a more humorous take on this issue check out

<http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/07/31/106-facebook/>

</comment><comment><USER16> The article makes a big, big mistake. The same proportion of black people left myspace, but if you are white on facebook, and your friends are mostly white, then facebook looks like a white place. Same with blacks - if you are black and your friends are mostly black on facebook, it looks like a black place.

Myspace looks "ghetto" simply because there are more minority bands, and so more minorities still maintain active facebook profiles.

</comment><comment><USER17> Is't MySpace closely tied to music preferences? Maybe a few influential bands heavily invested into MySpace presence and their audience happened to be black?

<comment><USER18> I'm not sure that MySpace was ever associated that closely with a small number of bands, but it certainly was/is associated with bands and self-promotion in general.

At least in the beginning (this has changed as Facebook has become more mainstream), you didn't hear people in "up and coming" bands flogging their Facebook URL, it was all MySpace. The flipside of that was, if you were just a regular person looking to interact with your friends, and _not_ someone trying to 'build a brand' or tell people what club you were playing at this weekend, Facebook seemed like the place to go.

The article talks about spammers, and spam was/is certainly a problem, but MySpace turned itself into a vehicle for self-promotion much earlier and more crassly than Facebook did. I think that shaped the direction of the site and drove users who weren't looking for that away.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> It's "danah boyd." All lowercase.

</comment><comment><USER11> MySpace is planning a major rebranding / relaunch soon.

via <http://adage.com/digital/article?article_id=144480>

<comment><USER20> But how far can they get with just a relaunch? Unless they find the perfect mix of privacy, clean interface, and a huge influx of people, a relaunch would be all for naught.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> if MySpace is the digital ghetto, then twitter is the graffiti covered walls of the ghetto.</comment>


Seven Years To Secure A Domain Name: a tale of web identity. - <AUTHOR> http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2009/11/25/7-years-to-secure-a-domain-name-a-tale-of-web-identity-consolidating-redmonk-for-the-web-squared/

<comment><USER2> Interesting story. I've got a short and sweet one. Someone bought carbonmade.org after we failed to renew it 4-5 years ago. The guy contacted me out of the blue about six months ago and just said: "Do you want carbonmade.org? Happy to transfer it to you for free. I have no use for it and you own the .com." I was like "Yes, thank you very much." And the next day I had it in my GoDaddy account. A really nice gesture that never happens in the domain market.

</comment><comment><USER3> Was really hoping this would be about getting a domain from one of those offshore squatters - been trying to scoop up one that related to my business for years. Worse, on the company's obscure and hard to find website, they say they won't even consider selling domains. Even though it's essentially not being used.

</comment><comment><USER4> So, uh they chipped away at this guy so they could secure a domain name that probably isn't essential to them.

I read all the bit where they said about not wanting to be heavy handed - i.e. didn't want to be the "big bad corp". Sorry, but this way seems just as rude to me :(

(and yeh I know the other guy seems reasonably happy, but still....)

</comment><comment><USER5> If I was on the ICANN board, I'd pass some resolution that says that squattered domains can be claimed back.

I'm sure I can come up with a decent definition for squatters.

<comment><USER2> The guy in the article wasn't a squatter.</comment></comment>


Couple stole $300,000 after discovering River City Casino glitch - <AUTHOR> http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/crime-and-courts/jefferson-county-couple-stole-after-discovering-river-city-casino-glitch/article_8c162bb5-b128-5c4e-9262-4673cbe7e197.html <comment><USER2> > she cashed out money she didn't earn, according to charges

It's a casino... you don't "earn" money, you win it by skill or luck. This lady got REALLY lucky and discovered this glitch, and had the SKILL to exploit it.</comment>


No Brainer - <AUTHOR> http://www.rifters.com/crawl/?p=6116 <comment><USER2> This could imply that (a) the exterior folds are far more important than the inner volume or (b) we shouldn't discount interstitial fluid as being inert with respect to cognition in these cases. Though the absence of lissencephaly cases with normal or above average intelligence (from a cursory search) probably supports the former. The latter would be delightfully weird - but I'm sure there's all kinds of strange and poorly understood things going on your spinal fluid.

<comment><USER3> (a) is exactly what is described in a paper he linked- the exterior, and more important, gray matter is pretty much all there. The vast majority of what is missing is white matter.

[http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/neuroskeptic/2015/07/26/is...](http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/neuroskeptic/2015/07/26/is- your-brain-really-necessary-revisited/)

Not as exciting when you look at it like that.

<comment><USER4> Also, it's fairly reasonable to assume that IQ doesn't scale nearly linearly with brain mass (data on male/female differences clearly shows that a 10% size difference doesn't translate to much of anything on average).

But let's pretend mass difference does simplistically affect neurological computational throughput. Even then, physically larger brain will need longer, more expensive signalling pathways, which can't be entirely free. Also, the larger the animal, the lower the metabolic rate - and translated to a brain with lots of dead weight, that may mean that mass gained via density is at least partially offset by a lower metabolic rate of the tissue (i.e. such a damaged brain may be burning more calories per gram of brain matter left, and that might even be less efficient overal - but in todays society, I think it's safe to say that some hypothetical extra calorie needs wouldn't need to be a problem...)

If you look at it computationally, it's reasonable to assume that many of the "algorithms" the brain uses scale supra-linearly. If you had twice the computing power, the accuracy of the resulting solutions wouldn't be twice as good or arrived at twice as quickly, but some amount much lower than that. To take the classic example of chess; twice the computing power only lets you look ahead a fraction of a move more, not twice as many moves. Furthermore, the brain is a ridiculously parallel computation device. At that scale, it's conceivable that even considerably fewer neurons that operate slightly more quickly (due to a higher metabolic rate and shorter signaling pathways) might perform just as well or even better on certain tasks.

All in all, it doesn't surprise me that a considerable difference in brain mass don't _necessarily_ translate to an easily measurable IQ difference. There's going to be some effect surely, but how large would the mass difference need to be before it's noticeable? I have no idea. And those dramatic images seem to be from [http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-67...](http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736%2807%2961127-1/fulltext), that describe a patient with IQ 75 - perhaps still impressive, but also clearly below average.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I don't remember reading a post as interesting as this one in a long time here.

</comment><comment><USER6> While "extracorporeal" evokes the supernatural, some scientists have been working on bringing this back to science. The Relativistic Brain Theory is a book by the neuroscientist that built some of the first brain computer interfaces along with a mathematician that worked on the Human Brain Project. It talks about how the magnetic field created by the electrical current in the brain creates some sort of analog computer. It's a very interesting read but I couldn't shake off the feeling that it was somewhat religiously driven.

[http://www.nicolelislab.net/?p=665](http://www.nicolelislab.net/?p=665)

<comment><USER7> One of my professors at old University ([http://www.dejanrakovic.com/english.html](http://www.dejanrakovic.com/english.html)) had a somewhat similar theory about electrical impulses of our brain being able to extend outside of neural pathways into a much wider surrounding space, all based on some advanced quantum physics calculations (frankly, too advanced for me to follow). And yes, he is also heavily inspired by popular religious/metaphysical ideas, but considering his academical background and indisputably huge knowledge, it's an interesting Sci-fi idea, to say the least...

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> > While I was writing Blindsight

I was just about to recommend him to read it. :(

<comment><USER9> The recommendation may still be appropriate: he hasn't necessarily read it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> The most obvious hypothesis to me is that the (missing) inside parts of the brain is much less important than the (remaining) outer structures

<comment><USER11> I have a friend working on the Connectome project ([http://cbs.fas.harvard.edu/science/connectome- project](http://cbs.fas.harvard.edu/science/connectome-project)) who told me last summer that all brain logic happens in the outer millimeter of tissue, everything inside is essentially routing.

I'm summarizing his summary, so I'm certain it's more complex than that, but to a first order approximation, I'd guess your guess is correct!

And so it wouldn't be particularly surprising that someone with cavities in their brain could be smart. One might expect deficiencies of some sort, but one might be speculating; I probably wouldn't bet on it.

<comment><USER12> Uhm, but why isn't the routing essential for processing? And why is it there in the first place? In other words, why wouldn't evolution eliminate this costly and unnecessary part of the brain?

<comment><USER13> it was mentioned that the condition develops gradually from the normal brain. So it seems pretty plausible that in some people the brain successfully rewires in parallel with and in response to the development of the condition so that direct white matter connections get functionally replaced by some kind of mesh-style network in the gray matter layer. While this may suggest that typical amount of white matter may be not strictly necessary, the significantly less than 100% success rate of such rewiring may explain why evolution hasn't gone this way .

