Moleskine X Adobe - <AUTHOR> http://www.moleskine.com/en/news/adobe <comment><USER2> Being a PhD CS student, I find it professionally disappointing that this technology arises mainly for graphic artists where the translation from ink to content is basically dot per dot. Or dot per vector, but in this case already arcs have some internal order that vectorization misses (have characters on a different layer than background, etc).

I understand the targeting -- there's vastly more doodlers (professional or amateur) than scientists with cash in their pocket for gadgets. [1] Generating LaTeX from handwriting [2] is still in the distant future, ebook readers for people with A4 needs have gone stagnant since 2010 (although there is the extremely expensive Sony DPT-S1 [3] ).

The main advances I see in science is making faster use of the technology of yesteryear -- streaming classes and conferences on YouTube, arXiv being near mandatory now in CS, and so forth.

[1]: I am currenly a person in that exact group -- the university where I am a PhD student has a surplus of equipment funds every year. Every December, I am asked whether I want a laptop, a tablet, or anything else (with the implied condition that it should be purchasable in Central Europe, which rules out several products such as the DPT-S1 [3] or the Microsoft Surface). I have so far always declined as there's nothing that I can imagine improving my productivity.

[2]: [https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/1443/what-is-the- sta...](https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/1443/what-is-the-status-of- generating-latex-from-handwriting-i-e-ocr) (2010)

[3]: [https://pro.sony.com/bbsc/ssr/product- DPTS1/?PID=I:digitalpa...](https://pro.sony.com/bbsc/ssr/product- DPTS1/?PID=I:digitalpaper:digitalpaperproductpage)

<comment><USER3> It's not exactly TeX from handwriting, but the developers at MyScript [1] seem to be doing a pretty good job at parsing basic TeX for notetaking. I met some a few years ago at the MWC and talked a little about TeX "recognition" and well, it got added to their flagship handwriting app. Still far from perfect (won't get you a \mathfrak) but usable enough for taking quick course/lecture/ideas notes.

[1]: [http://www.myscript.com/](http://www.myscript.com/)

<comment><USER4> Myscripts math demo for android, while just a toy calculator [1], really impressed me. With that I can easily and smoothly draw complicated calculations, then draw a square root symbol on top of it and see it recognize it, draw a line underneath and divide the whole thing by something, -no problem.

The notepad thingy that was supposed to be a real product was a real disappointment in comparison imo.

[1]: It see s to use floats internally and doesn't make any attempt at hiding it. Try sin(360)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> The only tech I see from the MoleSkine side is the positioning of dots on the page. Adobe use these as guide marks for scanning, sizing and rotating. I'm wondering how easy it would be to just draw the dots in the right place, and have the App scan your picture correctly.

<comment><USER6> I bet there is a design patent on the exact placement of the dots, preventing competing notebooks.

<comment><USER7> How easy do you think it would be to acquire just a single page of these and replicate it was an inkjet printer? $35 for a paper notebook isn't worth it- I tend to make a hundred drawings for every one I actually vectorize and use as is, so it this wouldn't be practical. Anyway, an expensive notebook is always intimidating, I go for cheaper ones with tear out pages so I don think about being wasteful when I'm creating

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> 33 EUR for a notebook with a few dots printed on its pages?

[http://store.moleskine.com/aut/de-de/catalog/detail/smart- no...](http://store.moleskine.com/aut/de-de/catalog/detail/smart-notebook- creative-cloud-connected/adobe0notebook14)

</comment><comment><USER9> I'll stick with my leuchtturm link[1] notebook. Seems more flexible, and I don't see it as a real advantage to directly tie the image to adobe's stuff vs. dropbox/email.

[1] [http://www.leuchtturm1917.com/en/content/whitelines- link-%C2...](http://www.leuchtturm1917.com/en/content/whitelines-link-%C2%AE)

<comment><USER10> But but but... that doesn't have the 5 orientation dots like the Moleskine smart book! How could you possibly snap a picture of your work and vectorize it? How? How? Imposiblu!

<comment><USER9> There actually are orientation patterns in the corners - and they do seem to help it do a good job of un-stretching the page.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Generally speaking, kudos to Moleskine for capitalizing on a mundane product & average quality but nothing beats japanese brands when it comes to fine paper. Also, you might give Whitelines[1] a whirl for scanning sketches.

[1]([http://whitelines.se](http://whitelines.se))

<comment><USER12> > nothing beats japanese brands when it comes to fine paper

Any recommendations?

<comment><USER11> Maruman Mnemosyne e.g. [http://www.jetpens.com/Maruman-Mnemosyne- Notebooks/ct/765](http://www.jetpens.com/Maruman-Mnemosyne-Notebooks/ct/765)

<comment><USER13> Any more suggestions? (That looks good but I'm hoping to find something I'd never heard of but readily available in the UK)

<comment><USER11> There's [http://www.thejournalshop.com](http://www.thejournalshop.com) in the UK; not sure about their JP stuff. Midori might be a cheap choice but they're turning more and more into a Moleskine-like brand.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Surely this is just the existing Adobe Shapes app rebranded?

[https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/adobe-shape-cc-capture- creat...](https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/adobe-shape-cc-capture- create/id919014644?mt=8)

</comment><comment><USER15> Actually, I just released this to a test batch of artists: [https://www.instapainting.com/projects/5465aa8b90f1f8845d8b4...](https://www.instapainting.com/projects/5465aa8b90f1f8845d8b4568)

It uses automatic detection without corner markers shown in the video, so it can actually work with any book/paper. This example: [https://www.instapainting.com/projects/546ade9890f1f85d2a8b4...](https://www.instapainting.com/projects/546ade9890f1f85d2a8b456c) is actually with a moleskine notebook, although I had to draw a black line in the fold to help it detect it.

<comment><USER16> Not really sure what we're seeing in your links - I'm assuming you've created an app that uploads images to instapainting? Would be good if they were whitebalanced.

I'm guessing the pages you link are tailored to a particular browser that's not FF as those pages look appalling on FF ;0)

<comment><USER15> It's actually an app that lets you take photos of artwork and it automatically crops and aligns them like the adobe app, but you can use it to create seamless time-lapse.

Thanks for the FF heads up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The title seems to imply a dispute between them when in fact it's a partnership.

<comment><USER18> "x" in Italian (Moleskine is an Italian company) stands for "per", which means for. It's shorthand for partnership round here.

<comment><USER19> '×' is used to signify a crossover product in Japan too.

<comment><USER13> And the cross-product in maths! [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_product](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross_product)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Any (cheaper) alternative to this? Not that it is that expensive,but I want to offer 5/10 of these as gifts,so I wonder if there are cheaper alternative systems available in Europe.

Looks great anyway.

</comment><comment><USER21> I was tempted to get one of these digital pens [http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wacom- Inkling-Digital-Sketch-Pen/dp/...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wacom-Inkling- Digital-Sketch-Pen/dp/B006DLPYPQ)

But I've read slightly mixed reviews about them? Anyone used one?

</comment><comment><USER22> It seems to me Adobe has been much more innovative now that they have their Creative Cloud service. I wonder if this is a result of increased revenues from Creative Cloud or part of their efforts to get everyone to upgrade to the subscription service.

<comment><USER23> Very much the latter. We're a shop with 60 creatives pushed hard over to CC. I believe the regular recurring licensing model is better business for them over the long term.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Naive question : is there an equivalent application that would allow to quickly transform my handwriting into unicode ?(Basically OCR but maybe with some learning mechanism)

<comment><USER25> Livescribe has been doing this with handwriting for awhile: [http://www.livescribe.com/](http://www.livescribe.com/)

<comment><USER24> I have looked a bit into it, it seems it exports the writing sessions in a kind of proprietary format. Thanks for the recommendation, it looks like an interesting solution anyway.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> The problem with these products is in 3-4 years it will not be sold anymore.

</comment><comment><USER27> As far as Moleskine partnerships go, this doesn't top Evernote's.

<comment><USER28> I think you're missing the key difference. It converts the image to an SVG. I see zero mention of that with the Evernote version. This is HUGE for anyone who wants to actually _use_ the image rather than just have a cloud based copy of it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> i don't see how this is different from just vectorising any bitmap image?

</comment><comment><USER30> I love Moleskine...

</comment><comment><USER10> And Moleskine's contribution to this "technology" are the 5 dots printed on every page. Wow.

I've seen better joined marketing campaigns.

<comment><USER31> Marketing campaigns are evaluated on their impact to the top line, not on "contribution to technology".

<comment><USER10> Two separate observations there, buddy.

<comment><USER31> What observations? You say that it's not good marketing, because moleskine did not contribute some 'grand technology' to the project.

I say you can't possibly know if it is good or not, because you don't have the research and data behind it, and you most definitely cannot predict how it will affect their revenue and/or brand loyalty.

My opinion is that it will pan out really great for them. I would tell you what position I hold and the size of the company, but I'm sure that will only lead to some "appeal to authority" comment on your part.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


SatNOGS: Open-Source Ground Station Network - <AUTHOR> https://satnogs.org/ <comment><USER2> SatNogs is fantastic for satellites operating in the amateur band. A global coordinated ground station network and community with loads of expertise. They have on at least a couple occasions (including a cubesat mission I was involved in) found satellites (ie tracked and identified from beacons) after deployment before the satellite operator. Hoping to add a station to the network sometime in the next 12 months. The grafana dashboard they set up is super cool also.

