Turned off Sprint shuts down cell tower near school over parents cancer concerns - <AUTHOR> https://www.modbee.com/news/article228538324.html <comment><USER2> Close down that school, obviously zero education taking place there...</comment>


DRM/EME in HTML5 - an American thing - <AUTHOR> https://ameliaandersdotter.eu/2013/10/13/drmeme-html5-american-thing <comment><USER2> I find it amusing that everyone is acting like there's no DRM today and this is somehow an attempt at bringing DRM to the Open Web. DRM is already a required and de facto standard for the Open Web -- it's just hiding inside of NPAPI and ActiveX. It's there and it's even worse than DRM because there are no DRM plug-ins that don't bring massive runtimes with them that are the number one cause of security problems on the Web.

(If you do not have Flash or Silverlight today, you are not going to be able to watch restricted content. Pretty much everyone has one or both installed and will happily install it if it's not already on their system.)

Killing NPAPI and ActiveX, which is how DRM integrates with browsers today, and replacing it with a much smaller and considerably safer API is progress at _shrinking_ the proprietary surface of today's real Web.

This is two steps forward and one step back, folks. This is positive evolution.

<comment><USER3> Flash is cross-browser and cross-OS, but I suspect CDMs won't be. Netflix apparently doesn't mind "solving" the resulting fragmentation by encrypting everything N times, but users of other sites may not be so lucky.

<comment><USER4> Flash is only cross-browser and cross-OS for {IE,Firefox,Chrome} on {Windows,MacOS}. It barely works on Linux, doesn't work at all on iOS or modern Android, and is in general a huge barrier to adoption for free software. Not to mention its rich history of security vulnerabilities. The only reason Flash hasn't been completely abandoned yet is because it's currently the only widely-supported option for DRM.

Anyone who has worked extensively with legacy software can tell you that the procedure for removing a deeply hated but heavily used piece of code is:

1\. Wrap the entire mess in a giant API.

2\. Reduce that giant API over time by rewriting bits of the mess in clean new code.

3\. Eventually you will have a few remnants that can't be rewritten, safely contained behind a minimal API like rotten food in a garbage bag.

4\. Wait until the market forces requiring (3) are obsolete, which may take years.

5\. Throw away the bag.

(1) is NPAPI and ActiveX. (2) is <audio>, <video>, <canvas>. (3) is EME, the trash bag that will let us isolate DRM from the rest of the browser. Don't fight against it on the basis of hating garbage. Everyone hates garbage, it's just that we're more interested in watching House Of Cards than in throwing it out right now.

<comment><USER5> Flash at least is a known quantity — it is possible to license to port to one's own platform (assuming one can reach agreement with Adobe on licensing terms), as was done for the Nintendo Wii (the port being done by Opera Software). Will the EME plugins (and EME doesn't even have a defined API, unlike NPAPI and PPAPI — so will likely be browser-specific even when they are available) be able to be ported by third parties?

An argument such as that can quite probably be made to build a business case against EME for a lot of device manufacturers shipping embedded browsers.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Wow! That make us wonder how Sweden(and Germany?) are advanced and sophisticated in technological policies over the rest of us; They got people from the pirate-party elected to the congress already? look at the all the issues they are discussing, and the high-level of the discussions..

Meanwhile, our governments or are in bed with the corporations or are unprepared to deal with their lobby in a way that dont hurt people, innovation, fair competition and democracy..

She has an X ray vision to this complicated issue and make someone who understand all the danger that come from this evil game of monopoly, feel more safe to have a good and prepared parliament to defend the interests of the people the way she is doing..

I think that is an example of what our democracies need to breath a new, revigorating air, and get stronger again with the faith and trust of the people

<comment><USER7> _Meanwhile, our governments or are in bed with the corporations or are unprepared to deal with their lobby in a way that dont hurt people, innovation, fair competition and democracy.._

If you think politics in Europe (at the local, national and european level) doesn't have political corruption, I've got a bridge I can sell you.

<comment><USER6> ha! ok.. That's definitely spread all over the world, unfortunately we are not free from the spooks yet.. but what i meant is that they are a step further.. and think that countries with stronger industries and big lobby groups will have a hard time to elect and create real politics that can benefit the interests of the population in the digital rights ground..

So its not that they are not suffering from the same diseases of the democracies all over the world.. its the observation that by electing this class of representatives, prepared for the XXI century and the digital age, they are more prepared against those evil and corrosive effects on governments imposed by a industry formed in the XX century and with a hard time to adapt to new times

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I find the funniest part of all of this DRM browser talk is that the people most in favor of this kind of standardized DRM are pirates. It's fairly easy to see why when you look at the obvious point that any DRM running client side can be cracked. By standardizing it into the browser, you only need to crack a single thing - the browser DRM module - and then you will have free and unrestricted access to all of the DRM content with no additional work.

It's the same way PS2 piracy was so rampant. You only needed to install a simple mod chip into your PS2, and since all of the DRM relied on that, you could now run every game with no additional work. It created something of a golden age for gaming piracy and the PS2 actually remains popular today in certain regions because of it.

So standardizing DRM into the browser is a huge boon for pirates, and a problem waiting to happen for everyone else. The stupidity is sometimes mind- blowing.

<comment><USER9> The hardware and the OS will hold the DRM, as far as I understand. That means that if say pirates break the DRM on Windows, Microsoft can patch it by next Tuesday.

That being said DRM by default in browsers (through EME) is probably the end of the "open web" \- or at the very least the end of a "clean open web", meaning that everything will need to be hacked and cracked to make it work. Want to copy text or an image from a website? You'll have to find the crack for that website. Not to mention that doing that will be soon declared illegal (if it's not already from the moment DRM is applied to something).

<comment> w0rd-driven This. I don't get why so many comments gloss over the fact that this isn't just about Netflix types of content, but something as simple as "view source" becomes banned outright. Its a step above when sites restrict right clicks because damn that image/whatever is off the hizzy and needs "protection"

Minification and obfuscation have often been enough so far but the slope we're sliding down is pretty steep and if TBL wants us at the bottom a lot of people are just going to follow suit. As someone who's finally embracing that development is increasingly being pushed to the web over native devices, I'm likely to be looking for yet another career shift (first from IT to software dev) before its all said and done. I do not look forward to debugging DRM when I already loathe minified JavaScript. Tooling is already abysmally slow in spite of Chrome's excellent dev tools (unmatched by any other browser or plugin IMO).

While I do understand the concept of protecting IP, this measure is inherently flawed right out of the gate. I'd honestly rather keep archaic Flash and not- so-archaic Silverlight around because at least their tooling is decent. I can't wait another 10+ years for this to catch up because everyone is foolishly starting from 0, not building on their successes (however much or little you define).

<comment><USER10> Comments 'gloss over it' because that's not what this fight is about. EME does not allow disabling 'view source' (unless I've completely misunderstood it). It's a step down the DRM road, but assuming that taking one step that way means we'll inevitably go the rest of the way seems hyperbolic.

<comment> w0rd-driven [https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/10/lowering-your- standard...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/10/lowering-your-standards) is where I got the 'view source' line. If its hyperbolic, the EFF does a very good job of pushing it.

I thought another article pointed blocking the command out in the spec but I could be totally wrong there. Even so, nothing is stopping anyone from building a dumb front end and placing the entirety of the logic in the DRM container. Netflix isn't an argument in countries where it doesn't apply, like much of the world. View source and the actual openness of the web would be that argument, however. If its a concoction made up by what the EFF believes this fight would go versus an actual result of the fight as it stands, then I sadly fell for it pretty hard. Its not a difficult leap to make but I'm definitely more interested in facts over opinion based on someone's failing attempt at predicting the future.

<comment><USER10> I think the EFF is engaging in some FUD themselves on this. There's some other project exploring ways to protect source code of web applications, and the EFF suggests that, now that the W3C has touched some form of DRM, that will be able to push a way for sites to disable 'view source'. I don't think that's realistic - minification and copyright work well enough to protect JS code already. I'm disappointed that the EFF is resorting to scare tactics like this rather than debating the actual issue at hand.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I don't understand why they are pushing drm when they could implement a webbytecode (ie. the v8 ast as a loadable blob) and just do the drm on their own dime.

<comment><USER4> 1\. The only way to have even somewhat secure Digital Restrictions Management is to have some proprietary binary on the local machine which can authenticate itself to the display device. This requires a level of access permission which you do _not_ want to provide to the web in general.

2\. If the DRM blob were delivered via the web, then it would be trivially easy to connect through a proxy that delivered its own ineffective DRM blob. Content companies would not accept this solution.

3\. The goal of EME is not to increase the number of people who can access restricted content, it's to provide a replacement for the rapidly collapsing Flash Player pseudo-standard. The various content companies require their distributors to use something at least as good as Flash, but YouTube et al know that Flash probably won't exist in a few years, so the race is on to see which replacement will dominate the market.

