Theoretical physicist explains why Moore's Law will collapse - <AUTHOR> http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/theoretical-physicist-explains-why-moores-law-will-collapse-20120430/ <comment><USER2> The _really_ neat physics argument limiting Moore's law (to my eye) is the ultimate limit on the information content in a given region of space. It turns out to be impossible to pack entropy (and thus information) more densely than in a black hole. Because the entropy of a black hole scales with surface area rather than volume, Moore's law runs up against the maximum number of bits containable within the solar system (or even the galaxy or the entire observable universe) surprisingly quickly. I haven't looked at the numbers lately, but I seem to recall that those absolute limits show up within a few centuries, tops.

<comment><USER3> Here's some napkin math:

Moore's law says that the number of transistors on a chip doubles approximately every two years. The Core i7 Sandy Bridge has ~2.3 billion transistors [1], and measures 434 mm^2 [1]. Silicon has a density of 2.4g/cm^3 [2] or .0024g/mm^3. Silicon's atomic weight is 28 --- meaning ~6 _10^23 atoms of Silicon weigh 28 grams --- which means a single atom weighs 4.7_ 10^-23g.

Let us pretend that Si crystals are simple-cubic (they're actually diamond- cubic [3]). In that case, a 1x1x1mm cube of crystal weighs 2.4 _10^-3g == 5.2_ 10^19 atoms. The cube root of this number, 3.7 _10^6, is the number of atoms on a side, so the number of atoms on a mm^2 face is 1.4_ 10^13.

The chip is 434 mm^2, so the face has about 6.1*10^15 atoms on it, otherwise known as 6 million billion.

For roundness, say we have 2 billion transistors on the chip today. Log_2(6,000,000) == 22.

If Moore's law continues until the year 2053, there would be more transistors than atoms on the surface of the chip :-)

[1] [http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3960x-x79-sandy-...](http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3960x-x79-sandy- bridge-e,3071.html)

[2] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon>

[3] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diamond_cubic>

<comment><USER4> Do away with your heat dissipation problem by going to reversible computing, and you aren't restricted to surface atoms anymore.

The black hole argument goes way beyond that, though. It's the ultimate physical limit of the universe, rather than what's potentially practical or imaginable. Even a computer built of neutronium might not reach that limit.

<comment><USER3> Could you explain a bit more about the black hole argument?

<comment><USER2> Here's some napkin math on the black hole argument. Information is essentially equivalent to entropy: the entropy S = k * log M, where k is Boltzmann's constant and log M is the number of bits encoding the information. Now, it turns out to be _fundamentally_ impossible to store more entropy in any region of space than would be contained in a black hole of the same size: S_max = (k A c^3)/(4 G hbar), where A is the "surface area" of the region, c is the speed of light, G is Newton's gravitational constant, and hbar is Planck's constant. That means the maximum number of bits of information in a region of space is (A c^3)/(4 G hbar), or about A * (10^69 1/m^2). Our solar system is maybe 1 light year in size: about 10^16 m, so its "surface area" is 4pi r^2 ~ 10^33 m^2. That means that the solar system can hold at most 10^102 bits of information.

If Moore's law says that computer memory doubles in capacity every 2 years, then they'll go up by a factor of 1000 about every 20 years. We currently have computers that hold about 10^12 bits of information, so just 90*20 = 1800 years would get up to that absolute limit, regardless of what technology we used, unless our single computer was bigger than a light year in radius.

<comment><USER2> Whoops! I had a feeling I was being careless at the end there. It should have been 30x20 years rather than 90x20, so just 600 years until Moore's law is absolutely finished regardless of technology. (That shouldn't feel all that much closer, but it does.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I'm really not impressed with this guy's description. His understanding of a 3d transistor is flawed. Currently 3d transistors are just one layer of the transistor which has a rectangular cross section to reduce leakage. Future 3d processors will have transistors layered on top of other transistors. Granted heat dissipation becomes a harder problem for those processors but "a hard problem" is much easier to overcome than the theoretical laws of physics at 5nm.

Also, I don't like how his go to solution for after silicon is molecular computing. He said himself that silicon breaks down when we are around 5 atoms across. How big are the molecules which we can use as switches? Much more than 5 atoms across. Molecular computing will not get a transistor density any greater than silicon will.

</comment><comment><USER4> We're nearing the limits for silicon, but we're nowhere near the limits of physics. We'll likely lose the nice smooth curve, but the long-term trend started with mechanical adding machines, and it'll probably continue well past silicon.

Within the next decade, memristors will give us a big jump for certain kinds of problems. Down the road, reversible computing would be another huge leap, essentially eliminating the heat problem.

</comment><comment><USER6> Moore's law is a relationship between transistor count and _cost_.

The physical limits of the universe govern transistor _density._

Cost may continue to drop in the face of increasing tranistor count for some years: dies will have to get bigger, but yields on big dies have a lot of improvement left. We may see chips get cheaper and cheaper even if the feature size never drops.

</comment><comment><USER7> Ah reality. You're why we can't keep nice growth patterns.

</comment><comment><USER8> Personally, I'm looking forward to cheaper and cheaper computing, rather than more and more powerful.

Raspberry Pi is just the beginning. Wait until Sandy Bridges are as cheap and plentiful as 555 timers. I'd also like to see some sort of worldwide standardization on a single CPU architecture. Innovation will continue long after Moore's law.

</comment><comment><USER9> Moore's law is not a law. It's an observation, it's as much a law as my observation that the amount of rain increases in podunk at a rate of 10% per day. There may be some phenomenon where it's true for a little while, but calling it a law just makes me cringe. The law is a self fulfilling prophecy because chip makers make it as a target which is neither too ambitous nor too cautious. It should be called moore's phenomenon.

</comment><comment><USER10> I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Are you listening?

Quantum.

(edit: not that I have a clue what I'm talking about)</comment>


Thank you Hacker News - You are all invited to Scribd's party tonight in SF - <AUTHOR>

Yesterday we posted on Hacker News asking for your feedback, and wow, did you guys come through!  We are very so grateful for all the great constructive feedback we received.  We hope that going forward we can continue to use Hacker News as a sounding board to help make our product better.
To say thank you, we'd like to invite all users of Hacker News to the Scribd 3 Year Anniversary Party tonight in SF.  We honestly didn't plan to do this originally, but we were so overwhelmed by the response that it felt like the right thing to do.  Here is the invitation:
http://anyvite.com/events/home/dq4gjpnquo/w7ji380d8kmwpc/lhckmc261rk4agq2gz7v
To get in, just bring your Hacker News user name and the password is "font".  Hope to see you guys tonight!
Thanks, The Scribd Team <comment><USER2> Here is what the invitation says:

 _Invitation Details_

Scribd Turns 3!!

Help celebrate Scribd's (belated) 3rd birthday!!!

We want to thank all our amazing employees, partners and friends who've helped make this past year a blowout success. Enjoy great food, drink, company and maybe even some go-karting and ziplining at Scribd's SoMa headquarters.

Be sure to try the Scribdtini while you're here!

\- Trip

 _Date & Time_

Friday, May 7 at 8:00 PM (PDT)

 _Location_

Scribd Office 539 Bryant Street, Suite 200 (between 3rd & 4th Street) San Francisco, CA

[http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&...](http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&q=539+Bryant+St+%23200,+San+Francisco,+California+94107&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=63.640894,96.591797&ie=UTF8&cd=2&geocode=FaZ6QAIduF-0-A&split=0&hq=&hnear=539+Bryant+St,+San+Francisco,+California+94107&z=17&iwloc=r13)

</comment><comment><USER2> [http://anyvite.com/events/home/dq4gjpnquo/w7ji380d8kmwpc/lhc...](http://anyvite.com/events/home/dq4gjpnquo/w7ji380d8kmwpc/lhckmc261rk4agq2gz7v)

<comment><USER3> FYI anyone who follows that URL will be logged in as you.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> wish I was in SF ;/

<comment><USER5> aww. me too ;/

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> What documents should I bring?