<comment><USER3> > The grafana dashboard they set up is super cool also.

Here's a handy link for that: [https://dashboard.satnogs.org](https://dashboard.satnogs.org)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> SatNOGS is awesome. I'd like to use it for experimenting with bouncing radio off the moon and maybe us a few Amateur Radio satellite repeaters.

I really wish someone would sell a kit or preassembled tracker for us lazy people.

<comment><USER5> Can you just use a Yeasu G-5500 rotor?

<comment><USER4> I suspect so, but it's pretty heavy machinery and really made for a big mast. I've shied away from it so far because it's a big investment, and it's a bit unclear how precise it is, how exactly to connnect it to a computer and so on.

My gut feel is that SatNOGS would be easier end-to-end (and probably easier to repair and upgrade if necessary).

But yes, I should consider the Yaesu.

<comment><USER3> Can always use the SatNOGS client with your Yaesu rotator [https://wiki.satnogs.org/Rotators](https://wiki.satnogs.org/Rotators)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Site seems to be hugged atm. This snapshot of it seems ok:

[https://archive.vn/v91aW](https://archive.vn/v91aW)

<comment><USER7> [https://web.archive.org/web/20200612010517/https://satnogs.o...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200612010517/https://satnogs.org/)

This is more recent.

Also check out [https://network.satnogs.org](https://network.satnogs.org) [https://db.satnogs.org](https://db.satnogs.org) and [https://dashboard.satnogs.org](https://dashboard.satnogs.org)</comment></comment>


Google accused of 'double standard' for punishing publishers for user comments - <AUTHOR> https://sociable.co/business/senators-grill-google-exec-double-standard-punishing-publishers-user-comments/ <comment><USER2> I am worried that US senators confuse 230's protection from legal action which some mystical barrier that protects you from all consequences.

It's like the people who claim that moderation infringes on free speech. "Not running ads" is not the same as legal action.

</comment><comment><USER3> Ironically, if nobody but Google can benefit from Section 230 immunity, because people must obey Google's content moderation rules in order to remain viable in Search and Ads, then it's even more fuel to remove Section 230 to level the playing field.

<comment><USER4> [I work at Google, unrelated to Ads, I'm not a lawyer, views are my own, _caveat emptor_ , etc.]

This pushes the limits of my section 230 knowledge, but I think you've got this backwards. A company that wants to comply here needs Section 230 to exist, a company that is okay with ignoring Google doesn't care about Section 230.

Section 230 immunity isn't necessary for things that are completely unmoderated. If the comment sections are literally entirely unmoderated, they fall under the pre-existing statute (Cubby, Inc. v. CompuServe, Inc).

However, if the site wishes to moderate comments for some reason, they could be held liable for comments that stay up but are problematic (libelous etc.). So without section 230, a site would be in a catch-22. Section 230 continuing to exist avoids this problem.

<comment><USER5> > if the site wishes to moderate comments for some reason, they could be held > liable for comments that stay up but are problematic (libelous etc.). So > without section 230, a site would be in a catch-22. Section 230 continuing > to exist avoids this problem.

You have this exactly right. It's a fairly straightforward law. It's kind of bizarre how far people (especially journalists!) misunderstand it.

<comment><USER6> The old guard Journalists tried to fabricate "techlash" out of thin air. They are lying and showing themselves to be hypocrites. Look at the softballs given to power and abusers but as soon as they see a scapegoat for their business sucking the knives come out.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Legally, the playing field is even. The question is whether Google makes money from hateful content posted by users on their platforms. And then the topic indirection comes up.

This article avoids the distinction between law and economy at all costs because it would invalidate its entire thesis. I am not convinced Google is guilty of a double standard here.

<comment><USER8> Legally you are right, but I think it's a congressional inquiry so lawmakers are looking to see the flaws in the laws application in real life.

If there are flaws, then it needs to be patched or abandoned.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This post is a poorly disguised argument that racist speech does not create hostile environments for non-racists, and misapplies one aspect of Section 230 while ignoring another that counters their own argument.

Section 230 explicit grants Google, and publishers, the authority to restrict speech when it is offensive:

> _(A) any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access to or > availability of material that the provider or user considers to be obscene, > lewd, lascivious, filthy, excessively violent, harassing, or otherwise > objectionable, whether or not such material is constitutionally protected_

Racism is offensive content under these terms. If the publishers do not exercise their Section 230 rights to deny service to racist content and the racists that post it, Google will exercise their Section 230 rights to deny service — to restrict their 'banner ad' dialect^ of speech — to racist content and the sites that contain it.

To cut off the usual replies that try to invoke 'free speech' and 'but what about an unrelated example that doesn't include hate speech':

Racism is hate speech, and hate speech is not a form of protected speech. The only slippery slope to be considered here is 'what is considered hate speech?'. Racism is, unquestionably, hate speech. There is no slippery slope for racist speech. It's already at the bottom of the pit.

If this article were about content _other_ than hate speech, it would be interesting. As it stands, it's just 'we shouldn't demonize racism' in the usual 'first amendment' style of overcoat.

Dissecting the article in specific, I find:

> _Google threatened to demonetize The Federalist news outlet on the grounds > that readers were leaving "racist" comments that advertisers didn't want to > be associated with._

Google threatened to withdraw service from a news outlet over racist user comments.

> _The Federalist was targeted only because of its readers' comments_

Google was reacting only to the racist comments and not to the content published by the site operators themselves.

> _the alternatives were to either ban comments altogether, moderate /censor > them, or make them more difficult to access_

Google identifies several technical solutions, but then we have here this most interesting appendix from "The Sociable" itself:

> _— all of which discourage real engagement_

This phrase suffix attempts to frame "take action against racist comments" as "unrestricted speech is the only 'real' form of engagement". This is false. Racist comments discourages real engagement. Discouraging racist comments discourages racist engagement. Racist engagement is _not_ "real" engagement. It's just racist engagement.

> _This means that publishers have to make their sites Google-friendly_

"The Sociable" would like to remind you that the issue here is that Google is hostile to "racist comments" — yet, somehow, it's _not_ interesting to them that a major news outlet, The Federalist, was found to have such a degree of racism in their user comments that Google bothered to react at all.

^ Hieroglyphics and GIFs both prove that images are a form of speech. So, then, are banner advertisements.

<comment><USER10> > Racism is hate speech, and hate speech is not a form of protected speech.

You mean in the US? If so, which Supreme Court case are you basing this on?

Edit: As dextralt pointed out, I ask not because I expect HN posts to adhere to scientific journal standards, but because that claim is contrary to every Supreme Court decision in recent history, so I have trouble figuring out how you got that idea.

Edit 2: As dextralt's post is now flagged, let me reproduce what they cited:

 _Hate speech in the United States is not regulated due to the robust right to free speech found in the American Constitution. The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly ruled that hate speech is legally protected free speech under the First Amendment. The most recent Supreme Court case on the issue was in 2017, when the justices unanimously reaffirmed that there is effectively no "hate speech" exception to the free speech rights protected by the First Amendment._ \-- [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_in_the_United_Stat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_in_the_United_States)

<comment><USER9> Please use HN's reply feature to reply at HN. I do not reply to edit-replies as you're using. I view them as a form of conversational warfare.

<comment><USER10> I would if I could - my posts were rate-limited. It seems to only take 1-2 downvotes to get rate-limited to 2 posts/hour or less.

<comment><USER9> You'll want to email the mods about that, using the footer Contact link.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


This Is How Amazon Could Invade the Pharmacy Business - <AUTHOR> https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-07/six-ways-amazon-could-upend-the-pharmacy-business <comment><USER2> I already have to worry about counterfeit electronics when ordering from Amazon. I'm not sure I'd trust them with prescriptions.

<comment><USER3> Also, with expensive drugs I would worry that counterfeits could be introduced within Amazon's warehouses by workers, or within the postal system. Open a package, extract the original, and put the counterfeit in. For drugs that are worth hundreds of dollars per package, why not?

I expect pharmacies to double check everything they buy, and I somehow doubt Amazon will be able to ensure safety when the package is handled by 10 different people. If they develop some kind of (digital?) package seal, I might change my mind. Or every pill container has an RFID chip and is verifiable with the supplier's public certificate.

<comment><USER4> IIRC in The Everything Store, Stone recalled how Jewellery was a struggle because of its high value to weight ratio. Pharmaceuticals will probably be a similar problem, but I'm sure Amazon will have a process built in to manage for this if they chose to move into the area

<comment><USER5> Of course. People assuming that they'd toss drugs in with their random goods are not even trying to comprehend this business move.

They bought World Foods. They didn't start storing week old bread on their shelves.

The pharmacy division would be a completely separate process subject to all the additional _legal_ requirements all the other pharmacies adhere to. They're not going to just have buckets of Percocet lying around on shelves for anyone to access.

<comment><USER6> it would be difficult, every state has different requirements and they'd have to have a pharmacist licensed in every state to fill the rx. What they'd probably do is buy up a central fill facility in every state and hope the pharmacists who work there choose to stay (pharmacists are in short supply). Also, i'm not sure how they'd handle scheduled prescriptions ( like oxy ). At least in Texas those have to be reported to the state and e-prescribing is difficult so most patients end up with a physical scheduled rx that can't be scanned/faxed in, the pharmacist has to collect the original.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There are lot of stories going around on this, all of which are based on the client note by Leerink's Ana Gupte which was released on Friday, setting cat among the _pharma industry_ pigeons:

[http://www.barrons.com/articles/amazon-pharmacy-could- make-w...](http://www.barrons.com/articles/amazon-pharmacy-could-make- walgreens-cvs-sick-1507309531)

This article re-packages all the points from the client note like shipping, generics, B&M stores etc without even attributing to the original report.