\---

The basic position of EME opponents appears to be that if we refuse to allow DRM modules in browsers, then the companies pushing DRM will give up and let us watch unrestricted video. This position, in my opinion, is fantastically optimistic.

If EME is blocked, then these companies will either start distributing their own customized locked-down applications ("You must install the Netflix Player to watch this movie"), or will work privately with the major proprietary browser platforms (IE, Safari, Android Chrome, ChromeOS) to implement what they demand. Firefox and Chrom{e,ium} will be left out in the cold, and the advancement of the open web will se a significant setback.

<comment><USER12> > If EME is blocked, then these companies will either start distributing their > own customized locked-down applications ("You must install the Netflix > Player to watch this movie"), or will work privately with the major > proprietary browser platforms (IE, Safari, Android Chrome, ChromeOS) to > implement what they demand. Firefox and Chrom{e,ium} will be left out in the > cold, and the advancement of the open web will se a significant setback.

First thing, Chrome is a proprietary browser platform. Only Chromium should be in the last sentence. I believe Chrome already ships with EME; I am not sure if that includes Google's DRM plugin for it as well, but if not then that is soon to come as well. Chrome already ships with various other proprietary code (Flash, SwiftShader, a PDF reader, etc.) so this would not be a new thing.

Google and Microsoft have been developing proprietary DRM plugins, with Netflix and Hollywood, for their browsers. EME is just a generic API to those plugins. So your comparison of what will happen with vs. without EME appears flawed: in both cases, only proprietary browsers that include DRM plugins, which are the result of private collaboration with Netflix and Hollywood, will be able to access content. And yes, that would leave out open source browsers like Firefox and Chromium - with or without EME.

I also disagree with the premise underlying

> The basic position of EME opponents appears to be that if we refuse to allow > DRM modules in browsers, then the companies pushing DRM will give up and let > us watch unrestricted video. This position, in my opinion, is fantastically > optimistic.

I agree to the conclusion - that it is highly optimistic to see Hollywood quickly move to unrestricted video. But you are assuming there is no other option. There are in fact several:

1\. Watermarking as an alternative to DRM, that achieves similar results.

2\. Non-proprietary DRM solutions, either standardized (which EME does nothing for, intentionally) or done in web content (HTML5). Those would not be as secure as proprietary binary blobs (what EME assumes), but could still prevent 99% of casual piracy - and professional piracy isn't stopped even by the blobs.

3\. Eventual movement to unrestricted video, perhaps after a period of using 1 and/or 2. We saw this in music, it took a while, but sanity prevailed.

<comment><USER4>
      > First thing, Chrome is a proprietary browser platform.
      > Only Chromium should be in the last sentence. I believe
      > Chrome already ships with EME; I am not sure if that
      > includes Google's DRM plugin for it as well, but if not
      > then that is soon to come as well. Chrome already ships
      > with various other proprietary code (Flash, SwiftShader,
      > a PDF reader, etc.) so this would not be a new thing.

I want to distinguish between a browser platform, where the browser is considered an integral part of the underlying OS, and standalone web browsers. Chrome and Firefox are regular applications, they do not (yet?) feature the deep OS integration that would be necessary to implement functional digital restrictions.

Google's DRM plugin is currently available for both Firefox and Chrome through the standard Netscape plugin API, but is not bundled with either browser.

      > in both cases, only proprietary browsers that include
      > DRM plugins, which are the result of private
      > collaboration with Netflix and Hollywood, will be able
      > to access content. And yes, that would leave out open
      > source browsers like Firefox and Chromium - with or
      > without EME.

If I'm reading the EME spec correctly, then EME plugins can be installable by the end user in the same way that Netscape plugins are today. Assuming the browser chooses to implement the plugin system, both Firefox and Chromium ought to be able to use DRM plugins from the system.

      > 2. Non-proprietary DRM solutions, either standardized
      > (which EME does nothing for, intentionally) or done in
      > web content (HTML5). Those would not be as secure as
      > proprietary binary blobs (what EME assumes), but could
      > still prevent 99% of casual piracy - and professional
      > piracy isn't stopped even by the blobs.

Any non-proprietary DRM solution would not be able to stop even casual piracy. The casual pirate will search for [download netflix movie], click the first link, install a browser extension, and get a one-step piracy button right in their browser.

That's what content companies are terrified of, and any DRM system that can't stop this sort of pirate will not be accepted.

      > 3. Eventual movement to unrestricted video, perhaps
      > after a period of using 1 and/or 2. We saw this in
      > music, it took a while, but sanity prevailed.

We have not seen a victory for free formats in music. The majority of music online is still distributed wrapped in layers of digital restrictions (e.g. Pandora, Spotify) or in patent-encumbered formats (e.g. iTunes, Google Play, Amazon).

<comment><USER13> > If I'm reading the EME spec correctly, then EME plugins can be installable > by the end user in the same way that Netscape plugins are today.

They can be, but neither the browser vendors nor the content providers have to allow them to be, and the EME spec doesn't standardise any equivalent of NPAPI that standardises the interface between them and the browser. Browser vendors can (and it appears will in some cases, e.g. Internet Explorer) only support EME modules supplied by them and compiled into the browser binary; this is anticipated by the spec.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> She makes a good point. Netflix doesn't work at all in Australia. This is very much an American thing.</comment>


Acoustic 3D: The Most Immersive Audio Experience You Can Get - <AUTHOR> http://www.novede.com/2012/03/04/1330858611/acoustic-3d

<comment><AUTHOR> Before anyone starts to discount this, you must hear them.

When I first heard about these, I thought they were very much going to be like a gimmick. Personally they blew my mind, but make your mind up after you hear them.</comment>


Moving Freenode Webchat to Kiwi IRC - <AUTHOR> https://freenode.net/news/moving-to-kiwiirc <comment><USER2> I sure hope freenode's kiwi will use a monospaced font. The "try me" on kiwiirc.com uses a proportional sans, which is horrible for IRC.

<comment><AUTHOR> Go to settings (the cog icon in top left corner), tick the "Use monospace" box in the topmost section "General". It remembers your settings across sessions.

<comment><USER2> oh—thank you!</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What is the worst thing about Google search? - <AUTHOR> Hey everyone,
I hate google search when I am using it for learning a subject. It is hard to find relevant and time worthy resources, because there are a lot of fluff/SEO content out there.
I have to open dozens of tabs and check them to find 1 great content. Such a waste of time.
What's yours? <comment><USER2> The fact the search engine seems to think it knows what you want better than you do. The amount of times I'll enter a query and get results which have nothing to do with said query is astounding, especially when the result crosses out an important word and says it matches one of the others instead.

Or when I enter a phrase and they think it's a typo despite not actually being one, giving me a whole bunch of irrelevant results related to the 'corrected' term in the process.

<comment><USER3> I agree; that is one of the problems.

I don't know which problem is "worse", but that is certainly one of them. Queries don't work properly, due to that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Google is pretty good. Here are the things I find frustrating:

1) It tries to guess what I mean, and it's hard to make it change its mind. I was searching for a specific thing and Google decided I was looking for clothing brand in this colour. In the past adding or removing words, using the + (or "") or - operators would help, but I couldn't find the right combination this time.

2) Sometimes I want to search for results from a different country in a different language and I don't know how to do this. Google seems to really want to only push English language results to me. I don't know if /ncr is still a thing.

3) There's a bunch of heavily SEO'd content that's sort of okay but not great, and a bunch of content that's great but hidden.

4) Google really wants you to use natural language queries. So when you're fault-finding a problem you type a question into the search box. This will return many people asking that same question, but often they will not have got an answer. I don't need to be linked to a closed, with no answers, Stack exchange question, or a forum when OP says "never mind, fixed it" with no more details.

5) Google has decided to de-prioritise certain types of link. If you search for torrents Google has chosen to put other stuff in the first few pages. I think I'd prefer it if they just said "nope, we don't do those links" than what they do at the moment. Try searching for pirate versions of Pozner and Dodd's _Cross-Examination Science and Techniques_ and you get a lot of links, but they're all terrible. They all lead to malware infested sites, or sites that are part of a weird complicated network that don't provide any content, but cause you to spend some time finding that out.

</comment><comment><USER5> It's lack of PRIVACY! Here are some good alternatives IMHO. [https://www.ecosia.org/](https://www.ecosia.org/) [https://www.startpage.com/](https://www.startpage.com/) (uses Google but respects privacy) [https://www.qwant.com/](https://www.qwant.com/) [https://duckduckgo.com/](https://duckduckgo.com/)

</comment><comment><USER6> You can't give feedback about the search results.

You can't opt out of advertisement results.

They link you to their amp pages, again, with no choice.

