'Accuracy nudge' could curtail Covid-19 misinformation online - <AUTHOR> https://mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/study-accuracy-nudge-could-curtail-covid-19-misinformation-online <comment><USER2> Who decides what information is accurate?

There are many purveyors of misinformation. I think the CDC and the WHO are rather dishonest about viruses. All they recommend is washing hands and wearing gloves and "social distancing", so that we can "flatten the curve" and "slow the spread" and survive long enough for a vaccine to become available for "herd immunity", so that we can prevent old people who are likely to die of something soon anyways from dying of Covid-19.

I refuse to believe that Science hasn't figured anything else out about how to be healthy. One doctor's video about Chloroquine said it works by carrying zinc into cells [3]. Maybe zinc supplements would be preventative? I don't know, I'm just a simple retired taxi driver. Why doesn't the CDC provide an official list of known anti-viral lifestyle adjustments, to help us all be resilient against inevitable viruses?

There is a difference between official misinformation, well-intentioned Chicken Little-ism, and those who are just along for the ride and follow whomever they find most credible.

Chicken Little [0] meant well, he was just a simple chicken who didn't understand what he experienced, and was adept at recruiting followers to his simplistic ideology: The sky is falling! The terrorists are coming! The super- virus is going to kill us all!

Official misinformation is when the news media deliberately misleads its audience: "Cheeto Hitler only got elected because the Russians helped him", when in fact Hillary Clinton manipulated the DNC [1] to be the Democratic party's presumptive nominee in spite of her having a fraction of Bill Clinton's charisma. Imagine how that election would've turned out if the Democrats had held a primary rather than a coronation. IMHO Cheeto Jesus/Hitler (Donald Trump, depending on your perspective) won the election because he ran an smart campaign, unlike his opponent [2].

My latest readings of the situation in Italy is that they are likely to have to restate the cause of death of many of their recently deceased, so that Covid-19 is only a factor instead of the primary cause. I don't think they'll admit to irresponsible medicine: oxygenating and ventilating old people to death.

But it's too late: official misinformation has grabbed onto the preliminary statistics and used it to shut down the economy. In a video I watched earlier today, a German doctor said Covid-19 (SARS v2) is not even as potent as SARS v1 or MERS (the super-viruses of years past). Maybe I'll find that video and submit it here.

People believe things fervently, and it's difficult to get us to believe more accurate things. Accuracy is objective, but also a matter of perspective. Most of us are just along for the ride.

[0] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henny_Penny](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henny_Penny) (Europeans: 'Henny Penny'. Americans: 'Chicken Little')

[1] [https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/11/02/clinton-b...](https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/11/02/clinton- brazile-hacks-2016-215774)

[2] _Shattered: Inside Hillary Clinton 's Doomed Campaign_ \- [https://books.google.com/books?id=OmS0DgAAQBAJ](https://books.google.com/books?id=OmS0DgAAQBAJ)

[3] _Chloroquine Is a Zinc Ionophore_ \- [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4182877/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4182877/)

<comment><USER3> > Why doesn't the CDC provide an official list of known anti-viral lifestyle > adjustments, to help us all be resilient against inevitable viruses?

They have.[1]

TLDR: Wash your hands, practice social distancing, and cough/sneeze into your elbow instead of your hands.

[1] [https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting- si...](https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting- sick/prevention.html)

<comment><USER2> I clicked your link, then followed to "if you are sick" [1], and found the advice to be non-helpful for helping people prevent and recover from viral sicknesses.

I'm interested in advice to help people become more 'resilient' against viruses:

> resilient [adj] 1. Capable of returning to an original shape or position, as > after having been compressed. See Synonyms at flexible. 2. Able to recover > readily, as from misfortune. > -[https://www.thefreedictionary.com/resilient](https://www.thefreedictionary.com/resilient)

I proposed that Zinc might be helpful. Vitamin-D is also indicated on account of the season. Vitamin-B1 may be indicated for people who smoke and/or live in an area with especially polluted air (Wuhan, northern Italy).

The experts should be telling us what to eat and how else to take better care of ourselves while we're sick. But they default to 'don't catch the virus, if you do you'll probably be fine, if not hopefully the medical system will help.' Why can't they give more helpful advice?

[1] [https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/if-you-are- sick/st...](https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/if-you-are-sick/steps- when-sick.html)

<comment><USER4> Because that's too complicated a message to send.

At a broad, high level, the message has to be simple and direct: stop (modes of) transmission (touching eyes, washing hands, being around people), quarantine yourself, self-isolate yourself, just stop!

Those simple and direct actions cover everything they need. Maybe that's pareto's principle.

Getting into vitamins, whatever, minor optimizations, how do you propose that works when literally everyone understands "America has an obesity problem-- stop eating so much", and yet there America is.

<comment><USER2> > At a broad, high level, the message has to be simple and direct:

"Vitamin D is the sunlight vitamin. Eat liver, or take a supplement, in the winter when the sun has gone away."

> Getting into vitamins, whatever, minor optimizations, how do you propose > that works

The CDC could simplify the actual findings of science to something understandable for most people.

> when literally everyone understands "America has an obesity problem--stop > eating so much", and yet there America is.

This explanation -- 'people eat too much' -> obesity -- is simplistic. Sometimes people eat too much, but most of America's weight problem stems from the food industry's misapplication of science. My father and his wife have extra weight mostly because they eat meat-based diets complemented with industrial starches (boxed chips, crackers, pancakes, fake syrup, etc). They eat salads, but only when they're coated with large servings of industrial salad dressings (soybean oil is cheap).

Maintenance pharmaceuticals put a lot of weight on people too.

The war on butter was quietly abandoned by the powers that be. The food industry quietly reformulated some of their worst products to remove trans fats, but there's still a lot of terrible foods on the grocery stores' shelves.

The obesity epidemic is evidence of crimes against the public's health.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Eagle attacking drone caught on camera [video] - <AUTHOR> http://www.nrk.no/trondelag/drone-fra-forsvaret-ble-angrepet-av-orn-1.12842625 <comment><AUTHOR> Drone delivery may be somewhat more challenging in Norway.</comment>


Interview With Digg CEO Matt Williams On Future Of Digg - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/21/interview-with-digg-ceo-matt-williams-on-future-of-digg/

<comment><AUTHOR> Related on Digg Blog: <http://about.digg.com/blog/digg-goes>

</comment><comment><USER2> Well I'm convinced! No CEO would pretend to be bullish about a company they knew was in trouble.</comment>


Notes on the upcoming release of Scala 2.12 - <AUTHOR> http://get-scala.org/2.12 <comment><AUTHOR> [https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/5ab948/scala_2...](https://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/5ab948/scala_212_release_notes/)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/scala/comments/5a6lzq/better_releas...](https://www.reddit.com/r/scala/comments/5a6lzq/better_release_notes_for_scala_212/)</comment>


Git-wtf : Displays the state of your repository in an easily readable format - <AUTHOR> http://git-wt-commit.rubyforge.org/git-wtf <comment><USER2> The link is to the source code. If you'd rather understand what this does by seeing example output (without running it), see:

<http://git-wt-commit.rubyforge.org/#git-wtf>

<comment><USER3> Sweet! He's got a script to automate pushing a local branch to a remote and setting up tracking at one shot: <http://git-wt-commit.rubyforge.org/git- publish-branch>

I always forget the exact config settings each time I have to do it... probably should have written a script myself after doing it twice :)

<comment><USER4> If you don't mind using ruby, you can use git remote branch

<http://grb.rubyforge.org/>

It has got many timesaving tricks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Works great with this little script I wrote to execute commands on all my repos:

        #!/bin/sh

        REPOS="\
        $HOME/git/repo1 \
        $HOME/git/repo2 \
        $HOME/git/repo3"

        for REPO in $REPOS; do
            echo "</comment><comment></comment><comment>=="
            echo $REPO
            if [ -d "$REPO" ]; then
                pushd "$REPO" > /dev/null
                    sh -c "$1"
                popd > /dev/null
            else
                echo "$REPO doesn't exist"
            fi
        done
        echo "</comment><comment></comment><comment>=="

Save it as "eachrepo" or something, then do

        eachrepo "git wtf"

<comment><USER6> Some friendly shell-scripting hints!

— Quoted strings continue until the close quote, regardless of intervening newlines, tabs or spaces. Your REPOS definition would be more readable without the backslashes and work just as well:

      REPOS="
        $HOME/git/repo1
        $HOME/git/repo2
        $HOME/git/repo3
        "

— pushd and popd are handy, but are bash extensions and not part of POSIX /bin/sh (and yes, a lot of systems including Ubuntu and Debian have a bare POSIX /bin/sh). Even when they are available, shell error handling can make it difficult to be sure that each pushd has a matching popd. A simpler approach is to just cd in the subshell:

      sh -c "cd $REPO; $1"

— Rather than explicitly invoking the shell you might find it easier to do the same thing with syntax:

      (
        cd $REPO
        eval "$1"
      )

...or, you might find that even less readable. Up to you!

<comment><USER7> No need. "git --git-dir $REPO/.git --work-tree $REPO <command>" is (almost) exactly equivalent to cd-ing to the work tree.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> God bless you and your children and your childrens childrens children, for 7 weeks.</comment>


Dotfile Management and Documentation with Org-Mode - <AUTHOR> https://expoundite.net/guides/dotfile-management <comment><USER2> Semi-related: I have written an org-mode replacement that addresses some of the key challenges (hard to learn, awkward) while keeping some key benefits (efficient from keyboard, extremely flexible), and adding huge flexibility in what can be done: [http://onemodel.org](http://onemodel.org)

It is a personal organizer, and the beginning of a platform to change how individuals (or mankind) manage knowledge overall.

(Now with an improved web site.)

Feedback appreciated.</comment>


Show HN: DIY Oscilloscope Voice Control - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/jmwilson/ollie <comment><USER2> Interesting use case, neat!

How hard/easy was it to get started with snips for this?

<comment><AUTHOR> Pretty easy, I had no background in voice assistants before. You set up the intents on their console site, rack your brain for every way you could phrase a command, and then press a button and Snips will let you download the trained assistant in a .zip file.