</comment><comment><USER8> It should be easy for Amazon to start delivering my meds: Convince my employer. Right now, I walk two blocks to Target for new prescriptions, and I'm required to buy any refills from Express Scripts. My clinic also has a pharmacy on site that I could use. I'm betting that refills (i.e., stuff that's taken chronically) is the bulk of the prescription drug business, but it would be interesting to know if that's true or not. I don't see much fat to trim.

<comment><USER9> I suspect Amazon isn't overly concerned with trimming the fat in this case (Walmart took out a lot of what was left of that when they entered the business). At break-even in pharmacy, while not trimming so much as a dollar of fat, Amazon benefits big. Here's how:

\- Increased shipping volume. This adds to their market leverage and it can bolster their own logistics business over time. Anything Amazon can do at scale, while at least breaking even, is a very big benefit to their flywheel.

\- Another entry into the home, into a person's life. And in this case, a far more important one than most purchases. If Amazon can sell a 67 year old a prescription and get into her home, they're no doubt betting they can also sell her an artificial intelligence tool in the coming years (maybe it takes three years of advertising the Echo on the side of the prescription delivery box to convince the customer).

\- It becomes a very sticky repeat business. People will stay with those so long as you don't treat them horrendously. That buys Amazon time to figure out new ways to make money in the segment. It may also be a long-term play on the fact that the US is guaranteed to increasingly shift to government healthcare, as the ACA or equivalent walks its way up the income ladder by necessity; Amazon may see an angle in that.

\- Walmart is finally becoming a serious online competitor. They're growing at 2x the rate of Amazon, with about 1/3 the online retail sales. Walmart's online business appears to be kicking into another gear. They've got a $20 billion per year pharmacy sales business. Then there are obviously the other far larger pharmacy-centric giants (the big three have ~72% of the pharmacy business). Anything Amazon can do to press them all in that segment, is a win competitively. To grow at this point, Amazon has to take from everyone else, as US consumer spending is expanding relatively slowly.

<comment><USER10> Totally agree with what you said. I'd like to add that another part of the break-even game is that often all it takes is for your competitor to take one step in the wrong direction, for you to become profitable.

When Blockbuster (for example) took on streaming to compete with Netflix, not only were they far too late, but they also charged a fee for movies. People didn't bother because Netflix had unlimited streaming. They also had a poor catalog if I recall correctly. Too many mistakes.

<comment><USER6> don't forget the Blockbuster streaming deal involved ( a may have been originated by ) Enron of all things. It never had a chance in hell.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I think that the Whole Foods acquisition now gives Amazon a physical footprint to compete with CVS, Rite-Aid, etc. Imagine ordering online and picking it up at a Whole Foods. After this step, they will find ways to fully by-pass the physical store and ship you medicine directly via Prime. There is a lot of money in the pharmacy business and a lot of opportunities for Amazon to enter this market and disrupt it. I don't think that any of the incumbents have the technological capabilities to compete with Amazon's supply chain. The question is not if they will enter. The question is how and how fast.

<comment><USER12> To put it into context, Whole Foods has less than 500 stores, compared to 8200 and 9600 for Walgreens and CVS.

<comment><USER13> Whole Foods also doesn't currently have a pharmacy, unlike many other grocery chains.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Ok, so this is what a winner-takes-all game looks like, and it is getting pretty boring. Can we now play a different game, please?

We can start by turning Amazon into a utility.

<comment><USER15> But then it would turn into a slow government entity, all the talent will leave, and our economy would lose a great innovator.

<comment><USER14> > But then it would turn into a slow government entity

Public utilities are not necessarily government entities; they can be privately owned.

> all the talent will leave, and our economy would lose a great innovator

That talent could work at universities again, so everybody would benefit more evenly from innovation.

<comment><USER16> _Public utilities are not necessarily government entities; they can be privately owned._

Like Bell, who had to be sued to allow people to use modems and fax machines?

<comment><USER14> At least the law was on our side.

Try suing Amazon for a similar cause.

<comment><USER16> I don't need to - I can not use them.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I know the ex-CEO of a generic pharmaceutical firm. Drugs that are wholesaled at $100 are discounted by the firm to around $25$.

There is much profit for Amazon to harvest.

<comment><USER18> I worked at a distributor throughout college and the week a drug went generic was party time. The company would ship more of a recently genericized drug in that week than they had until that point. Dropping to ~25% the original price is the average but sometimes it would be 10% or less.

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> Looking forward to having my adderall delivered by drone.

<comment><USER6> heh i take vyvanse and have to burn a morning once a month to get my refill. It's so infuriating i wrote a telemed system based on webrtc and am selling it to my doctor so i can see my NP and get my rx snail mailed to me without leaving the office.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Is Amazon going to attempt to tackle the healthcare insurance market? CVS and Walgreens may have started in that direction, but they rely on EHRs to get them the industry knowledge they lack. I'm not sure if Amazon would do the same. That opens patients up to some crazy HIPPA scenarios when Amazon decides to collect your prescribing visit info to send to the insurance company.

</comment><comment><USER21> I think the brick and mortar pharmacy business is already being cut out by placing like Optum and express scripts.

</comment><comment><USER22> They ought to buy Pillpack.

</comment><comment><USER23> Negotiating that legal framework is going to be challenging</comment>


Outsmart your brain by knowing when you are wrong - <AUTHOR> http://troysimpson.co/outsmart-your-brain-by-knowing-when-you-are-w

<comment><USER2> For my 6th birthday party, my mother challenged all the kids to guess the number of Smarties (M&M-like candy) in a tube. Everyone guessed in the range of 15-20, except for one joker who yelled out 100. It ended up being 121.

This makes me think that underestimation is more common for the things you want lots of (chocolate, tickets); with overestimation being the norm for the things you want less of (enemy soldiers, incoming vehicle speed).

This would make sense from a what-happens-if-you're-wrong perspective.

<comment><USER3> Interesting. I did not know that Smarties were Europe-only.

<comment><USER4> The US has a candy called Smarties, but they are different entirely, and made by different companies.

<comment><USER5> Smarties in US: [http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Qm2M81VKS-s/SaC6lVU2-UI/AAAAAAAADn...](http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Qm2M81VKS-s/SaC6lVU2-UI/AAAAAAAADnM/YmF- _vGHM34/s400/smarties.jpg)

Smarties in Europe: [http://www.sogoodblog.com/wp- content/uploads/2008/11/smartie...](http://www.sogoodblog.com/wp- content/uploads/2008/11/smarties-3.jpg)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Don't try to count or guess, use simple math shortcuts.

I took a rough average of the double digit numbers on the screen (35), multiplied by the number of double digit numbers (16), and since 30 x 10 is 300, I guessed the total would be around 500.

This was all done within 5 seconds

<comment><USER7> I think you are missing the point. No simple math tricks can overcome the fact that I am impressed at the amount on my credit card bill at the end of the month.

What the author tried to convey is more the incapacity of the brain to apprehend a large amount of small numbers.

<comment><USER3> Simple math will tell you to estimate your credit card bill using old credit card bills as a reference, not your gut feeling about how much you spend.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Slightly related to the post: If you are in Kuala Lumpur, don't bother going up the Petronas towers, you don't get up that high, the wait is long, the view isn't spectacular, and the infomercials about the worlds nicest little petroleum company gets pretty grating.

Don't miss the KL Tower though. It costs to go up (RM12, pocket change!), but the view is spectacular and you can stay as long as you like. The rotating restaurant is also very nice, but remember to book in advance.

<comment><AUTHOR> I can confirm the infomercial before you go up the elevator is VERY grating.

However the whole day was amazing for me resulting from the aquarium visit right nearby the towers - the entrance is right where the picture of the towers is taken from.

Here is the pictures from it, truly amazing. It has an incredible 100 meter (!) underwater tunnel through a massive aquarium with a moving sidewalk.

<http://taiwan.teebyte.com/malaysia-day-7-kl-aquarium-visit>

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> On this topic- any recommendations good books/articles on Maths/statistics, or how the mind does estimation, and how to improve the same?

Back when I was in high school, I had read this book "How to develop a super power memory", by Harry Lorayne. I daresay, it was not a complete success for me :)

But you could pull-off some pretty neat memory tricks, like remembering lists of items, phone numbers. The reason I quote this-the author's reasoning was that the "memory" of human mind works best when it is irrational. For instance,if you have a list of unconnected items like carpet,guitar,laptop- make an illogical association of one item to the next.For instance, in your mind's eye,"see" something ridiculous like you strumming a carpet, and so on. This actually did work for me, back then.

So, has anyone tried out/read something similar for improving number estimation?

<comment><USER10> I'd vote for this: [http://www.amazon.com/Secrets-Mental-Math-Mathemagicians- Cal...](http://www.amazon.com/Secrets-Mental-Math-Mathemagicians- Calculation/dp/0307338401/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1286369636&sr=8-1) and this: <http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Mental_Math>

<comment><USER9> Nice links! Hadn't seen wikibooks before..