<comment><USER7> All of them. :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Have you guys done my 3+ year old request of making a cool URL scheme for encoding documents?

<http://microsoft.com.scribd.com/some/path/to/a/document.pdf>

I'd attend your party if I could. Sounds cool. Good luck.

<comment><USER9> That looks a bit shaky to me. Confusing to users, impersonation, etc

<http://scribd.com/microsoft.com/path/to/document.pdf> would have less issues.

<comment><USER8> Works well enough for Coral Cache <http://news.ycombinator.com.nyud.net/item?id=1328844>

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Since this is after all a community of geeks and hackers, we can probably expect people to comment here _from the party_. Elsewhere, it would be a social faux pas, but here, it's probably a sign of not being there only for the booze and hors d'oeuvres.

</comment><comment><USER11> When I tried that link it said I wasn't on the guest list to that event :(

</comment><comment><USER12> Great party, thanks for the invite.

<comment><USER2> Great meeting you there, thanks for coming!

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> address?

<comment><USER14> 539 Bryant Street, Suite 200

<comment><USER11> When? Someone should really either fix the link in the OP or give the info there... I'm not sure what this Anyvite site is, but this is giving me a horrible first impression for something that may or may not even be their fault. Unfortunate, but such are first impressions...

<comment><USER15> Anyvite is a YC company. Their Tweetvite service - <http://twvt.us> \- is baller. I've never actually used the old-school Anyvite service.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Obama administration defends $222,000 file-sharing verdict - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/02/obama-administration-defends-222000-file-sharing-verdict/

<comment><USER2> Here's 'tzs on Jammie-Thomas Rasset:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2140293>

Here's another:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4781933>

She's not a very sympathetic defendant. [Late edit: I should be more careful, since the case could be made that she's being taken advantage of by unscrupulous attorneys, and it's they who are unsympathetic.]

[Even later: I thought it was 'tzs who had pointed out that Jammie Thomas- Rasset had also lied under oath, first claiming that her relatives had been behind the downloaded files, but eventually admitting that it was her; ultimately, the narrative I picked up was, "the RIAA offered to settle for $5k, but instead she went to court with a defense so ludicrous she had to disavow it on the stand; she achieved a retrial, at which point she was again offered a $5k settlement by the RIAA, which she again refused". That is, for what it's worth, what seems to have happened, but I'm not sure that whole story is attributable to 'tzs.]

<comment><AUTHOR> His comment is based upon a misconception of what civil law is supposed to accomplish. It's not intended to be a disincentive, rather a plaintiff is only supposed to be able to recover actual damages. The guiding principle is "make whole" -- a plaintiff can go to court to recover actual losses, and no more. Punitive damages are assessed where the defendant is shown to have willfully and intentionally harmed the plaintiff, but only in extreme circumstances should those damages exceed the actual damages incurred from the act itself.

The statutory minimums don't really adhere to that principle which is unfortunate.

<comment><USER2> The US has had punitive damages since its inception. The point of punitive damages is to deter conduct when the mere threat of actual damages is insufficient. It is exactly the same principle that leads a ticket for a skipped tollway toll to cost $75 when the underlying damages were only 80 cents: if the ticket only cost 80 cents, or even a buck sixty, nobody would pay tolls, because it would be economically irrational to do so.

For whatever it's worth, the RIAA offered --- on two very separate occasions --- to settle for actual damages.

<comment><USER3> The court-based fines are not only higher just to be punitive, nowadays.

Despite thinking this particular verdict is ridiculous, in a lot of cases, walloping unreasonable defendants if they lose is a mechanism to prevent overburdening the courts.

Courts are a wildly inefficient way to settle disputes, they know this, and they are overburdened docket-wise with mostly bullshit. There is a determined push by most courts across the country to not try cases that could be settled. Some force day-of-trial mediation for simple suits. For complex suits, the vast majority now require at least some mediation.

If you come along, refuse to settle a case that is by-the-books law _and you lose_ , judges will generally impose enough to make you think twice about doing this again.

Whether they should, whether it's right, this is what happens. This has actually been fairly successful on the torts side. Only something like 2% of tort cases now go to trial across the US. Results in other areas are not so good yet. Family law is an area where it is very hard to get people to settle, even when lawyers on both sides tell their clients "you won't get what you want at trial, the judge is going to follow the law and statutory guidelines, and do X. We should settle". They still want a trial (mostly because they want some judge to tell them they were right and their ex was wrong, and instead the judge just tells them both they are wasting his time), then get angry at the lawyers.

In any case, to be fair to the judges, most people truly have no concept of the amount of stupid cases[1] that the average federal district court judge sees. This kind of stuff is why the average civil lawsuit now takes years to resolve.

[1] Not person did dumb thing stupid, but cases that are so trivially resolvable that they complete waste of time for everyone involved.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Just in case anyone was not aware (or is shocked by this), the Obama administration has very close ties to the copyright industry: <http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/04/obama-taps-fift/>

It is entirely unsurprising they would react in this way

<comment><USER2> Government attorneys defend by-the-books application of decades-old federal law. Film at 11.

<comment><USER5> Government attorneys fail to act on behalf of the people. Film at 11.

<comment><USER2> Government attorneys fail to act on behalf of the people _I favor_. Film at 11.

Fixed that for you. :)

<comment><USER6> Yes and no. There's a clear divide in this case between corporate and personal interests. America wasn't originally all about defending corporate rights more vigorously than personal ones.

<comment><USER2> And you find the idea that the interests of groups of people are disfavored over those of individual people where, exactly, in the Constitution?

<comment><USER7> Hopefully the 28th Amendment: <http://www.wolf-pac.com/the_plan>

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Yes, it's a stupid verdict. Yes, the defendant's reasoning that the statutory damages in this case be analogized to unconstitutional punitive damages is a very compelling one.

That being said, the DOJ is basically Congress's lawyer. It is obligated to defend Congress's laws from Constitutional challenges.

<comment><USER4> It seems, the POTUS has discretion in telling the Justice Department what to pursue:

[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/23/obama-doma- unconsti...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/23/obama-doma- unconstitutional_n_827134.html)

<comment><USER8> The DOJ's decision to not prosecute DOMA is actually quite a soupy mess, and much more controversial legally than it was politically.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> What is it with these administrations in recent years urging the Supreme Court _not_ to do it's job?

I admit, I have not studied the history of such particular requests from the justice department, but I do not remember hearing so many of them from previous administrations. By "previous" I mean before Bush, since if memory serves, W did a lot of this as well.

<comment><USER8> The DOJ will always weigh in on the side of asking the Supreme Court not to invalidate the Constitutionality of a law. It's part of their job. The decision to not defend the constitutionality of DOMA was quite controversial actually.

I think the reason it seems worse in this administration is because Obama's DOJ is fucking bad at public relations. Their understanding of the optics of cases is unusually bad.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> "The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to Grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment. He shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments. He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the Time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States."

Hmm. Nothing in there about getting involved in potential supreme court cases.

<comment><USER8> > he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall > Commission all the Officers of the United States

What about defending the Constitutionality of Congressional laws seems outside the scope of "take care that the laws be faithfully executed" to you?

Also, note that the Attorney General's position was created in 1789 by the first Congress, and was tasked with more or less the responsibilities he has today: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Attorney_General>

<comment><USER10> Read the section labeled "argument" here: [http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2013/02/12-715...](http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2013/02/12-715-Thomas- Rasset-Opp2.pdf)

That sounds like a defendent of the record companies, not the executive branch trying to ensure law is faithfully executed. It would be one thing if the supreme court were ignoring laws, but arguing for the denial to review a case is hardly taking care that law is faithfully executed. Our executive branch is suggesting the subversion of due process in this case.