They have examples in JS and python for simple client apps to build from; the platform sends processed intent messages over local MQTT, so it's just a loop to listen and process those intents into commands to send via USBTMC.</comment></comment>


Fantastic 8000x8000 NASA photograph of the Earth - <AUTHOR> https://secure.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/6760135001/sizes/o/in/set-72157627439487497/

<comment><AUTHOR> Article:

<http://mashable.com/2012/01/26/hi-res-image-earth/></comment>


Ask HN: Amazon Deliveries - <AUTHOR> I opted out of Prime years ago, since it was not worth it for us.
When making orders now most of the time we avoid third party vendors, and choose "sold by and sent by Amazon" with free shipping.
Now, to the weird part. It's been a few months that when checking out on a free shipping order, ( on top of the constant teasing about how great Prime is and why we should rejoin ) we are usually given three or four options :
#1 Free shipping, delivery in 4-5 days.
#2 Small extra fee, delivery in 2 days or so.
#3 Bigger extra fee, delivery tomorrow.
#4 Biggest fee, delivery today.
Consistently choosing option #1 consistently results in delivery next morning at no extra cost, which is option #3 minus the payment, it's delivered for free.
Not that there's any reason to complain, but what's going on here ? <comment><USER2> In my experience, Amazon will underpromise and overdeliver if they can.

I don't think they purposely sit on orders so that delivery takes longer just because you didn't pay extra. If your order can go it will go, but those who did pay for guaranteed faster delivery will still have priority.

You just seem lucky to live in an area where they usually can fit your order in fast.

</comment><comment> BA4gDY-cqjsEPWn I'd wager that you are riding on top of other people's prime subscription in close proximity to you. Amazon dispatches your stuff on the same truck as their because it's more economical than having to come back twice. This would only work in an urban setting where orders are scarce. In a densely populated area it's unlikely to happen.

<comment><AUTHOR> Extremely densely populated though. Amazon orders are coming several times a day, every single day, all around us.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Where do you live? It may be that you're located conveniently near a warehouse, or in a place where shipping is unusually cheap.

<comment><AUTHOR> Japan, and yes we are close. In fact we could get delivery in one hour if we chose, either at home or in the nearest konbini, of which there are at least a dozen within a 5 minute walk.

Still, getting a service we're not paying for. And it actually makes me distrust Amazon, since we've been enjoying the same service as a paying customer, for free and without an obvious explanation.</comment></comment>


State Machines and the Strange Case of Mutating API - <AUTHOR> http://250bpm.com/blog:142 <comment><USER2> This is precisely the problem addressed by typestates and session types. Each state has a unique type, and in that state, one can only call the appropriate functions.

Interestingly, Rust used to have typestates in its very early incarnation. See: [https://pcwalton.github.io/2012/12/26/typestate-is- dead.html](https://pcwalton.github.io/2012/12/26/typestate-is-dead.html)

<comment><USER3> Rust's affine typing solves precisely this problem as well. Your state change methods consume the previous state variable, making it a compile-time error to access it afterwards. Given code like in the article and assuming connect_unauthenticated takes self by value:

      let i1 = socks5_socket();
      let i2 = i1.connect_unauthenticated(proxy_addr);
      let i3 = i1.connect_tcp(addr);

Rust will complain:

      error[E0382]: use of moved value: `i1`
        |
      2 |     let i2 = i1.connect_unauthenticated(proxy_addr);
        |             - value moved here
      3 |     let i3 = i1.connect_tcp(addr);
        |              ^ value used here after move
        |
        = note: move occurs because `i1` has type `socks5_socket`, which does not implement the `Copy` trait

<comment><USER4> That is really marvelous. How is this kind of thing implemented under the hood?

That new wizkid language Zig by Andrew Kelly - I wonder if it has anything similar?

<comment><USER5> You can actually do the type-checking part of this even in C, it's just uglier:

      struct sock5_blank i1 = socks5_socket();
      struct sock5_authed i2 = connect_unauthenticated(i1,proxy_addr);
      struct sock5_tcp i3 = connect_tcp(i1,addr); /* error: expected struct sock5_authed, got struct sock5_blank */

Rust adds the constraint that any (non-copyable,non-dropable) variable has to be passed to a function (or operator, or return statement) exactly once:

      Noncopyable a = ...;
      Copyable b = ...;
      f(a,b); //=> f(a,copy(&b)) // a is no longer in scope after this
      g(b); // this is fine, we took a reference to b and made a copy without changing the original
      h(a); // error: a is no longer a live variable

<comment><AUTHOR> The problem with the C solution is that you'll get hanging pointers. Try using i1 after the code above executes and you'll get a runtime error.

<comment><USER5> Er, yes; that's what I said (or rather, hanging various things including but not limited to pointers). C only supported the typechecking part of this because it doesn't have any facilities for compile-time linearity checking.

Linearity[0] and dependency[1] checking is what makes Rust a improvement over C, rather than yet another "let's reinvent C++, but slightly less awful" project.

0: "error: no implementation for copy〈T〉","error: no implementation for drop〈T〉"[2]

1: "error: cannot move/destroy x (of type T); y (of type T&'x) outlives it"

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> > What options do we have to support such mutating API at the moment?

What is wrong with implementing the states with polymorphic classes providing the API or an interface to it?

<comment><AUTHOR> Can you give an example?

<comment><USER7> Apple's GameplayKit has several examples

[https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/Ge...](https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/General/Conceptual/GameplayKit_Guide/StateMachine.html)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'd probably do it like this:

      socks5_socket([&](auto closed_socket) {
          closed_socket.connect_unauthenticated(proxy_addr, [&](auto authenticated_socket) {
              authenticated_socket.connect_tcp(addr, [&](auto tcp_socket) {
                  //tcp_socket.send or w/e
              });
          });
      });

</comment><comment><USER9> problem solved via pattern matching (visitor pattern in oop).</comment>


Get to know Voxis, the cybercrime platform for evading fraud detection - <AUTHOR> http://www.networkworld.com/article/2840816/opensource-subnet/get-to-know-voxis-the-cybercrime-platform-for-evading-fraud-detection.html

<comment><AUTHOR> Almost like buying into a franchise, criminals outsource building fake ecommerce sites and buy software to beat fraud detection systems.</comment>


Blockade - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/worstcase/blockade <comment><USER2> What are the principal differences between this tool and Jepsen?

I am not personally familiar with either tool, just curious.

<comment><AUTHOR> It seems like it uses Docker instead of custom cluster-building logic. I'm not sure if there are differences between how it slows down the network and creates partitions.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: How can I direct my experience towards renewable energy? - <AUTHOR>

I'm a computer engineer with 15 years experience on a variety of platforms, architectures, programming languages and so on.
I'm currently looking for a bit more. Although it's a huge field, I feel like I've done my time learning and doing things around 'computers'. I see a big future in renewable energy, not just as a new industry, but because I'm as passionate about it as I was 15 years ago when I discovered programming.
I'd be interested to see any thoughts or ideas from people involved in or passionate about the field. <comment><USER2> look into data center energy efficiency, energy efficiency software, or synthetic biology. also- are you in the bay? if so, i'd love to meet up. my head's in the same place- software is cool, but renewable energy offers something bigger.

<comment><AUTHOR> Hey, thanks for the ideas. Unfortunately not, I'm in Australia.</comment></comment>


The dark side of electronic waste recycling - <AUTHOR> https://www.theverge.com/2019/12/4/20992240/e-waste-recycling-electronic-basel-convention-crime-total-reclaim-fraud <comment><USER2> The "good guys", the responsible for-profit recyclers, get 28 months in prison for falsifying documents about flat screens that were shipped to Hong Kong. No solution in sight for ewaste.</comment>


Ask HN: Am I hirable? - <AUTHOR> Here's my brief story. I'm a 30 year old white male in the USA. I have a bachelors in psychology, an incomplete graduate degree in psychology (60 out of 66 credits), no criminal record, good credit, over 50k in student debt, and a failed startup to my name. I spent the last three years learning to program because I had an idea for a website. I created it, but frankly, I don't have the business background nor the proficiency to be a one-man startup success story. I've learned MySQL, PHP, Javascript, jQuery, Laravel, HTML, CSS, some Python, and a lot about general computing. I'm an excellent typer, and I'm savvy with most tech. I have a variety of skills that involve computers, counseling, writing, and critical thinking.
I'm writing this because I feel like I'm telling myself a story that I'm not currently hirable. I read job requirements, and I feel like most startups or tech companies would choose someone with a computer science degree or more legitimate programming skills. I tell myself that I can't get a job as a counselor since I don't have a Masters degree. I also feel like my limited references (having worked for myself the last 3 years) will hold me back from getting any position that pays over 40k a year.
The frustration here is that I am extremely valuable to many companies, but without a strong résumé, I figure I'll be glossed over for a stronger on-paper candidate. I'm a fast learner, very resourceful, and I'm great with optimization. I love improving methods and systems to produce greater efficiency and effectiveness.
I can also move to anywhere in the USA, and I currently have enough money saved up to relocate immediately.
Any thoughts or suggestions are appreciated. <comment><USER2> In addition to outericky's post, consider if you can present a sample project to employers. You say you had an idea for a website; do you still have it? Is it running? Put that in your resume, link to the source code if you can. (Perhaps take a bit to clean it up if necessary, or make sure to highlight what it is and where the best stuff is.) There's a lot of places you can get a foot in the door if it's a decent website. You probably do want to stay away from anywhere with heavy HR screening.

You may also want to consider trying to angle for a management track. I'm not sure you can jump straight there, but if you can find something a little bit larger than a 5-person startup, and can find something growing, you may be able to work you way up that path; put a bit of that under your belt and you'll probably be in pretty decent shape.

Perhaps some people who have gone that path could offer some insight?

But, upshot, with some hustle you seem hireable to me based on the given info. You just definitely aren't in a position where the job will hop into your lap right now.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's hard to say from afar, of course, but I believe you are not only hirable, but potentially a very valuable employee.

Writing skill is a big plus, even if many people (including HR people) don't realize that immediately.

Psychology can be valuable, as well, especially if you find a tech field to "dock on". Maybe some user experience stuff or so? Security (social engineering)? I don't know, but it would be a shame to totally abandon that amount of knowledge.