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> I wildly overestimated (700) due to the emphasis you placed on telling me how much I was likely to underestimate!

Maybe move that section to after the part where you ask the readers to guess?

</comment><comment><USER12> My favorite example of something people are terrible at estimating is the number of leaves in a tree.

It's typically (rot13'd) bire n uhaqerq gubhfnaq.

<comment><USER13> ... why was this rot13'd?

But cool. I could see that. Lots of leaves in trees...

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I would be interested to see what people guess the total number is - post your estimate!

<comment><USER14> I guessed between 500 and 700 because there are 4x10 blocks (40) with a range between 0 and 40 tickets per block (time slot). But in fact the top two rows are almost empty, and the bottom two have many tickets left.

That makes:

Max = 40 slots x 40 tickets div 2 rows = 1600 div 2 = 800

Min = 40 slots x 10 (average number of tickets) = 400

Probable range: somewhere inside 400-800 so lets say 500-700! (that is not a "strong" reasoning, that is just what I thought).

<comment><AUTHOR> Interesting - perhaps if you go the opposite way about how many tickets are already taken it will result in you overestimating the results.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> ha. what I've learned from reading the comments is that it's not necessarily necessary to compensate for this error. (I also guessed 400 as a lower bound.)

<comment><USER16> Most likely everyone commenting _was_ compensating for error, as the author primes you by telling you about the error before asking you to guess. If he had written that people tend to grossly overestimate, I bet you'd have a very different result.

<comment><USER3> A/B test!</comment></comment></comment>


Do you have a secret? - <AUTHOR> http://www.doyouhaveasecret.org <comment><USER2> Brandon Mayfield was arrested as a material witness, not as a suspect. The problem here is the increasing use of material witness warrants to arrest people suspected of a crime, rather than actually getting an arrest warrant.

According to Wikipedia, "Ensuing lawsuits have resulted in a formal apology from the U.S. government and a $2 million settlement."

I'll be honest: I feel like I'm being swindled by doyouhaveasecret.org. Instead of presenting me with facts, they're relying on emotion and hearsay. And that's just as bad as the government wanting to search my laptop. The EFF's campaign is a more mature: <https://cyberspying.eff.org/>

<comment><USER3> The sad part is that the people we have to convince that these laws are a bad idea will only be swayed by emotion. It's emotion that convinced them to support bills like this and it is going to take an appeal to emotion to convince them otherwise.

It sucks to admit that, but it's how many humans work.

<comment><USER4> Physicians contended for a long time that they were too educated, thoughtful, and professional to be swayed by advertising and other promotional efforts that were not directly related to efficacy and cost of drugs:

<http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=192314>

Nobody is immune to advertising, PR, or emotional appeals. Some of us are more/less impacted by specific types of advertising, but we are all susceptible. Including the people in this community.

<comment><USER5> Interesting.

It seems physicians have a long history pompous bullshit.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis#Conflict_with_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis#Conflict_with_established_medical_opinions)

<comment><USER4> Which puts them in the beautiful company of the rest of humanity.

Edit: Also Semmelweis was a badass.

<comment><USER6> We have this interesting idea that modern medicine is what is responsible for greatly extending life expectancy. Semmelweis's work largely showed at least in his day that for women it was the opposite (remember his work started with the question of why midwives had so much lower maternal mortality rates than physicians), and even today, it is probably a distant third behind year-round food supply and modern sanitation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Huh? What does any of this have to do with CISPA?

There are good reasons to oppose CISPA. You shouldn't appreciate people trying to manipulate you into opposing it.

<comment><USER8> _There are good reasons to oppose CISPA. You shouldn't appreciate people trying to manipulate you into opposing it._

This is something that really annoys me. It's incredibly frustrating to see people argue "on my side", but using reasons that are based almost entirely on FUD and hyperbole. It undermines that entire side of the argument, because people who aren't already on your side assume that if you had valid reasons, you wouldn't be resorting to manipulative exaggerations for shock value. Unfortunately, when the internet outrage machine is whipped up into a frenzy, people don't seem to care and will happily upvote and share anything that supports their side, even if it's completely full of shit.

<comment><USER9> Unfortunately, while the sticklers insist on moral purity and perfect argument, they live in a world that operates on FUD and is grotesquely exploited and has become the modus operandi of our government, corporations, and fear mongering right.

It is the reason that science and reason cannot take hold in many human societies, because there is a false equivalency of opposition. Opposing heinous attempts to control are not equivalent to opposing freedom, liberty, and self-determination.

<comment><USER8> That's nice rhetoric, but when you disregard the truth in order to keep up in the arms race of lies that you claim the other side started, you become as reprehensible as them.

<comment><USER10> Telling lies and X is not equally as bad as telling lies and not X. EX: Where X is killing people. 'Smoking cigarettes makes you popular smoking cigarettes makes you unpopular.'

<comment><USER11> That's a particularly bad example, since the idea that cigarettes will make you unpopular will be a transparent falsehood to the target audience, and might cause them to doubt you when you say that cigarettes will kill them.

<comment><USER10> There was some recent anti smoking advertising that used that line, basically smoking = bad smell/yellow teeth = unpopular. Where a few years ago similar advertising used the smoking = cool = you become popular line of argument.

Granted this was sub textual, but the implications where clear enough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> I fail to see the link between the title plus domain of this site and opposing CISPA.

I do not think I could even call it link bait. They may as well have called it, "doyoulovebluewhales.org"...

Also, the soundtrack ruins its factual/informative presentation value and use of scripting for such a light site makes it feel unprofessional and insecure.

Some of the content and flow of information is good though. But overall just too light, lowbrow and unconvincing if I was not a techie but otherwise had half a brain to care about issues like this.

<comment><USER13> Ok, two things.

The first element loaded here on the train was stop soundtrack ... that made me bounce as I thought "My mobile tethering will choke on this" and "I don't have headphones hooked up".

* A lot of idle browsing come from idle time spent at coffee shops, libraries, and trains using low-power devices (e.g. netbooks, tablets, phones). If you want that to be your time then you have to play by those rules. Make sure your experience is acceptable for these scenarios.

* People don't expect playing audio on page-load. If you are trying to shock, ok. But if you are trying to get a message across, and people are around other people they will bounce from your site or have to quickly press mute...you're forcing your user to be really reactive here. Instead of trying to understand the content, they are doing damage control.

Think about your grandparents riding the subway reading the old-time newspaper or standing in line somewhere with the 25cent novel. Although our media today has changed, the purpose of the content consumption really hasn't. Make sure you captivate people in analogous ways.

Second, the domain made me think it was a reboot of "post-secret".

You can go with a goofy or an intriguing domain as long as you deliver something that matches the level of goof or intrigue. The delivery here is ok ... being on HN, I just expected more I guess.

<comment><USER14> Exactly, if there's one thing I don't miss from mid 90's internet it's embedded, can't be turned off audio. And, as you pointed out, I also thought it was going to be a post-secret type thing or news story about how common certain 'secrets' are.

That most of the 'facts' present are at best tangentially related to what the bill allows just made it worse.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This site showed me nothing about the bill in question. I would have liked at least a few references to sections of the bill that are considered bad.

Anyway, a link to the bill is here: <http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-112s2105pcs>

</comment><comment><USER16> This is just creating a database of informed CISPA dissenters. Wake up sheeple! </tinfoilhat>

On a more serious note, this could have been presented much better. This gave me the same feeling as that semi-attractive girl in college stepping into your personal space to tell you all about how unjust mandated meal plans are.

<comment><USER17> why does it give you that same feeling?

<comment><USER16> It's pandering to the lowest common denominator in an unprofessional and not entirely honest fashion, using shitty vectors (a soundtrack, really?).

<comment><USER18> To each his own. I found the presentation pretty well done and the soundtrack was a nice touch. Perhaps that's exactly why it could be seen as a problem; it is _too_ appealing and thus "unprofessional" (i.e. not boring enough to cause one hit the back button midway through).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> For a slightly more balanced take on it, check out the Wikipedia article: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyber_Intelligence_Sharing_and...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyber_Intelligence_Sharing_and_Protection_Act)

There are definite problems with CISPA in regards to privacy, but a lot of the stuff on that "Do you have a secret?" page is just mindless FUD.

<comment><USER19> > _calls page mindless FUD when in fact there are specific examples cited on > page_

> _doesn't back up own claims of FUD_

Hello?

<comment><USER8> Please explain how either of the examples (one is specific, one is not) have anything to do with CISPA. One was a traditional terrorism investigation that was horribly botched, while the other is a case in a foreign country with laws that are completely different (and much, much worse) than CISPA.

Both qualify as FUD because their factual relevancy is extremely low, while their shock value is high. Their only use on the page is to scare visitors into going "Oh my god, that could happen to me!" so that they tell all their friends about all these terrible things that the evil gubmint is going to do if we all don't oppose CISPA.

<comment><USER19> > _Their only use on the page is to scare visitors into going "Oh my god, that > could happen to me!" so that they tell all their friends about all these > terrible things that the evil gubmint is going to do if we all don't oppose > CISPA._

Sounds relevant to me.

They're just taking a big picture approach here, not focusing on CISPA. I think that's okay.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> I question how seriously people would have taken this website if it was designed based on "ransom note" 1990's design standards. And wasn't operated by the age group that has taken up these causes.