<comment><USER9> This is quite unconvincing: the evolutionary advantage of, let's say, all animals the size of lemurs, having human level intelligence is such that pressure to find this rewiring would have been unprecedented.

I think more data and research is needed here. My feeling is that when a few dozen of such cases are closely studied, interesting patterns will emerge.

It is surprising that these cases exhibit high IQ and no immediate signs of dysfunction, but it would be absolutely extraordinary if no patterns of difference vs. typical brain were found at all.

<comment><USER14> evolutionary trees are littered with branches that have thus far been unable to overcome local maxima- Our eyes' retinas for instance, have optic nerves that connect on the light sensitive surface, blocking a huge portion of valuable photons, instead of the logical place to connect them- on the REAR of the retina- as squid and octopus retinas have been connected in their completely independent eye evolution.

Once something works "good enough" there's not really any selective pressure to eliminate obvious design flaws if they don't particularly impede reproduction or survival.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I want to know if people like this are less susceptible to concussion. If so, and if it's true that there's not necessarily a decrease in ability, it seems like a strictly superior arrangement.

<comment><USER16> Not to mention innate resilience to the impending zombie apocalypse.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Energy expended by the brain makes up one-fifth of the resting metabolic rate, so if it is largely ornamental (by volume), it is a very expensive ornament.

<comment><USER18> I guess the immediate question is, how much energy is this guy's (small) brain consuming?

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> If I remember correctly, grey matter (that is situated in the outside) is grey because it's mostly composed by cellular bodies.

White matter (in the inside) is white because is mostly composed by axons, and its function is to connect cellular bodies.

My understanding is that if the external part is not damaged, the processing power should be there.

Of course, that doesn't explain everything, but we don't need to star to believe in souls yet.

</comment><comment><USER9> One possibility is that the mode and requirements of life have changed so quickly over the last few thousand years that the brain's ability to rewire and optimize for changed environment is lagging, and disabling large swathes of it acts as a kind of a shock therapy to rewire the rest of it at fast pace. The implication is that finding a way to gradually disable parts of the brain may force similar rewiring of active parts; at this point the latent part may be re-enabled and may 'learn' from the rewired part. I would volunteer but, uh..

</comment><comment><USER20> So it _is_ for real ... o.O

It's a recurring theme in science that the more we know the more we become aware how little we actually understand.

But the brain and it's embedding in the rest of the body and environment raises this phenomenon to a new level.

I think to some extent it shows that considering something to a certain restricted level as true until falsified is a valid approach. Because a lot of the things science is uncovering about our mental capabilities has been postulated for thousands of years by means of introspection and meditation.

</comment><comment><USER21> Does anyone know whether this is a degenerative disease or a condition one is born with? It's possible the whole brain is necessary for learning, (including learning how to learn more abstract things), but then can be pruned heavily to move information into denser networks.

</comment><comment><USER22> (Stupid question perhaps, but) have they looked outside the skull? Lots of old brain-like systems are around the spine and other places I hear (guts etc.). Couldn't there be an anomaly that a part of his brain sits somewhere in his chest?

</comment><comment><USER23> There are a lot of nerve cells concentrated in the gut and spinal cord[1]. Maybe they took over some of the functions of his missing brain?

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

</comment><comment><USER24> > The point, though, is that under the right conditions, brain damage may > paradoxically result in brain enhancement.

Makes me think of one of my favorite stories: 'Understand' by Ted Chiang. In the story, brain-damaged people treated with an experimental drug gain superintelligence.

</comment><comment><USER25> It reminds me off the difference between a desktop and laptop computer. I've often thought it remarkable with them how you squish the circuitry into about a tenth the volume and get much the same functionality.

<comment><USER26> Except then you realize most of the inside of a desktop is unoptimized empty space nowadays.

<comment><USER27> It's not "unoptimized." It's quite well-optimized for modularity, expandability, and ease of maintenance.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Isn't that because the most of a brain activity happens on cortex?

</comment><comment><USER29> Google cache of this page: [http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:LQ2p32k...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:LQ2p32k0Z_0J:www.rifters.com/crawl/%3Fp%3D6116+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=et) (the actual site is currently down)

</comment><comment><USER30> How would this bring us closer to the Singularity?

<comment><USER27> I assume you're referring to this paragraph from the article?

> _But maybe the reality is simpler than the fiction. Maybe you don't have to > tweak genes or interface brains with computers to make the next great leap > in cognitive evolution. Right now, right here in the real world, the > cognitive function of brain tissue can be boosted— without engineering, > without augmentation— by literal orders of magnitude. All it takes, > apparently, is the right kind of stress. And if the neuroscience community > heeds de Oliveira et al's clarion call, we may soon know how to apply that > stress to order. The singularity might be a lot closer than we think._</comment></comment>


Show HN: Find inspiring wellbeing sessions taking place online - <AUTHOR> https://timeforme.today <comment><AUTHOR> TimeForMe.Today is a search engine for well-being sessions taking place online. Now that many of us are stuck at home, taking care of our well being is more important than ever. I have been enjoying this kind of sessions over the past two months, trying to make the best out of this strange situation we are in, and it has been an amazing experience. This website is an attempt to share the magic moments I've been having with others.</comment>


11 Inspirational Quotes from Leading Freelancers - <AUTHOR> http://www.freelancebusinessguide.com/2015/07/11-inspirational-quotes-from-leading-freelancers/ <comment><USER2> These are actually really good bits of advice.

<comment><AUTHOR> I was fortunate to have some really smart folks contribute.</comment></comment>


Yale Computer Science Dept overworked, understaffed - <AUTHOR> http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2013/01/29/computer-science-dept-overworked-understaffed/ <comment><USER2> Ugh this sounds familiar.

Back in 2008-2010 I was one of two sitting students on the Computer Science curriculum committee at Rensselaer Polytechnic University (RPI).

Three topics were always present:

1\. What do we do about kids who come in knowing inadequate math and how does this keep happening?

2\. Should we consider switching out C/C++ as the default for Java as the default. (The answer to this was almost always no, but many professors at RPI accepted assignments in multiple languages, usually whatever the TAs were familiar with. I used a lot of python later in the year instead of C/C++/Java)

3\. _God damn it_ we are understaffed.

I hate to say it but #3 was always brought up near the end of every meeting and was _visibly_ discouraging to all the teachers involved. RPI at the time was on the war-path of cutting professors in every single field who did not participate in research (so called "clinical faculty") which included letting one of the best CS professors go.

That teacher for you RPI alum was Dave Hollinger. They let him go(?) at the end of '08 but he taught a single class in '09 before leaving for good. Everyone loved him. <http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/ShowRatings.jsp?tid=100535>

<comment><USER3> Maybe part of the problem is the misnomer of the whole field itself. CS is _not_ really science, it's math. It's about tools that every professional and scientist will later need. And as such, I'd argue that teaching is actually more important than research.

Of course, these tools need to be researched and developed as well, but more importantly do we need very capable teachers in order for people to build their foundation. IMO every Master of Science should have a good overview of which tools in math and "CS" there are available, and they should be proficient in at least two of each.

<comment><USER4> No we do science too. Math is a fundamental part of lots of CS branches but we also do straight up science (with the whole research question, hypothesis, experiment, evaluate cycle).

<comment><USER5> I'm willing to be convinced either way, but it seems to me that there's nothing in computer science you can't figure out by thinking or using pen and paper (maybe a _lot_ of pen and paper). You don't have to "ask nature" as Feynman would say. Contrast that with figuring out the Gravitational constant, say. The only way to estimate its value is by doing some careful measurements (i.e. asking nature). Sure there may be some calculations, but without the measurements, they're a waste of time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm a CS student at the University of Washington.

We do something [that I consider] interesting here to staff TAs for courses, which is hire undergraduate teaching assistants. Generally, a course will have one head TA who is a grad student, and multiple undergraduate TAs. I've TA'd for a while as an undergraduate, and it's been a really great experience for my career.

Especially in the intro courses and lower level courses, I don't think that it's necessary to hire computer science gurus -- it's actually easier to find undergraduates who are capable and passionate for teaching than it is to find graduate students (partly because there are more undergraduates).

Some documents produced by one of the lecturers who I work for as a TA.

[http://www.cs.washington.edu/public_files/publications/msb/h...](http://www.cs.washington.edu/public_files/publications/msb/html/21.1/reges.html)

ftp://ftp.awl.com/cseng/authors/roberts/cs1-c/documents/ugradtas.txt

<comment><USER7> The University of Chicago has begun to do this, as well. It's uncommon for UofC to fall into technological trends.