The problem is, as you have realized, that it takes effort on the hiring manager's part to correctly evaluate your potential value to the company.

Write your resume more in the direction of cross-disciplinary projects, show the (very different) things you've done of your own accord.

And (although this may be very tricky to do, depending on your personality) don't go into it as a supplicant competing with recent university graduates. Paint yourself a career changer, a bit apart from the masses.

Still, hiring tends to be conservative, so I wouldn't want to give you high hopes of immediate success.

Depending on the time frame you're contemplating, maybe use your writing skills and curiosity, paired with technical skills, to impress people.

Julia Evans ([http://jvns.ca/](http://jvns.ca/)), for example, is much admired here on HN. I don't know her backstory, from my point of view she simply showed up one day with an interesting blog post, then another, then another.

And while all of those blog posts are kind of basic, maybe even boring, to people who are deep in whatever she's writing about, she managed to write about lots of different subjects competently, gaining lots of respect and job offers, IIRC.

</comment><comment><USER4> Run a test. Hop on angelist, and see what some early stage companies think. Show interest in their job postings. Don't mislead anyone about your skill set.

Large companies often times get many resumes, and have to go through a weeding process. Normally that's degree/years of experience thing. But smaller startups (especially less popular ones) may give you a shot. Start there, get some experience and re-valuate.

</comment><comment><USER5> Ping Alex (firstname.lastname@example.com). She's our recruiter and currently looking for "college graduates" willing to start in June. Austin, Dallas or Houston. You can mention me (Cristian) if you like.</comment>


Apple's Latest Macs Have a Serious Audio Glitching Bug - <AUTHOR> http://cdm.link/2019/02/apple-2018-glitch/ <comment><USER2> Apple appears to be coming to some sort of head at this point. This is speaking as someone heavily invested in Apple products and shares.

Their iPhones have reached a peak, where it appears people are no longer willing to pay so much for them. They are too damn expensive, with nothing to justify their costs. I am one of the morons who upgraded to the XS, but only because I needed the 512GB storage. If not for the increased storage needs, I wouldn't have upgraded and I know for a fact there is really no difference after using it for several months. I have no plans on updating to the next one, the first time since iPhone 3.

MacBooks are worse now than they were since 2015. I won't upgrade until they get rid of the TouchBar. I would rather go back to Windows than use that stupid TouchBar.

Apple software is terrible. iTunes is still the worst piece of software that I'm forced to use. The bugs they've had are inexcusable.

Apple is the richest company in the world, and instead of paying their engineers top wages, they are wasting it on stock buybacks. Until their revenues decrease year-over-year they won't change their ways.

To put it bluntly, Apple is extremely, extremely arrogant and I hope they will pay their price in the next few years. It feels like all product lines are either too expensive and/or worse quality than even a few years previous. Many people unhappy or unimpressed with their products, but they don't give a damn.

<comment><USER3> > Their iPhones have reached a peak, where it appears people are no longer > willing to pay so much for them.

They may have reached peak growth, but the numbers show that outside China (which in hindsight appears to have larger economic issues), millions of people buy iPhones.

Are all the current iPhone users going to suddenly switch to Android? Very unlikely.

By all accounts the XS is a great phone. If I had anything other than the X, I would have upgraded.

> Apple is the richest company in the world, and instead of paying their > engineers top wages, they are wasting it on stock buybacks.

You realize that Apple has so much money they can do both. This is not a binary decision.

A much bigger issue for Apple is that they need more stores. They have a huge advantage over any other phone maker in that people can walk in and get service and support. The stores are so busy now, that it has become a challenge. Hopefully the departure of the head of retail shows that Apple has realized they have not grown the store base fast enough.

<comment><USER4> _> You realize that Apple has so much money they can do both._

Not with the same dollar. We shouldn't forget what giving money back to shareholders means. It means that Apple cannot think of anything to invest that money in that's more promising than what investors can find elsewhere.

You could say it's prudent and honest. Instead of wasting all that money on stuff that never yields a return they're handing it back their owners.

But I still find it surprising that a company like Apple with the enormous leverage of billions of (the wealthiest) users and a brand name second to none doesn't think that it can make great things happen with that money.

I don't think I'm best placed to tell them what that could be. But there are clearly some huge gaps in their strategy.

For instance, they keep pushing AR, because AR is an area where latency matters so much that you need expensive devices for it.

But AR would be so much more valuable in combination with all the information that only Google Maps and Google Street View has. Even more so if you think about the data that's going to be needed for (and generated by) self driving cars.

I imagine it's hugely expensive to gather that information. Apple Maps is second rate. They have nothing like Street View and no self driving car project. I think owning information that makes high end devices far more useful than low end devices is exactly what Apple needs.

There aren't going to be many players in that market exactly because it's so expensive. Only the biggest global tech companies can really do it. That moat will be one of the widest and deepest ever.

Gaming is another area where expensive devices make a difference. Playing games is something almost everybody does on their iPhones. I find it baffling that Apple isn't one of the biggest gaming companies.

Where are Apple's contributions to new user interaction paradigms? The touch bar? Is that it? Apple just isn't thinking big enough. That's why they have so much money left to pay back.

Anyway, you can completely disregard _my_ ideas on what they could do with that money and still be surprised that _they_ can't think of anything.

<comment><USER3> Again, thinking binary is incorrect here. Apple is spending 10B+/year on R&D [1]. They clearly can think of _something_. I guess it could be argued they should be the top R&D spender (they are trending that way), but even if they were they would still have enough money do stock buy backs and pay dividends. The amount of money they make is staggering.

Apple has traditionally not be an acquirer of large companies. I know many people argue for them to do some big acquisition. I'm not sure that's a good idea.

Apple Maps specifically has improved a lot since release. I can't remember the last time I used Google Maps. Apple is also collecting street view data [2].

Apple has plenty of areas to improve, but it is not from the lack of R&D spending.

[1] [http://dashboards.trefis.com/no-login- required/MCeJl2Yc?from...](http://dashboards.trefis.com/no-login- required/MCeJl2Yc?fromforbesandarticle=is-apples-soaring-rd-a-sign-of-good- things-to-come)

[2] [https://maps.apple.com/vehicles/](https://maps.apple.com/vehicles/)

<comment><USER4> _> Again, thinking binary is incorrect here._

They can only spend each dollar exactly once. In that sense it is binary. But of course they can decide to do buybacks and invest in stuff. That's what they're doing.

My point is that I don't get why a company like Apple doesn't see great investment opportunities for every last dollar they earn. Especially as they have really huge gaps in their strategy.

They are not on a great trajectory right now. The services business they want to expand on does not look that strong to me in spite of growing reasonably fast right now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> That's a weird glitch, and generally I'm not a fan of apple hardware (I think it's overpriced, that their keyboards suck, that they don't have enough ports, and I don't enjoy working in osx), but this article comes off as almost biblically haughty. Apple should have tests around clock updates affecting external audio quality? I mean, maybe after this bug being discovered, sure, but before, was that a connection that could have been made in a QA engineers mind? Maybe it is, maybe it's fair? I don't know anything about manufacturing hardware, but I just find it surprising.

Like, off the top of my head, the x1 carbon is still loved by most Linux users (that I have encountered) despite the fact that out of the box, sleep literally does not work on it for Linux systems. You have to install a BIOS update. Yet Lenovo doesn't seem to get nearly the attention that apple does for this and the myriad of other mistakes I have discovered with them.

<comment><USER6> The article comes from CDM which is a music production website, MacBooks are very popular in that field, and basically all audio producers use external audio interfaces, it's not an uncommon use case. This is not the first time that this type of issues happens (from memory, last year an OSX update broke compatibility with Native Instruments Maschine, a very popular music software). So I think the point that the article is trying to make, is that music producers are one of the most Apple-leaning crowds, and yet they feel like they are being ignored by Apple. But at the same time I understand your point, this is a small market in the grand scheme of things.

<comment><USER7> _music producers are one of the most Apple-leaning crowds, and yet they feel like they are being ignored by Apple._ [...] _this is a small market in the grand scheme of things._

This is the same point that's often made about developers. But if it's not developers and it's not music producers, what _is_ the large market for Macs that dwarfs everything else? And are they at least getting the products and features they want?

<comment><USER8> The main market for Macs are people who want an expensive-looking, high perceived quality machine for emails, Facebook, and Slack.

<comment><USER9> Pretty much what I use my macbook air for - £900 back in 2013, battery still lasts several hours. The electrical tape over the webcam reduces the 'expensive looking' part.

For real work on the road I use my t410s and ubuntu (although the hinge has now gone, which is a right pain), but most of the time I do real work I'm at home and use my z440 HP workstation (also with ubuntu)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm a former full-time musician working as an audio dev those days.

Developing audio-plugins (AU) make you use a lot of DAWs (digital-audio- workstations). There's some issue with Logic Pro X that has been logged for quite a while now.

A few days ago I heard the reason it isn't addressed for more than a year now... The developer in-charge on that feature isn't allowed to access other parts of code needed for fixing the issue.

Apple quality-control in the past years has been totally wracked. What concerns me isn't this issue, but the future of it: \- it might won't be fixed at all! (arghghgh) \- it might be fixed after very long time (and who know maybe they'll break or regress something else).

<comment><USER11> Did you ever come across how they map parameters inside the VST/AU standard? Everyone else does 0 -> 1\. They do 1 -> 120 or something completely boffed.

<comment><USER12> AFAIK it's 1 to 127 because of MIDI.

<comment><USER11> I distinctly remember it being not the MIDI standard, and it was really frustrating. I'll report back if I look at it again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I have a 2017 MBP, and it regularly has audio issues, among other issues. Sometimes I'm able to kill the audio daemon, and get my audio back. Other times I have to reboot (sometimes I have to reset the PRAM in order to get audio back). I have audio problems at least once a week. I know two other people with 2017 MBPs that have the same regular issues I do. I assume there are many more.

I feel that recent Apple laptops are no longer premium machines regardless of the premium price tag.

<comment><USER14> I had a 2017 MBP and the USB speakers I had caused issues. I sold them thinking it was an issue with the speakers, but the next set of USB speakers had the same problem. Eventually, I just used AUX to connect them.