It draws attention to the "Center for Rights" <http://fightforthefuture.org/> and on that page there are a bunch of hipsters <http://fightforthefuture.org/#staff> who know how to play things to the media and get taken seriously.

Certainly a case at the very least for the importance of good design.

</comment><comment><USER21> Ok. I guess I was the only one who enjoyed the site and soundtrack. I thought it was rather creative.

My only complaint is the scrolling is a bit broken.

</comment><comment><USER22> No, I don't have a secret. That isn't really what privacy is about. You don't have to have something to hide in order to not want everything you do/say and everywhere you go tracked. This makes it seem like everyone is hiding a folder full of kiddie porn or emails from their other girlfriend and therefore that is why you should care about privacy protection.

<comment><USER6> I think the key here is the ability of massive surveillance to be used to find something to use to prosecute "bad guys" especially when combined with vague laws. Really, everyone needs to read "Three Felonies a Day: How the Feds Target the Innocent."

Exhibit A: The Lori Drew prosecution. A lot of people thought that because she did something bad, that we should find something to charge her with, so the US attorney in California charged her with unauthorized access to MySpace's computer systems for the "crime" of violating their terms of service. After she was convicted of misdemeanor and acquitted of felony charges, the judge held the law was too vague as applied and threw out the convictions.

Exhibit B: The Daniel Hurwitz prosecution. Here was a doctor following exactly what the DEA's public guidance was, who was prosecuted and eventually convicted on the basis that he had some knowledge of the _statistical certainty_ that some of his patients were selling narcotics on the street from his prescriptions. And indeed when the defence noted that they had the DEA's public guidance to submit into evidence the DEA's response was to remove it from their web site.

The fact is that total surveillance + vague laws is _exactly_ what the USSR used to lock people up and exactly what China uses to lock people up. The comparison to China on the page in question is actually a very good one.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> It's really annoying when all these people complaining about bills like CISPA and other potentially dangerous bills don't actually mention why the bills are bad. Even the Wikipedia article on CISPA was horrible since it didn't directly quote the bill but just quoted others people paraphrasing the bill.

So what in particular is bad about this bill? <http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/s2105/text>

<comment><USER24> >Even the Wikipedia article on CISPA was horrible since it didn't directly quote the bill but just quoted others people paraphrasing the bill.

Direct quoting of something to prove something is "original research", then it's violation of Wikipedia's rules.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research>

<comment><USER25> Directly quoting the law and citing the source of the law would not be "original research" in the context of your link. To quote your link:

      The term "original research" (OR) is used on Wikipedia
      to refer to material--such as facts, allegations, and
      ideas--for which no reliable, published sources exist.

For example, the Wikipedia page [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_S...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution) includes the text of the US Constitution's 1st Amendment. By your interpretation that would make it original research.

Directly quoting a bill, citing the house.gov or whichever source, provides context for the ensuing discussion (pros and cons) which in turn should consist of a set of citations.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Turn off soundtrack by default please.

<comment><USER27> Yes I agree, Many software engineers frequent HN while on work breaks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> I really don't like propaganda. I don't need you trying to whip me into hysteria. Just tell me what the CISPA does that you think is so bad and let me decide.

<comment><USER29> _let me decide_

I don't think you understand how modern politics work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I am never sure just how much point there is to opposing such bills, due to my assumption that intelligence agencies always have and always will have all the indiscriminate access to domestic communications that they want. I think even publicised history provides more than abundant examples of that.

If there is a real fight, it is over criminal procedure, rules of evidence, and other things useful in more banal dealings with law enforcement, and thus having some bearing on the juridical outcome in the event that one is prosecuted (or persecuted) on the basis of some illegal surveillance technique. In other words, you could get acquitted of dealing drugs if the state's main evidence against you is something obtained through warrantless electronic surveillance, and that surveillance is illegal. And that's important.

But why is it important? It's important because it's small stuff, not the kind of stuff governments would throw national-level resources like NSA supercomputers at. So, the argument is really about the gaps, not the fringes. As far as terrorism and national security-type activities go, it seems to me they already have unlimited _de facto_ authority, capability, and inclination to spy on you all they want, and that this has more or less always been true.

Thus, I find that the rhetoric is a bit off. This isn't about stopping the government having "access to your e-mails". They already have that, in principle. With enough initiative and spiritual commitment, they can track you, read your e-mail, and listen to your voice communications. The real objective ought to be framed more precisely, perhaps something like: "There shouldn't be a law that goes out of its way to grant unto pedestrian police the formal sanction to employ surveillance capabilities hitherto the province of spooky intelligence agencies".

However, that's a lot harder to sell.

</comment><comment><USER31> The "Privacy Policy" button doesn't work ... how ironic.

<comment><USER32> Sadly, that was my fault (I'm one of the developers over at FFTF). Thanks for the heads up! Sorry for the foolish mistake.

For those playing along at home, here is our privacy policy: <http://fightforthefuture.org/privacy>

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Do you have a secret?

Yes, I have many.

Now can you tell all of your friends?

No.

</comment><comment><USER34> I'm curious if sites like this even work? There was a lot of them back when SOPA was a bigger deal and you signup, put in your email and it has some canned letter that gets emailed to your senator. If I was a senator getting these I'd filter them all to go to the trash. Unless we are using this method as some type of voting system now. It just seems like there should be a better more personal way than "spam the shit out of your senator".

<comment><USER14> As a result of all the letters I've sent my representative in the last six months I received a letter from him (Fortenberry, R-NE) asking if I'd like to attend a Q&A with him next week.

</comment></comment><comment><USER35> Instead of always trying to get the government to listen to its citizens, wouldn't it be better if it were required to seek OUR approval for new legislation?

<comment><USER36> What do you think elections are?

I realise that sounds sarcastic, but really- we have a democratic system for a reason. No, it doesn't work perfectly, but whole point is that they are _representatives_ of us.

<comment><USER37> Democratic? Really? Are we still kidding yourselves that we have some sort of democracy? Oh man.

Representatives of "us"? Oh, you donated millions to an election fund, right? No? Oh, OK then, you're a lobbyist, backed by millions? No. Ah well, they aint representing you then.

We are sold government in the same way tobacco companies sold tobacco in the past. Lies, misrepresentation, half truths, and attacks on the other brand. And because advertising is so powerful, yes it is, you think you are part of it. You're not, you are pawns. Necessary to get the "important" pieces in to position, but in the end, sacrificed at will for their greater good. Your jobs, homes, mortgages, businesses, financial health, health, all there for the taking so that those at the top can get rich, or as the banks have shown, survive and keep their bonuses. Its a filthy pyramid scheme, that we are conned in to supporting.

Sorry, democracy is a myth.

I assume its worse in the US.

<comment><USER29> So what do you propose instead? Direct vote on every issue?

<comment><USER14> It would be an interesting thought, certainly I'd be willing to entertain the idea of some kind of e-voting system, wherein people could, at very least, keep a running poll for each senator/representative in their jurisdiction regarding each piece of legislation, maybe make it an electoral college/delegate thing. Accurate information is hard to come by in those regards, so a lot of politicians vote the way they've voted for decades because they assume people still believe what they did when they first ran for election. Additionally, I'm intrigued by the Pirate Parties' "liquid feedback" system, which allows people to have a back and forth with their representatives and each other, in addition to being able to vote on the party platform.

<comment><USER35> Representatives know exactly who's supplying their campaign money and other inducements. And probably know how many citizens support various positions.

Knowing is not the problem. Doing is the problem.

<comment><USER35> If you could only hire an attorney from 2 options selected by other people that you had no control over and you couldn't fire him for 4 years, who do you think your attorney would be working for?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> In Australia, the government is trying to grant their security organisation (ASIO) permission to read citizens emails, monitor web behaviour, etc. There is a similar petition for Australians to sign [http://www.getup.org.au/campaigns/privacy/protect-us-but- res...](http://www.getup.org.au/campaigns/privacy/protect-us-but-respect-us/)

</comment><comment><USER39> Instead of simply displaying the phonenumbers of the local Congressmen, they could use a simple Grassroutes widget (<http://grassroutes.us/>). OccupyWallSt.org and Twitpic.com used the widget during the SOPA blackout.

</comment><comment><USER40> Makes me consider that ObamaCare compels everyone to give the government their medical records. Yeah, I'd consider those secrets subject to 4th Amendment protection.

<comment><USER41> Don't believe everything Glenn Beck tells you.

<comment><USER42> s/everything/anything

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> It would be nice if you'd provide DC in the list too. We have a senator, they just don't vote.

</comment><comment><USER44> Would it not be easier to create tools to ensure your complete anonymity when online?

<comment><USER45> Unfortunately, you can't fight battles like this on only one front.

Ignoring bad, overreaching legislation but finding a technological way to fight back will result in law enforcement going to congress later saying, "You gave us the authority to take these broad measures, but technology prevents us from doing our jobs. We now need new laws that outlaw those technologies or give us new authority to circumvent them. Perhaps we need a law that forces hardware manufacturers to include our backdoors so we can track users hiding behind anonymizing technologies. We'll also need more funding to increase our manpower and research to stay ahead of the subversive technologies out there."

<comment><USER14> Precisely, especially with Anonymous' doings lately I've heard several senators express a desire to outlaw TOR in the US, ironic since we were so in favor of it's use in Egypt, and since we developed it for use by Chinese dissidents.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER46> No need to shout :)

(That is my reaction to the graphical design of the page.)