You get news and trending results when you were looking for something more factual.

You can't give feedback about the search results.

Search results are at the whim of SEO and not usefulness.

Sometimes Clickbait.

Search operators are much less useful than they were before.

Etc..

<comment><AUTHOR> SEO thing frustrates me, there are too many SEO optimized bullshit content out there. I am so unhappy that I have to waste a lot of time to dodge from them while I am trying to learn something. Maybe human and machine partnership can create better solution.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The interface. I switched to DDG because Google results are large boxes with pictures that are taxing to scan and take a lot of screen space on mobile.

For learning I don't go to a general search engine. I search Wikipedia first. If I'm trying to find a code library I search GitHub first, etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> DDG have great privacy rules but not so great results on search :( I have always end up with more irrelevant results while I am using ddg

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> That it's turned from a search engine into a shopping portal and there are certain things you simply can't search for because Google assumes you must be going shopping.

<comment><USER9> Or because they're censoring search results for one reason or another.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> 9,999,999 results in .0000009 seconds.

Result 1: not even close

Result 2: that's the opposite of what I asked

Result 3: not even close

</comment><comment><USER10> The most annoying 'easy' fix is I'd like an easy way to stop domains showing. I used some extension in the past but it doesn't work now. Would be great if Google had a drop down next to results saying 'dont show this domain' for future searches. Probably useful data for their algorithm too.

</comment><comment><USER11> Mediocre sites aided by purchased links are returned instead of great sites with excellent content.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yep, my initial problem was this. For instance, I was trying to learn product market fit, but the results I found on google was terrible.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Many of these complaints listed here are valid, but another one is that it executes JavaScript code on the web page to find the text, and I don't want it to do that.

</comment><comment><USER12> The sense that I'm being shielded from dangerous ideas.

<comment><AUTHOR> What ahaha, do you mean they do sensorship?</comment></comment>


Responses to: On Redis master-slave terminology - <AUTHOR> http://disq.us/p/29wze0r <comment><USER2> The master vs main is a good shibboleth as it identifies those who are only interested in making irrelevant performative changes to make themselves feel better

<comment><USER3> There's a lot of truth to this. When I ask such a person what they're _really_ willing to sacrifice to improve the situation, it's crickets. Talk is cheap.

Aside from that, if we _must_ change the terminology, can we at least all change it to the _same_ new terminology. The last thing we need is 20 new euphemisms.</comment></comment>


Feedly Pro - <AUTHOR> http://www.theverge.com/2013/8/5/4589764/feedly-pro-premium-subscription-article-search-evernote

<comment><AUTHOR> The saddest part is that they are offering HTTPS only for Pro accounts.</comment>


Video of the Big Think search panel with Google, Bing, and Blekko - <AUTHOR> http://bigthink.com/ideas/26756

<comment><USER2> Matt, you are way too close to this dispute. You need to take a step back from the debacle and try to see it from the user perspective.

The real company motto of Google is simply, "Be Creepy." Even your CEO Eric Schmidt has said as much. Google will track people and invade privacy in every way it believes it can get away with. That is just the Faustian bargain every person makes when using Google.

Microsoft simply implemented another way to be creepy, invade privacy and track users that Google didn't think they could get away with or Google would have implemented the same. Sadly, Microsoft is actually getting away with it.

Both Google and Microsoft are creepy. Both companies spy on people for numerous reasons including for the sake of improving search results.

Now here is the tough question; Why do you believe Google has some sort of moral high-ground in this dispute when Google would do the same if they could get away with it?

The difficult part about posting this pointed question is I'm actually a big fan of all the hard and important work you do removing scam and spam sites from the Google search results. Though I may be critical of some of the practices of your company, you personally have my respect for the good stuff you do.

</comment><comment><USER3> Thanks for sharing the video Matt - I wrote a summary of my thoughts from an SEO perspective here:

[http://www.seomoz.org/blog/summary-of-the-futuresearch- talk-...](http://www.seomoz.org/blog/summary-of-the-futuresearch-talk-with- google-bing-blekko)

I was fascinated by Bing's hints that an author's authority might not be tied to a specific domain. Don't suppose there's any chance you could share Google's thoughts on this Matt?

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Some people on HN might be interested in the points that Rich Skrenta makes at 31 minutes in, and then the follow-up (which finishes at 32:25).</comment>


Big mouth in the front - <AUTHOR> http://www.37signals.com/svn/images/time-big.jpg <comment><AUTHOR> <http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1622565,00.html>

<comment><USER2> "To help build Basecamp, Campfire and the company's other core applications, Hansson developed Ruby on Rails. It gives 37signals' software a consistent look: sleek, friendly and without the extraneous bells and whistles that plague much of the bloated software sold by larger companies."

I didn't know that Rails came with a built in "look".</comment></comment>


Could Ancient Remedies Hold the Answer to the Looming Antibiotics Crisis? - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/18/magazine/could-ancient-remedies-hold-the-answer-to-the-looming-antibiotics-crisis.html <comment><USER2> Plants are a poor resource to mine in comparison to bacteria. There are way more bacteria, they evolve much more rapidly, and they spend much of their time trying to kill each other.

The historical problem with mining the bacterial world has been that only about 1% of all bacterial species can be cultured in the laboratory. That was solved a couple of years ago with an ingenious low-tech approach called the Ichip. The people who solved it went on an ad-hoc, short fishing expedition and found a new viable antibiotic candidate the first time they tried. [1]

The future of antibiotics, like the future of a large chunk of drug development, is thus going to involve mining bacteria for the weapons they use on one another and the tools they use to eat things. We'll never run out of those, and we'll have more candidates than we know what to do with once people make a serious go of using the new methods of culturing bacteria. [2]

[1]: [http://www.the- scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/41850/...](http://www.the- scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/41850/title/New-Antibiotic-from-Soil- Bacteria/)

[2]: [https://www.edge.org/response- detail/26701](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/26701)

</comment><comment><USER3> looking for biologics in plants is really nothing new. Done intelligently, you're exploiting 4.5 billion years worth of pre-optimization. Done poorly, you're selling herbal supplement snake oil with no oversight or meaningful regulation.

The last big hit was about a half-century ago, too, so it's no magic bullet. [1,2] >natural products aren't dead, by any means. But they aren't an untouched gold mine, either.

You'll get interesting hits, but the overall success rate for developing a reasonable drug out of them is still about 2% overall.

Sometimes (see: tramadol[0]), you can also confuse reuptake with production, and wind up concluding the wrong thing.

[0]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tramadol#Pin_cushion_tree](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tramadol#Pin_cushion_tree) [1]: [http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2016/04/19/gri...](http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2016/04/19/grinding- up-the-leaves-and-roots) [2]: [http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2008/01/04/pla...](http://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2008/01/04/plants_for_cancer)

<comment><USER4> > Done poorly, you're selling herbal supplement snake oil with no oversight or > meaningful regulation.

For obvious reasons though, the plants and mushrooms with the longest histories of antibiotic use tend to be the easiest to identify. I find it generally really difficult to learn new species from field guides, but most of the stuff with antibiotic properties is pretty trivial to identify even without joining your local mycological association or native plant society.

E.g. plantago, one of the plants they are making a big deal about in the article, is almost certainly growing within a hundred yards of wherever you happen to be if you're anywhere in North America, Europe, or Asia. So yeah, while it's completely criminal that big box retailers are allowed to sell fake herbal medicines with impunity, I also think that people generally have a moral obligation to learn something about their local plants and fungi anyway.

<comment><USER5> >> "...almost certainly growing within a hundred yards of wherever you happen to be if you're anywhere in North America..."

That's intriguing. Still true in downtown Manhattan?

<comment><USER4> > Still true in downtown Manhattan?

Absolutely. Just look in the grass of any park, or in any vacant lot, or even near the base of many street trees. Basically it's impossible to go anywhere with disturbed soil or grass without finding them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> There is also phage therapy.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_therapy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phage_therapy) [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/yGJ6MtYrP2S0gjssltQ...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/yGJ6MtYrP2S0gjssltQBS2/could- viruses-called-bacteriophages-be-the-answer-to-the-antibiotic-crisis)

<comment><USER7> One problem with phage therapy is that your immune system will still seek out and destroy phages, even though they aren't capable of infecting your cells.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Related:

[http://www.sciencealert.com/1-000-year-old-onion-and- garlic-...](http://www.sciencealert.com/1-000-year-old-onion-and-garlic- remedy-kills-antibiotic-resistant-bugs)

People 1000 years ago were smart, and understood "scientific" practices such as trial and error, running multiple experiments, etc. Since they had little way to communicate with peers, the scientific revolution had to wait another 800 or so years.