<comment><USER8> This is sort of interesting because the Math department at UChicago has had undergraduate TAs for a long time for at least the first year courses, and I believe a couple of the second year courses, but it seems only recently has the CS department done the same for its first year courses.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I'm a CS major at Yale right now.

In my opinion, this whole issue has arisen because there is confusion about what "computer science" should be at a university. Theoretical computer science that professors do is a world away from the casual HTML/CSS development that many non-CS-majors want to dabble in after watching The Social Network. I think an excellent university should have instruction in both, and enough professors to strongly support the latter.

The Yale CS department, with good reason, does not want Yale to become a "Java school". (good background on the topic: [http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/ThePerilsofJavaSchool...](http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/ThePerilsofJavaSchools.html)). They want to focus on CS fundamentals, algorithms, and UNIX skills, which are timeless skills that can serve as a foundation for a career in computer science. This especially makes sense given the strength of the theoretical component of Yale's CS department, both now and historically. (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Perlis>) (<http://www.macfound.org/fellows/877/>)

But the university also needs to realize that having a more casual computer science class for non-majors, like Harvard's CS50, is an essential part of offering a liberal arts education in the modern world. There's a lot of student spirit and initiative here, such as awesome student-taught web dev courses (<http://hackyale.com/>) and student-organized talks and hackathons, but the university itself seems to be playing catch-up.

<comment><USER10> Yale CS alum here (DC 04). Yale unfortunately tends to be on the extreme side of theories and fundamentals. Having some more practical experience helps those theories and fundamentals sink in. For example, I didn't appreciate closures until I started programming professionally. It was a curiosity before that. The professors there sort of expect you to get that sort of experience on your own, which some students do get but it's really uneven.

<comment><USER11> Davenport!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This will probably blow over once the impact of _The Social Network_ has faded. Enrollment will go back down to near what it was before.

I'm finishing my CS degree at Georgia State (after a 6 year hiatus) and all of the lower level classes the last 2 semesters have been filled to the brim with people who had no idea what they were getting into.

When you select CS as your major, there should be a popup box that asks if you're aware CS involves math.

<comment><USER13> _When you select CS as your major, there should be a popup box that asks if you're aware CS involves math._

I disagree that this is good advice to give someone considering a CS major.

Math is not fundamental to CS. CS is fundamental to CS.

Most of a high school/college math curriculum is not that closely related to most of what happens in CS.

In general, there is some "mathiness" to CS, but it is of such a different flavor to "the math you learn in school" that I don't think making a comparison is useful (it certainly would not have been in my case).

I have bachelor's and master's degrees in CS and am pursuing a PhD in CS.

<comment><USER5> The foundations of CS are things like sets, logic, formal languages, Turing machines, computability... all math.

Maybe you didn't learn that stuff in "math class" but that doesn't mean it's not math.

<comment><USER13> I would say that logic is fudamental to math and cs. I disagree with mathematicians that claim that math is prior to logic.

Formal languages, turing machines, and computability are computing science, which we call computer science. Computing science may be part of math, but math is not fundamental to it. In other words, you need logic as a basis for those examples, but otherwise, they are not dependent on other mathematical knowledge.

I don't think sets are all that important in cs (but I disagree with mathematicians who try to base everything on set theory).

<comment><USER12> You're correct that most of computer science (except for the explicit mat classes you're required to take) doesn't inherently rely on existing math knowledge.

However, they way computer science is taught does assume prior math knowledge. Thinking back to the very first example algorithms in my intro class--we had to impliment addition, multiplication, then heron's square root method.

Very basic math, but that was around the time many students dropped the class.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> This might be a concerning trend if you are a working programmer. Currently labor is tight, but it seems in a few years the schools will be cranking out huge numbers of CS majors. If past cycles are an indication, this might coincide with decreased demand. Look what has happened in the legal field. There is a glut of lawyers currently on the market.

<comment><USER15> Law has transformed into the liberal arts degree of the current age. Almost nobody actually goes on to law; they go on to management or other analysis/talk careers.

Edit:

It occurs to me that I've caused downvotable confusion because law degrees in the USA are quite different from law degrees in Australia (where I studied law).

In the USA law is a postgraduate degree.

Here it is an undergraduate degree. Australian citizens receive very generous loans and until recently, places for each degree at any given university were fixed by Commonwealth quotas. Students with high year 12 scores and no idea of what to do next studied law or medicine because, in a quota placement scheme, those courses had the highest entry scores. Basically a status thing.

You're "smart"? Do law! (Which is how I wound up doing it).

Hence my remark that it's replaced the Arts degree as something that can be used to step into a higher entry rung in a large company or government department.

<comment><USER14> That might be becoming the case as jobs in the field dry up, but I know plenty of lawyers who went to law school to become lawyers. It is hard to justify the cost of a law degree for general education.

<comment><USER15> See my edit. Australians and Americans have quite different causes leading to attendance at law school.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> But they've been increasing tuition like crazy too right?

~4-6% every 3 years according to <http://oir.yale.edu/node/108/attachment>

Apparently that gets spent on all kinds of things, just not the actual education the students need. At >30k a year you could really expect that they would hire enough real teachers.

<comment><USER17> The lack of professors may also be caused by the whole "world-class researcher" fetish. You don't need ninja rockstars to teach intro CS.

<comment><USER18> It seems strange to me that schools can have folks with titles like "Dean of Community Outreach" but they feel compelled to wring cutting-edge research _and_ excellent teaching out of the same people. I'd like to see the proof that world-class teachers and world-class researchers are the exact same set.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> I was in the the AI class mentioned in the article, and I can say the results were somewhat disastrous. The early problem sets were trivially easy to facilitate quick grading (e.g., creating truth tables for propositional logic statements, filling in two variable names in pseudo-code for a search algorithm), while later problem sets had enough errors to make completing them difficult or impossible. Incorrect and conflicting information was regularly given out at office hours, assignments and tests were graded incredibly slowly and rarely returned, and the professor and T.A. were almost never on the same page. I understand the difficulty of the situation for the professor and T.A., but as a student I often felt I was wasting my time.

</comment><comment><USER20> I bet it's a misunderstanding of what Computer Science really is. In my opinion, many youngsters or people that's not in the tech world think Computer Science as just programming, or developing a website. I have an experience on this because my parents are forcing me to develop a website in which I don't like and they reacted with _"what is your education for?"_

But what they don't realized is that Computer Science is more than developing a website or programming. CS deals with math, algorithms, and such words that they haven't heard before. Automata, discrete math, pumping lemma. Computer Science is much harder than they thought. With this, many students in my university shift to another course because they can't handle CS. Too many students are enrolling CS becase they think it is the trend. They think it is the right course to learn how to develop website, how to create something like Facebook, how to develop an app, how to develop something like Instagram, or even how to create a game ([http://blog.jpbalb.in/post/16048908922/game- programming-anyo...](http://blog.jpbalb.in/post/16048908922/game-programming- anyone))! Yes they can learn them through CS, but if that's just what they want, they can just go to the internet and do a Google search. Because again, CS is more than just that.

Finally, I think it's not the lack of staff, but the lot of students. Give those students few years in Computer Science, and I'm pretty sure those "lot" will be "few".

<comment><USER21> Our of curiosity, why are your parents forcing you to develop a website? (And, tangentially, is there a reason you can't say no?)

EDIT (reply to below): You said "my parents are forcing me to develop a website," which makes me think your parents are still forcing you to make a website, right now. That was what was confusing to me...

<comment><USER20> I'm always saying no. But they are always asking because they think it's the right job for me. It's because of their misconception of being a Computer Science == Website Developer (Wordpress, HTML, CSS)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> CS enrollment numbers are way up in every school. Yale is complaining about 200... at Princeton our intro course has over 500. At Stanford almost every undergrad takes a CS course at some point.

We have a good number of lecturers in addition to tenure-track faculty members (at Princeton CS). They are extremely good and greatly decrease our load, so we haven't faced burnout so far. That said, enrollment was up so sharply this semester that we had to hire lecturers on a month's notice, which is kind of insane. Also, we have a new industrial Master's program which lets us increase our number of TAs.

In spite of having adapted in all these ways and money not being a problem, we know that this won't continue to scale because enrollment growth shows no signs of slowing down. We're not sure what the long-term solution is going to be. Online education is part of it (and we're on Coursera), but so far we're not using it in a way that decreases our teaching staff requirements.

Strange times.

<comment><USER23> Stanford's enrollment was over 700 for fall quarter. Over 1500 students took the course during the entire year. A typical class has around 1650-1800 students for perspective.