</comment><comment><USER47> bug - the information form at the bottom of the page is missing validation.

</comment><comment><USER48> Hmm, I'm in trouble. The new NSA Data Center in Utah is being built just down the street from my house.

</comment><comment> s-phi-nl Flagged as political.

</comment><comment><USER49> Wait a minute. We're supposed to be upset that the feds took a guy's computer after they matched his fingerprints to a bomb bag used in the Madrid train bombings that killed almost 200 people? And we're supposed to believe this was ethnic harassment because "he is a muslim"? If any police anywhere find near- conclusive proof that you killed 200 people, it doesn't matter if you believe in the flying spaghetti monster. They just might take your computer away from you.

It turns out the fingerprints belonged to somebody else. Blame it on faulty software and faultier human interpretation. This scaremongering about routine evidence-gathering is socially irresponsible.

<comment><USER50> > Blame it on faulty software and faultier human interpretation

So you mean blame it on no one but a man's life gets destroyed.

And you wonder why they get away with murder...

<comment><USER29> Something bad happens, and the first thing on your mind is, "We have to blame this on somebody!"

And you wonder why America is mocked as such a litigious country...

<comment><USER51> Im always surprised by peoples aversion for trying to put blame on someone or some thing. Finding where the fault was is part of the process to make sure an error doesn't happen again.

I think there's confusion with the "blame game". As in, once you can blame someone, the problem is over and solved but that's just the start to solving the problem. I always want to know who did something wrong and how it happened so we could work to prevent it from happening again in the future.

<comment><USER52> Because as people state in this other thread (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4176658>) quite clearly:

"It's not about pointing the finger or otherwise apportioning blame. It's about learning from mistakes and preventing them from happening again."

Just assigning blame is a cop-out that doesn't do anything other than make people better by finding a scapegoat and punishing that scapegoat as a result.

<comment><USER50> Actually, I really don't care about blaming a person or a thing. What I am most concerned about is that the person who was most affected by the issue (the people who were incorrectly arrested) are made whole, as best as they can be.

This would include, to my mind, monetary compensation as well as having the offenders cover the cost of mental rehabilitation.

It's a traumatic experience and we should not be so heartless.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER53> if you're not breaking the law you have nothing to fear.

<comment><USER54> Live streaming webcam from your bedroom please. If you're not doing anything illegal in there, you're happy to do that, I assume?</comment></comment>


Hipster whines at tech mag, discovers pic was of an entirely different hipster - <AUTHOR> https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/03/06/hipsters_all_look_the_same_fact/ <comment><USER2> The word "hipster" has always rubbed me the wrong way, mainly because people have very strong opinions about hipsters, and I'm still not entirely sure that word means anything.

Google's definition is "a person who follows the latest trends and fashions, especially those regarded as being outside the cultural mainstream." We used to call people who followed the latest trends and fashions "trendy". The only difference between "trendy" and "hipster" seems to be the qualifier at the end of the hipster definition: "...especially those regarded as being outside the cultural mainstream." But that feels weasle-wordy to me. It's like saying, "a hipster is someone who follows the latest trends and fashions, except when they don't".

People have been wearing flannel and hats for a long time (check your parents' photo albums). Whether or not the person wearing those clothes considers themselves to be making a new fashion statement seems to be an assumption made on behalf of the person calling the other a hipster. Because of that, hearing someone call another person a hipster has always come across as that person projecting their emotions onto another person, not as a description of anything that's actually real.

<comment><USER3> Wikipedia has what I think is an extremely accurate and non-judgemental indicative definition of a hipster

> The hipster subculture is stereotypically composed of young adults who > reside primarily in gentrified neighborhoods. It is broadly associated with > indie and alternative music and genres such as chill-out, folk, modern rock, > pop rock, and post-Britpop. Hipsters also frequently flaunt a varied non- > mainstream fashion sensibility, vintage and thrift store-bought clothing, > pacifist and green views, generally vegan, consume organic and artisanal > foods, craft alcoholic beverages, and alternative lifestyles. The subculture > typically consists of mostly white young adults living in urban areas. It > has been described as a "mutating, trans-Atlantic melting pot of styles, > tastes and behavior"

To me eyes there is definitely a large and distinct subculture with these characteristics.

To be a bit more judgemental, another good definition of hipster is "what happens when pastiche and irony exhaust themselves as aesthetics" (Rob Horning, also in that article.)

<comment><USER2> There are so many different characteristics listed under that definition that virtually all young white people could be called a hipster to some degree.

I still disagree with the judgemental definition of hipster. You could call anyone wearing clothes that aren't totally unique "pastiche". Assuming they're wearing the clothes out of a sense of "irony" is projecting.

<comment><USER3> > There are so many different characteristics listed under that definition > that virtually all young white people could be called a hipster to some > degree.

I think that's pretty common in social subcultures though isn't it? It's an indicative description of something that's emerged naturally. It's not a mathematical formula.

If you want perfect that you'll need to give up trying to define cultures entirely.

<comment><USER2> That's a good point, most subcultures aren't going to perfectly describe everyone in them. I think my problem with the Wikipedia definition is that it's so overly broad that it's virtually unfalsifiable if you're young and white. That wouldn't be bad by itself (it would just be a large category of people). I guess the reason it bugs me is because it is so broad and so commonly -- exclusively, in my personal experience -- used as a pejorative.

<comment><USER4> "I think my problem with the Wikipedia definition is that it's so overly broad that it's virtually unfalsifiable if you're young and white"

Not my experience whatsoever. Philadelphia public school growing up, we had young white kids who would have unambiguously fallen into categories of "Punk" "metalhead" "goth" "hood" to just name a few of the most cliched highschool- sitcom-but-actually groups. (there was even regular assertions that "hipster" and "scene" were different but that one never really grokked for me)

Especially having lived east vs. west coast over the last decade, the assertion that there isn't a distinct subculture in a non-derogatory way that can be defined usefully as "hipster" doesn't ring true for me.

And for the most part, even growing up, I never got the sense the grouping was malicious except in rare cases. Most kids would own their tastes (usually associated with music and dress) and would probably take insult if you confused their clique :P (And less in the "you just shit on me" way, but that could happen, more in the "how the hell could you confuse that" fashion, which implies to me that others saw the same clean voluntary-group-agglomeration that I saw.)

<comment><USER2> Why would they have "unambiguously" fallen into those categories? There's just this assumption that people who "look like that" don't listen to punk or metal, and it's just not true. People who listen to punk or metal can be young, white (I hate to harp on the white thing, it's just the way Wikipedia describes it), live in gentrified urban areas, buy clothes from the thrift store, buy vintage jackets. Lots of punks are vegan and live alternative lifestyles. All of those things are characteristics that supposedly identify someone as a hipster. If it seems like I'm cherry-picking, I'd ask how many of the characteristics need to be met for the categorization to be true. So I don't agree that they unambiguously fall into their own "punk" or "metalhead" categories. Maybe they self-identify as punk or metalhead, but that doesn't change the fact that the definition of hipster is so broad that their subcultures are a subset of it.

<comment><USER4> "Why would they have "unambiguously" fallen into those categories? "

Pragmatically, because they often _wanted_ to and designed their personas intentionally.

You seem to be arguing that visible signifiers of subcultures don't provide meaningful signal. I would disagree broadly, and specifically in that the I don't even consider "hipster" the "generic white dude." Beanies? plaid? At least where I grew up those were _very conscious statements_ and not just the median type of dress.

As you say there are people who present as one thing who have tastes otherwise. I present nowadays as a metalhead but spend far more of my time listening to hip hop. But if someone called me a metalhead I'd probably go "there's some truth in that" and understand the connotations even if it's not 100%, and I see hipster similarly, whereas you seem to find it to have no signal whatsoever.

The core of our difference seems to be whether "generic white dude" falls into hipster. I simply can't find that to be true. The aspects the wikipedia article call out, I've only found to be "norm" in places that would, again without malice, probably self-identify as "hipster", although there's a definite "grunge" overlap. (Seattle, Portland, Vermont, in my personal experience) My main point being, that does not even come close to describing the vast bulk of jeans wearing boring-tshirt-or-button down blue/white-collar loafer/sneaker wearing white dude that I've met over the course of my life. (And sanity checking myself with a glance down my 55 person teamroom :P)

This may well end up being a "you live in a different bubble than I do" which I'm not about to argue or criticize. I just wanted to chime in from a music- nerd-often-accused-of-being-hipster's perspective; if only to speak for my friend group and myself, we find these terms to have inoffensive utility.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is a total puff piece but this quote stood out:

>"...For groovy models of how random acts by [group] "undergo a phase transition into a synchronized state""

So groups of people who start out from different groups or no groups after they enter a dominant group can coalesce around looks.

<comment><USER6> >This is a total puff piece

This article is written in their inimitable light-hearted/self-deprecating style by injecting some dry humour into a story. It is not meant to be taken seriously, as evidenced in the comment section.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The most surprising thing I learned from reading this is that people still call other people hipsters in 2019.

<comment><USER8> What else would you call a hipster?

<comment><USER9> There was a stretch of about 10 years either side of 1960 in which the term, and perhaps even the hipster, flourished. Having at least heard the term the first time around, and having encountered it in such writings as Mailer's _Advertisements for Myself_ and one of Styron's novels, I was surprised to see it reappear.