<comment><USER13> The sound issues I've been running into are not limited to a single type of output. When the sound is out on my computer it is out for internal speakers, Bluetooth, HDMI, USB, and 3.5mm AUX.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Honestly, I'm really disappointed with Apple for pro use lately.

1) not testing stuff thoroughly - the i9 mbpro overheating saga ("fixed" by firmware upgrade), this T2 usb2 dropout (which probably isn't fixable at all) - unacceptable.

2) releasing significant GPU upgrade 2 months after a flagship mbpro release - I and many others were screwed by buying the latest and greatest (the most expensive laptop I've ever bought) only to be obsoleted 2 months later by 90% faster GPU that doesn't overheat, with no chance for customer exchange at that point.

Inexcusable, I pay the Apple premium to avoid crap like this, now I'm wondering what I am paying 2x for?

<comment><USER16> Most recently, I'd also include the "iPad Pro Shipping Without A Headphone Jack". It's different than ditching the headphone jack on the iPhone, which is mostly just an inconvenience and wireless headphones are becoming more popular anyway. Music production is literally one of their big advertising markets for the iPad, with a vast array of applications available. Wireless headphones are unusable for music production (not just quality, but also latency) (not Apple's fault, its just bluetooth). So if I want to mess around and make some sounds, I need a dongle for my headphones; and most often, I need a full expensive USB-C hub because I need a second USB-C port for charging.

So now, you've got a hub to get two USB-C ports, then you've got a USB-C -> 3.5 dongle on one of them (some USB-C hubs have built-in 3.5 ports, but these don't generally support audio passthrough, and the DACs inside the hub are shit compared to Apple's official ones). If you've ever owned a big USB-C hub like this, you'll know that they get Hot. Like, "that's uncomfortable to touch" Hot.

All they had to do is put two USB-C ports on it. That's fine; I get that headphone jacks are thick and "last gen". But they couldn't even do that.

<comment><USER17> > the DACs inside the hub are shit compared to Apple's official ones

Nevermind the fact that Apple's official $9 audio dongle also only has a barely acceptable DAC in it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> What is happening with Macs?

My butterfly keyboard repeats keys. This easily halves my typing speed. (Or rather "Itt easily halves my ttyping speed")

Yesterday my machine got stuck booting with a black screen after running out of battery with the backlight turned off.

Also, the keyboards have gone from making virtually no sound to making loud clicking sounds.

I have also had a glitch where the sound gets distorted.

<comment><USER19> Depending on your Macbook's age and your location, you may be able to get the keyboard replaced due to sticking keys. I ended up getting a brand new MBP when they repeatedly fucked up repairing my sticking keyboard.

Obviously it would be better if the keyboards didn't break so easily to begin with, but at least you may not have to put up with it :)

<comment><USER20> Once I entered an Apple store with a cracked case (white MacBook fell from the table). I left with a brand new lower part (hard disk excepted - they moved mine to the new machine) for free. There was a recall for the case, IIRC, one for the upper palm rest (something to do with magnets that made the plastic crack) and they replaced the keyboard for no reason.

I have to say Apple's support experience is stellar. I can't imagine having that with a Dell or Lenovo.

<comment><USER21> With Lenovo you would get the 3 years onsite warranty with accidental damage protection at the time of purchase. Then a technician will come to your office or home and to replace the broken parts of your Thinkpad. That beats having to go to an Apple store IMO.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> From the article: "Issues with the way the new chip synchronizes timing causes dropouts and glitches in the audio stream. (It seems basically all USB 2.0 audio interfaces will be impacted. This of course unfortunately leads users to blame their interface manufacturer, but the fault lies with Apple.)"

As someone who works with a lot of pro audio gear on the Mac, I can say that it's hard to describe what a show stopper this is. Glitches and dropouts are a catastrophic problem for almost anything involving sound, and they're right: If you're having those kinds of problems, you run immediately to the interface manufacturer.

Still, I'm not sure many people using _pro-grade_ audio interfaces (mine cost almost as much as the computer itself) are still using the USB 2.0 bus. Thunderbolt has been pretty enthusiastically embraced by the industry.

<comment><USER23> > Still, I'm not sure many people using pro-grade audio interfaces are still > using the USB 2.0 bus

Audio AD/DA hasn't changed a lot in the past 10-15 years. A good USB 2 interface is still perfectly valid as long as the manufacturer provides drivers. For example the legendary RME Babyface Pro.

<comment><USER22> That's true. RME (definitely on the high end) is remarkably good about supporting a wide variety of connection technologies. Include Firewire.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Thought this was regarding Macbook Pro speakers being blown out due to audio glitches that was reported last week:

[https://www.dpreview.com/news/2610969677/some-macbook-pro- ow...](https://www.dpreview.com/news/2610969677/some-macbook-pro-owners- report-speaker-damage-after-experiencing-adobe-premiere-pro-audio-bug)

(RIP my 2018 Macbook Pro speakers, they sounded great when they worked)

<comment><USER25> I think I got bit by that last night - working with sound in Mathematica, a simple MIDI tune was playing and then my MBP made a horrendously loud noise. Didn't damage the speakers, which surprised me given how loud it was. Probably the fastest I've mashed CMD-Q to quit a program though.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Semi-related: But does anyone know why unplugging headphones while audio is muted causes the audio to become unmuted? This is easily my least favorite bug and results in a 10 second shuffle of frantically finding the mute button again, sometimes with the laptop closed. It seems like something that would never pass QA in previous iterations of Apple, though I could be remembering the past more fondly than was true.

<comment><USER27> Have you tried reproducing this with other headphones, 2 channel ones etc.

<comment><USER28> Not sure if it's present in OS X, but I know at least iOS has impedance memory, so it'll recognize specific headphones and set the volume to what it was last at when they were plugged in. It's a really nice feature.

<comment><USER29> TIL. That's really cool.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> Interesting as I don't seem to have this issue on the two 2018 MBP I've had. Originally I had a release day i7/32GB/1TB/560X model but it had a power/charging issue so Apple replaced it with an i9 model which has been perfect.

I have worried a lot about the keyboard breaking but so far it has been fine. I actually really like working on it now with the exception of the TouchBar which is the most useless change to keyboard design in years.

I really enjoy this laptop. I bought it after two years of pain buying, replacing and ultimately returning sub-par Windows laptops from Dell, Lenovo and Microsoft.

Apple gets a lot of hate in the tech press (and regular press sometimes) whereas people seem to accept far worse issues from only-slightly-cheaper Dell, Microsoft, etc. laptops.

The Dell XPS 15 9570 has far worse audio issues (DPC latency, crackling/popping speakers), coil whine on the majority of units shipped, keyboard issues (ironically I had more keyboard issues with my XPS 15) and much worse thermal throttling compared to the MBP 2018. Sleep issues (honestly just support S3 ffs)

I had a Surface Book 2 with a whole host of issues as well. From thermal throttling, constant BSOD/crashing when de/reattaching the performance base, pen input skipping and a whole host of silly-but-annoying software issues and of course sleep issues because not even Microsoft's own hardware works properly with their new S0i3 Connected Standby crap.

The MBP isn't perfect. The constant anxiety that something will kill the keyboard sucks but on the whole it is without a doubt the best modern laptop I have used in that it has the least issues. It sleeps when I close the lid, it also comes back on instantly, it never _needs_ to be rebooted to get things working again, screen is stunning, runs cool and quiet when not being pushed with no random spinning up of the fans for a few minutes, etc.

<comment><USER31> It seems like people are comparing current Apple products with a mythology of Apple products that never actually existed -- an invented fiction where in the past the hardware and software was the height of perfection.

Every Apple device and software product ever has had a number of issues, many significant. As you mentioned, however, the competitors hardly do better -- the litany of absolutely devastating faults with Dell devices I've experienced (paramount being that they never lasted more than a small fraction of the promised battery life) makes Apple look untouchable.

Apple should do better. For one MBPs should have something better than a cheesy 1 year warranty, especially given the fears about keyboards et al -- it essentially forces an AppleCare+ purchase. But the claims that this is a deadly direction seem dubious.

<comment><USER30> Yes this is how I feel also.

I constantly hear the phrase "This wouldn't have happened under Jobs" and it pisses me off. Apple had _loads_ of problems with hardware under Jobs.

You're right Apple should do better. I always factor AppleCare into the machine cost the same way I used to with Lenovo's 3 year on-site warranty upgrade after they changed it to depot by default and Dell's Plus warranty option, etc.

IMHO Apple isn't any better or worst than they have ever been but they are getting _cheaper_ with things like removing the AC extension cable, not including a USB-C to USB-A dongle like Dell, etc. do

Considering how much of a lottery it is buying a Dell, HP, Lenovo, Microsoft laptop is though there isn't much you can do. Apple is usually 20-30% more expensive but I have easily wasted 200+% in time waiting around for Dell engineers or shipping a unit back to Microsoft (as they don't even offer on- site in Europe!).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Can someone provide a good quality example of code that would bug on system clock updates? I have a hard time thinking about one. Especially as these system clock updates shouldn't change the time for more than a few seconds, at least if you have automatic updates turned on (and the fix in the article is to turn that off). I'm not interested in examples that shouldn't have made it through a merge request in the first place. It's not about the actual bug that happened here, but more about general things to think about that can go wrong with system time updates.

I can think about two main use cases for system time: Measuring time elapsed, most notably for timeouts, and scheduling something in the future (which can be done with a timestamp instead of time elapsed). Maybe I'm already missing some important ones here.

In the time elapsed use case a time shift into the future might delay something for these few seconds, which shouldn't result in more than a lag. A shift into the past might trigger a timeout, but a timeout that triggers on a few seconds should be a handled error.

In the schedule use case a time shift into the future shouldn't make any difference. You can't assume it's run at exact times anyway and always use "should happen after", i.e. greater than timestamp. A time shift into the past might only delay it a bit, still no reason for a bug.

What am I missing?

<comment><USER33> This bug is caused by the Mac time daemon stealing 10ms+ of resources from the scheduler (perhaps because of it being a wrong thread priority, or the clock hardware taking a very long time to respond to an update request? who knows), not because audio drivers use the real time value for any reason (they don't).