<comment><USER2> Exactly how is a brief suggesting that a case doesn't merit cert a "violation of due process"? A full hearing of one's case by the Supreme Court is _not_ a procedural right guaranteed to citizens by the constitution. SCOTUS rejects the overwhelming majority of appeals without hearings.

<comment><USER10> From the argument: "Petitioner's further contention (Pet. 15-18) that the court of appeals misapplied the Williams standard is not fairly encompassed in the question presented and is, in any event, a case-specific challenge that does not warrant this Court's review."

In other words, ignore the man behind the curtain.

Edit: to clarify- this is the final statement in the reasoning why due process should not be considered. Read the argument.

<comment><USER2> You didn't answer my question.

<comment><USER10> I did. Their argument was that due process was handled in the preceding two trials and due process should be denied because X and Y, but to the point that a relevant case was misapplied (which should result in appeal), they basically say "umm... that was case specific and yada yada yada we're right".

<comment><USER11> What exactly do you mean when you say "due process"? can you explain without using the actual words "due process"?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Disgusting that the executive branch is sticking it's nose into copyright law and the Supreme Court.

Does anyone care the highest office in the country has been bought?

<comment><USER2> Constitutionally incoherent argument is constitutionally incoherent. The executive branch houses the DOJ, which is charged with the enforcement of all laws.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> I'm glad for not living in a country with so many cases of legal bullying for small cases of copyright infringement.

</comment><comment><USER14> That quote from the solicitor general upset me enough that I decided I would go right ahead and petition the White House to address this issue. We've got this great democratic resource, so I figured I may as well use it.

Please sign and share: <http://wh.gov/dZCl></comment>


Watsi (YC W13) raises $1.2M first-of-its-kind 'philanthropic seed round' - <AUTHOR> http://blog.watsi.org/post/56425387090/announcing-our-1-2m-philanthropic-seed-round <comment><USER2> This is awesome, I just donated and tried it out.

If you guys are open to some conversion rate optimization testing ideas I saw a few areas that would likely respond to treatments - drop me a line via my profile and I'd be happy to have our team put together a free breakdown and help out where we can resource wise.

<comment><USER3> Darn it, my "anti-procrastination" parameters set in when I was writing an EDIT to my comment above, sorry for creating a secondary account but wanted to leave this here before I forget and maybe round up some other good HN ideas:

1) People won't click what they can't see - I've now encountered the watsi blog a few times via media. Link to Watsi.com from the header of the blog. Stick a call to action on the right side that links directly to "Donate Now". The "Donate Bitcoins" is cool, but that goes to Watsi opps vs your core biz. Ideally dynamically pull down the "closest to being funded" profile and stick it there w/a big button.

2) In checkout I used PayPal and I almost I clicked off before I saw there was another step required in the "You're about to confirm your donation" and then "Complete Donation". I'd test a little bit of a bolder statement there, would be interested to see abandons there but glad to see that you are storing the session.

3) Improve visibility of after-checkout links / actions - After funding you provide social links to share the message, get those higher up / directly under the top paragraph of text. Also include your "View Other Profiles"

4) I was compelled to donate a second time when I realized that I could be the "Final funder" to close out a campaign - that seems like a really solid way to drive a secondary call to action in the email that you send and gives immediacy that is otherwise lacking.

5) Your instant email is great, but with more and more email clients blocking images by default (1) it's a lost opportunity - this is what I saw in my gmail client [http://imgur.com/u9AifHM](http://imgur.com/u9AifHM) \- get some basic ALT tags in there as a quick fix, as a longer term fix shrink your logo way down, put block text in the top image quadrant along with a call to action eg "Thank you for funding [NAME]'s medical treatment - click here to meet other new patients on Watsi!"

(1) [http://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/will-it- work/image-...](http://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/will-it-work/image- blocking/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Watsi could use an API, so that I can rig code up in (for instance) contests to submit a donation every time a player finishes.

That would also have the beneficial effect of potentially randomizing some donations across the patient portfolio.

<comment><USER5> That's a really good idea. We started sketching out the API a bit ago but had to put it on hold. It's something we want/need to get right. Hopefully I get some time in the next few months to get started on it.

<comment><USER6> When you do get a chance to work on the API, I have an idea to tie donations to wristband activity monitors - so a sponsor such as a parent, etc. could donate into a holding fund, and then the fund gets released to your patients a bit at a time as the wristband wearer walks/runs.

People have a great need for a sense of purpose in their lives, and tying _their_ activity to the well being of another seems like a win-win.

So, if you could keep that use case in mind while designing your API...

<comment><USER7> That is actually an incredible idea.

<comment><USER8> Yep. That's exactly what Striiv does: tracks your activity and lets you donate to a variety of projects around the world for clean water, reforestation, and preventing polio via GlobalGiving.org.

[http://www.striiv.com/](http://www.striiv.com/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> We're searching the world for a front-end developer to join our team in time to travel with us to Nepal on August 20th. If you or anyone you know is interested, drop us a line! [http://bit.ly/1boYhK8](http://bit.ly/1boYhK8)

</comment><comment><USER9> Anyone reading this has enough time and money to fund another person now:

[https://watsi.org/fund-treatments](https://watsi.org/fund-treatments)

Do it.

<comment><USER10> I just tried to donate and since I use 1password to pre-fill the CC info, their form validation didn't kick in, and the "Confirm Donation" button was still ghosted out. I had to do some sleuthing and simulate some KeyUp events before it was enabled.

If anyone from Watsi is looking, please look into this (might be an edge case though). I was close to a "eh, let me do this later." \- which is bad.

<comment><USER5> This is a known issue with tools like 1password and LastPass. I'm not sure how to fix it. If you have any ideas, please hit me up on Twitter: @jc00ke.

<comment><USER11> I would skip the auto-validation and let the user hit the always-enabled "Confirm Donation of $xx" button to validate the form. Tried and true and catches the auto-fill cases.

<comment><USER5> Yeah, we'll consider that. Thanks Dave! ;-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Just freaking tremendous, guys. You're doing something magical: directly connecting philantropy to tangible results.

How can we help you spread the word? What's your media strategy? What's the pinnacle- the Today show? Somebody paying for a primetime ad?

<comment><USER13> Thanks so much! Really appreciate the kind words.

Re: media strategy. Broad, national, mainstream outlets will be our next big challenge. Today would be amazing. Good Morning America, Frontline World News, 60 Minutes, Anderson Cooper, Fareed Zakariah, Ellen, Diane Sawyer, Nick Kristof, Al Jazeera...any of those would be a pinnacle :)

<comment><USER14> I live in Heidelberg, Germany and I can't even fathom how many people here would be intrigued by watsi. I just found out about it and am blown away by how effective a simple idea can be executed.

You guys should get a grip in europe. Are you planning on making regular bank transactions possible in europe? For traditionally-minded people who'd like to donate.

<comment><USER5> We have had some traction in Europe already, but it's been a while since we ran the numbers. We do have a blog post on the topic: [http://j.mp/is- generosity-geographic](http://j.mp/is-generosity-geographic)? and we'll be looking to expand wherever we can.

As for regular bank transactions, we're going to explore it. For now you can hook up your bank to your Paypal account. It's not ideal though, we know!

Thanks for your support!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Serious congratulations. The idea of separating overhead from donations is a important idea that needs to be emulated more in the charitable community.

<comment><USER16> _The idea of separating overhead from donations is a important idea that needs to be emulated more in the charitable community._

Most already do, but that's actually a _problem_ for most charities, since they can't figure out how to scale or operate more efficiently because their budget is tied so directly to services.

For more than this, see the reasoning and extensive examples in Ken Stern's book _With Charity For All_. I wrote about it here: [http://blog.seliger.com/2013/06/02/with-charity-for-all- ken-...](http://blog.seliger.com/2013/06/02/with-charity-for-all-ken-stern- book-discussion/) , and anyone interested in how the charitable subset of nonprofits actually operate should read the book.

(I'm a consultant who does grant writing for nonprofit and public agencies and have heard a million laments on this issue.)