[http://www.stanforddaily.com/2012/10/04/cs106a-enrollment- re...](http://www.stanforddaily.com/2012/10/04/cs106a-enrollment-reaches- record-high/newcs106a04/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Harvard is seeing a very similar trend. Our intro to CS course, CS 50 [1], had an enrollment of over 600 this Fall (up about 20%), making it one of the largest classes at the College [2]. Even its teaching staff, which numbers over 100, is bigger than most classes (and most of them are undergraduates) [3].

The data isn't in for this term yet, but pre-term planning data suggests that enrollment in CS 51 (our second-term CS course) will go up by about 40% (it experienced similar growth last year), and CS 181, a machine learning class, might nearly triple in size since it was last offered [4].

For smaller departments like Harvard's (and Yale's, which is even smaller still), there just aren't enough professors to go around, and with the enormous influx of students, I think the quality and variety of the courses offered has suffered. Many courses are only offered sporadically--especially systems courses--since there simply aren't enough professors to teach them all.

And that's to say nothing of the (undergraduate) teaching assistants, which bear much of the brunt of this trend. I TFed Harvard's algorithms course (which doubled in size over the two years I taught it), and am TFing our operating systems class this term (which if today's turnout was any guide looks like it might nearly triple in size). The workload was considerable, and I'm sorry to say that the feedback and individual attention I was able to provide students has gotten worse and more tardy because of this.

I don't think Harvard (and Yale, etc.) can cope with this sort of explosive growth for too much longer.

[1]: <https://www.cs50.net>

[2]: [http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/4/13/cs-greatest- grow...](http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/4/13/cs-greatest-growth-seas/)

[3]: <https://www.cs50.net/staff/>

[4]: [http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/12/17/ptp-data- obtain...](http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/12/17/ptp-data-obtained- trends/)

</comment><comment><USER25> When I was TAing I remember the office staff glancing at my "classes I would like to TA" list and thanking me for putting all upper division courses; apparently most of the TAs competed for lower division course slots where the problems were easier and so presumably the workload was lessened. I always went for upper division because I hated dealing with entitlement complexes and don't like trying to teach shallow material. We never really had enough resources, but it wasn't quite that bad.

</comment><comment><USER26> Interesting thing to note: The Yale CS department has been hiring peer tutors and undergraduate course graders, which should definitely help alleviate things.

The idea that Scaz is working with 25 students on projects is a bit concerning. How can you give the necessary attention to any student, your own work, and any classes you teach when spreading yourself that thin?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> If anyone wants to email Yale's incoming President Peter Salovey to let him know why this is not OK, his email is email@example.com

<comment><USER27> It's a virtual certainty that email to that address goes to an administrative assistant and not directly to the president. Guess why?

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> ugh, seems like everyone is doing a cs major now a days. kind of diminishes the value of the degree, sort of like a business degree aha.</comment>


Ask HN: Can I have your couch in SF for a few days in May? - <AUTHOR>

Hi!
I have been offered a spot at App Academy (www.appacademy.io) in San Francisco starting May 13th and I would like to get into town a few days early to explore and attend TEDxStanford. Unfortunately, my funds will be very tight, so I won't be able to afford a hotel.
If you have an open couch that I could borrow for the 10th, 11th, and 12th, I would greatly appreciate it! My email is available in my profile. Shoot me a message and we'll get to know each other! <comment><USER2> [https://www.couchsurfing.org/n/places/san-francisco- californ...](https://www.couchsurfing.org/n/places/san-francisco-california- united-states)

</comment><comment><USER3> You can stay on my couch but I live in Australia, is that going to be a problem?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's a bit of a commute, so I'll have to get back to you. I appreciate the offer though!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Um, you might try actually stating the city instead of assuming everyone knows (or cares to parse it out).

<comment><AUTHOR> I blame it on 2AM-brain. Thanks for catching that.</comment></comment>


Amazon raised Prime Day prices, misleading consumers, says vendor - <AUTHOR> http://www.foxbusiness.com/features/2017/07/24/amazon-jacked-up-prime-day-prices-misleading-consumers-says-vendor.html <comment><USER4> I've become more and more disillusioned by Amazon over the years. Prices are now almost never the best; I only buy from them when I need something quickly (and can't get it locally). NewEgg (nearly) always has better tech prices. Walmart often has better prices on everyday items and I can have it immediately. I just bought a pair of tweezers at my local grocery store for two bucks that was $6 on Amazon for the same make/model; sure, it's a terrible item to sell online because it's tiny and cheap and shipping it with prime shipping probably costs as much as the item itself, but I thought they'd solved that problem with "add on" items.

I mean, Amazon is still a very good customer experience, but when I'm buying something big I always comparison shop now. As recently as a couple years ago, I would just buy it. No thought to whether it might be cheaper elsewhere. The convenience of Prime, plus the reasonable confidence that the price would be competitive with everybody else, was enough to where I didn't bother comparison shopping.

Obviously, Amazon isn't hurting. But, I can't help but think that having more of their longtime customers starting to comparison shop is a bad thing.

<comment><USER5> Interesting. I also find myself picking up tech from NewEgg more often than Amazon. And I recently ordered most of the supplies for a cocktail party I was having at Walmart and Bed Bad and Beyond.

Amazon prices might beat local retail, but they are only sometimes competitive with other (often more specizlized) online retailers at this point.

Also, at least for me, shipping New Egg, Walmart and BBAB was faster than Amazon. I don't have Prime however.

<comment><USER6> The issue I have with NewEgg is returns. There's always some condition, or expensive fee for return shipping. By comparison, Amazon makes it very easy

<comment><USER7> The flip side to Amazon's easy returns is that I regularly receive used/returned merchandise from Amazon that was advertised as new.

<comment><USER8> If the product clearly appears to be used I'd say that's a problem with Amazon's quality control for returns (though I never experienced those problems). However what do you think happens to returned items? You don't expect them to be thrown out, do you?

Maybe I'm way off, but I was always under the impression that those returned items are re-packaged (if necessary) and sold as new.

And I think that's fine since I really don't see any other way to handle it. Think about europe, where every shop has to offer a free 14 day return policy, regardless of if you're Amazon or a small Shopify seller.

If the item can't be sold as new, that means the customer overstepped and should be held accountable.

<comment><USER9> Of course there is another way for retailers to re-sell customer returns. They can list them with labels such as "Used - Like New" or "Open Box" or whatever applies.

For example, go into any Best Buy and ask them where the open box deals are, or look on their website.

Or go to a Fry's Electronics store. They put returned items on the shelf with new ones, but there is a special label on the package noting this and generally offering a small discount.

Lenovo has a factory outlet separate from their main website where they sell customer returns. Unopened returns may be listed as new; opened returns are listed as used or refurbished.

Amazon lists returned products under "Amazon Warehouse Deals" in the New and Used section of a product listing, with the product condition noted in the description.

For most product categories, Amazon prohibits a returned item from being resold as "New":

[https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=...](https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=1161242)

> _New:_ Just like it sounds. A brand-new, unused, unopened item in its > original packaging, with all original packaging materials included. Original > protective wrapping, if any, is intact. Original manufacturer's warranty, if > any, still applies, with warranty details included in the listing comments.

There are some different policies in certain product categories; the page above lists them.

Of course, _third-party_ sellers on Amazon may well re-sell customer returns as "new". But if they don't comply with the rules on this page, they are violating their seller agreement.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There were real deals on Amazon hardware devices (Echo, Fire, etc). Most everything else was "meh".

camelcamelcamel.com is your friend to research how good of a deal it really is. (no affiliation, just a happy user)

<comment><USER11> I second the recommendation for 3camels, and not just for Prime Day. I bought quite a bit on Prime Day - all of which I'd had in my cart / wish list for months and all of which were well below their actual price (per 3camels).

I also saw quite a few products that were well above their normal prices, while showing as "80% off" because the prices were raised a week before. I didn't see anything that drastic from Sold-By-Amazon products. They were generally 3rd-party vendors.

<comment><USER12> camelcamelcamel is indeed a great resource. Also, you can set up a Workflow workflow on iOS to get a quick price history via the 'share' button from within the Amazon app.

<comment><USER13> Great idea! Do you happen to have a Workflow to share? I'm heavily interested in getting this.

<comment><USER12> [https://workflow.is/workflows/e194d7fdef0343649b6d037293b18c...](https://workflow.is/workflows/e194d7fdef0343649b6d037293b18c09)

(There was a bug for a while where you had to insert an alert before opening the web page to make it work, but it seems to have been fixed recently so I've taken this out).