Perhaps in your 50s you will be surprised to find some term from your younger days reappear after long disuse--yuppie? slacker? brogrammer?

</comment></comment></comment><comment> Digit-Al I wonder if he can find a trendy pop-up street-food restaurant that sells humble pie.

<comment><USER10> Wash that down with some Hobo Lager</comment></comment>


WhatsApp Security Vulnerability - <AUTHOR> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/internet-security/11850817/WhatsApp-security-breach-lets-hackers-target-web-app-users.html

<comment><USER2> I wonder why this should only be exploitable on the WhatsApp web application. If it is possible to trick browsers into launching arbitrary applications by using vcards, this should affect many web application using vcards and the the security issue would have been in the browser side of things. What am i missing?

<comment><USER3> It simply allows you to send arbitrary files. No different to sending a link to a virus over email or putting a link on a Web page.

Stupid/normal users would then try run the downloaded file.

<comment><USER4> It's a little more guileful than that, and it definitely is a flaw with WhatsApp not validating their file types/formats.

<comment><USER5> But only a little - you could argue the vast majority of e-mail attachments are .doc etc with parsing bugs rather than straight .exe. Contrary to the gushing "using only their phone number" in the article, they admit that gullibility is required.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Fiction: Who Killed Windows Phone? - <AUTHOR> https://mondaynote.com/fiction-who-killed-windows-phone-af7491d4a363 <comment><USER2> Clearly, Microsoft killed windows phone. Between Windows mobile 6.5 devices not being able to upgrade to WP7, and then again from WP7 to WP8, they weren't doing well to support existing users. WP8 was pretty good on low spec phones though, so you got a lot of new to smart phone users buying the cheapest thing; yes, a lot of apps were missing, but a lot of those run so bad on similarly priced androids that it's almost better not to have them.

WP8.1 added some good things, but also added the ability for the homescreen to swap out; loading... when starting a backgrounded app was bad enough. Anyway, there were new cheap options that were decent and shipped with WP8.1, so.

Then came WP10 -- the promised upgrades for WP8 devices didn't really pan out, the majority of WP8 devices aren't eligible because they don't have enough ram, and very few of the rest were offered the upgrade through the update system, you have to jump through a bunch of hoops.

That's really for the best because the first year of WP10 releases seem like nobody actually tested them on a phone, until Creators Update, which was actually pretty decent -- except for Edge, which is so much amazingly worse than IE, but Microsoft didn't want any other browsers on their store. It doesn't help that there's only about 5 phones available that ship with WP10, three of which are high end, and the low end ones are more expensive than the WP8 phones upgradable to WP10, and have at best, equivalent hardware.

I'm not saying a good WP10 release would have somehow gotten windows phone into 2nd place (even worldwide, where Apple is way behind Android), but it would have kept them out of speculation for which platform would finally fail first -- Symbian, Blackberry, Blackberry 10, or Windows Phone.

Edit to add -- each flavor of Windows Phone strongly encouraging developers to throw out the SDK and start again doesn't help either. There may never been more WP10 users than there are WP8 users right now, rewriting the app to better support WP10 is a waste of effort, and the proposed update to WP10 to stop supporting apps that can also run on WP8 is a great way to kill both platforms.

</comment><comment><USER3> "In this alternate reality, Microsoft easily kills Android with one simple headline: Windows Phone Now Free"

It's worth noting that Microsoft did actually do this in 2014 - they made windows free for devices sized 9 inches or less: [https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-officially-makes- windo...](https://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-officially-makes-windows-free- for-devices-under-9-inches)

Granted, this is long after Windows Phone 7's initial release back in 2010.

</comment><comment><USER4> I was in the Windows CE space (the basis for Windows Phone 'til appx. Windows Phone 8) a bit when Windows CE was mostly killed; so sad to see the MS employee blogs withering on the vine filled with comments from helpless developers as Microsoft kept moving the cheese.

[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/obloch/2010/05/03/windows-c...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/obloch/2010/05/03/windows- ce-is-not-dead/)

[https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2012/11/16/introduci...](https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2012/11/16/introducing- netcf-3-9-in-windows-embedded-compact-2013-a-faster-leaner-and-multi-core- runtime/)

[https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/...](https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/595712/no- support-for-windows-ce-and-compact-framework-development-in-vs2010)

\--

I blame Experiment 19: [https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/research/project/experiment-...](https://www.microsoft.com/en- us/research/project/experiment-19/)

 _The prototype proved that Windows NT and the CLR could deliver better performance than Windows CE and the .NET Compact Framework on identical hardware. Within months of the completion of Experiment 19, Microsoft launched efforts to build what would become Windows Phone 8 and Windows RT for ARM tablets._

<comment><USER5> Yes. They lost in 2004-2007 when they decided to stop investing in the growing CE platform. I still don't understand why. It's got to be one of the biggest business blunders of all time.

<comment> Const-me > I still don't understand why.

AFAIK, they wanted developers to use native code and Windows API. This is especially needed for games and other resource-demanding apps.

Windows CE is just too old. The security there is comparable to Windows 9.x, i.e. almost no security. It was very hard to design a CE-based OS that would allow arbitrary native code to run, while denying the ability to access user's private data and break the device.

WP7 only allowed C++ code for close MS partners. Regular developers had to use .NET, which has its own very advanced security model built-in.

Probably, MS thought that once they allow C++ development, third-party developers start to port their older Windows games to WP 8 + Direct3D 11 feature level 9.3.

Eventually the plan didn't work. MS bought Minecraft, convinced Rockstar to port GTA San Andreas, but the platform still hadn't gain enough traction, and most third party developers passed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Well, I personally still just miss Metro UI, the Windows Phone 7 and Zune HD iterations of it. No UI quite looked as pretty since.

</comment><comment><USER7> I never considered a Windows phone because it failed to provide a substantial value prop vs Android and iOS. They could have competed on price, physical quality (we still have no truly waterproof phones), battery life (as in not a few more hours but actual weeks of battery, or warranty. That last one would have been the easiest: offer substantially better warranty than Apple (are there any Android phones that have original comprehensive warranty? I mean not through the carrier or Best Buy.)

The other thing to do would have been to offer Android app compatibility. I wonder if it would have been possible to spend that money they paid developers to port apps on developing a decent compatibility layer that would have made the porting unnecessary. Or provide tooling that made APK -> Windows app compilation super easy.

As is, they had a sad story of a phone with some neat features but no big steps forward, in a market already saturated by good-enough competition.

<comment><USER8> > we still have no truly waterproof phones), battery life

Aren't iPhones and galaxy "active" or something are waterproof?

There are "survival" type phone that have weeks of battery life and shock/water proof, but it's not what the market wants, there is a minority of people who would sacrifice the look/dimensions/weight of he phone for the N week batter life. Most consumers would go for the looks and portability I think. That's why iphone sells as much and those "survival" phones don't. Do you think if iphone would stick a twice as thick of a battery in its next iPhone many people would buy it? I certainly would not

<comment><USER9> I don't know what other people would buy if they were advertised heavier, but I'd buy a phone with about a 4.5"-5" screen, and 1.5x thicker than my current one, as long as the edges aren't sharp. Something like a Galaxy Nexus with a bit of battery bulge, updated components, and a micro SD slot would be close to perfect.

<comment><USER8> What prevents you from buying a battery case for he nexus or iPhone?

<comment><USER9> The Galaxy Nexus that I have is for the wrong carrier, its version of Android doesn't receive security updates, and has a tiny amount of storage with no expandable memory option.

iOS lacks a lot of the features I take for granted (MTP for arbitrary file types, support for app stores like HumbleBundle, ability to run different browsers and servers like ssh on-device). The iPhone hardware itself: non- removable battery, no external storage, and current models don't have a headphone jack. I'm not a fan of wireless audio devices. I'd have a fair amount of software to re-purchase. I've got an iPhone 6 available to me, that was originally a work phone. It's nice, in a lot of ways. Not something I'd consider for my "daily driver".

So, what prevents me? The fact that those devices would still be unsuitable, even if I got a battery case. I would've considered the Sony Xperia X Compact, if it had been released when I was last phone shopping. Seems Sony's got a bad habit of not updating their phones, I doubt their commitment to supporting them, and that's a particularly niche model, anyhow. Not much third-party support.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> As a windows 10 user, I would have definitely moved to a 'windows phone' anytime before ~2010. What would have gotten me to move would have been some sort of seamless 'handoff' from my desktop computer to my phone. I still think the opportunity is there for them to do that. I dont mean the ability to run desktop apps of course, but maybe some new take on 'remote desktop' which had a ios like UI. I just imagine leaving my house and going to work where I take my phone out and just plug it into some dock and I magicly have my home environment. And when I am on the go, I have some 'ios-ified' version of my home setup.

The only other phone I know of that kind of tried to do this was the atrix, which afaik was a failure

</comment><comment><USER11> I'm sticking with the combo of being late to the party and not having even a solid fraction of the top apps on iOS/Android. I believe Windows Phone could've survived if it had enough of the top app support. A distant third. But still enough to warrant continued investment.

So in my eyes if they could've gotten top app support from coming out with W7 earlier or just somehow getting that support when they did release things, it would've salvaged things. The insane Nokia purchase price would still need to be heavily written down along with a lot of layoffs. Just not as much as what actually happened.