<comment><USER17> I would be interested in your take on Dan Pallota's perspective (below, several times); he seems to have a lot of exposure with his claim that nonprofit isn't working as well as it could, primarily because of the focus on "overhead".

\--

Dan Pallotta: The way we think about charity is dead wrong

[http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pallotta_the_way_we_think_about...](http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pallotta_the_way_we_think_about_charity_is_dead_wrong.html) (20 min video)

      > nonprofits [...] are rewarded for how little they spend
      > -- not for what they get done

Pallotta on Charity and the Culture of the Non-Profit Sector

[http://www.econtalk.org/archives/_featuring/dan_pallotta/](http://www.econtalk.org/archives/_featuring/dan_pallotta/) (1 hr EconTalk podcast)

      > The use of overhead as a measure of effectiveness makes it difficult for
      > charities to attract the best talent, advertise, and invest for the future

Uncharitable: How Restraints on Nonprofits Undermine Their Potential

[http://amzn.com/B003BLY740](http://amzn.com/B003BLY740) ($15 340 pg. Kindle book)

      > double-standards place the nonprofit sector at extreme disadvantage to
      > the for profit sector on every level

<comment><USER18> There's been some rejoicing in my nonprofit nerd circles about a recent acknowledgement by a few important nonprofit rating orgs that overhead is a bad measure of effectiveness: [http://www.guidestar.org/rxa/news/news- releases/2013/2013-06...](http://www.guidestar.org/rxa/news/news- releases/2013/2013-06-17-overhead-myth.aspx)

<comment><USER15> it's not universally bad, it's just important to acknowledge corner cases. It's important to remember that a 'high overhead' though, does correlate to bad performance.

<comment><USER17>
      > It's important to remember that a 'high overhead' though,
      > does correlate to bad performance.

Dan Pallota's entire point is that this line of thinking is wrong.

<comment><USER15> I don't think either of us have real statistics on this. I do know within certain nonprofit (mostly research, but not exculsively) organizations I've been in/worked with, increasing overhead has correlated with my personal dissatisfaction. The place where I volunteer, for example, spent a lot of money on a posh warehouse to prepare food, which was very different from the church that it operated out of - meals then were only delivered MWF instead of daily, and the client base shrunk, there may be a bit of mission creep too (but I'm not quitting volunteering for them quite yet). When I lived in DC, I was dismayed at that location's "parallel" (i.e. does the same thing, but unrelated) organization for similar reasons, except it had gone down the other side and was no longer delivering hot meals even, so I chose a different place to volunteer.

In the sciences, high overhead (as charged on top of grants given by taxpayer- funded organizations such as NIH, NSF, DOE) inevitably means questionably high payouts to the executive-level presidents, and what not. Now that I know how to read 990s, I am looking through the history of a particular nonprofit science research org; 10 years ago it was entirely run off of its endowment and had a promise to the researchers of independence from the tyrrany of grants. Over the course of the decade, the active scientist corpus has shrunk by 3/4, the president gets paid 3x more, the endowment is < 20% of what it used to be, and PIs are being pushed to apply for soft money, and they are negotiating overheads of 60% or more.

Then there are spectacularly bad organizations such as the Harlem Boy's Choir, which I have no personal experience with, but certainly serve as cautionary tales.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Congrats to the Watsi.org team!

<comment><USER13> Thank you for everything, Eric!

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> This is really cool, but does it scale?

I tend to think of Watsi as sort of a one-off, at least right now. Do you think it will become easier to make philanthropic ventures if funding them becomes similar to funding Venture companies? I mean in a way it already is, except you write a grant instead of pitching a capitalist.

Does this pave the way for more non-profit venture companies or is this just a one-off?

EDIT: Massive congratulations to the team at Watsi :). Job well done.

</comment><comment><USER21> I just funded a pregnant women's medical care and it only cost $215??? In the USA it cost tens of thousands of dollars. Amazing.

On a separate note, this is an AWESOME idea and service. Trust the private sector to take on poverty, where the government has failed to date.

<comment><USER22> In the USA, the doctors, nurses, and admin staff all live a more expensive life than their colleagues in less developed countries (and not in strictly bad ways). I'd also suspect that your $215 wouldn't cover, say, an emergency caesarian, or an epidural and similar drugs.

<comment><USER23> I can't speak to everywhere, but in Kenya (the funding in the OP was for a Kenyan) many of the charity medical facilities are run by religious organizations, who recruit religious medical professionals from abroad to volunteer their time and services. If an OB/GYN happens to be volunteering the person could very well receive a C section. They also have stockpiles of various drugs which they've received from donations, so they could get an epidural if they happened to have the right stuff in the stock room.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Serious questions:

1\. Do you think there may be selection effects in this type of donation model? How do you plan on preventing discrimination against the less photogenic?

2\. Do my dollars, etc actually go directly to specific individuals, or is there a layer of intermediation a la Kiva (over which there was some confusion and "controversy" [1])

3\. In a world where watsi-like treatment model becomes successful, do you believe that creating these individual-to-individual dependencies is a net positive improvement for society?

[1] [http://pages.kiva.org/fellowsblog/2009/11/11/kiva- transparen...](http://pages.kiva.org/fellowsblog/2009/11/11/kiva-transparency- and-p2p-microlending)

<comment><USER25> A "random" button (super smash bros style) which picked a random from page then post donation confirm showed you who was picked would help address the photogenic issue.

Also, some UK localization allowing gift aid would help you scoop up my tax with the donation. (Unless I missed it already, I'm only browsing on mobile.)

<comment><USER5> Thanks for the UK idea. Luckily we can also chat with Prizeo, one of the companies in our YC batch.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> This is great news but I'm pretty sure this it is not a "first of its kind" occurrence as there are a number of vehicles (e.g. New Profit in Boston) that specialize in these types of strategic venture-like philanthropy investments.

<comment><USER27> Yup. There's a bunch of impact funds that do this kind of investment and measure themselves on metrics other than IRR. eg. Khosla Impact, Acumen, etc etc.

</comment></comment><comment><USER28> Very excited for and proud of the entire Watsi team!!

</comment><comment><USER29> The absolute hardest part I have when donating on this site is having to choose who gets your money. It hurts me a lot realizing just how much help people in poverty need, and it hurts even more knowing that I (or anyone else for that matter) lack the resources to help everyone in need.

That said, congrats to the team for tackling such a worthy cause.

<comment><USER30> > ...and it hurts even more knowing that I (or anyone else for that matter) > lack the resources to help everyone in need.

This isn't really true, most issues about resource distribution are political in nature and are not the result of a lack of resources.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Awesome news guys -- cheering this on!

EDIT: Cheering => Donating -- [https://watsi.org/fund- treatments](https://watsi.org/fund-treatments)

</comment><comment><USER32> Seriously, your goal is awesome and I love it. Aside from donations (which I've done) is there anything else that we can do to help?

</comment><comment><USER33> congrats watsi! you guys are my fave

</comment><comment><USER34> This is incredible, question for you guys, do you avoid having to pay the PayPal fees if I pay with funds from my bank account? If so, everyone should try to do that to save the small percentage charge.

</comment><comment><USER35> Good job guys!

</comment><comment><USER36> Congratulations guys, it is an awesome news. I really love your mission and you have done wonderful job until now. Keep going like that!

Wish you luck for the future!

</comment><comment><USER37> Well done guys!

</comment><comment><USER38> Congrats guys! Well deserved :)

</comment><comment><USER39> How do you prevent fraud?</comment>


Let me assess your company logo design for FREE - <AUTHOR> Hi, I do logo design and brand identity (blooform.com) Post your logo here and I'll give you feedback! <comment><USER2> Sure, [https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/955472286353518592/UBXQ...](https://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/955472286353518592/UBXQwjac_400x400.jpg)

<comment><AUTHOR> If it is an unique design it's actually goood. It will work no matter how and where you use it. Just make sure any other company doesn't already use it.</comment></comment>


Show HN: Athena, drop-in replacement for wkhtmltopdf using Docker, Electron and Go - <AUTHOR> http://athenapdf.com/ <comment><USER2> Hello, current maintainer of wkhtmltopdf here. This looks like an interesting approach, as Qt/WebKit is effectively unsupported. wkhtmltopdf is further hampered by the fact that a lot of the functionality requires a patched Qt version, which hasn't been ported to Qt 5.x.