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> I'm curious... since it seems like a number of high-profile bugs often tend to be with clock- or date-related things... is there a set of best practices somewhere around creating time-related tests? A complete list of situations to test under?

I'll confess that testing that my software works while a user (or daemon) changes the system clock is something that I don't think has ever occurred to me, and now I'm wondering what other edge cases also haven't occurred to me.

<comment><USER35> Part of the problem is that it's hard to determine all the possible situations you could be in -- changing the time during a DST transition while using the Islamic calendar and so on. Formal methods are relatively inaccessible in general, but I wonder if you could make an easy-to-use verification tool specifically focused on date/time code.

<comment><USER32> You are right that it's near impossible and unpractical to test all edgecases. But your example goes into the wrong direction. Shouldn't you build your system completely agnostic of time interpretation changes? A DST transition is not actually changing the time. The bug here seems to be coming from system clock updates. I honestly also never thought testing against system clock updates. If I schedule something to happen in 10 seconds I never expected the system clock might be shifting backwards and 10 seconds might become minutes or more. But that should be so super rare.

What is a realistic code example that might have problems with system clock updates?

<comment><USER36> Not all parts of a system can be independent of changes to how time is interpreted or displayed. E.g. in a calendar: what happens to the time of a recurring meeting after a DST transition? What if participants are in different time zones with different DST rules?

But as long as you only need to track time for dealing with time intervals in an abstract fashion, you can get away with a nice continuous and monotonous scalar representation of timestamps.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I had a different glitch but this reminded me. I have a 2017 Macbook Pro. About a week ago, the left speaker randomly started blasting odd rhythmic white noise. It stopped after a few seconds, but it appears to have blown the left speaker. I've no idea if this is common, or how to prove it and get a new one, or if I even care to go through the hassle.

<comment><USER38> This happened to me as well a few weeks ago. Same model MBP. Left speaker got blown out. Haven't had time to take it in to Apple yet (my right hand USB-C ports are also dead so I'm overdue anyway). Googling it, it seems we're not alone

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> The article tries its best to sensationalize the fact that Apple, _gasp_ of all people, has a bug it its stuff. The reality is that all software and all devices have bugs. I would prefer a more journalistically honest, non- sensationalist approach to writing. Tell me what the bug is. Tell me what it affects. Tell me how to fix it. Done.

<comment><USER40> Maybe they're expressing their frustrations with Apple in general, but it is weak to exaggerate.

And I'm unsure if you're an Apple fanboy or not, but you maybe missing the big picture aside from this article: Apple is now just like supermarket produce - pretty, tasteless garbage. The facts are:

\- Those low-profile keyboards are loud, uncomfortable and frequently break

\- Glued in batteries basically destroyed if removed

\- Overpriced

\- Many MLB failures causing all sorts of random problems

\- Many overpriced dongles required to do anything

\- Non-Apple USB-A to -C adapter disconnects WiFi, but works fine on all other brands. Not just one adapter, multiple peripherals cause this issue.

\- All sorts of other random quality issues and first year breakages

\- No official parts channel

\- Hidden/proprietary tools for diagnostics, repair and dead MLB SSD transfer

\- Soldered in RAM

\- Soldered in SSD

\- No available schematics for repair

\- Apple declares almost every model "vintage" at six years, preventing repairs and further OS upgrades

In conclusion, if someone is willing to take all this abuse when Apple clearly tells them "FU," what should an observer think? To me, it says: _SJ is gone, a bean counter and a Bentley-chauffeured designer don 't have a clue, so it's time to give up on Apple's computers until they find some vision and awareness._

<comment><USER39> Hello,

I can see why some of the things on this list might be frustrating for some users. To offer a different perspective, I actually like many of the things you consider "tasteless garbage." For example:

1\. I like Apple's low-profile keyboards. As I get older, I find myself suffering more and more from RSIs unless my keyboard is absolutely flat and I don't have to lift my fingers too much to hit the keys. Before I started using Apple computers, I'd buy TypeMatrix and low-profile Logitec keyboards for the same reason. Apple's low-profile keyboards feel pretty good to me. I cannot use mice anymore either, and there isn't anything on the market that compares to Apple's trackpads (both built-in and external).

2\. When I buy a laptop or desktop, I always max it out with memory at the time of purchase, so I don't really care about removable RAM. Even on machines I build myself, I max out the RAM and never touch it again. Since soldered-on memory (and batteries and SSDs for that matter) result in a slimmer profile and less weight, I prefer this in a laptop. I can see why this would be an issue for some though.

3\. I think, the "Apple products are too expensive" argument is largely a myth. Maybe other people have different experiences but I've used both Windows and Apple computers throughout my career and my Windows machines are always more expensive over time. When I buy an Apple laptop, the OS and all supported updates are free, productivity tools and all supported updates are free, the best version Apple has to offer of its development environment is free, and most of the other software I use is a lot cheaper than similar Windows products. Apple machines may cost me more up front (which isn't always the case), but Windows machines have always cost me more in the long run due to the cost of software and upgrades. For example, buying VisualStudio's standard subscription alone adds $1,199 to the cost of my Windows computer the first year and $799 every year after, easily eating up any savings I may have had at the time of my original purchase. If I want to update Windows at some point, that costs more as well. Productivity tools are now subscription based and add to the cost over time, too. I typically use a laptop for three years and then buy a new one. I've always spent more on my Windows laptops during those three-year periods than I have on my Apple computers. My use case is probably different that other people, so this may not hold true for everyone.

4\. I've been using Apple laptops since 2007 and never had a problem. I know there have been publicized failures (just like there have for Dell, HP, and components for DIY computers), but I'm pretty happy with Apples 12 year track record with me personally.

5\. I've never used a dongle on my MPB. I do have some USB devices (e.g. audio interfaces), but I just bought a couple of cheap USB-C to USB-B cords. No need for expensive dongles. I guess that's the price of progress. I don't use my serial/parallel port cords anymore either.

I'm not saying you don't have some legitimate complaints. I'm just saying my experience and opinions have been different. I've always been satisfied with my Apple purchases.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> I hope that fix mentioned works! I just changed the time setting now.

I use an iMac pro, I've definitely noticed it over the last few weeks, typically when several chrome tabs are open or heavy use it seems. I also noticed it pretty bad when using a Universal Audio Arrow device, and web midi also.

Currently I close chrome and reopen to fix. Happens every 1-2 days.

<comment><USER42> As mentioned in the comments on the link, it doesn't work. It just lowers the amount of "clicks". I noticed the bug the same day the Mac mini 2018 came out and have found no solution.

<comment><USER41> Ah, that sucks. It's definitely pretty bad, especially for a 6-8k+ machine.

<comment><USER43> Certain applications - Sibelius seems particularly bad - cause audio glitches that can be cured by restarting coreaudiod.

The other glitching problem I've had is in Ableton Live, where every thirty seconds or so the sound from the audio inputs glitches and breaks up, which makes Live useless for any kind of recording.

This is a known Live bug that has been around for a long time. It seems to be caused by the built-in audio devices competing with external hardware.

Certainly Apple are a long, long way from "It just works" now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER44> Generally, pro-audio users lag behind on OS updates and hardware updates. Apple generally has problems with audio with every new generation, and this is nothing new. When you count on something to work, you tend to buy the old models.. you tend to run the previous known good OS... you tend to avoid updating anything as much as possible. This is only getting worse as apples software and hardware quality are severely degrading over the past few years. Pro users are leaving left right and center.

</comment><comment><USER45> Apple's latest macs have all kinds of bugs and glitches that I can't remember _ever_ being present in ~2010-2015 MBPs, including but not limited to what's mentioned here (the already-shoddy keyboard being taken out by a spec of dust, speakers blowing out entirely, screen develops massive artifacts / heat damage from closing lid "too early", fan is a permanent 747 ready for takeoff, on and on and on).

The quality of their laptops is sub-par relative to the price point. At this point, the software / OS is the strongest selling point (to me, at least), but my patience is wearing thin and at a certain point I'd rather just go back to Linux rather than deal with this absurd form-over-function design-uber-alles paradigm they've embraced.

</comment><comment><USER46> Apple definitely have a major issue here - I upgraded from the 2016 MBP to 2018 MBP (max'ed out specs in both cases apart from SSD size) and audio dropouts etc when using Mainstage for live performance with virtual instruments (sound sources) have increased greatly. I'm a (piano) keyboard player and low buffer sizes and latency (<5 ms) are essential for turning my MBP into a responsive and expressive musical instrument. Unfortunately such settings reveal harshly the huge degradation in audio performance that has occurred and I am not any longer be prepared to use my MBP in a live performance situation. (Even if a larger buffer size reduces the dropouts I don't want to play an unresponsive instrument.) It's just ridiculous to see my powerful MBP running at very low percentage CPU utilisation and performing so badly.

Interestingly yes I experience issues with my USB2 interface (RME Babyface Pro) but also when using the MBP's headphone jack or the interface via USB ports on my LG Ultrafine 5K monitor (which has its own USB chip). I do wonder if the root issue may be along the lines of this poster's theory about poorly written Apple driver code (since Apple probably wrote new driver code to accommodate T2): [https://www.gearslutz.com/board/showpost.php?p=13492144&post...](https://www.gearslutz.com/board/showpost.php?p=13492144&postcount=4)

</comment><comment><USER47> Generally, Apple MacBook Pro suck since 2017!

<comment><USER48> Not sure why this getting downvoted.

Had my MBA for 6 years and worked perfectly the whole time, just needed to install a new battery after 4 years but that was a personal preference.

I've had my MBP w/o touch bar for 13 months and I seriously regret spending $2300 on it.

\- The keyboard is continually sticking, the left Command key is now completely separated from the keyboard and falls out all the time. I make so many typos now compared to the MBA and people also complain about how loud the keyboard is when Im typing. \- The battery life barely lasts more than 2 hours while the MBA lasted 5 hours for exactly the same use case. \- If someone trips over the power cable then the whole laptop moves, on the MBA the magsafe just disconnected and no harm done. \- Having to use adaptors for USB devices is now getting really tedious.