<comment><USER13> Thank for you for following this back!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Not only is this not new for traditional vendors, it's not even new for the internet. Scummy sellers on Steam do the same thing right before sales every single year. Oh well. At least some quite nice Anker stuff was actually on sale. You can never have enough USB chargers these days.

Just like in the case of Steam, I'm more apt to believe it's sellers that are doing this than Amazon. While both stand to benefit, sellers stand to benefit much more overall.

Although it's never going to be perfectly accurate, I recommend anyone who shops Amazon for expensive stuff use a price tracking service, like CamelCamelCamel, to see exactly how good a deal on Amazon really is. Again, not perfect, but at least you can then get some context for what the price is currently showing up as.

<comment><USER15> Their prices are not the lowest, just experienced this recently. Here is a bike i wanted to buy

[https://www.amazon.com/GMC-Denali-Large-63-5cm- Frame/dp/B00F...](https://www.amazon.com/GMC-Denali-Large-63-5cm- Frame/dp/B00FNVBS5C/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1500950302&sr=8-1&keywords=Denali%2Bbike&th=1) ($220)

Ended up buying on walmart ($170) [https://www.walmart.com/ip/25-700c-GMC- Denali-Men-s-Bike-Whi...](https://www.walmart.com/ip/25-700c-GMC-Denali-Men-s- Bike-White-Red/51838812)

So much for paying $99 to get prime. I have noticed of late that lot of items are cheaper on Walmart and they offer free 2 day shipping.

<comment><USER16> Off-topic, but that's a truly terrible bike. I know a few people who've gotten it or similar GMC's as "the first result on Amazon for road bike" and they've all had problems with chains breaking or very poor fit of components. I'd recommend [http://www.bikesdirect.com/](http://www.bikesdirect.com/) for cheap bikes online if you're comfortable with assembly and tuning.

<comment><USER17> Another happy bikesdirect customer here - a bunch of coworkers over the years have gone that route and been pleased as well. They're cheap, but definitely usable, safe, and a good value.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> It's clear to any layperson willing to do research that they did so - I looked up several items on a few price history websites, and found that while they did have lower than normal prices, it was more like a 4% discount off the bottom instead of the 40% they claimed. The Yeti microphones seemed to be the absolute worst - they have never ever been $150, more like $90, and they were on sale for $85 or so.

<comment><USER19> Although your larger point may be right you're incorrect about the Yeti microphones. They are _usually_ $129.

[https://camelcamelcamel.com/Blue-Yeti-USB-Microphone- Silver/...](https://camelcamelcamel.com/Blue-Yeti-USB-Microphone- Silver/product/B002VA464S)

I bought one on sale for $100 last summer, and according to CamelCamelCamel, it was a good deal at the time.

<comment><USER18> It looks like the average price from 2011-2013 was at around $100 - <USER2> they've improved the model, but it seems like they've pegged it at $130 in mid-2014 but it appears it still regularly dips below $100. Add in 3rd party, it USED to be $100, but is now $129.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Wirecutter found an improvement over last year (0.54% of deals good value vs 0.008%).

[https://twitter.com/wirecutter/status/884900863218769920](https://twitter.com/wirecutter/status/884900863218769920)

Will have to wait for their full write up but there genuinely were a lot of quality items for the lowest price ever.

<comment><USER21> 0.008%? Wow. I almost wonder if they went through the legal department and asked them "how small can we make our discounts before it becomes illegal to claim they are discounts?" Apparently, _that_ small.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> "Order within the next 5 hours and receive free next day shipping".

Hmm. OK. _click_

"Please review your order. $8.99 for next day shipping or free two day shipping."

Uh, OK. 'Check two day shipping. Submit'

"Your order has been placed. Delivery date - 5 days from now"

<comment><USER23> This happens so often to me. I'll be expecting a package one day and 8pm rolls around and I check the order status and it says 'expected delivery: tomorrow' \- when I was _sure_ the delivery was today at the time I placed the order.

It makes me feel like I'm going crazy, but I'm sure there's some sort of bug during the checkout process which switches me back to two-day shipping after I've selected one-day.

<comment><USER24> > I'll be expecting a package one day and 8pm rolls around and I check the > order status and it says 'expected delivery: tomorrow'

Is the carrier LaserShip? They're well known for lying in order to meet daily delivery numbers.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> That's pretty standard for what I call the "scam economy" that is the US for the past 20 years. Watch any commercial.

<comment><USER26> Lest anyone not take you seriously, I noticed this when I first immigrated to the US, and every time I've returned from a multi-week trip: the first time I see a TV again I'm just flabbergasted at how nasty the advertizing is. When you're not used to it, it just seems especially manipulative and very negative towards the competition compared to other the other countries I've spent time in (which primarily other countries heavily influenced by the UK).

<comment><USER27> It's pretty shocking even if you are used to it. I can't believe people pay for cable given how terrible of an experience it is.

<comment><USER28> Weird. It's always on when I click the button.

I pay for cable to enjoy baseball games, primarily, as there is no other way to watch "in-market" otherwise. For certain demographics, it's just the most sense.

I mean, TV is TV. If I spend a little bit more to never have to deal with buffering, or a laggy UI, it's worth it to me. I think a lot of non-cord- cutters would agree.

Re: cord cutting; I've tried, I really have.

<comment><USER27> I totally get the always on thing; especially for baseball. My point was more that ads are the driving force for me, and i am sure others, to abandon the platform; it feels a little like someone invading your home to yell at you if you're not used to it.

But this applies to YouTube too; cable cutting is hardly a panacea to avoid intrusive ads.

<comment><USER26> Personally, ads are easy enough for me to skip with a DVR (so long as you don't mind a lag between the live event and you watching it happen - <USER3> results on the Internet isn't always easy) - but I don't even get the always- on thing. I had outages just as often as I do with Internet (actually more so), and I've had events not broadcasted when advertized. NBC Sports has been especially bad with this and F1 coverage - they outbid a motorsport-specific channel to get exclusive access to more niche events, and then those events get bumped to the bottom of the priority list in any scheduling conflict. So if you are DVR'ing it, you better check on it at least daily with other sources of information otherwise you're out of luck several times a season. Which wouldn't even be so bad if the only way to get NBC Sports and the other channels they move it to wasn't buying a 200 channel package and tripling my bill. So I just withdrew entirely.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> My issue with Amazon lately isn't just the prices no longer being the lowest, it's that a big chunk of their products are counterfeits. I honestly have no idea how they haven't tamped down on that. If I shop at Wal-Mart, Target, Footlocker, etc, etc I know the products I buy aren't going to be fakes; no so with Amazon. I have started buying less stuff on there after a number of products have come back as fakes. I use Prime Video more than any other service now, but there's only maybe 2 shows I even care about on there.

<comment><USER28> What kinds of things are you buying where counterfeits are a problem? Genuinely intrigued.

<comment><USER30> Everything.

Just like the root poster, I am disgusted by clusters of knockoffs and increasingly more weary of seeing them. Just about anything common you run across on Amazon is probably not original (is there such a thing as an uncommon product these days?) The worst part is that I can't get myself to trust any reviews - good or bad - which was my go-to for feeling assured about a purchase. A knockoff competitor may review or pay reviewers to ding someone else's version of the product, and boost their own, and they've created a scorched earth of uncertainty from this seller ecosystem.

For example, if you look up can openers, you'll see a bunch of ones that look exactly alike but are labeled as different brands. They contain slightly altered stock photos, but almost certainly all are stemming from the same original product. Mixed reviews give you cautions for some products, but not for others that are identical. Does it stay sharp, or doesn't it? Does it fail after 10 uses, or doesn't it? Does it work with lipped cans or doesn't it?

If you look carefully, you can probably guess in which order a product imitation was born in, based on the progressively more distorted JPEGs of the cover photo.

Look for a wire brush and you'll see same photo of the same product, "manufactured" by different companies. Senkary, Sucool, Tekton, eBoot, ABN, and a few dozen seemingly randomized names. I think I don't care about wire brush manufacturing consistency as long as it doesn't arrive wrapped in 1/4 lb of plastic and foam, and dripping with machine oil (I chuckled when I got it).

On the other hand, I do care whether a sprinkler head I get is actually pressure regulated and calibrated to 30 PSI, that the variable arc nozzle is built to spec and won't decompose in sunlight and clog rest of the irrigation system, and I do care whether a phone charger might burn my house down. Unless I order those three products directly from the known manufacturer, I won't trust that it's genuine.

<comment><USER24> > Everything.