Switching to Blink is obvious, but which wrapper to use (CEF, Electron, etc) is hard to decide. Because they all use a multi process architecture, supporting the API around which the tools are built is not really possible. Time to work on it has also been in short supply in recent times.

So, good work by the authors. Wish we could get something better, but as long as browsers move at the pace they do, it's going to be tough.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for all your good (and hard!) work on wkhtmltopdf - it sets a high bar for usefulness. We'd love your input on areas that you think could be improved in Athena.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Cool project, but firing up docker to convert a website to a PDF is just silly.

<comment><USER4> Using docker means that you don't have to install any of these dependencies on your computer, and, if it's setup correctly, it runs sandboxes from the rest of my system. So it's not just about the "overhead".

<comment><USER5> Does docker have a single system to report included libraries up to management, so that when, for example, there's a major hole in openssl or nginx or a php library or the Chromium engine, I will immediately know which docker images are vulnerable and which I don't have to worry about?

Because until that happens, the only way I can run docker images is when I've created them myself... and even then I really need a tool that does the above, so that I can rebuild them when the next CVE comes around.

<comment><USER4> ... so build them yourself. And keep them in your own repository. And build them on a base that you have analyzed. You can probably use whatever tooling you are using for that purpose today. They aren't voodoo.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> wkhtmltopdf frustrates me to no end. I've even got a wrapper script to help iterate through it's various major versions and option flags in an attempt to get usable PDFs. I really hope this is a significant improvement.

<comment><USER7> Agreed (and same).

I get that it's hard to convert web elements (via Chrome) to a readable/nice PDF, but wkhtmltopdf really isn't the miracle tool it is made out to be. Like you, I have to tweak the options majorly, and even then it fails to support proper page breaks between text lines (i.e. a line of text that is cut across a page break looks so unprofessional).

We are in need of a true web to PDF conversion tool; it's one of those things that is overlooked in the business sector but represents quite a valuable niche.

<comment><AUTHOR> Please stress-test and feel free to submit problem cases as issues to the github repo [0].

"Aggressive mode", which leverages Chromium's "simplify page" mode, might do some of what you want, but typically you need some of the funky print css classes to enforce widows/orphans.

The main reason we have built this however is that wkhtmltopdf just crashes all the time. Other commenters seem to agree. We'd love feedback on whether Athena works in cases that other tools fail, as well as on quality of conversion.

[0]: [https://github.com/arachnys/athenapdf](https://github.com/arachnys/athenapdf)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> If I've followed all the trails correctly, this is essentially a docker image of a wrapper around Chromium in order to print HTML to PDF.

wkhtmltopdf uses a WebKit browser to print HTML to PDF.

</comment><comment><USER8> This isn't a package replacement, it's a microservice in a Docker container.

Replacing one package with three is nothing to be proud of. Replacing one with 13 plus wrapper code [1] is utterly ridiculous.

I don't know the background of this project, so there may be some important detail I'm missing, but it seems they would have done better to set up a stable wkhtmltopdf Dockerfile microservice instead, and avoid all of the wrapper code entirely. Cool as a demo of what's possible with tech today; less cool as a demo of how many hoops you can jump through to reproduce existing functionality.

[1] [https://github.com/arachnys/athenapdf/blob/master/cli/Docker...](https://github.com/arachnys/athenapdf/blob/master/cli/Dockerfile)</comment>


Show HN: Rcjit – An experimental Jit Compiler for R - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/nimble-dev/rcjit <comment><AUTHOR> Author here. We're thinking of this as kind of a "numba for R", where Rcpp is the "cython for R". Any feedback is appreciated!</comment>


Goats fighting America's plant invasion - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30583512 <comment><USER2> When my coworkers see news like this they start telling me that I ought to bring my fleet of Nubian goats out on jobs like this. They do great work, easily digesting poison ivy (and destroying its seeds so it can't regrow from their droppings).

Goats are a big component of a project I'm working on now, where they will graze on fallow land, eating weeds and grasses, depositing fertilizer and tilling the land with their hooves in the process.

In a small farming operation where the negatives to using many chemicals (to fertilize crops, and to kill weeds) isn't even always safety or environmental, but simply cost-related: the work that grazing animals like goats can provide is a game-changer. Plus, they are super fun animals to be around. I used to think that having a few backyard chickens for eggs would always be a no- brainer decision, but now I am sure that I'll always keep a couple goats around too.

<comment><USER3> _they will graze on fallow land, eating weeds and grasses, depositing fertilizer and tilling the land with their hooves in the process_

Almost literally as it's described by John Seymour! Ok he talks about pigs, but there's not _that_ much difference - quote: _To say nothing of the fact that pigs are the finest free cultivators that were ever invented! They will clear your land, and plough it, and dung it, and harrow it, and leave it nearly ready for you to put your seed in, with no more labour to you than the occasional shifting of an electric fence_

<comment><USER2> I've got my hands full with my current flock, but I would love to have pigs for this reason (among others). Would be great to have them root around in some scrub land as Seymour describes, then use its new fertility to grow grains to feed myself and the goats, continuing the cycle! Just not enough time in the day :)

<comment><USER3> Yeah I know the feeling, never enough time. Maintaining land+flock really seems to be a full time job. But pigs are awesome, very intelligent as well. We have some kunekune pigs and while they don't prepare the land as described above, they do happily eat grass and various kinds of plants the entire day and usually drop their dung in a couple of confined places so it's relatively easy to collect and use elsewhere. But I admit the main reason we have them is they are super adorable, cute, friendly, funny, play well together with goats, loved by children, don't require much looking after, you name it. Highly recommened :P

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I love this hack. My mom had a small herd of pygmie goats for her Montessori preschool. Some guy she knew convinced her to rent them out for this kind of job.

It wasn't the money that convinced her (don't think those little guys were the best earners) but the idea that "we could send in dudes with poison sprayers and loud gas power mowers, or we could just send Billy and his friends in to quietly munch on it for a few hours/days".

So many more eco points for doing it with the goats. Plus goats are intelligent and an interesting population to have suddenly show up and take over a spot. If there were any kids at the cleanup spot, interacting with the goats was good for the kids. While being chauffeured to various feasts kept the goats in high spirits.

Even the obvious down side isn't that bad -- goat shit comes out in these clean little dry pellets; much better than dog shit or cow shit or bird shit or a San Francisco sidewalk.

<comment><USER5> > If there were any kids at the cleanup spot, interacting with the goats was > good for the kids.

I read this sentence three times before finally deciding that you were using "kid" to refer to human children and not young goats. It's true either way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Another advantage which isn't mentioned: the goats (or similar grazing species) are also walking manure factories (really, compared to a compost heap they are _machines_ ), so pretty effective at spreading fertilizer all over the place. Automatically and for free :P

They perfectly fit in the self-sufficiency style - especially compared to the alternative worst-case senario: you don't need to get your polluting vehicle and drive to a store to pay money for some chemicals, then drive back and use some other polluting machine to get the checmical crap where it has to do whatever it does. Oh yeah, and repeat every year and be left with unhealthy soil. Which can probably be countered with more chemicals, yay!

</comment><comment><USER6> I have always wondered why western nations do not consume goat meat. One of my christian friends mentioned is that ii is because of hooves and devil symbolism; is there any merit to this argument ? I understand Hindus don't eat beef because of religious reasons and muslims don't eat pork also because of religious reasons. This is a comparison of nutritional value of goat vs. beef vs pork. [http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=goat+meat+vs.+beef+vs.+...](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=goat+meat+vs.+beef+vs.+pork) . Bon Apetit!