Im at the point where I doubt my next laptop will be a Mac unless they do some serious adjustments to these ridiculous keyboards. I just want the old keyboard back.

<comment><USER49> I might be the exception here but the 2018 Macbook Pro keyboard is the best I've typed on. It is accurate, quiet, requires very little effort to push the buttons. I don't feel muscle fatigue typing on it.

> and people also complain about how loud the keyboard is when Im typing.

We must not be using the same keyboard. The mbp is quietest I've even used to date. Everything else doesn't even come close.

> The battery life barely lasts more than 2 hours while the MBA lasted 5 hours > for exactly the same use case.

That's weird. Mine lasts 8-10 hours. It lasts a good 6-7 hours of daily work, watching videos, compiling C code, playing an intensive game and extensive Chrome browsing.

> \- If someone trips over the power cable then the whole laptop moves, on the > MBA the magsafe just disconnected and no harm done. - Having to use adaptors > for USB devices is now getting really tedious.

The mbp is supposed to be a desktop replacement computer. Get a usb-c hub. You'll be able to charge the device, connect all your devices (and screens!) from one single usb-c. Put the hub close to the Mac. But yes, I do miss the magsafe.

I've lots of complaints about the new MBP but none of the points you mentioned above. I suggest you take it to an Apple shop for some diagnosis.

<comment><USER50> I like my USB-C/Thunderbolt dock (when it works... for some reason my 2 monitors get flipped about 20% of the time), but when it fell off my desk it took my MBP with it :(

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> The advice to just run to Windows for pro audio uses is really something I wouldn't like to be accounted for. Sure, I had a stable rig with tight MIDI and audio decades ago but I was a pretty huge geek and started with quality components to begin with (the Asus P2B was almost godlike in performance and stability) with of course just a bit of good old luck.

</comment><comment><USER52> I am / was heavily invested in Apple hardware as well (MacBook Pro, iPhone, iPad).

I recently switched to an Android phone, because the price-point of buying a new iPhone is just not justifiable any more. Android feels a bit spammy, but overall it does what I need it to do. I will stick with Android for now.

I was looking at the iPad Pro recently, because I could need a second screen when I'm working e.g. from a co-working space. It looks beautiful, but things like no-headphone jack makes it too much trouble for me. I don't want to bring my dongles all the time. As others have mentioned using Bluetooth headphones for music production just isn't good enough because of latency. Also I prefer having devices without a battery. Less to think about when leaving the house.

I am using my MacBook Pro 2014 daily for 10+ for work and as a private computer. It's about time to upgrade for me, because I could save quite a lot of time with a faster CPU. While I would love to have a more powerful device running macOS (so a newer MacBook Pro), from what I heard they are just worse than my 2014 MacBook Pro. I still use a lot of USB 2/3 devices, I want a keyboard, which feels good and does not get broken easily. I don't care about it being thin at all. I want performance and an SD slot.

Because it is clear that there is no such machine produces by Apple right now (and probably in the future) I had to look for alternatives. The Surface Book 2 by Microsoft is really interesting. They even have a Nvidia GPU, which can be used for Deep Learning and graphical experiments. A big advantage over the GPUs used by Apple imo. Sadly from all what I hear Windows 10 just isn't good enough to use it daily as a programmer. I spend many hours researching and found a lot of comments from former macOS user who switched. Windows will (still) drive you nuts if you are used to things just working they say.

The only alternative, Linux, would mean a serious commitment to figuring out stuff by myself, spending time making my system work. I am currently stuck with macOS, and therefore my laptop from 2014. I'm quite sure I will switch to another OS in the next two years, but it is hard to figure out which is the better option for me.

<comment><USER53> In my experience I spend most of my time in a terminal emulator or a web browser. Windows runs Docker these days, so theoretically you could avoid toolchain annoyance. Windows also has Firefox.

But, YMMV (written from a macbook)

<comment><USER52> Could be an option. But then I have to take care of two operating systems instead of one. Maybe WSL will be worth a shot after the next update of Windows 10. So far I did not hear too much good about it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER54> If you've never read Andrew Grover's "Only The Paranoid Survive" I highly recommend it. It really appears that Apple has reached an inflection point where they need to fix the core product design lifecycle. I think it's very possible that the C-level execs and the board of directors don't realize the pressing issues from the outside.

Sure, the typical software engineer isn't their target demographic. But I would argue that tech-oriented users should be the bellwether for key issues related to performance and usability since as a demographic they tend to do things that will identify the flaws of your product.

</comment><comment><USER55> As someone who just bought an imac pro for audio/video recording, this is deeply disappointing.

Has anyone found that this workaround on reddit solved the issue? [https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/anvufc/psa_2018_macs...](https://www.reddit.com/r/apple/comments/anvufc/psa_2018_macs_with_t2_chip_unusable_with_external/)

On a forum linked in the cdm.link article someone mentioned blocking the time services via firewall: is there a list of everything needed to be blocked?

</comment><comment><USER56> I just bought a new Mac Pro after spending over a year trying to fix audio/performance issues. Posting on stack exchange, apple forums, and endless googling proved fruitless. I tried every possible reset (nvram et al) and even created a new account (which seemed to help for a while until the issue came back after a month or so oddly).

I had such a spark of hope when I saw this title. Alas, my fix for coreaudio HALC_ProxyIOContext::IOWorkLoop: skipping cycle due to overload Audio still eludes me.

</comment><comment><USER57> I recently bought a new MacBook Air, and it had an absolutely terrible keyboard, and had a horrible high pitched whine. I sent it back within a few hours and got a refund. So now I still have my Late 2013 MBP (top spec) but I really want a new work machine. I've looked at a few Apple alternatives with the intention of putting linux on them but they are all so ugly or bulky.

Is it so hard for laptop designers to create decent looking machines?

<comment><USER58> I have a Huawei Matebook X Pro and I like it. There are many things to like about it but the one that stands out for me is the 3:2 ratio screen.

No matter how much Dell and Lenovo call their offerings professional, I just can't see a professional working on a 13" 16:9 screen.

Things I don't like about the Matebook is that the warranty and repair services are basically unknowns, there is no next business day, on-site warranty and of course, they aren't battle tested —though quality issues seem to be all the more common for Lenovo, Dell an Apple nowadays. Had a friend joke the other day _your Huawei is the only one sure to keep working, its main purpose is surveillance and if it brokes down, it can't perform its duty_. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER59> Have had many issues with USB2 RME pro audio interfaces and recent Macs, the most serious of which RME was able to overcome (for us) in the v3.13 driver.

More of a long term problem is the fact that USB C/TB3 is a totally unsuitable connector for professional use. It's far too prone to coming out of the port through lack of locking mechanism, insufficient friction. On MBPs the ports also wear very quickly.

</comment><comment><USER60> > But more alarming is that this is another serious quality control fumble > from Apple. The value proposition with Apple always been that the company's > control over its own hardware, software, and industrial engineering meant a > more predictable product.

I can't believe they don't know that themselves and act accordingly. How much more incentive do you need? What the heck is going on at Apple?

</comment><comment><USER61> Guessing here, but ... CLOCK_MONOTONIC for the win?

<comment><USER62> Would guess that as well. Very common error, which comes in many fashions and which can be made in practically any language. I'm mostly working in Java, where it's the same thing with System.currentTimeMillis() used instead of System.nanoTime() to measure and/or enforce timespans (because "you know, nanoseconds are so unwieldy, and milliseconds are so nice on the eyes, and I only needed millisecond precision...and anyway, who on earth would change the clock while our software is running...").

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Isn't this being blown out of proportion? Can't it be simply repaired by a firmware update?

</comment><comment><USER63> Among other problems. IPv6 is not impossible to be disabled and few other minor annoyances.

</comment><comment><USER64> I have been frustrated by it..as of writing this comment the speakers have gone dumb...

</comment><comment><USER65> As frustrated with Apple as the next person, but I have never experienced this using a bunch of interfaces and devices with their own clock source...

</comment><comment><USER66> Every mainstage user :/

</comment><comment><USER40> Not surprised after watching Louis Rossmann's rants and demos of brand new MBP's failing. Glad I bought a Lenovo T480 on-sale rather than deal with an overpriced loaf Apple pinched out lately.</comment>


Sources: Data from San Bernardino phone has helped in probe - <AUTHOR> http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/19/politics/san-bernadino-iphone-data/index.html <comment><AUTHOR> In case you're wondering, the way accessing the data helped:

> The phone didn't contain evidence of contacts with other ISIS supporters or > the use of encrypted communications during the period the FBI was concerned > about. The FBI views that information as valuable to the probe, > possibilities it couldn't discount without getting into the phone, the > officials said.

If this is the threshold for gathering information, then there's no way the data could _not_ have helped.</comment>


ScalaDays 2012 – Odersky's Keynote: Where Scala is Going - <AUTHOR> http://skillsmatter.com/podcast/home/where-scala-is-going/js-4179

<comment><USER2> There's another talk by Guy Steele where he compares Fortress and Scala. The evolutionary convergence between the two is fascinating.

<http://skillsmatter.com/podcast/home/scala-days-keynote-3018>

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> _Contents_

 __Retrospective (00:00) __

\- First ScalaDays in Lausanne (2010), sold out with 150 attendees. Scala 2.8 was announced.

\- Second ScalaDays in Stanford (2011), sold out with 260 attendees. Commercial support, Typesafe Stack with Scala 2.9 and Akka 1.1.

\- Third ScalaDays in London (2012), sould out with 400 attendees. Typesafe Stack with Scala 2.9.2, Akka 2.0, Play! 2.

 __Where we are now (05:45) __

\- Scala 2.10 on the horizon, basically feature-complete.

\- Refinements, testing and release, will happen in the next months.

 __Scala 2.10 overview (06:20) __

\- Lots of work on tooling: Eclipse, IntelliJ, ... more features, better performance.

\- Low-level concurrency framework in the standard library (Futures and Promises), used by both parallel collections and Akka.

\- Native reflection framework.

\- A few new language features.

 __Reflection Framework overview (08:05) __

\- Cake pattern has a central role, improvements in 2.10 (dependent method types) make it more useful.

\- Compilers and reflection are quite similar: Both need to deal with the same concepts, answer similar questions.