The solution is to purchase products shipped and sold by Amazon. Avoid third party sellers unless you either know the seller well or if the seller is the manufacturer of the product.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Er, is this not illegal in the USA? It is in Canada:

 _The Act prohibits false or misleading representations to the public as to the ordinary selling price of a product, in any form whatsoever. Ordinary selling price is validated in one of two ways: either a substantial volume of the product was sold at that price or higher, within a reasonable amount of time (volume test); or the product was offered for sale, in good faith, for a substantial period of time at that price or a higher price (time test)._ [0]

[0] [http://www.competitionbureau.gc.ca/eic/site/cb- bc.nsf/eng/02...](http://www.competitionbureau.gc.ca/eic/site/cb- bc.nsf/eng/02776.html)

<comment><USER31> >Simpson says Amazon is breaking Section 5 (a) of the FTC Act that prohibits "unfair or deceptive acts or practices."

>"It's strategy called 'Price-anchoring.' It's pretty common across the board. Now as far as it being against the law or breaking any rules or regulations, it could be considered false and deceptive marketing under the FTC Section 5," Kelly adds.

Many States call this practice out specifically as an unfair trade practice in their laws as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> When I worked at a very large bricks/ecommerce retailer, the FTC had their eye on us for decades, so we had very complex pricing rules to make sure that we established "regular price" for a certain number of days before an item could be put on sale, and could only stay on sale for a certain percentage of on- sale days, then once "marked down" or "clearance" could never have the price raised again.

I'm guessing the FTC will have their eye on Amazon pricing soon.

<comment><USER33> Given the current political climate, it's more likely the FTC will be dismantled first. That is unless The Washington Post pisses off the POTUS enough.

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> If you look at revenue and profit analysis from Amazon, it's clear that they are still customer focused. It's just that advertisers are now a bigger customer than the "real" customers. Amazon makes more money off of sponsored listings than selling the item sponsored. Kinda crazy.

<comment><USER35> Does that imply that, overall, people are making less from selling things than it costs to advertise them?

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> Back at an old startup when I had a lot of data from clothing retail websites, including historical prices and sale status, I ran some queries out of curiosity to look for this.

I'm pretty cynical but I was still shocked at the number of results. This seems to be a completely normal practice. Price and being on "SALE" seemed to be optimized or A/B tested almost separately. And the "regular price" field on sale items was garbage data that correlated with nothing.

</comment><comment><USER37> I saw a lot of comments saying "Prime Day" was really "Prime Marketing Day". Seems that was the case.

<comment><USER38> Can confirm. I spotted a plane towing an Amazon banner over my city on Prime day.

<comment><USER39> I can't figure it out, is this absurdist sarcasm or just factual reporting of real events?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER40> I use Google Shopping ( [http://shopping.google.com/](http://shopping.google.com/) ) to compare prices. We saved over $300 on a King-sized bed when we wanted to upsize our bed.

</comment><comment><USER41> I suspect RRP/ MSRP have nearly always been useless. Comparison is the only way to get a true sense of what a regular market price is for something. Too often I will see something on a 50%+ off sale which might just be matching the market or actually 5-10% off where the rest of the market is at.

After all, why would a retailer ever discount more than 10-20% off what everyone else is charging, outside of a clearance?

</comment><comment><USER42> Note that producers can't contractually force independent retailers to obey certain prices under antitrust rules. Hence MSRPs being merely "suggested".

<comment><USER43> It sounded to me like what the company objected to was Amazon claiming that the MSRP was higher than it actually was.

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> So, just like every other store, before the sale, they jack up the prices to make the markdown look more extreme.

What, have people never shopped in Sears/Macys/Mervyns or any other department store since the beginning of time?

Seriously, the only response I can come up with to this news is "Well... duh."

<comment><USER45> > just like every other store

This is illegal in many countries, so waving it off as "everyone does it" is not only morally weak, but factually inaccurate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER46> For me, Amazon used to be synonymous with quality, convenience and peace of mind. That has now changed, it is now merely convenient and subject to increasing competition. This last year I cancelled my Amazon Prime and now using Amazon far less than I used to.

Amazon has dropped the ball.

</comment><comment><USER47> Not really newsworthy. This is one of the oldest tricks in the book. "Everything is worth what its purchaser will pay for it." -Publilius Syrus (1st century BC)

<comment><USER48> This is newsworthy and should be called out every time, especially when it is such a trusted seller as Amazon.

<comment><USER47> "trusted seller"? What does that mean? What makes Amazon a "trusted seller", and why should we expect them to be different than any other seller?

<comment><USER31> [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon.com_controversies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon.com_controversies)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> For some reason, I can't take this seriously coming from fox news. They seem to be having an agenda with the current president, and Amazon has been getting hit as a collateral for feuds against the Washington post.

Either way, the article concludes with the vendor saying he think its just an issue with tweaking their algorithms, and not an actual tactic from Amazon.

Is there any other source that claim the same?

</comment><comment><USER50> Udemy does this as well for all of their products.

<comment><USER51> Indeed. They pretty have an eternal "sale" for $10.

Quick check: yep. $10. "Set Yourself Apart - Keep your competitive edge with courses for $10—ends 7/31!"

Pretty sure by 8/3, there will be another sale for $10.

<comment><USER52> Hmmm. I seem to recall that Sears was sued for running "sales" more than six months out of the year, and lost. I feel like that would apply here?

<comment><USER53> There is an administrative code in my state that says that "furniture retailers may only have one 'closing down'/'final' sale per year"...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> Amazon created a second black friday. I'm impressed by Jeff Bezos!

<comment><USER21> And they both offer fake discounts, too! The attention to detail in the replication of Black Friday is amazing!

</comment></comment><comment><USER55> Off topic but I just picked up those shoe deodorizers for $10 at the container store and they have actually knocked down the stench emanating from my hiking shoes.

</comment><comment><USER56> I bought a Brother laser printer with toner for $80 shipped in two days. Happy Amazon consumer here. You'll have to rip Prime out of my cold dead hands.

<comment><USER28> Agreed.

People are just complaining to complain. It's also kinda cool right now to hate Amazon. It's gotten too big, ya know. They're evil, lol.

</comment></comment><comment><USER57> I feel the same based on price of items I watched. I'm curious any site like camelcamelcamel can help quantify this "scam" :)

</comment><comment><USER58> aka these Labor Day, Black Friday, and other annual sales by your nearest retailer. Same old.

</comment><comment><USER59> There were good deals on shoes. I bought shoes for $36.20 (New Balance) that retail for $51.

</comment><comment><USER60> Article is worth reading. Imo the upping of price after demand increase is awful.

Also, i do not think those addicted to Amazon care about these types of things. They keep ordering and ordering. Convenience is the name of their game

<comment><USER61> _> Imo the upping of price after demand increase is awful._

What? This is economics 101 of supply and demand. When demand exceeds supply, the price will increase. [0]

Just look at the stupidity of video card prices recently if you want a concrete, non-sale example of why price increases when supply cannot meet demand.

[0] [http://www.investopedia.com/university/economics/economics3....](http://www.investopedia.com/university/economics/economics3.asp)

<comment><USER62> From the article: _" It's not like they're bumping it by a buck and making a little bit more money. They are really tanking sales and it kind of has a ripple effect to us, being a small company trying to do demand planning"_

The relevant Econ 101 buzzword isn't "supply and demand," it's "agency problem".

Amazon is "tanking sales" unilaterally, while the supplier manages stock on assumptions of higher sales at the regular, lower price point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER63> Keepa is a great extension for price tracking on Amazon directly embedded into the page.

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

</comment><comment><USER64> Amazon bumped the price of a $20 Britta water filter by $15 when I went to purchase it a second time. Odd how that can happen.

</comment><comment><USER65> How do you fact check Fox?

<comment><USER28> How do you fact check anyone?

</comment></comment><comment><USER66> haha, this is similar to what JD do in China.

</comment><comment><USER67> FOX is fishing for how Amazon could be hurting consumers so as to get anti trust litigation going. It is not illegal to be a monopoly but if it is hurting consumers it is fair game.

My opinion Amazon is NOT hurting consumers but rather Trump and the Republicans want to hurt it. YMMV

<comment><USER68> Conservatives can be looking to hurt Amazon and Amazon can be hurting consumers at the same time. I don't see how you can argue that lieing to consumers is not hurting them

<comment><USER69> Yup. As much as I dislike RNC and Foxnews right now, it doesn't mean Amazon ain't being a bad company.

FoxNews can be right once in a full moon.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER70> A few years ago, the word on the street was that bezos agreed to boost prices to reward the longtime shareholders/hedge funds/etc. And as expected, the prices on amazon have noticeably increased and the shares are at all-time highs.