<comment><USER7> I suspect it is a matter of taste.

As for the pork thing, it is not just muslims. Strictly speaking christians should not touch it either as it is part of the old testament.

My personal take on this is that back then someone observed that people that ate pork often ended up sick and died.

While we now know that is is because of an illness passed from pig to human, back then it may well have been interpreted as divine punishment.

But then those days religion and law was one and the same, and so the declaration of pork as unclean may well be seen as a health and safety regulation.

Supposedly you can find passages from nearby cultures that line up very well with the old testament, with one crucial difference. While other cultures makes violations an offense against society, the bible makes them an offense against god. Meaning that what others deemed a social or secular matter, suddenly became religious.

<comment><USER8> Christians had those foods explicitly declared "clean" by God, at the same time that he declared Gentiles clean. [https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts%2010&versi...](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts%2010&version=HCSB)

<comment><USER7> Guess it shows i am no theologian...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> When Amazon Japan used goats as lawnmowers [1], proper procedure had to be maintained:

"The company has officially hired the goats following a procedure similar to the one used when hiring humans: it made identity cards for goats, just as it did for its human employees."

[1] [http://www.tokyotimes.com/amazon-japan-hires-goats-to-mow- gr...](http://www.tokyotimes.com/amazon-japan-hires-goats-to-mow-grass/)

</comment><comment><USER10> It takes 8 years for goat news to cross the Atlantic. ;) The NYT had an article titled "In Tennessee, Goats Eat the 'Vine That Ate the South'" in 2007, at [http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/05/us/05goats.html?_r=0](http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/05/us/05goats.html?_r=0) .

Tallahassee started using sheep in 1999 for kudzu. Unfortunately, people stole 10 of the sheep in 2001 ([http://jacksonville.com/tu- online/stories/072701/met_6795173...](http://jacksonville.com/tu- online/stories/072701/met_6795173.html) ) and another 21 in 2003 ([http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20031004/NEWS/310040550](http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20031004/NEWS/310040550) ).

I can't find mention of Tallahassee still using animals for kudzu control.

</comment><comment><USER11> Aren't these goats also an invasive species?

<comment><USER12> I was wondering about that too, hopefully nothing like the wild pigs that plague Texas will happen with the goats. We might just have to bring in tigers or something like that to control the goats later on...

<comment><USER13> In general hogs breed 3 to 4 times faster based on litter size.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> relevant map: [http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/12/m...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/12/map- literally-every-goat-in-the-united-states/)

</comment><comment><USER15> Shark Tank season 5, episode 5: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHqBFqh- SIY&t=1340](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHqBFqh-SIY&t=1340)

</comment><comment><USER16> TIL phragmites is an invasive species. An incredibly fun and useful plant, right up there with day lily (also invasive and hardy). Kudzu is beautiful but incredibly destructive.</comment>


Peter Thiel: The Education Bubble Is Becoming Dangerous (2018) [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crAHDXdBCXg <comment><USER2> I agree college is overpriced, but I doubt Thiel's companies often hire people without a formal college education. He's really just stating the obvious here without mentioning any viable alternatives.

<comment><USER3> Agreed. And it's not just "overpriced", because "overprice" says you are not getting enough output per input. In this case, with higher education, the economy (and nation) _needs_ skilled workers, and universities are not producing them in the quantities needed even as they graduate more and more students who have degrees that don't help them succeed in the job market.

I think the solution should be a combination of things:

1\. Make universities cheaper. Say fire 90% of non-academic staff, and force universities to have more academic staff than non-academic staff. Also make admission more rigorous, so they are more selective. Also get rid of the non- tenure track slave labor in academic staff. Ideally roughly 1/3 of the population should go to university, say 30% fresh from college students and 5% older students.

2\. Provide vocational training so that people can have as option vocational education such as electrical work, carpentry, plumbing, machine tools, and yes, programming, day care, medical assistant, accountant, etc. Vocational training should be max 3 years of focused training with an apprenticeship period in the last year, and unlike universities, these vocational schools should be setup so that everyone can access at least a couple of vocational school options, at government expense. Ideally 2/3 of the population should go to a vocational school.

3\. Stop providing government loans to universities entirely. Universities can provide scholarships and there should be government scholarships available based solely on merit. There should also be student _aid_ based solely on financial need, but with high academic requirements, otherwise route the student to a vocational school, which should be fully paid for by the government.

4\. Safety valve. If someone goes to a vocational school there should be an option to go back to university based on academic merit. Say a construction worker really takes to it and wants to become an architect, etc. The safety valve should be rare, say 5% max.

5\. Online learning/certifications for people switching specializations roughly within the same field.

<comment><USER4> I think other countries do well without such expensive universities, like Germany for instance where students are much more on their own. So I disagree with reducing "non-academic staff" and making admissions more difficult. In my opinion class sizes could be even larger and moved online completely. After all students only spend a fraction of their time in classes. Most of the time needs to be spent actually learning the stuff from the lectures, both alone and in groups with other students. Universities are there to facilitate the latter, it's just not possible with pure online learning - yet. To me most valuable are tutoring classes that are lead by staff or just more senior students, so it's possible to get qualified feedback and help with exercises and to actually understand things on a deeper level. At least for CS, Math, Natural Sciences.

There is a tendency to automatize a lot of basic work. Speaking for myself, I moved out from home 15 years ago and had to hire someone to repair something at my place only once. And that was because they messed up an installation that was initiated by the landlord. Societies as a whole are economically much better off when people get a higher education and should strive to enable it for everybody who wants to get it. (Many people actually don't want to study.)

<comment><USER3> The _reason_ why education in Germany is affordable whereas education in the US is not, is precisely because we have 7-10 non-academic staff per academic staff, whereas Germany has less than 1. These proposals of reducing non- academic staff, increasing rigor, reducing time to graduation, etc, is an attempt to be more like the German model.

You might want to look at this comment where I provide some numbers:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23817814](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23817814)

<comment><USER4> Thanks for sharing, this is really interesting.

Still, I wonder how German and U.S. universities compare for example in numbers of tutors. ("HiWis") I would estimate there is one per 20-50 students per course and they might fall into both groups since those helping out in 1st or 2nd semester courses might not have a university degree yet. Also the payment is typically quite low, although considered good enough for a first student job.

They are actually quite an important part of studies like Physics and Mathematics.

Regarding time of gradution/number students: in the past German model (which is now obsolete) where people studied for diploma, the typical lazy student would mean basically no extra cost for univsersities. Since this person usually doesn't occupy any lecture room or tutoring capacity... ;-) But the introduction of Bachelor/Master introduced quite some changes, in particular closer support for the students and more stringent time lines. But still, the Bachelor usually takes 3 years and the master an additional 2 years. Basically the curricula for diploma studies were just being split.

<comment><USER3> So people like tutors, graders, TAs, are considered academic staff, and you can add them up in terms of FTE (full time equivalent), so 5 tutors that each work 8 hours per week add up to a single FTE.

It turns out not to make much of a difference to look only at full time staff versus FTE -- I didn't know this when I started looking at the data, but the slices of time by tutors end up being a marginal correction to counting just full time staff when you look at things like student-teacher ratios or total expenditure per staff.

In the US, there _is_ a meaningful difference between tenure track and non- tenure track, as universities shift ever more funds away from academic staff and towards non-academic staff, one way this is accomplished is to pay the academic staff less, and this is accomplished by keeping the old professors at current pay but hiring mostly non-tenure track instructors as headcount is increased. The other way this is accomplished is by identifying some problem that needs an immediate solution, and then creating multiple vice provost positions which require their own department position, etc. Say community relations, gender equality, many different types of "outreach" positions, etc. European universities have so far resisted this type of cannibalization of tuition dollars by non-academic staff.