\- Differences between compilers and reflection: Where does the information come from?, Generate code vs. invoke pre-generated code, error messages vs. exceptions, thread-safety, (im)mutability of types, ...

 __Reflection in 2.10, demonstration (12:05) __

 __Mirror-based reflection (16:50) __

\- Mirrors return the reflective information of runtime values.

\- Different mirrors can provide different characteristics.

\- Types of different mirrors are enforced to be incompatible with each other: Reflects the design of VMs that for instance even the same types on different machines are distinct.

\- Common supertype allows reasoning about all mirrors.

 __Implementation of reflection (18:30) __

\- Functionality for trees, symbols, types, names.

\- Functionality to decompose and explore relationships between them, ...

\- Roughly equivalent to the core of the language specification and the core of the compiler.

 __Comparison with Java (19:15) __

\- Java has a quite complex typesystem since Generics were introduced.

\- What is Java approach? Pretty much empty interfaces, no useful methods defined.

\- Want to do anything non-trivial with types in Java? Write your own compiler/typechecker!

\- Why was it done this way? Would have required to write essential parts of a compiler (hard) and to make sure both compilers always agree (almost impossible). Smart decision of the Java designers to not suffer this maintenance nightmare.

 __Scala's approach (22:00) __

\- Unify the core parts of compilers and reflection.

\- Compiler architecture: Object-oriented encapsulation, seperation of concerns. Use a cake pattern in which every component has a self-type that contains all its required dependencies ("Slices of the cake").

\- How to integrate reflection?

\- Multiple cakes: compiler cake (`scala.nsc.Global`) and reflection cake (`scala.reflect.runtime.Mirror`) inherit from common super-cake (`scala.reflect.internal.Universe`), which captures common information.

\- Refactor common functionality into super-cake, let individual cakes handle differences (e. g. compiler cake: IO, reflection cake: thread synchronisation)

\- Refine super-cake (`scala.reflect.internal.Universe`) by providing a cleaned-up facade to the user on top, `reflect.api.Universe`.

\- Java's interfaces not enough, Scala leverages abstract types to both present a convenient interface to the user and allow elegant/efficient implementation behind the scenes.

 __Reflection summary (29:50) __

\- Scala is a pretty regular language:

\- Everything can be nested: Classes, methods, objects, types.

\- Everything can be abstract: Methods, values, types.

\- Type of `this` can be declared freely to express dependencies.

\- Enables expression of cake hierarchies for software design in the large.

 __Macros overview (30:50) __

\- Once reflection and compilers are unified – what can we do now?

\- What happens when the compiler itself can make use of reflection?

\- It can call user-defined methods during compilation, which can consume/produce trees/types.

\- This leads to a simple macro system, which is included as an experimental feature in Scala 2.10.

 __Macro definition (32:40) __

\- Standard Scala methods declaration with all the same rules for overloading/overrididng/... + implementation part which points to a concrete, stable macro implementation. Both have standard Scala method signatures.

\- Types are lifted from `T` to `Expr[T]`, which can be descriped as an AST which, when run, produces a result of type `T`.

 __Macro expansion (34:35) __

\- If the compiler encounters a macro application during type-checking, it will first type-check the arguments (as usual), expand the macro application by doing a reflective call to the macro implementation with the context (call site info) and the AST. Then the macro implementation runs and produces a tree, which will be taken as a replacement of the macro application and type- checked again.

Macro example (35:55)

 __Expressing syntax trees (37:00) __

\- Scala provides no special/new syntax. Writing down syntrax trees might be cumbersome, but there is actually a better way to do it without introducing special syntax.

 __Contexts (40:00) __

\- A macro context contains a mirror (in this case the current compiler instance) that anchors trees, types which are being passed in and out of the macro.

\- Also contains information about the macro call.

 __Hygiene (41:25) __

\- Lot of hard work in the Scheme community in the 80ies to avoid hygiene issues.

\- Scala's macro system is trivial, does nothing more than accepting trees/types and producing trees again, not hygienic. "Not so good."

\- Real motivation for macros was `reify`: Takes expression of type `T` and produces a tree representing this expression of type `Expr[T]` at runtime.

\- For example to create a query from filter/map expressions.

\- See also LINQ on .NET.

\- `reify` can be (and is) implemented as a macro, enables composition.

\- `reify` and `eval` are inverses, `reify: T => Expr[T]`/`eval; Expr[T] => T`.

\- `reify`( and `eval`) enable:

\- Splicing.

\- Hygiene enforcement, types will prevent mistakes.

\- No need for special syntax for syntax trees.

 __Macro summary (51:55) __

\- Very nice syntax and hygienic macros without much effort.

\- Cost/benefit ratio is huge.

\- Bootstrap operation: Minimal, unhygienic macro system -> Reification as a macro -> Code-as-syntax-tree + hygiene.

\- Macros are a better solution than compiler plugins, because APIs are kept stable.

Language features overview (54:00)

\- Scala Improvement Process (SIP) with a lot of community involvement.

\- SIP11: String interpolation

\- SIP13: Implicit classes

\- SIP14: Futures and Promises

\- SIP15: Value classes

\- SIP17: Type Dynamic

\- SIP18: Language modularity

\- Small additions, but interesting implications.

 __SIP11: String interpolation (54:50) __

\- Constructing strings with `+` is very cumbesome.

\- Embedded strings would be rather nice, but it is not possible to just reinterpret `$`, because it is already a legal symbol inside a string.

\- Syntax is itself extensible: `id"..."` gets translated to `StringContext("...").id(<args>)`.

\- Enables format strings, embedded XML, JSON, SQL, Scala, JavaScript, ... just provide an appropriate method on `StringContext`.

 __SIP13: Implicit classes (59:50) __

\- "Everyone got extension methods! Why doesn't Scala?" – "Actually you want implicits, because implicits can not only add methods but also implement new interfaces, and in mature software systems methods exist for a purpose – to implement interfaces."

\- Scala 2.10 completely eliminates syntactic and runtime overhead of implicits:

\- Syntactic overhead, adressed by SIP13: Implicit classes

\- Runtime overhead, addressed by SIP15: Value classes

\- Risk of misuse, adressed by SIP18: Language modularity

\- Before: `class Bar(foo: Foo) { ... }` + `implicit def fooToBar(foo: Foo) = new Bar(foo)`

\- After: `implicit class Bar(foo: Foo) { ... }`

 __SIP15: Value classes (63:50) __

\- Drop restriction that user-defined classes have to (explicitly or implicitly) inherit `AnyRef` (`java.lang.Object` in Java).

\- Scala classes can now also inherit from `AnyVal` (only `Int`, `Long`, etc. could inherit from `AnyVal` before).

\- `AnyVal` classes have no object identity and only allow a single public value.

\- Instances of those classes can be created and destroyed by the compile at will – basically as transparent as boxing/uunboxing in Scala before.

\- Methods of `AnyVal` are compiled down to extension methods ("static" methods in Java class files).

\- Combination of implicit and value classes results in both efficiency and conciseness of extension methods with all the advantages of implicits.

 __Summary (66:15) __

\- Scala has grown to an accepted and popular technology for scalable applications.

\- Development continues at a rapid pace – both at the language and the middleware level.

\- Invaluable community involvement in refining the language and its libraries.

<comment><USER3> Thanks for the summary. Very exciting developments!</comment></comment>


Wolfram - Macsyma/lisp anecdote (posted on Nov 2002) - <AUTHOR> http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/f3b93140c2f2e922?dmode=source found it across on reddit and thought there would be something interesting to add here - specially from the "elders of the internet"! <comment><AUTHOR> I found this across the borders on reddit and thought there would be something interesting to add here - specially from the "elders of the internet"!</comment>


Edge 2017 Q: What scientific term or concept ought to be more widely known? - <AUTHOR> https://www.edge.org/contributors/what-scientific-term-or%C2%A0concept-ought-to-be-more-widely-known <comment><AUTHOR> Here are some favorites:

* Richard Thaler's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27174](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27174)

* Peter Norvig's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27151](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27151)

* Scott Aranson's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27127](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27127)

* Kevin Kelly's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27063](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27063)

* Jon Kleinberg's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27057](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27057)

* Frank Wilczek's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27095](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27095)

* Nigel Goldenfeld's response - [https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27236](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/27236)</comment>


Why the Kitchen Computing Dream of the 80s Never Caught On - <AUTHOR> http://motherboard.vice.com/read/why-the-kitchen-computing-dream-of-the-80s-never-caught-on?curator=MediaREDEF

<comment><USER2> I dunno... I can't help but feel the entire article was undercut by the third- to-last paragraph. If computing now doesn't look like it did in the 80s, well... where else does it now, either? It took longer than pundits may have anticipated, but nowadays I know all the places in my kitchen that I can plop down my tablet now, with the Pinterest-provided recipe.

Or Netflix.

Or both.

I can't help but feel the article would have worked better with the exact same facts as "How The Kitchen Computing Dream Of The 80s Is Finally Here". And there's actually an interesting article there. (Though I tangentially wrote it already... kitchen computing isn't likely to be "a cookbook, _but on a computer_!" [http://www.jerf.org/iri/post/2916](http://www.jerf.org/iri/post/2916) But it's interesting to think about how it is indeed finally here and where we may be going in the next ten years.)

</comment><comment><USER3> I think that this article falls into exactly the kind of ignorant trap that it describes, by failing to recognise the diversity of users and their computing needs.

Mobile and tablet devices have brought about widespread use of computing in the kitchen. Pinterest has millions of users sharing recipes and food ideas. A quick browse of the major app stores reveals dozens of popular cooking apps.

Most people don't really need any sort of reference material in the kitchen, but there are a significant number of niches where computing can be fantastically useful, verging on life-changing. People on calorie-restricted or low sodium diets can find easy-to-use databases of ingredients and recipes and track their food intake. Coeliacs, vegans and people with food allergies can easily check to see if a food product is suitable for them. Diabetics can track their carbohydrate intake and blood glucose levels; The latest generation of glucometers are Bluetooth enabled.