</comment><comment><USER9> Increasing antibiotic resistance isn't inevitable. Norway has placed strict limits on antibiotic usage, and as a result, effectiveness of drugs like penicillin is coming back [1].

All we have to do to solve our problems is behave sensibly.

[1] [http://www.cbsnews.com/news/when-drugs-stop-working- norways-...](http://www.cbsnews.com/news/when-drugs-stop-working-norways- answer/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Strange: after describing all the roadblocks to development (money, indifference by pharmaceutical companies; government requirements; resistance by regulators to anything labeled 'traditional') they mentioned how they'd _added their own obstacle_ : the new international Convention on Biological Diversity that requires companies to negotiate with traditional healers for compensation.

</comment><comment><USER11> Wonderful article, thanks for posting.

It seems like a race against time, with much of the wisdom accumulated over centuries lost as people move into cities, and with a lot of biodiversity being destroyed.

Would be great if the proven natural remedies were compiled into a clean, peer-reviewed database, free to use. I also wonder if it's possible to automate the discovery and testing much further than currently

<comment><USER12> > Would be great if the proven natural remedies were compiled into a clean, > peer-reviewed database, free to use

'Proven' in this context means 'FDA-approved', but regulation in the US basically _only_ encourages development of novel, patentable pharmaceutical compounds at the expense of everything else.

Because only _novel_ compounds and formulations can be patented, there is zero incentive for any company to do research on plant medicinals: they wouldn't be able to recoup the cost of the research (people can just go buy the actual plant supplement, even if the company patented a different formulation).

Because only deep-pocketed pharma companies seek FDA approval for drugs, the regulatory apparatus has over time gotten more and more expensive and rigid. I believe even getting a drug to Stage 3 trials is in the tens of millions of dollars. This very high barrier to entry further forces pharmaceutical companies to only invest in drugs that will be highly profitable ('blockbusters'). ([http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2012/04/25/how- the...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2012/04/25/how-the-fda- stifles-new-cures-part-ii-90-of-clinical-trial-costs-are-incurred-in-phase- iii/#65af6acb41e8))

Because of the close relationship between pharmaceutical companies and doctors, it's often a large professional risk for a doctor to prescribe a supplement to a patient. If something goes wrong, the local medical board can and will go after doctors for not going with FDA approved guidelines for treatment. That's why to even see a doctor who will prescribe supplements, in the US you often have to look for a 'naturopath'.

TL;DR: regulation that favors new compounds -> no profit incentive to look at plant compounds -> no group that will lobby for change -> regulation that favors new compounds

Just as a counterpoint, herbal medicines in China are widely available, very cheap, and there is a large amount of government-funded research into which plants have what compounds and what they do. Doctors are also allowed to prescribe them and routinely do. Obviously, it helped that there was a developed system of medicine in China before Western medicine arrived.

This is somewhat similar to the status of Kampo medicine in Japan ('Kampo' literally means 'Han prescription'), except Kampo medicine isn't under as active development.

By no means is the system in China is perfect -- there's probably under- regulation of the 'patent medicine' system and a lot of low quality crap sold to the public. But at the end of the day, a large class of pharmaceutically active and relevant medicinal compounds aren't simply excluded because they don't mesh well with the basic assumptions of the regulatory apparatus.

<comment><USER11> Yeah. I don't think FDA-approved will ever happen for a majority of the substances, since it's too expensive.

Perhaps "proven" could just be several independent studies showing something works in a certain way. Even if most doctors were not able to use the database initially in their daily work, it would still be valuable to researchers.

TCM - I'm not overly familiar with it, but I think an ideal system today would need to be subject to much more rigorous scientific examination in terms of what works and what doesn't. Traditional medicine and folklore can greatly reduce the search space of plant compounds, but probably isn't enough on it's own.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I got as far as the paragraph where they are hoping to _create new drugs_ from these plants as their brilliant solution to the fact that drugs are our new problem. I stopped there.

 _We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them._

\- Albert Einstein

</comment><comment><USER14> What about phage therapy(1)? Why does it seem to be completely ignored in the west?

1: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacteriophage#Phage_therapy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacteriophage#Phage_therapy)

<comment><USER12> At least in the US, the regulatory framework and medical system is heavily biased towards mass-produced pharmaceuticals.

Biological agents like phages have a much higher regulatory hurdle to clear (you need to show that they won't develop virulence), and they have also been traditionally harder to administer than drugs (e.g. phage therapy ideally requires a sample of the infectious agent and individualized identification of phage species).

Basically once we discovered penicillin, it was so cheap, effective, and easy to distribute, that we built a medical system premised on developing new drugs, and dropped most alternatives. It's very hard to turn back the clock.

FYI, one reason phage therapy continued to be developed in Eastern Europe was less widespread availability of antibiotics at the time.

<comment><USER14> This makes a lot of sense but with superbug bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics, wouldn't phage be a solution?

It looks as though we're not even considering them, while people are of MRSA etc...

<comment><USER12> We don't know that phages are a solution until a whole bunch of money has been spent trying it, but the system currently discourages the research.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


California's job growth defies predictions after tax increases - <AUTHOR> http://www.sacbee.com/2014/07/20/6564879/states-job-growth-defies-predictions.html <comment><USER2> Yes, there is still a net migration to California, and tax increases are unlikely to just kill it, but it is also revealing how many bigger businesses are relocating to elsewhere, like Texas or Tennessee.

Both Google and Apple has lots of HR people in Texas.

The Japanese auto manufacturers have since left SoCal, too:

[http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/28/us-autos-toyota- mo...](http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/04/28/us-autos-toyota-motor- torrance-idUSBREA3R1EW20140428)

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/dalebuss/2014/04/27/it-makes- sen...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/dalebuss/2014/04/27/it-makes-sense-for- toyota-to-leave-california-for-texas/)

"254 companies left California in 2011":

[http://www.ocregister.com/articles/moved-342887-companies- te...](http://www.ocregister.com/articles/moved-342887-companies-texas.html)

The housing prices in the greater SF Bay Area are simply ridiculous (even in the South Bay, where there's lots of empty or unused land, and East Bay, where there are few high-paid job opportunities), the housing and land speculation is quite out of hand.

<comment><USER3> Actually net migration is negative for California within the United States -- 93,915 more people are leaving California for other US states than arriving there. Now, immigration, generally from poor countries, is still flowing through California but that does not mean that California is a more desirable place to live or raise a family in the middle-class, compared to other U.S. states. [http://www.governing.com/gov-data/census/2010-census- state-m...](http://www.governing.com/gov-data/census/2010-census-state- migration-statistics.html)

<comment><USER4> You mean the poor Chinese migrant worker who is making $250K a year? Oh, and he can buy a house in some places for around $500-750K (assume east bay somewhere), which is way cheaper than Shanghai/Beijing.

California is definitely desirable in terms of climate, quality of life, and job opportunities (if in tech); whether you can afford to live there is another matter.

<comment><USER3> Perhaps in the Bay Area, but California-wide most of the newcomers are not highly paid skilled workers from China.

California is a wonderful state, but mostly for the rich or early arrivals.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Headline should read "A single piece of uncontrolled data influenced by numerous causes must mean what I think it means".

This article isn't information in the sense it doesn't tell us anything new about the world except that one event happened to be in line with the author's pre-existing opinion. Nobody seriously thinks that a tax increase, small relative to the entire economy, can stand in the face of all the various economic forces by itself.

<comment><USER6> I think you missed the point, ie: refuting the dire predictions of the anti- tax crowd, none of which came to pass. This will no doubt fail to stop the usual hue and cry in the future, as that particular demographic seems to be evidence proof.

<comment><USER7> The evidence given by the article (job growth numbers) is insufficient to prove whether the tax hike killed jobs or not. It's quite possible that the effect is negative, as claimed by taxpayers associations, but that it's small, so the larger positive effect of the current tech boom dominates the total.

A good economist would try to hold more things constant to tease out whether the effect exists. Maybe break down the job growth numbers by area of the state (not all areas are in a tech boom, but all would face the same state tax policy). Or break it down by industry (have non-tech companies lost jobs?). Or break it down by size of company (since the opponents claimed that small businesses would be particularly hard hit).

<comment><USER8> > The evidence given by the article (job growth numbers) is insufficient to > prove whether the tax hike killed jobs or not. It's quite possible that the > effect is negative, as claimed by taxpayers associations, but that it's > small, so the larger positive effect of the current tech boom dominates the > total.

Um, no, science doesn't work that way.

Anti-tax folks made predictions. Those predictions did not come to pass. That's a negative result. The anti-tax predictions have been _falsified_ with some level of confidence.

It is _NOT_ required for pro-tax position to be proven true in order for the anti-tax position to be proven false.

Let's be clear. The anti-tax people did not make a prediction of "might be too small to measure"; they made a prediction of _doomsday_ which has proven to be false.