Thus the extra cost of non-academic staff is a good first order explanation for the diverge in annual tuition between US and Europe, and the fact that our students take 5-6 years to graduate and many don't graduate is another multiplier that explains differences in total spending on tertiary education per bachelors degree holder.

Taken together, these three factors: non-academic staff, longer time to graduation, much higher dropout rates, basically explain the full difference in spending between the US and Europe.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I find myself having binary reactions to virtually all of Thiel's positions: I either strongly agree or strongly disagree. I guess that's what his methodological contrarianism generates.

I agree with this one. Not only are college costs out of control, but the fact that colleges have seen tuition increase much faster than inflation _while simultaneously decreasing the number of real tenure track positions and other academic positions_ should be a national scandal. It's borderline fraud.

What the hell is all that money going toward? As near as I can tell it's unnecessary vanity buildings, executive salaries, and runaway bloat in administrative offices. It's going toward everything but real tenure track professorships, better teacher/student ratios, and everything else a university should be doing.

<comment><USER6> See _The Baumol Effect_ by Alex Tabarrok [1]:

> After looking at education and health care and doing a statistical analysis > covering 139 industries, Helland and I conclude that a big factor in price > increases over time in the rising price of skilled labor.

The interesting question, in my mind, is why the United States is an outlier compared to other advanced nation states.

[1] [https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/05/th...](https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/05/the- baumol-effect.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I find that discoverability is the problem. Out of all the classes I took, 2 without a doubt made the whole experience worth it and is still paying dividends: (discrete math and advanced algorithms) -- but I had no idea at the time that they would be the ones that would provide so much value. They were the classes that convinced me that I wanted to write software and not do electrical engineering. I wonder how you can solve this without simply going through the four years and hoping for the best.

<comment><USER8> Which discrete math class? (Currently trying to decide on a math class for autumn as CS major)

<comment><USER7> This one back in 2014 -- just the intro undergrad class. I actually absorb very little from lectures and do most of my learning by reading and doing problems myself -- the book was so good I read it cover to cover and did a lot of the practice problems.

[https://wl11gp.neu.edu/udcprod8/bwckctlg.p_disp_course_detai...](https://wl11gp.neu.edu/udcprod8/bwckctlg.p_disp_course_detail?cat_term_in=201610&subj_code_in=MATH&crse_numb_in=2310)

[https://www.amazon.com/Discrete-Mathematics-Applications- Ken...](https://www.amazon.com/Discrete-Mathematics-Applications-Kenneth- Rosen/dp/0073229725/ref=mp_s_a_1_12?dchild=1&keywords=discrete+mathematics+and+its+applications+8th+edition&qid=1597488825&sprefix=discrete+math&sr=8-12)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> This appears the final section of a 2014 episode of _Conversations with Bill Kristol_ [1]:

> CH. 6 : THE HIGHER EDUCATION BUBBLE (1:13:57 - 1:36:39)

> Is American higher education heading towards a major fiscal crisis? Thiel > explains he thinks it is.

[1] [https://conversationswithbillkristol.org/video/peter- thiel/](https://conversationswithbillkristol.org/video/peter-thiel/)

</comment><comment><USER9> IMO, adding 2018 in the title would be better.

</comment><comment><USER10> Peter Theil is an insulated idiot genius who happens to be right on this

<comment><USER11> Couldn't have said it better myself.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Hard for me to separate theses Thiel is partially right about from the great harm his existence has done to our species.

<comment><USER13> He's not nearly the first one to make this claim, so I'm not sure why it's even notable... "billionaire believes an oft-feared problem"

<comment><USER14> Yes, but Thiel has been saying this for many years, if not decades, and he did put his money where his mouth was, by paying students to drop out as part of the Thiel Fellowship program: [http://thielfellowship.org/](http://thielfellowship.org/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> At this point I think Thiel lives in his own wealth bubble so distinct from the experience of most people that his reckons just should be ignored by default.

I suspect that the main reason we see what he has to say so much is that he can pay a publicist to get people to listen to him .... he's essentially trying to buy\ his way into the 'marketplace of ideas' using money rather than actual ideas, essentially trying to skew the marketplace in his favor

<comment><USER16> Although there's merit to the fact that people can be blinded by their wealth- bubbles to the point that they cannot adequately identify/assess solutions to address problems that seem obvious to the rest of society, to discount someone's views based on their wealth-bubble status is likely ultimately a recipe for division, grid-lock, and a more closed-off society. Perhaps it's more useful to try to evlauate an individual's ideas based on the merits of their feasbility and overall utility versus writing them off by default in order to achieve a more functional society for everyone?

<comment><USER17> Why should we listen to the ideas of a rich guy rather than an educator? How many times have have you seen an education expert on this site discussing these topics from a critical standpoint?

The bigger issue is why to people want to listen to rich people rather than experts in the field? This reminds me the climate change where some people don't want to listen to the experts but instead want to listen so someone (or news organization) they already know.

<comment><USER18> don't discriminate much, take every idea, the odd idea that gots strong reaction (in a good, strange, nonobvious way), probably is on to something.

same idea with anova, the variable that causes a lot of variance is probably significant.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


New saltwater electrical generation could power submarines or medical devices - <AUTHOR> https://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/green-tech/geothermal-and-tidal/a-saltwater-river-runs-through-it <comment><USER2> The power generation potential given is in units which make it almost useless. A kWh is a unit of energy, converted into a frame of reference more useful than the joule. Saying that a device can generate 2 kWh doesn't really tell you much - it could generate that in 10 seconds (good) or 10 years (bad).

I think the quoted figure was meant to be in kW - a unit of power, which is a much more useful piece of information. I looked at the original paper (here: [https://arxiv.org/pdf/1907.13170.pdf](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1907.13170.pdf)) but couldn't find any reference to the 2kWh quoted from the researchers.

If the suggestion is correct, and a 10mx10m panel can generate 2kW, then there's some really interesting potential applications. History has shown that the path towards robust technology is normally by making things solid state - vacuum tubes to transistors, solar collectors to solar panels, even helicopters to drones all benefited from a huge decrease in mechanical complexity.

<comment><USER3> It might be a nice add-on for desal plants, which already have plenty of waste saltwater getting pumped around.

Someday.

<comment><USER4> I think that's the key right there: motion of the water. There's no free lunch here; it's not a battery.

Maybe a good application would be throwing the whole rig into the surf, or a salty tidal stream, where you get the induced current from lunar power.

<comment><USER5> Your comment made me go on a total tangent considering whether the Moon with eventually fall on us if we harvest enough tidal energy due to gravitational drag. But interestingly enough, the opposite is true, tidal drag is actually moving the moon further away from us, and slowing down the Earth's spinning.

<comment><USER6> That didn't make sense to me, so I looked it up and found there's a good wikipedia article about it (which you probably read as well.) It's too much for me to explain poorly in an HN comment, so I'll just link it for anyone who's also scratching their head: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_acceleration#Effects_of_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tidal_acceleration#Effects_of_Moon's_gravity)

<comment><USER5> The key point to me was that since earth is spinning about 28 times faster than the moon rotates around us, the drag force equalizes the frequencies by making earth spin slower, and the moon rotate faster, thus further away from us. Eventually they'd be in equilibrium, spinning in lockstep.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Submarines sound like a stretch to me - the motion of the water past the hull would be driven by the main engine, so it would just be reclaiming some of that energy (and inducing drag into the bargain). Where I _can_ see it potentially working is on Slocum gliders, where the main motive force comes from gravity. Whether you'd get enough watts off the available surface area to be worth the added drag, though... different question.

<comment><USER8> I think the idea is to run the process in reverse - run an electrical current through the metal to push against the ions in the water. No idea how practical it would be.

<comment><USER9> Not very, at 2kW per 100sqm of material, covering an attack sub in this material would give you the power of a compact car's motor: approximated to a cylinder 12m by 110, USS Seawolf has a lateral surface of under 4200sqm, 42 panes, 84kW.