Ask anyone who repairs phones and tablets, and they'll tell you about all the devices they have resuscitated from a dip in cake batter or the kitchen sink. Computing in the kitchen is no longer a technologist's pipe dream, but a practical reality. Our industry is still dreadful at understanding the needs of people who aren't affluent tech-savvy men, but I would argue that we're even worse at recognising and celebrating the companies who are getting it right.

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm reading this on an iPad while in the kitchen, and I think I'm not the only one who has a tablet floating around while cooking

</comment><comment><USER5> I find the assumption throughout the last few paragraphs that being a hobbyist is a masculine thing rather sexist, and not representative of reality.

<comment><USER6> I think the author was confusing sexism for classism. The book is definitely aimed at _people who are cooking to impress someone_ rather than _people who are cooking to eat_ —but that set identifies "rich people", not "men".

In other words, the book is aimed at the same sort of people who would, in 1980, invite their friends over to marvel at their new $6000 computer.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The most useful kitchen information product I've ever used is a photocopied page, laminated.</comment>


How do you choose between job and family? - <AUTHOR> http://chrisyeh.blogspot.com/2011/02/how-do-you-choose-between-job-and.html

<comment><USER2> > In theory, shouldn't I find a nice cushy corporate job?

... where your outcomes are determined by currying political favor, gamesmanship, and your boss's shifty whims. Yeah, that's not a recipe for relaxing if you ask me. I'd also like my kids to view me as someone of integrity and not some sycophantic corporate douche.

<comment><USER3> You're choosing the wrong corps....

<comment><USER2> Most companies operate on the same ridiculous performance review process that puts the judgement of your value to the organization into the hands of one person, your boss. OR they try to use objective goals that are obsolete as soon as the ink dries, so you spend your time either hitting irrelevant goals or managing up so you can work on the right things. It sucks. It's toxic.

It makes you a less-whole person and that makes you less-good as a parent.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Not making what you like should have a negative effect on your self esteem and therefore on your family.

There is no simple answer.

I personally began to choose work and I wasn't so happy with it. Then I choose my family and I feel better. But you have to consider I had the chance my corporate job didn't pressure me too much.

Furthermore my wife work at Hospital in a field where, last month, she saw four children die. It is something that make you think about priorities. And clearly, now family is my first priority. But I also don't forget my feeling have direct consequences on the happiness of my family.

</comment><comment><USER5> > _In theory, shouldn't I find a nice cushy corporate job? I'm good at getting > along with people, so I could probably nestle into the underbelly of a big > corporation and make a ton of money without having to exert myself too > much._

Wrong, wrong. You'll control much more your time if you're on your own. In a corporate environment, lots of people will pressure you. All by yourself, you just need to have the balls to not work more then 28 hours a week or whatever limit you want to set.

<comment><USER6> That's not a good answer either. You've got no backup, so often it's even less flexible and easier to suddenly devote huge amounts of time to make it work and keep your family fed. Fear is a big motivator.

"It depends" is the best answer unfortunately, neither is panacea. Corporate culture, the success (or not) of your own business, where you are, what your SO does, healthcare, etc..

<comment><USER7> You don't necessarily have a "backup" at a corporate job either. Anyone could lose their job at any time at a corporate job. One might actually be better off by having experience with being self-reliant.

<comment><USER6> I meant backup as in having someone else available to do the work when you're on vacation, sick, etc. You don't have that solo. You're right that it might be better, but as I stated - depends on many factors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Prioritize: 1) Health 2) Family's health 3) Marriage 4) Reputation 5) Education 6) House 7) Savings 8) Job

That doesn't mean there is nothing left for the job. Just don't fool yourself into thinking you can support one of these when anything more important is threatened.

</comment><comment><USER9> Simple, I choose job.</comment>


Most Published Research Findings Are False–But Little Replication Goes Long Way - <AUTHOR> http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.0040028#close

<comment><USER2> I would like to see replication handled with the introduction of a new type of journal: one that only publishes studies that have been previously published but are now backed up by additional, confirming studies. Maybe two replications would be enough.

It would be even better when paired with a journal of studies failing to reject the null hypothesis. The first journal could then base the publishing threshold on statistical power of the group, rather than a simple replication count.

</comment><comment><USER3> It's a bit trickier than the title says. By a "false" finding, they mean "a finding fails to yield the same result in at least one other study." But there's nothing wrong with failing a replication. See cancer risk factors research papers: they regularly yield results with opposite signs.

Rather, we should talk about "more research is needed to get a representative sample of studies of a phenomena."

<comment><AUTHOR> > See cancer risk factors research papers: they regularly yield results with > opposite signs.

You'll have to expand on that - when I think of 'cancer risk factors', I think of data-dredging epidemiological analyses which are predictably wrong by the logic of hypothesis-testing, or I think of biochemical studies which blatantly overfit by failing to cross-validate or keep holdout samples, and lack of replication seems like it has the usual meaning.</comment></comment>


Amazon Developing a Free, Ad-Supported Version of Prime Video - <AUTHOR> http://adage.com/article/digital/amazon-developing-a-free-ad-supported-version-prime/311273/ <comment><USER2> I wonder if this will cause any changes to the existing adverts paying customers see. At the start of each episode they often play adverts for their other shows and devices. Ok it's not an advert for toilet roll, but still, adverts are what I wanted to avoid by paying for TV.

<comment><USER3> If done right, I think those ads could feel more like previews at the movies. I think the problem that Amazon gets into is that they show the same one over and over and it feels like an ad.

How would I fix it? 1) create a setting that allows people to turn it off. 2) Don't hide or delay the skip button. 3) Make them really previews. Previews do a good job of intriguing and entertaining. Some of Amazon's ones just feel like ads which more just tell you that something is available - I'm thinking of _The Tick_ ones in particular. 4) Don't repeat a preview within a 36 hour window. When a preview is new, it can be interesting. Even an ad can be interesting once. When I see the same ad over and over and over, it gets ridiculously annoying. One of the worst things about online video ads is that I can watch a show and get the same ad 10 times in an hour. I've watched HGTV and gotten the VW-man-cave ad literally twice in a row during the same ad break. The ad stops and then it starts again because it's the next ad. Amazon isn't as bad as that, but I don't want the same ad for the same content starting every episode I watch. I've seen it, don't beat me to death with it. 5) Also mix in some previews for non-exclusive content. Amazon has Indiana Jones. Throw in a preview there. Show people your library.

Still, one ad for another piece of content doesn't feel the same. Once in the program, there's no interruption. Amazon isn't making money by you watching more content (unless you count continuing to pay for Prime because of its value).

I often appreciate good previews. It's something I think can be missing. How do I decide to try a new show? I really want a good preview that gets me interested. Shows can start slow, but a preview can show me that I should try it.

Again, I think there are some adjustments that could be made to make them less annoying and possibly even welcome for most people. I think the biggest problems are the annoying ad-like properties - delaying the skip button, repeating the same preview over and over, etc. And I think if you allow opt- outs, that's more than fair.

If I were guaranteed not to see the same preview more than once in a 36-hour period and there was no delay on the skip button, I'd keep them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> >[Update, 5:03 PM ET – Amazon has now denied AdAge's new report, as well]([https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/13/reports-of-a-free-ad- suppo...](https://techcrunch.com/2017/11/13/reports-of-a-free-ad-supported- amazon-video-service-resurface/) )

According to Techcrunch, this is false.

</comment><comment><USER5> I wish they made their existing service work the same on all platforms. HD content is practically not available on Linux (HDCP issues) and half-works on Windows (works on my desktop but not on my laptop although both should be HDCP compliant).

<comment><USER6> I have a prime subscription but I hardly use the video streaming service for this reason. It's just too crappy and user-unfriendly, especially on Linux. And like with all video streaming services the selection is not good enough to be my "go-to" provider to watch shows and movies.

So instead I keep torrenting everything I want to watch (using a RSS feed to download TV shows automatically) and I end up with better usability and a much better selection than legitimate services for zero kopeks. No DRM, no shows randomly made unavailable (or missing seasons) because of licensing shenanigans. No need to worry if it'll be compatible with $device.

I even torrent shows available on Amazon Prime Video because I can't be bothered to use their crappy webplayer instead of kodi. One day I'm sure we'll have a "spotify for video" and I'll subscribe to it. In the meantime I can't be bothered.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I like Amazon Prime Video's exclusives but their service as it is now shows videos you have to purchase seperate to view.

Contrast that with Netflix where if the videos not available on streaming you can usually get it in the mail as a DVD.

</comment><comment><USER8> When will they develop a version that works with Chromecast? I have Prime Video but the easiest way for me to get Prime content on my TV is to pirate it and stream it.

<comment><USER9> This is kind of fucked up. You bought a locked down dongle that works only with Google services. You can't even play your own media on it[0]. Now you expect every service to support google's dongle?

Here's what you should have done: get a TV or a dongle with DLNA support. Then your PC will show up as a source and you can play any goddamn thing you want. Or you could have got a TV or a dongle with android on it, then you could have just downloaded Amazon's app.

[0]no "official" way at least

<comment><USER10> >You bought a locked down dongle that works only with Google services.

What? Pretty much every other video app/player I can think of works with chromecast.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > did you mean youtube?

</comment><comment><USER12> 'free' as in 'you are paying with our attention and your nerves' (in this case too: and your privacy?)

<comment><USER6> I doubt you have much better privacy with the paying service. It's amazon we're talking about, they probably collect as much data as technically possible.

<comment> a-priori (Disclaimer: I work for Amazon but this is my opinion.)

While it's true that Amazon collects about as much data as it is able to, there's a big difference in their intentions when compared to someone like Google or Facebook.

In the end, it's obvious what Amazon's motives are: they want you to buy more of their products, or more of other people's stuff from their store. The data helps them improve their products and services so you pay them more money. Personally, I'm okay with that because their incentives are aligned with mine: if they make more stuff I want, then I'll pay them for it.

Note that I'd argue the same way about Apple and Microsoft.

On the other hand, it's not clear what Google or Facebook want from you. Their incentives are not aligned with their users because their money comes from advertisers. It's the advertisers that are their customer, not the users. So I'd put Amazon in a completely different class from the Google and Facebook.

But this ad-supported Amazon Video starts to change that, because any money they get from this is shifting their interests towards advertisers and away from customers.</comment></comment></comment>