And, if your position is, this is sufficiently small that it got swamped, then your anti-tax hypothesis is _STILL_ false.

Consequently, raising taxes is useful because A) the downsides appear quite limited (too small to measure) and B) the upsides are quite significant.

<comment><USER9> >Um, no, science doesn't work that way.

I'm hard pressed to believe you can apply any sort of "science" to macroeconomics - its way to hard too isolate a single variable.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> If you take 3% more away from a million+ earner, they don't spend less on personal luxuries. They spend less on investment.

So that is 3% that is not being spent on expanding production. (i.e. "Making the economic pie bigger.")

Yes, the government will spend the money somewhere else, but typically it will go almost entirely to consumption, instead. That is redistributing the pie, rather than growing it.

Note that growing the pie lowers the cost of things, so it inherently benefits everyone. There is no such thing as growing the pie and only benefiting the rich.

In fact, not growing the pie disproportionately hurts the less well off. While the rich forego investments, the poor forego things that actually make their lives better.

<comment><USER11> Trickle down economics have been AFAIK demonstrated to be false. But that will be hard to argue with someone who judging by his HN about section is an Ayn Rand fan.

<comment><USER12> In Economics nothing is ever "demonstrated to be false." There are just various schools of thoughts with their various detractors and supporters. Sure, some of those schools of thought are more popular at one time or another, but none are ever "demonstrated to be false." It is only in politics and news that claims will be made to that effect. There is evidence to support pretty much every school of thought, and evidence to contradict it. Liberals, in particular, like to make this claim--but the jury is still out, and likely will be for...well, ever.

<comment><USER11> Ok, I guess I should have said 'have not been demonstrated to be true'. I'd like to see some recent peer-reviewed study that has shown that trickle down economics does work then. Of course it won't be conclusive.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I think the point being missed here is that without tax increases the job growth could have been even more higher.

Also marginal tax increase is not going to reduce job marginally but it will be a more drastic change down the line.</comment>


Clojure on Google App Engine  - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/gcv/appengine-magic <comment><USER2> I'm the author of appengine-magic. Rather flattered to see this on the front page of HN. If you have any questions about appengine-magic, or running Clojure on App Engine, I'll answer as best I can.

One thing to keep in mind: the latest version of the App Engine SDK is fully supported in the development (version 0.4.0) branch of appengine-magic (<https://github.com/gcv/appengine-magic/tree/v0.4.0>). I'm not quite ready to finalize and release this branch, but it's stable enough for in-development applications.

<comment><USER3> To only thing that is missing is a small example application that uses your library and showes all the things working in works with each other.

<comment><USER2> Yes. :) I also really need to find time to record a screencast.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I recently built a simple site on this library (my experiences described here: <http://www.thurn.ca/version_10_of_the_ackbar_blog_engine>) and found it quite pleasant to work with, although there were a few Google API problems. GCV was also very helpful about answering my questions about the framework.

<comment><USER3> Ah very nice I was looking for a blog engine in clojure. I will defently look at that.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Clojure for GAE is nice. Its really cool that you can use this library with all ring-bases webframeworks (witch are basiclly all clojure webframeworks).

I don't now how python is for the appengine but clojure is much more better then java. The leiningen plugin that this library provieds is great.

<comment><USER5> Have you actually tried using clojure? Last I heard, relying on a large jar like clojure meant you spent 29 of your request's 30 seconds loading the jar and had only 1 second to do real work before GAE killed you.

<comment><USER2> I'm looking at a live App Engine console for the Clojure app I'm working on right now, and I see cold-start JVM times varying from 3 to 10 seconds. Although this is a lot, with the latest App Engine, you can (1) pay $9/month to have 3 JVMs always running, and (2) your app receives warm-start requests which will cause a new JVM to start before it's needed.

In other words, your users should (almost?) never pay the penalty for a JVM cold-start. A single JVM stays around to serve requests as long as App Engine detects sufficient load to justify the resource usage.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I find the creation of the body text kinda ugly. Isn't Clojure a way to make code easier to read and write? Why does the body look so ugly?

<comment><USER2> The example in the README is intentionally minimalistic: it relies on no external libraries. The Clojure ecosystem has several highly respected libraries for handling server-side templates, e.g., Enlive and Hiccup. All work fine with appengine-magic.

<comment><USER6> Thanks for the info. You might want to consider adding some to your 'startup kit'

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I'm still not sold on Clojure because of the syntax aesthetics but this is a surprisingly mature and complete project. Looks like it's been in active development for 8 months now.

<comment><USER8> I don't want to start flame war on lisp syntax again, but you may find clojure syntax more usable/readable after installing proper plugins for managing lisp code. Personally (as an emacs user) use highlight-parentheses-mode (each level of nested parens gets a different colour) and paredit (provides closing paren for each new you open, helps with joining/splitting expresions). I know there are also similar plugins for vim and eclipse (I'm not sure about paredit here). I was actually surprised when I started using them how much they help me.

<comment><USER3> I started emacs with clojure too. Paredit reallly rocks and is really easy. Some paredit function are so useful that I use paredit for other languages to here is the chatcheat <http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/PareditCheatsheet>.

Emacs has paredit or like 90% of it. Its written in clojure and you can use it as a library (<https://github.com/laurentpetit/paredit.clj>).

Im not sure about vim. It has nice rainbow parens (each level of nested parens gets a different colour).

<comment><USER9> I use VIM to code in Clojure. I don't have paredit [1] but I don't find it really necessary, I can live just with rainbow parentheses and paren-matching (not to say that I would not find it useful if I had it).

[1] When I set up my Vim for Clojure development I made some research and I never saw it mentioned anywhere, so I think it's not available.

<comment><USER8> I am pretty sure there is paredit-like mode for vim, because I actually used it for some time. It seems that it is part of slimv [1] now, however I recall using it without setting up slimv.

[1] <http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=2531></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Memory profiling in Haskell - <AUTHOR> http://blog.pusher.com/memory-profiling-in-haskell/ <comment><AUTHOR> Hi, I'm the author of this post. I found it hard to get good information about this topic in Haskell compared to other languages, so I'm hoping this post will help people get started if they are in a similar situation to where I was. This is a topic I'm still actively learning about, so I'm eager to hear about any suggestions or feedback you might have.</comment>


Ask HN: What do you know about DevOps? - <AUTHOR> http://brainfreez3.blogspot.com/2015/12/devops.html <comment><USER2> This is documented really well.</comment>


Show HN: SxSW Panelists by Company & Title - <AUTHOR> http://ubuntu.axlotl.com/sxsw/

<comment><AUTHOR> While it doesn't seem like this has captured the zeitgeist, I have made a subtle improvement.

I updated it to list speakers' panels directly underneath their company. This eliminates a lot of clicking back and forth and makes the thing less annoying.</comment>


NYC's Underground Grilled Cheese - <AUTHOR> http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2010/09/21/am-nycs-undreground-grilled-cheese/

<comment><USER2> Interviewer: So, Why [do they call you] Ronnie?

Ronnie: Well, it's the perfect pseudonym because it's my name also.

This is the funniest thing I've read all day.

</comment><comment><USER3> He will probably need to up his price from $5 to $10 if he goes legal. The increased overhead (especially in NYC) will kill the operation.

If he wants to be really clever, he could offer on-demand pricing and ensure that he doesn't get overloaded with order and fail to deliver on time. People would text and say "how much?". Then he would reply with the on-demand pricing "$5 in 20 minutes or $15 in 5 minutes."

If someone in the subway is REALLY hungry they'd probably pay $15 for a sandwich - especially if they know there's a two hour ride home.

<comment><USER2> You are over thinking this. The greatest part about this story is the simplicity. I bring sandwich to you - you give me $5

<comment><USER3> I'm trying to find the sustainable model in this operation. From reading the article he's obviously trying to take it to the next level. Having good advice from a hacker (such as on-demand pricing) could make his next move that much more likely to succeed. Hacker News is about creating and improving upon ideas. We're not here to keep the status quo - we're here to say you can do more and do it better...

NEWNAM: So what's next?

RONNIE: Next I'm looking to get into a legal kitchen. For example, a restaurant that isn't open for lunch. I would rent it out from them and just work the lunch shift delivering sandwiches everywhere.

<comment><USER2> I don't think the answer is to have a complicated fee structure, just charge more.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Lot of illegal consumables innovation in NYC these days as well: [http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/nyregion/21nutcracker.html...](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/nyregion/21nutcracker.html?src=ISMR_HP_LO_MST_FB)

With only two texts I could have a delicious grilled cheese and a nice styrofoam cup of Nutcracker!