The 2018-2019 Kia Soul EV has a 81.4kW engine.

<comment><USER10> I see you've posted this approximate figure and its comparison to a car three times already, but the Kia figure is irrelevant. The relevant comparision is the required power to push the USS Seawolf forward and what speed can you get with 84kW? I myself can push a 6500Kg boat although not as fast as the built- in 10kW engine, admittedly.

Don't forget that it is a sub and silent running is likely way more valuable than fast running (nobody is saying they can't have two methods of propulsion)

Also, I don't know anything about this USS Seawolf - is it a nuclear sub? IIRC the problem with them is that the pumps cooling the atomic core can't be shut down, meaning there is always detectable sound. Would a hose with this material on the inside be able to pump cooling water silently? Don't forget that the 'pump' in that case could be almost the entire length of the sub..

<comment><USER9> > I see you've posted this approximate figure and its comparison to a car > three times already, but the Kia figure is irrelevant.

It's very relevant as it gives a sense of scale of the issue and how little power is actually produced.

> The relevant comparision is the required power to push the USS Seawolf > forward and what speed can you get with 84kW

Since you're apparently checking all my comments you've likely seen Gotland's 2x75kW AIP gives it a top speed of 5kn. These 85kW would be a smidge above half that on a submarine about 6 times the weight. The relationship is probably somewhat non-linear but I'd say the result would be around "geriatric pacing".

> Don't forget that it is a sub and silent running is likely way more valuable > than fast running (nobody is saying they can't have two methods of > propulsion)

You could get about the same effect by just shutting down propulsion entirely.

> Also, I don't know anything about this USS Seawolf - is it a nuclear sub? > IIRC the problem with them is that the pumps cooling the atomic core can't > be shut down, meaning there is always detectable sound.

That doesn't seem to have any relevance to my point that this tech doesn't seem able to actually provide propulsion for a sub'.

> Would a hose with this material on the inside be able to pump cooling water > silently? Don't forget that the 'pump' in that case could be almost the > entire length of the sub..

You do realise there's other shit in a sub than just reactor cooling systems right?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > We've got a device that works, and we've got a number of ways we can run it. > But we have not, for example, yet lit up a lightbulb.

IEEE is really hurting their image with these poorly written clickbait headlines. While an interesting idea if it can't even produce enough power for a lightbulb it's not going t obe powering submarines or medical devices anytime soon.

</comment><comment><USER12> >10-meter-by-10-meter

>as much as 2-5 kilowatt-hours of electrical power

>could power submarines

Not really. I don't know about non-nuclear subs, but this is several orders of magnitude too low to be space effective for use on subs. I cant find any official public info, but suffice it to say subs run closer to 2MWs than 2KWs

<comment><USER13> I believe the submarine use-case is supposed to be the other way around:

> and even (running the process in reverse) a silent propulsion system for > boats or submarines.

So the submarine would have on-board power generation that powers this, not that this would provide the power to the submarine.

<comment><USER9> > and even (running the process in reverse) a silent propulsion system for > boats or submarines.

10x10m for 2kW is 2kW per 100sqm.

That's pretty much nothing, propulsion-wise. A seawolf-sized sub (108m long and 12m wide) covered in this material would produce about 85kW. That's around the powertrain of a modern compact / city car: the nissan leaf's motor is 80kW.

<comment><USER13> > would produce about 85kW

It's not _meant_ to produce energy in this case. That's what I'm saying.

<comment><USER9> It would convert electrical energy to mechanical, acting like an engine (and drivetrain).

An 85kW engine.

Which is — as I noted — about what you'd find on a compact EV (that's about 115hp).

<comment><USER14> Or for another point of reference, about what a fast-ish medium sized motorcycle of around 400lb/180kg produces.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Bad title, it could be used to generate power when it is fixed and there is a source of moving water (tides, fixed implanted medical devices) or generate force for something moving through water (submarine), but not both at the same time.

Moving water generates electrical currents, this is a pretty standard physics demonstration and how lightning works. This is perhaps a novel way of utilizing that property with thin conductive films.

</comment><comment><USER16> This sounds like a quite promising generation method. They quote 10x10 meter area with 100 layers as potentially generating 2-5 kwh.

It fails to mention if water flow can be continuous or has to be droplets and flow speed/salt content required for that generation.

Running in reverse to generate propulsion is also mentioned. Covering a submarine and just moving a thin layer of water out of the way to move forward is a super interesting application.

<comment><USER10> Also, they are worried about slime build up. but in the case of using that as a motor rather than generator, I wonder if that would be an issue at all, or if once activated it would just push the slime off..?

<comment><USER16> It is a fun thought. Probably far less efficient and slower than current propulsion, but no moving parts is a big plus.

Small drones that patrol the ocean for long times would be a cool application. Move a bit until the batteries are nearly depleted, float around to recharge, and then resume moving.

<comment><USER17> Silent operation is always a big plus for subs that want to stay hidden.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> kWh are units of energy, not power. This method is of no interest if it takes years to generate those kwh!

Also those films will rust completely off the slide in a matter of hours.

Edit in the case of iron, a 20nm film would fully corrode in about 20 min using a corrosion rate of 0.55mm/y

<comment><USER19> "Energy is the total amount of work done, and power is how fast you can do it. In other words, power is energy per unit of time. Power is watts. Energy is watt-hours."

<comment><USER20> energy is total change, power is change over time

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> How is running this in reverse different from a magnetohydrodynamic drive?

</comment><comment><USER19> So the trick would be to get a vat of salt water with these sheets in them, then set up an electric pump to circulate the salt water across the sheets. Power the electric pump using the generated electricity and... tada! Free energy! :D

<comment><USER22> Right. Reductio at perpetuum mobile proves this idea doesn't work.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> Reminds me of two works of science fiction:

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

and

Red October</comment>


Using New VCPU-Based On-Demand Instance Limits with Amazon EC2 - <AUTHOR> https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/compute/preview-vcpu-based-instance-limits <comment><USER2> Not exactly the clearest announcement from AWS, but the "instance limit" they are referring to is the limit on the number of server instances you can have running in your account at any one time.

Before the limit was quoted in a maximum number of servers, now it's quoted in a maximum number of total VPUs (virtual CPUs) that all of your servers contain.

Unless you're running a lot of instances, this doesn't change anything for you because you're probably not bumping into this limit.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> I got this in my email box. Does anyone know what this actually means?</comment>


Ask HN: Anything Like 365psd.com for CSS? - <AUTHOR>

365psd.com provides psd files with UI elements, templates etc that are free for commercial use.<p>Is there anything out there that does the same for CSS/HTML snippets? (of a similar high standard) <comment><USER2> Designmoo(we own 365psd) is planning to eventually roll out a code based resource site but we probably won't get to it for a few more months. If you don't find anything by then, check back with us.

<comment><USER2> And if we get funded, it'll be done sooner than that :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> <http://codecanyon.net/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Just found that after posting. Not free, which is what I'm after.

<comment><USER4> Yes, but did you see how low the prices are?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hrmm, maybe I should set something like that up for my next project.

</comment><comment><USER6> I don't think so, but you're given me an idea ;)

<comment><AUTHOR> I was starting to think the same thing ;) there's surprisingly nothing — at least to be easily found anyway.</comment></comment>


E-Book Price War Has Yet to Arrive - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/24/technology/e-book-price-war-has-yet-to-arrive.html?_r=0&adxnnl=1&ref=technology&adxnnlx=1356382553-nDwmZT11xS/9qZqgGxJmRw <comment><USER2> The price war will come in 2013. Contracts have only just been put in place under the DOJ settlements. Also I suspect that Amazon may be holding since they've done a boatload of TV ads and I can't see that they raised prices. I would guess that there is a reasonable chance they'll lose money in Q4.

</comment><comment><USER3> I would rather pay more for the hardware, and get cheaper content, than get cheaper hardware, but then expensive content.</comment>