Amazon is large enough now that they have a "captive market".

</comment><comment><USER71> Maybe I'm in the minority here but I don't have a problem with this. If they raise the price based on demand, and I still deem it a good price, then who was harmed here? Sure I paid more than I needed to but I still paid less than I felt it was worth to me.

<comment><USER39> They didn't raise the price based on demand. They raised the price so that they could "discount" it and make it look like a good deal when it wasn't.

If a product is normally $10, and then it's sold as "discounted 50% for Prime Day, now only $10," that's fraudulent.

If Amazon decides to charge more and people are willing to pay it, there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is when they lie to make people think they're getting more of a deal than they are.

<comment><USER71> But that's not what they did. Their algorithms automatically raised those prices based on demand. The demand just happened to be driven by being part of prime day.

<comment><USER39> Meaning that the algorithms were raising the non-discounted prices automatically because the discounts were driving demand?

If they're going to offer discounts that compare to the original price, that original price needs to actually be an original price, not something that's being changed while the discount is still in effect. If Amazon didn't do this, they're either utterly incompetent or they're letting it happen because they know it will trick people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER72> Go to a brick and mortar jewelry store, everything is 100% off.

<comment><USER73> 100% off is free, no matter what the base price is, so that's clearly not true. (Though, oddly, it's not uncommon online, with a "just pay (inflated) shipping and handling charge" proviso.)

<comment><USER74> The guy meant 100% of the new price off from the old price. It's a bit of a reverse temporal brain fart, but it is a valid statement. For some reason I just instinctively knew that this is what he meant.

<comment><USER28> Hey, any reason to downvote someone into oblivion is a cause worth fighting for.

\- Someone with too much time and too much karma.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Four reasons we don't apply the 80/20 rule - <AUTHOR> http://www.johndcook.com/blog/2009/02/03/obstacles-to-applying-pareto-rule/ <comment><USER2> As any other rule, 80/20 rule has to be broken if it doesn't apply to current situation. No rule should be obeyed blindly.</comment>


Ubuntu cron stops working after auto update, check your backups - <AUTHOR> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pam/+bug/790538

<comment><USER2> This hurt me. I didn't notice until 24 hours later that no cron jobs had run at all the previous day.

Affects my confidence in updates big time.</comment>


Request for Startup: WFH Watercooler - <AUTHOR> WFH Watercooler (aka B2B Video Chat Roulette)
User signs up with: Work email (so we don't get randoms)
Google Calendar (so we know when they're available) LinkedIn Profile (so we know where they work)
User tells us basic preferences: How long they want to talk How often they want to talk Other preferences like "Only women" or "Only Marketing people"
We match them, and put a Zoom calendar invite on their calendar
Ground rules: Be on time Camera on Don't share any confidential company info
At the end of the call you get to rate the conversation: Would you want to be matched with this person again? Did you learn anything new? On a scale of 1 - 10 how stress-reducing was that call? Other... <comment><USER2> Checkout [https://wfhappyhour.com/](https://wfhappyhour.com/) :)</comment>


Ask HN: How can the changing industrial manufacturing world be applied to hacking? - <AUTHOR>

I found this interesting study entitled
Industrial Policy: New Wine in Old Bottles (26 pgs):
http://c4ss.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/industrialpolicycarson0109.pdf
The study is a little lengthy, but it's well-researched and I think you'll find it interesting. It essentially focuses on the fact that many people are able to manufacture items from the comfort of their own home which were previously manufactured solely in large plants.  The study mentions the availability of cheap hand-tools as one of the reasons.  Similar to cheap hand-tools, it mentions, the availability of a computer in everyone's home has permitted cheap video editing, sound editing, and almost priceless transfer of videos/music, but the study doesn't go into too much depth regarding other applications of cheap computers/internet.  Obviously the existence of the internet and the many cheap businesses which have been started using it as a medium of distribution are testament to the applications of dispersed manufacturing (or hacking).
The study mentions that manufacturing will continue its trend of becoming available to even more people than it is now, but that centers for development such as a community manufacturing center would still most likely develop.
My questions are as follows:
In what ways do you think the internet will continue to disperse and converge?
Which technologies are still out of reach to most people in terms of price or required technological know-how?
What is the optimal size for hackers to be able to effectively collaborate but not be bogged down by excessive control? <comment><USER2> I look at this problem in terms of automated systems. I think it's interesting how you can architect large groups of people to efficiently deliver a service. If you can conceive of and design systems you can as you put it "converge" nodes of the internet to produce wealth. There is a lot of opportunity and focus on leveraging current software and building social systems around that, which is great. The idea that interests me is how you can build virtual companies of people who do work and deliver value to a customer, which I think is ultimately what you and the paper you referenced are getting at.

> Which technologies are still out of reach to most people in terms of price > or required technological know-how?

Entrepreneurs have fantastic building blocks available today. In the first world price isn't a problem, it's know-how. Benevolent hacking can deliver a kid from poverty to financial independence pretty quickly if he's clever enough and can truly solve people's problems. That's an inspiring idea. At some point, laziness becomes the real barrier.

> What is the optimal size for hackers to be able to effectively collaborate > but not be bogged down by excessive control?

That's an interesting question. I suppose the answer would depend on the quality of the hackers, the problem they're working on and the parameters they're working within.

</comment><comment><USER3> In what ways do you think the internet will continue to disperse and converge?

i think the internet helps refining the art by feedback loop. i learnt a lot reading success/fail experiments results posted in forums. needless to say, i won't be able to make fert without the internet -- so dissemination of idea goes without saying

Which technologies are still out of reach to most people in terms of price or required technological know-how?

law can be bigger hurdle, especially for chemistry. price is not normally the problem since the raw materials are usually very cheap. 100x markup for commercial ready products is common.

What is the optimal size for hackers to be able to effectively collaborate but not be bogged down by excessive control?

hmmm ... one -- if you can automate the whole process without human presence (it's very doable in web 2.0 -- much less so as things go more physical or from bit to atom spectrum)</comment>


A technical introduction to the Async CTP (C# 5.0 in-depth) - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.msdn.com/b/lucian/archive/2010/10/29/a-technical-walk-through-all-of-the-async-ctp.aspx

<comment><AUTHOR> I highly recommend reading through this slide deck if you have any interest in cooperative threading and concurrency. They go into depth about how this feature is implemented in the compiler and libraries, and explain some of their design decisions.</comment>


Markdown.css – make HTML look like plain-text - <AUTHOR> http://mrcoles.com/demo/markdown-css/ <comment><USER2> Firstly this is awsome!

As much as I like kittens... This adds the markdown for images too:

        .markdown img {
          display: inline;
          content: "";
        }
        .markdown img:before {
          content: "![" attr(alt) "](" attr(src) ")";
          display: inline;
          color: #333333;
        }

The trick to make it work with images is the `content: "";` on the img element to stop the browser from treating it as an image.

EDIT:

See it here: <http://jsfiddle.net/F2mjs/>

Anyone know how to make the link clickable?

<comment><AUTHOR> You're using opera, right?

This was already in my code, but I commented out, maybe I should just let it be in there real quick before opera changes to webkit: [https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/016bf0863867aed...](https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/016bf0863867aed0428bcfb8256d43863af0a09b/markdown.less#L191)

If not opera, lmk what browser you're using.

<comment><USER2> This is working in Chrome 24.

Oh, yes it is. Its in the .less file, I had not spotted that.

EDIT:

You need `content: "";` in the less file and it should work.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh, interesting. Chrome does play nice with that.

Also, it looks like maybe you have to make the img content "", in order for the :before to work—otherwise it doesn't show up, at least in chrome, and with that demo it appears as nothing at all in firefox. It's a cruel world…

In the bookmarklet (included at top of demo) I do an extra step to make images inside links smaller and appear inside the link markdown—not what you were getting at, but it is a little something something.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> This is cool :) I do a similar thing on my site[1]to make it look like Org- mode files (which is what I use to write it). I enjoy the fact that so much processing goes into making it look just like it did to begin with :p

1: <http://almostobsolete.net>

</comment><comment><USER4> very clever, particularly how the width of the equals signs below an h1 is made to match the text width using hidden overflow:

[https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/0d00981143172aa...](https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/0d00981143172aad4f9939f6deed8106ca4000b5/markdown.css#L61)

<comment><AUTHOR> The magic is the quirks in how `display: table-cell` makes it like a block, but only as wide as the text, then the pseudo element with equals signs is positioned absolutely inside. Fortunately, most browsers allow this, but firefox doesn't let things be positioned absolute inside a `table-cell`, so I make FF just fall back to `display: block` [https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/master/markdown...](https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/master/markdown.css#L185)

<comment><USER4> interesting!

in the same vein as the h1 equals, i like the blockquote brackets implementation as well:

[https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/0d00981143172aa...](https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown- css/blob/0d00981143172aad4f9939f6deed8106ca4000b5/markdown.css#L122)

<comment><AUTHOR> yeah, the \A makes a newline and the `white-space: pre` makes that work like a <br>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> It's interesting and seems well implemented but I don't understand the use case? Why would you need this?