</comment><comment><USER5> see also: the twitter lobster roll guy in greenpoint [http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/20/wb_lobsterman_201...](http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/20/wb_lobsterman_2010_05_14_bk.html)

got caught: [http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/34/wb_drclawcuffed_2...](http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/33/34/wb_drclawcuffed_2010_08_27_bk.html)

<comment><USER6> His gangster persona is brilliant marketing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> This story keeps getting media coverage and is presented as a good thing.

I wonder though. Coverage makes clear that running a small business like this is illegal in NYC and the only alternative is to acquire costly government permission to engage in basic entrepreneurial activity that would be legal in any normal free state.

<comment><USER8> With food in particular there aren't actually that many places in the western world where you can legally run an unlicensed/uninspected operation at significant scale. People think of Texas, for example, as a libertarian- leaning state, but it's actually _completely_ illegal in TX to sell home- prepared food, even at church bake sales (though in practice it's not enforced for small-scale charity bake sales). There are a handful of states that have recently passed "cottage food laws" that allow people to sell home-baked goods in certain categories below a certain volume, so e.g. it's now legal in Ohio to sell modest amounts of cupcakes and cookies and whatever. But not that many, and most don't cover food outside of baked goods and perhaps some kinds of home preserves (marmalades and similar).

<comment><USER9> I like where these cottage food laws are going. I'm just thinking out loud, but I'd be interested in seeing a system where smaller outfits would simply be required to post some kind of notification that they are unlicensed/uninspected. This might also be accompanied by a higher cap on claims resulting from food poisoning lawsuits or something similar.

<comment><USER10> From a policy maker point of view this would be saying 'we are going to allow unsafe goods to be sold'. While I personally agree with the sentiment, it's never going to happen.

<comment><USER11> What? Your Mom bakes unsafe cookies?

<comment><USER10> Huh?

<comment><USER12> Joe's point was that your mom's kitchen is neither licensed nor inspected by the state. Yet, she served you baked goods out of that kitchen. The false implication that unlicensed == unsafe is what he was commenting on.

If they were safe enough for you to eat, they're probably safe enough for me to eat, regardless of whether she has a seal from the state.

<comment><USER10> Oh I see. But that's unrelated to the discussion. Fact is that to produce and sell food outside of the 'home' setting requires a license, for food safety reasons. While we (or rather, other people - myself I'm not so much interested in that discussion) could argue about whether or not that's warranted, fact is that such regulations exist and they are very unlikely to go away.

Now, while technically 'unlicensed' does not equal 'unsafe', the existence of 'licensed' outfits, for safety reasons, does mean that 'unlicensed' means 'we cannot verify the safety'. Which, realistically, is as good as 'unsafe' in terms of pressure against it.

(This is not a discussion about actual food safety, this is about processes and pressures on policy makers and perceptions of control.)

(edit: add 'un' to 'likely')

<comment><USER11> Of course its going away; folks have commented on this - allowing church bake sales etc.

Agreed on other points however. There are Mom's Kitchens I would definitely NOT want to eat out of. And licensing means (or used to mean) inspecting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Favorite bit:

      NEWNAM: So why Ronnie?
      RONNIE: Well, it's the perfect pseudonym because it's my name also.

If those sandwiches are 100% cheddar they're missing the flavor that only gruyere can bring to a grilled cheese.

</comment><comment><USER14> we got him to cater a lunch at our start-up... i think most of us weren't very keen on the sandwiches, though we thought it was great in the abstract.

</comment><comment><USER15> I was thinking about a similar service paired with a smartphone app. You're in Central Park, and you're thirsty, you press a button in an app, and a guy on a bike finds you from GPS coordinates and gives you a bottle of water.

Something like this could revolutionize Taxi service. No talking to a dispatcher, fumbling with your wallet, or dealing with credit card numbers, just bring up an app and press a button.

</comment><comment><USER16> Funny, I was just talking with a friend last night about the viability of a cheese sandwich cart/stall in NYC. They're extremely cheap to produce (plain wheat bread and Kraft singles) and when hot, are delicious snacks. I was thinking of a price point closer to $1, since you can easily get so much food in the city for around $5 (gyros, chicken w/ rice, etc). Interesting to see someone doing it already!

<comment><USER17> Assuming you can even get ahold of the appropriate licenses to run a cart/stall, that's between $10-20k right there. Now add on the cost of paying someone to take orders at your stand, the stand itself, heating element, insurance, etc... that's a lot of $1 cheese sandwiches.

Oh, and watch out for the hot dog stand guy or the guy selling beads near you who thinks you're encroaching on their turf.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> His business isn't going to scale very well. I've never been to NYC but I expect you can't cover much of the city in 15 minutes.

<comment><USER19> It seems that he only delivers to people in the Lower East Side for now. Of course, food delivery has operated on a limited geography basis since...well pretty much since its inception.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Hmmm, someone needs to build an "AirBnB for Lunch" so Ronnie can take orders online

</comment><comment><USER21> what's the number?

<comment><USER22> Looking for the number as well.

Sort of an interesting exercise... Can you find it? If that piece of information is available online somewhere, how would you get it (calling all of your stoner friends is probably the fastest way, but disallowed for this exercise).

I couldn't find it, so I called AMEX concierge service to see if they could.

edit: boo, i suck. was easy to find, but i missed it the first time.

<comment><USER23> I'm more curious if the AMEX concierge was able to find it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> __found it: 917.727.6643 __

</comment><comment><USER24> i had a similar business idea in college. breakfast express, an all day breakfast delivery for hungover college students.</comment>


Cdncss.com - the next step - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/cdnjs/cdncss

<comment><AUTHOR> Hi guys, January this year we created "cdnjs.com - the missing cdn". Since then we have acquired full sponsorship from CloudFlare.com who have stabilized the hosting infrastructure and reached new speeds Amazon S3 could not.

Cdnjs has had measurable popularity and going into the new year we thought it's time to step it up a notch and host popular CSS snippets/frameworks. The idea itself is in a trial and once the community has spoken we will again make informed decisions on infrastructure if we are to go ahead.

At the moment we are inviting anyone and everyone to contribute to the cdncss.com project.

Simply create an issue or comment on issues that you think are important, if you have the time we would greatly appreciate populating the actual repository via a fork request.</comment>


Amazon's push: Employees and drivers say an overworked system is lax on safety - <AUTHOR> https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/inside-amazon-s-delivery-push-employees-drivers-say-overworked-system-n1087661 <comment><USER2> The number of times I've been cut-off or nearly run off the road by someone driving an Amazon delivery van is one too many for me to not question the real value I'm getting from Amazon Prime.

I get it, people have to make a living. But please do it in a way where I don't die because some idiot decided to endanger others for $11.50 an hour.

</comment><comment><USER3> We used to get virtually all packages via USPS, with the occasional one via UPS. Maybe one late package a year.

Amazon's logistics system now delivers probably 25% of orders late to us. I used to complain and get a month's extension on Prime each time, but it happens enough now it's not worth the argument.

<comment><AUTHOR> I had similar experiences before switching to Walmart.com - a combination of Amazon getting worse and Walmart getting better along with fewer supply chain issues and no monthly fee for 2-day just pushed me over the edge.</comment></comment>


Go 1.8 toolchain improvements - <AUTHOR> https://dave.cheney.net/2016/11/19/go-1-8-toolchain-improvements <comment><USER2> MIPS32 support - kudos to Vladimir Stefanovic and Imagination Technologies for making this happen. Many people from the embedded world will also greatly appreciate support for soft-float MIPS32 hardware.

<comment><USER3> This is honestly the thing that is most interesting to me right now. MIPS32 has a massive embedded user base. Combined with Go's very fast GC there's some good opportunities here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> There are scores of other optimizations [0] as well:

      Optimizations:

      bytes, strings: optimize for ASCII sets (CL 31593)
      bytes, strings: optimize multi-byte index operations on s390x (CL 32447)
      bytes,strings: use IndexByte more often in Index on AMD64 (CL 31690)
      bytes: Use the same algorithm as strings for Index (CL 22550)
      bytes: improve WriteRune performance (CL 28816)
      bytes: improve performance for bytes.Compare on ppc64x (CL 30949)
      bytes: make IndexRune faster (CL 28537)
      cmd/asm, go/build: invoke cmd/asm only once per package (CL 27636)
      cmd/compile, cmd/link: more efficient typelink generation (CL 31772)
      cmd/compile, cmd/link: stop generating unused go.string.hdr symbols. (CL 31030)
      cmd/compile,runtime: redo how map assignments work (CL 30815)
      cmd/compile/internal/obj/x86: eliminate some function prologues (CL 24814)
      cmd/compile/internal/ssa: generate bswap on AMD64 (CL 32222)
      cmd/compile: accept literals in samesafeexpr (CL 26666)
      cmd/compile: add more non-returning runtime calls (CL 28965)
      cmd/compile: add size hint to map literal allocations (CL 23558)
      cmd/compile: be more aggressive in tighten pass for booleans (CL 28390)
      cmd/compile: directly construct Fields instead of ODCLFIELD nodes (CL 31670)
      cmd/compile: don't reserve X15 for float sub/div any more (CL 28272)
      cmd/compile: don't generate pointless gotos during inlining (CL 27461)
      cmd/compile: fold negation into comparison operators (CL 28232)
      cmd/compile: generate makeslice calls with int arguments (CL 27851)
      cmd/compile: handle e == T comparison more efficiently (CL 26660)
      cmd/compile: improve s390x SSA rules for logical ops (CL 31754)
      cmd/compile: improve s390x rules for folding ADDconst into loads/stores (CL 30616)
      cmd/compile: improve string iteration performance (CL 27853)
      cmd/compile: improve tighten pass (CL 28712)
      cmd/compile: inline _, ok = i.(T) (CL 26658)
      cmd/compile: inline atomics from runtime/internal/atomic on amd64 (CL 27641, CL 27813)
      cmd/compile: inline convT2{I,E} when result doesn't escape (CL 29373)
      cmd/compile: inline x, ok := y.(T) where T is a scalar (CL 26659)
      cmd/compile: intrinsify atomic operations on s390x (CL 31614)
      cmd/compile: intrinsify math/big.mulWW, divWW on AMD64 (CL 30542)
      cmd/compile: intrinsify runtime/internal/atomic.Xaddint64 (CL 29274)
      cmd/compile: intrinsify slicebytetostringtmp when not instrumenting (CL 29017)
      cmd/compile: intrinsify sync/atomic for amd64 (CL 28076)
      cmd/compile: make [0]T and [1]T SSAable types (CL 32416)
      cmd/compile: make link register allocatable in non-leaf functions (CL 30597)
      cmd/compile: missing float indexed loads/stores on amd64 (CL 28273)
      cmd/compile: move stringtoslicebytetmp to the backend (CL 32158)
      cmd/compile: only generate ·f symbols when necessary (CL 31031)
      cmd/compile: optimize bool to int conversion (CL 22711)
      cmd/compile: optimize integer "in range" expressions (CL 27652)
      cmd/compile: remove Zero and NilCheck for newobject (CL 27930)
      cmd/compile: remove duplicate nilchecks (CL 29952)
      cmd/compile: remove some write barriers for stack writes (CL 30290)
      cmd/compile: simplify div/mod on ARM (CL 29390)
      cmd/compile: statically initialize some interface values (CL 26668)
      cmd/compile: unroll comparisons to short constant strings (CL 26758)
      cmd/compile: use 2-result divide op (CL 25004)
      cmd/compile: use masks instead of branches for slicing (CL 32022)
      cmd/compile: when inlining ==, don't take the address of the values (CL 22277)
      container/heap: remove one unnecessary comparison in Fix (CL 24273)
      crypto/elliptic: add s390x assembly implementation of NIST P-256 Curve (CL 31231)
      crypto/sha256: improve performance for sha256.block on ppc64le (CL 32318)
      crypto/sha512: improve performance for sha512.block on ppc64le (CL 32320)
      crypto/{aes,cipher}: add optimized implementation of AES-GCM for s390x (CL 30361)
      encoding/asn1: reduce allocations in Marshal (CL 27030)
      encoding/csv: avoid allocations when reading records (CL 24723)
      encoding/hex: change lookup table from string to array (CL 27254)
      encoding/json: Use a lookup table for safe characters (CL 24466)
      hash/crc32: improve the AMD64 implementation using SSE4.2 (CL 24471)
      hash/crc32: improve the AMD64 implementation using SSE4.2 (CL 27931)
      hash/crc32: improve the processing of the last bytes in the SSE4.2 code for AMD64 (CL 24470)
      image/color: improve speed of RGBA methods (CL 31773)
      image/draw: optimize drawFillOver as drawFillSrc for opaque fills (CL 28790)
      math/big: 10%-20% faster float->decimal conversion (CL 31250, CL 31275)
      math/big: avoid allocation in float.{Add, Sub} when there's no aliasing (CL 23568)
      math/big: make division faster (CL 30613)
      math/big: use array instead of slice for deBruijn lookups (CL 26663)
      math/big: uses SIMD for some math big functions on s390x (CL 32211)
      math: speed up Gamma(+Inf) (CL 31370)
      math: speed up bessel functions on AMD64 (CL 28086)
      math: use SIMD to accelerate some scalar math functions on s390x (CL 32352)
      reflect: avoid zeroing memory that will be overwritten (CL 28011)
      regexp: avoid alloc in QuoteMeta when not quoting (CL 31395)
      regexp: reduce mallocs in Regexp.Find* and Regexp.ReplaceAll* (CL 23030)
      runtime: cgo calls are about 100ns faster (CL 29656, CL 30080)
      runtime: defer is now 2X faster (CL 29656)
      runtime: implement getcallersp in Go (CL 29655)
      runtime: improve memmove for amd64 (CL 22515, CL 29590)
      runtime: increase malloc size classes (CL 24493)
      runtime: large objects no longer cause significant goroutine pauses (CL 23540)
      runtime: make append only clear uncopied memory (CL 30192)
      runtime: make assists perform root jobs (CL 32432)
      runtime: memclr perf improvements on ppc64x (CL 30373)
      runtime: minor string/rune optimizations (CL 27460)
      runtime: optimize defer code (CL 29656)
      runtime: remove a load and shift from scanobject (CL 22712)
      runtime: remove defer from standard cgo call (CL 30080)
      runtime: speed up StartTrace with lots of blocked goroutines (CL 25573)
      runtime: speed up non-ASCII rune decoding (CL 28490)
      strconv: make FormatFloat slowpath a little faster (CL 30099)
      strings: add special cases for Join of 2 and 3 strings (CL 25005)
      strings: make IndexRune faster (CL 28546)
      strings: use AVX2 for Index if available (CL 22551)
      strings: use Index in Count (CL 28586)
      syscall: avoid convT2I allocs for common Windows error values (CL 28484, CL 28990)
      text/template: improve lexer performance in finding left delimiters (CL 24863)
      unicode/utf8: optimize ValidRune (CL 32122)
      unicode/utf8: reduce bounds checks in EncodeRune (CL 28492)

[0] [https://github.com/golang/go/blob/master/doc/go1.8.txt](https://github.com/golang/go/blob/master/doc/go1.8.txt)

</comment><comment><USER5> So, the language has now spent getting on for 18 months significant slower than it used to be, and nobody seems to have a real issues with this?

<comment><USER6> No, the language got "faster" over the last 18 months. This graph is about compilation speed. Everyone in the Go community wants faster compilation times, hence why Dave is tracking these with every release.

<comment><USER7> I consider that the Go compiler is pretty fast, how big has to be the project to make it noticeable enough?

<comment><USER8> As a concrete example, Kubernetes (0.5M first party lines of code, ~0.7M libraries) can take about 2-3 minutes to compile on a 2013 MBP on Go 1.7. So probably around 200-300kloc you'd start to say "this feels slow".

<comment><USER9> Before golang, my experience with compilation was about building softwares as an user in gentoo, and a few LFS. Speed of compilation was the first thing that stroke me with golang. But then again, it was the first time I was actually writing code to be compiled.

Is it that usual C/C++ opensource projects are very big, or am I correct to assume golang compiler processing go code is indeed really faster than gcc processing C/C++ ?

<comment><USER10> The 10.000 foot view is that C code is optimized more, but compiles slower.

Historically this was always seen as a good tradeoff. You only compile once, but code runs thousands of times or more. Therefore a large slowdown in compilation is seen as a good tradeoff for better runtime speed.

Go follows the turbo pascal type compilers in that

1) the language is limited in several ways to make compilation faster (e.g. it is given as an argument against generics)

2) the compiler just doesn't try a whole range of optimizations

Unfortunately this is not really what you're seeing. What you're seeing in this case is a massive difference in the size of the projects you're compiling.

Go has been written with the explicit purpose of making writing large programs somewhere between tedious and impossible. By contrast, many C/C++ programs are huge. Tens to hundreds of megabytes of source code, and when compiling Gentoo, I bet you're compiling more than a gigabyte total.

<comment><USER9> Very insightful. Thanks!</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Osborne Effect on the Auto Industry - <AUTHOR> https://cleantechnica.com/2019/02/25/the-osborne-effect-on-the-auto-industry/ <comment><USER2> I'm curious if increased demand and production of electric vehicles will cause a subsequent crash in oil prices.

<comment><USER3> When cars mostly get their power from batteries how will that power be generated? Hopefully it won't be from burning oil but it has to come from somewhere right?