Ah well. Most of all I will miss webOS, then Windows 8 Mobile.

</comment><comment><USER12> A platform is only as good as the applications that are available for it, and we live in a world where some of the best applications are made by one company named Google.

For many users, the everyday experience of using the Internet surrounds watching videos on YouTube, finding their way with Google Maps, and communicating using Gmail.

Google's mission statement, of course, is "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful"... however, that is an abridgment: the full version continues in a whisper with "(except on Windows Phone)".

What follows are a selection of stories of Google's process of systematically isolating Windows Phone, each backed up with articles of the time (though it is of course trivial to find references: even mainstream media started to realize that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts and started questioning the underlying motives).

-

Microsoft was forced to write their own YouTube application, which did not show ads and so was blocked by Google. I will note that Apple also effectively did this, though working with Google (a key difference), so this isn't crazy on the face of it: the original iPhone came with a copy of YouTube written by Apple that did not play any advertisements.

[https://www.windowscentral.com/google-microsoft-remove- youtu...](https://www.windowscentral.com/google-microsoft-remove-youtube- windows-phone-store)

In the aftermath of this debacle, they wrote a new one, working along with Google this time (as far as I understand), that did show advertisements and was designed to satisfy Google's other demands... but Google seriously waited until it was not just completed but fully released and then went ahead and blocked it anyway.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2013/08/16/google- blo...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2013/08/16/google-blocks- microsofts-youtube-windows-phone-app-again/)

-

Recently, Google decided that users of Gmail would not be able to access their email using Outlook on Windows Phone... even though it isn't like Microsoft is bad at _email_ of all things.

[https://mspoweruser.com/google-appears-blocking- windows-10-m...](https://mspoweruser.com/google-appears-blocking- windows-10-mobile-users-adding-google-accounts-outlook/)

However, this isn't the first time that Google messed with Windows Phone on email: when they removed the Exchange ActiveSync protocol, it was seen by many as a direct attack on Windows Phone.

[https://www.theverge.com/2012/12/14/3768274/google-gmail- act...](https://www.theverge.com/2012/12/14/3768274/google-gmail-activesync- windows-phone)

-

And who could forget the saga of Google Maps, which was blocked by Google on Windows Phone, even though it was accessible on other phones which used the exact same web browser engine, and even though the renderer was shared by the desktop version of IE.

[http://gizmodo.com/5973295/google-maps-has-never-been- access...](http://gizmodo.com/5973295/google-maps-has-never-been-accessible- on-mobile-internet-explorer)

[http://www.businessinsider.com/google-admits-it-was- blocking...](http://www.businessinsider.com/google-admits-it-was-blocking- wp8-maps-2013-1)

-

At one point Google's AdMob started to see a massive drop in revenue... only on Windows Phone. This was later claimed to be a "bug", but of course took Google a long time to come up with a fix, undercutting developer revenue on the platform.

[http://www.businessinsider.com/developers-see-drop-in- window...](http://www.businessinsider.com/developers-see-drop-in-windows- phone-ad-revenue-from-google-admob-2015-5)

-

Of course, Google refused to bring any other software to the platform, such as for Google Voice; and while you used to be able to use this from the web, once Apple relented and allowed Google Voice in the App Store, Google mostly stopped bothering maintaining their web version.

[https://www.cnet.com/news/lack-of-google-voice-app-for- windo...](https://www.cnet.com/news/lack-of-google-voice-app-for-windows- phone-isnt-just-inconvenient/)

This wouldn't be so bad, but Google also tends to throw its weight around to get third-party clients for their products pulled from places like the App Store... now, I personally think they have no legal basis to do this, but Apple goes along with it (as Gooogle does support their platform ;P) and it creates a chilling effect on people writing their own clients elsewhere.

[http://www.macworld.com/article/1141939/googlevoice_apps.htm...](http://www.macworld.com/article/1141939/googlevoice_apps.html)

Regardless, someone _did_ write a third-party Google Voice app for Windows Phone, and Microsoft (who had even been frantically writing their own third- party apps) let it stay around. So, Google had to change their terms of service and figure out how to block it on their server, as again: their unabridged mission statement _clearly reads_ "(except on Windows Phone)".

[https://www.neowin.net/news/metrotalk-third-party-google- voi...](https://www.neowin.net/news/metrotalk-third-party-google-voice-app- for-windows-phone-is-dead)

<comment><USER13> Your account is true, and I'm not disputing it or that Google took nefarious actions here, but the OP's thesis is that Windows Phone was doomed as a platform years before even the release of Windows Phone 7, the fist "modern" version that dropped compatibility with Windows Mobile/Windows CE.

I think Google could have only employed this strategy against an already failing adversary: they haven't tried the same against the iOS platform.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> As a user I quite enjoyed the UI concept of Windows Phone. It felt refreshing then especially because of its apparent simplicity, and focus on typography, which was a stark contrast from the skeuomorphism of iOS then.

Too bad there were never enough apps, IE mobile was buggy, and I felt that my Lumia never had the build quality Nokia was once famous for.

</comment><comment><USER15> I sold my S7 Edge and Lumia 1520 just today.

I _loved_ the Lumia 1520 device. It was beautiful, felt extremely good in the hand, was only slightly hefty, and the IPS display was phenomenal -- no AMOLED screen can compare to a Lumia IPS display when it comes to reading text. It was so good.

However, it was a death by a thousand paper cuts -- as many others have already pointed out. Even though I adored the device, I couldn't help but notice how useless it was. I was lucky enough to find several apps that I wanted to have on both my S7E and the L1520 but in the end, they were written by enthusiastic underpaid devs and were lagging behind in features, and some of their bugs I continuously observed throughout my full year with the device.

I was saddened to sell it but hoarding tech whose death clock has been running for a while is not sensible.

</comment><comment><USER16> Windows phone 8 was pretty nice to develop on. Microsoft's experience on building OS and a developer environment was also pretty visible on the product. IT was probably a little bit too late, though.

</comment><comment><USER17> The people.

No one asked for another restricted platform.

<comment><USER18> Who killed Ubuntu phone then?

<comment><USER19> Time traveling UX designers to prevent a future catastrophe.

<comment><USER20> Are there any manufactures building phones I can just install some form of Linux on?

Update: I mean, other than Android :)

Update: I'm reading about Tizen now and Sailfish

<comment><USER21> It seems like the Sony Xperia X is becoming a sailfish option: [https://blog.jolla.com/sony-xperia-project- update/](https://blog.jolla.com/sony-xperia-project-update/)

Now if only I could work sony's naming scheme. Apparently the x series is the replacement of the z series (what happened to the y series?). Then looking at local retailers, all I can find are the XZ phones, so who knows what they are. Haven't looked at specs yet because I'm lost in code names. I really wish buying from any other manufacturer was as simple as buying from apple.

<comment><USER22> just found a name chart.

[http://www.fonearena.com/blog/224635/sony-g8441-with- snapdra...](http://www.fonearena.com/blog/224635/sony-g8441-with- snapdragon-835-android-8-0-surfaces-in-benchmarks-ahead-of-ifa-2017.html)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Thinking about it, the entire MS business model was to pay royalties on hardware that is now often made by ODMs in China. It is very likely that the next economic collapse will result in a decline in PC sales. Of course, shareholders rely on MS stock to go up every time PC sales increase.

</comment><comment><USER24> What killed Windows Mobile/Phone? The iPhone (the first one) did.

Windows Phone was complicated, and all about the enterprise. The business model was all about selling more server licenses, and everyone having a phone that tied them into that ecosystem was good.

Once Apple put out a phone that normal (non-techy) people could use, it really was over. Their UI was much, much better, and although it had less features to start, all their features worked.

It was all downhill from there.

And yes, I agree with the story that culture was the real culprit:

> We know who/what killed Windows Phone, and it's not Android. We could point > fingers at one or more Microsoft execs as the culprits, but that misses the > point: Microsoft culture did it. Culture is dangerous; under our field of > consciousness, it sneakily filters and shapes perceptions, it's a system of > permissions to emote, think, speak, and do.

</comment><comment><USER25> I always wondered what Jean-Louis Gassée was doing after BEoS.

</comment><comment><USER26> _[in 2013] The company's Lumia brand of smartphones offers respectable devices — I bought one — but..._

Haha this closing admission explains entirely the goofy anachronisms and _non sequiturs_ that comprise the rest of TFA. The dream of windows on the phone could have come true, if only it had been a decent phone OS, before either of the two actual decent phone OSes had been introduced, and also it had been completely free... JLG has lots of uncles but no aunts.

We still make fun of my brother's Lumia phone, that he "got for really cheap". Why was that, I wonder?

<comment><USER27> Loved the Lumia phones. Rock solid stability.

<comment><USER28> Yea I had one for a while. It was a good little phone. Durable. I liked the OS too. The Kindle app was terribly buggy .. if there was a version of Firefox for it I think I'd have been set.

<comment><USER27> Yea...Windows Phone OS is really reliable (2 restarts in 5 years). I've never felt it underpowered either. Yes, my biggest complaint is the terrible PDF apps. Seriously Microsoft? Full Excel, but no PDF?

<comment><USER26> This is not a basic problem, but it obviously stems from one. When you only get the apps that the platform vendor can be arsed to provide, you'll find that their priorities are not your priorities.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>