If you want plain text inside HTML isn't what the <pre> tag is for?

<comment><USER6> As a developer you may not want it - but my friends who are copywriters, editors and content strategists will LOVE this. A simple way to grab existing web content as markdown, which many are already using to write and edit their content.

<comment><USER7> But this doesn't _convert_ HTML to Markdown (there's already pandoc for that), it displays it as if it were Markdown. It's a clever example of what you can do with CSS, as well as perhaps poking fun at the current popularity of systems like Markdown which artificially restrict us to the IO capabilities of 70s VTs.

<comment><USER8> Here's another way to convert HTML to Markdown: [http://www.lowerelement.com/Geekery/XML/XHTML-to- Markdown.ht...](http://www.lowerelement.com/Geekery/XML/XHTML-to- Markdown.html)

<comment><USER9> XHTML, your 90s are calling…

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is awesome. Projects like this make me appreciate the fortitude of Markdown. John has made a project that essentially got it right on the first try[1], with very few patches or additions. In a world of software development where I'm running `gem update` _all_ the time, it's nice to have something like Markdown which really knocked it out of the park in one try. I don't have to check the docs to know if the syntax for URL linking changed, and _your_ implementation isn't going to be any different from mine. It's nice to have a standard like that everyone can rally behind.

[1]: I'm aware of projects like MMD, which AFAIK are primarily add-ons to the original Markdown syntax. I also realize that Markdown isn't perfect: Jeff Atwood has a good write-up on this from late 2009 -- [http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2009/12/responsible-open- so...](http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2009/12/responsible-open-source-code- parenting.html)

</comment><comment><USER11> shameless plug: client-side (or node) html > markdown, like _actual_ conversion

demo: <http://leeoniya.github.com/reMarked.js/>

repo: <https://github.com/leeoniya/reMarked.js>

<comment><USER12> Nice! I am working on an editor (based on content-editable) which translates to markdown. If your script handles invalid html I might as well use yours.

<comment><USER11> it relies on the client's html > DOM conversion, so in a sense it does. but it does not have a self-contained html parser.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I still wonder why Markdown is so popular while reStructuredText is not. I find the latter much easier to read, it looks better in both plain and rendered format (and rst2pdf makes nice docs).

<comment><USER14> Markdown is 'lighter' and aimed at the more general case: churning out lightly-formatted text quickly, with as few 'rules' as possible, with page layout concerns addressed by templates defined elsewhere.

reStructuredText is 'heavier' and only really an improvement over Markdown if you're trying to embed page layout into the text. Which fewer people are.

<comment><USER13> You are right. I think I prefer reST because it produces documents. It's not a quick way to add markup, it's a quick way to structure a document (and provide links, sections, inline code etc).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Heh, I did something a year ago to do the opposite - take a plain markdown file and give it some styles.

<http://kevinburke.bitbucket.org/markdowncss/>

HN discussion: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2827892>

</comment><comment><USER16> Same as ReMarkdown? <http://fvsch.com/code/remarkdown/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow, that's really similar with very similar approaches. The internet is a great way to find out you're not very original. I'll add a link to that project from mine.

<comment><USER16> Kudos.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Pretty cool. Would it also be possible to include the markdown markup when copying the text?

<comment><AUTHOR> the after and before pseudo elements are kind of weird. I think for it to work with copy-paste I'd have to include some JS to look at the selection, reverse markdown it, and then get it into your clipboard.

<comment><USER18> Quite frankly that would be the most common useful use case for this, in my opinion. In any case this is some great css hacking!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Finally. A proper use-case for displaying content with the :before selector.

<comment><USER20> Then it's only fitting that the use-case is completely useless.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> I think could be interesting for Phrack as they are (or should be) modernizing their e-zine format.

In that way, the old school boys can still keep their pure-ASCII, and others may wish to apply some other CSS to make it more pleasant to read.

</comment><comment><USER22> Just submitted a pull request to auto-increment the ordered list numbering so it doesn't repeat 1. over and over.

<https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown-css/pull/4>

<comment><USER23> I'm pretty sure that was an intentional design choice to make the text look more like Markdown. Ordered lists increment by default — they went out of their way to disable that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> This is nice. The one use case its missing for me is copy/paste with formatting. Currently I use:

        $ pandoc -f html -t markdown http://example.org/page.htm > page.mdwn

</comment><comment><USER25> If you're interested in this, you should also know about Showdown.js, a library that converts markdown into HTML client-side: <https://github.com/coreyti/showdown>

For an example use, view the source of <http://dergachev.github.com/pin- screenshot-bookmarklet>

</comment><comment><USER26> I'm much better at HTML than Markdown. I totally could use this when I'm forced to write Markdown.

<comment><USER27> You can't, actually. Use Pandoc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Awesome project. Is there anything that can actually convert HTML to Markdown though?

<comment><USER29> I use pandoc[1] for this.

      curl -s example.com | pandoc -f html -t markdown -

[1]: <http://johnmacfarlane.net/pandoc/>

<comment><USER30> This works too:

        pandoc -t markdown http://example.com

<comment><USER29> Nice. Didn't know pandoc can directly read from an URL, even easier.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Just curious, but what version of Opera did you get `:before` & `:after` working on? I was just trying this out on the latest Opera and couldn't get it to work.

<comment><AUTHOR> Works for me on opera 12.14 on Mac OS X. What version and OS are you using?

<comment><USER31> I'm also using 12.14 on OS X 10.7.5

Opera/9.80 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.7.5) Presto/2.12.388 Version/12.14

<comment><AUTHOR> What is it that you're not seeing working? screen shot of how it looks to me in opera: <http://i.imgur.com/7te5TWW.png>

<comment><USER31> I meant regarding the image, but I looked at the code and realized you didn't include it at all. Sorry about the confusion.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Pretty neat and cool! Seeing this i got reminded how awesome markdown is and i just played around with my vim markdown plugin after long time.

</comment><comment><USER33> Cool, but the numbered list has everything lablled as '1.' for me: ff esr 10.0.12

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah, technically markdown doesn't need the numbers to be incremented, so I thought it'd be more fun to explicitly not use counters. Maybe it's too confusing though. There's a discussion about it here: <https://github.com/mrcoles/markdown-css/issues/1>

<comment><AUTHOR> UPDATE: I ended up merging that in and making the ones toggle-able, and then added a toggle link into the demo so you can see both <http://mrcoles.com/demo/markdown-css/>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER34> I find this clever. Use cases aside, it's fun.

</comment><comment><USER35> I don't understand this, Markdown is meant for writing.

Why don't you just output real markdown with something like Jekyll, Markdown Server (node) or Showdown?

<comment><AUTHOR> It's meant as an interesting CSS hack to make markup look like markdown, but still function as regular HTML (including having things like links still work). There are thousands of things that compile markdown to HTML, that's not at all what this does. Try clicking on the different tabs to show the different states or the demo link to the left of them—maybe that'll make more sense?

<comment><USER35> I still don't get it, why should I make something look like markdown when it can be actual markdown. Links work in markdown, you can eve use something like maruku to have html elements (divs, id's etc) in actual markdown.

Markdown is portable, fake markdown isn't.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER36> This is hilarious. Thank you :)

</comment><comment><USER37> Does anybody else think we've come full circle now?

I don't see how this is at all useful. Just upload a .md file.</comment>


Medical journal: "Health behavior models according to sermons of John Paul II" - <AUTHOR> http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=pl&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=pl&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.phie.pl%2Fpdf%2Fphe-2012%2Fphe-2012-1-233.pdf

<comment><AUTHOR> This is a Google translation of a paper published by a Polish medical journal (in Polish, with an English abstract). Despite being an automated translation, it excellently conveys the scientific value of the original text.

The journal in question scores 7 points on a list of journals published by Polish Ministry in Science. For comparison, "Nature" is worth 50 points. Those points subsequently translate to the authors' evaluation factors, affect their chances of obtaining grants, etc.</comment>