<comment><AUTHOR> Very little electricity comes from burning oil. Most oil is used for transportation.</comment></comment></comment>


What do you guys think of Vator.tv? - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.zdnet.com/social/?p=197 <comment><AUTHOR> What potential does vator.tv have? The idea to pitch your business is nice what what is the desired outcomes of these entrepreneurs?</comment>


Quora raises $50M at a $400M valuation with Peter Thiel leading - <AUTHOR> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303505504577404510443769988.html?mod=wsj_nview_latest <comment><USER2> Firstly, is there any chance we can have a story without someone using the word "bubble"? This is not evidence of a bubble. More to the point, it's a _boring_ prediction because it doesn't add anything. Some years from now we may well be in a bubble and the person who happens to be right that day will say "See? I said we were in a bubble" and the previous 1000 days of being wrong will be summarily ignored.

Basically it's pointless.

As for Quora, I stand by my original assessment: I don't see this going mainstream. Q&A seems to be something that works well for particular verticals (eg programming aka Stackoverflow) but doesn't seem to be a general purpose or widespread tool. This is in part cultural (eg I believe Q&A is very big in Korea).

I see this more as "bubble thinking" and in this context "bubble" has nothing to do with valuation but more that the people who use and value Quora live inside a bubble. That bubble is the Valley. VCs and Valleywags only know other VCs and Valleywags and all of those people use Quora so they make the mistake of thinking it's far larger than it actually is.

Quora does not have the mainstream breakout appeal that, say, Pinterest or Instagram does and honestly I don't think it ever will (you can quote me on that). Neither does (or will) Stackexchange.

That's not to say either won't exit for 9-10 digits but that's another story entirely.

Quora has done a fantastic job of marketing itself to VCs/Valleywags but I see Q&A much like I do Foursquare and the whole check-in thing. It's a (to borrow a Mark Suster term) FNAC (feature not a company).

IMHO Quora will suffer the same fate every social/curation site does: eternal September. If it ever does grow massively the influx of new people will change the site and those early adopters people like to follow now will move on to the next thing. It's Slashdot, Digg, etc all over again.

<comment><USER3> I view quora as a highend QA website that connects me to experts. I have access to people with deep understandsings of technology, business, science, lingustics and culuture all while being "peer reviewed". I dont think the lower class and noneducated will flock to it, but it would be invaluable to anyone in the knowledge economy.

<comment><USER4> I see a lot of potential for the "lower class and noneducated" in the Q&A space. Questions about relationships and social issues often cannot be answered by merely browsing websites. Everyone views their own situation as being unique. People love giving advice on these issues, even if the right answers aren't black and white.

<comment><USER3> I dont disagree, but I think ask.com, yahoo q&a, reddit and even to some extent metafilter as a better fit for those types of questions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Can anyone explain why Quora would garner such a high valuation? I have a hard time believing its revenue based so is it seen as an acquisition target?

<comment><USER6> 1\. Very well connected founders.

2\. Founder ponying up millions of his own cash.

3\. Frighteningly Ambitious(TM) problem.

4\. Reasonably good traction and product execution.

<comment><USER7> I simply do not see #4 happening. Hell, at this rate I'm willing to bet that StackExchange, itself a rather niche site (or network of sites) has higher activity than Quora.

I don't know a single person outside the (somewhat incestuous) startup industry that uses Quora. In fact, I do not know a single person outside the tech industry who _knows about Quora_.

Claims that Quora has achieved good traction are, to be polite, overly generous, but more frankly, bullshit.

<comment><USER8> They have a reasonable diversity of backgrounds (it feels about on par with Reddit or MeFi in that regard) which leads me to think it's not _entirely_ a tech industry phenom.

Also: they have an interesting strategy of courting mainstream media distribution; there's a "Quora" section on Slate now, for instance. They could keep doing that.

9 figure valuation? No clue. Valley numbers, agreed. Just saying.

<comment><USER9> Slate is more mainstream than HN, but not mainstream. Forbes is a better example of mainstream reach, but also the risk: the Forbes audience is not a quality content crowd, it's an infotainment filler crowd, and infotainment is cheap these days.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Ok I know the word bubble is overuse but I think we are in a bubble. I know the market choose « the right price » for any project. We have seen this movie before:The housing market. Money was "easy" to get for almost anyone without checking those fundamentals. The main idea was simple prices cannot go down. Now back here, the idea is simple someone somewhere is going to pay $400M or more in a near future.... what's the plan B put ads again? Paid questions?

I'm just trying to understand how people can come up with valuations like that …. I just don't get it ...

<comment><USER11> I think it has to do with probabilities - many small loses and one big win (Facebook) - and you have a profit

<comment><USER9> But many small losses and zero big wins...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Wow, can we spell "bubble" yet? This is _definitely_ a 100% bubble-based valuation. Don't get me wrong, I don't think Quora is a completely worthless company, but unless they have some incredibly magic sauce they haven't showed us yet, I can't possibly see how they'll get that much revenue ever.

In fact, a simple check would do: let them show how much they made last year, projected growth for this year, and we can start talking about anything beyond a $10m valuation.

<comment><USER13> Or Quora ignores dguaraglia's requests, continues their success (however you - or they - wish to measure it) as a private company and watches Hacker News whip itself into a frenzy about the financing climate?

<comment><USER12> Although that's the most likely answer, it's also the stupid thing to do. And by 'stupid' I mean it in the "because of things like this, all of us will get fucked in the long term, even the short-term winners" sense.

I just _hate_ this idea that you can create a company without any kind of realistic approach to making money, value it at in millions without any kind of basis and hope some rich (and dumb) buyer bites. It's opportunistic at best and dishonest at worst.

It makes _everyone_ in the milieu look like he's trying to pull this stunt, although there are plenty of honest (and profitable) companies out there not getting millions in investment because they don't try to sell something shiny.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Quora is just damn useful.

I actually struggle to think of many other b2c companies who are equally as useful and yet also fun to use. It's like Google Search (useful) combined with Tumblr (fun.)

</comment><comment><USER14> People can talk about elite team, synergetic community, excellent quality content, usability, etc but it all comes down 95% to one thing: SEO.

</comment><comment><USER15> I been an advocate of conservative valuations but, in this case, I highly agree with the number proposed.

Quora is much better than all its comparable companies (eHow, Mahalo, etc...) in every possible sense: community, technology, founding team, etc. Traffic is very strong, it displays strong social integration tools and has managed grow very impressively.

On a side note, I expect Quora to move into the mainstream with much less friction than Reddit or Askolo. Being more design and experience oriented, Quora has the upper hand here. I hope Quora's team realizes and exceeds this valuation.

<comment><USER16> Aren't quora and "mainstream" at odds though? Quora is about _quality_ questions, the majority of mainstream people that would use a Q&A site are the sort of people that use(d) Yahoo Answers, the sort of questions that you want to exist for long enough to get a reply but once they have been replied they hold absolutely no value to anyone.

How can Quora "go mainstream" and avoid this problem?

<comment><USER3> The simple answer is that you redefine mainstream. Mainstream doesn't mean that everyone uses it like Facebook, but instead that "everyone" uses it just like "everyone" uses shopify or github.

Quora goes mainstream when a certain elite, much like the Salons of Paris, gather there. Academics, Business, Cultural, Medical, Scientific and Technology elite all show up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> Techcrunch broke the evaluation story 3 weeks ago:

[http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/21/quora-is-raising- at-a-400m-...](http://techcrunch.com/2012/04/21/quora-is-raising- at-a-400m-valuation-with-dangelo-putting-in-his-own-money/)

And Quora already has numerous Q/A's on the valuation. See, for example,

[http://www.quora.com/Valuations/Is-Quora- worth-400-million-d...](http://www.quora.com/Valuations/Is-Quora- worth-400-million-dollars-If-so-why)

along with the Related Questions listed on the right.

</comment><comment><USER18> We really like Quora. It has an active community, made up of a wide range of experts giving really great answers. The Quora valuation sounds high but the wealth of knowledge, number of users and available intelligence must be of value to some investors.

We have written an article (still to be published) on these expert Q&A sites. Stack Exchange, Quora, Askolo, Sprouter, Reddit plus more are delving into matching questions with answers.

There is growing trend towards matching experts to inquisitive minds. These platforms are essentially allowing subject matter experts to sell their knowledge to others. Why not?

Maybe the high valuation - Quora and others are commoditizing expert knowledge with the intention of selling this on?

</comment><comment><USER19> How does Quora make money?

</comment><comment><USER20> Ugh, paywalls/loginwalls.

<comment><USER21> yea, that really killed Facebook in the early days.

<comment><USER22> I'm not sure if that's the point he was making. It's that making it socially acceptable to do, is annoying. At least that's what I think he meant.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> $400M... let me guess: no revenue at all? but it was started by a couple of Mark's dorm pals from college! not a bubble, not a bubble, not a bubble, not a bubble....</comment>