The End of the End of the World - <AUTHOR> http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/05/23/jonathan-franzen-goes-to-antarctica <comment><USER2> Fairly warned be thee, this is a Jonathan Franzen essay, so it's not everyone's cup of tea, but if you like lengthy light prose peppered with his usual shout-outs to degenerative diseases you're in luck.

Franzen went on a luxury cruise around the Falklands, South Georgia Island and the pointy bits of the Antarctic Peninsula. He is a keen bird-watcher. He has eyes of glass and the heart of a tape recorder. He found Antarctica beautiful and finds the notion of global warming slightly upsetting, but life goes on. The cruise was a bit over three weeks long, but he has known his family for much longer than that so they feature proportionally.

There are no photographs of Antarctica because he resolved ahead of time not to take any photographs. He did not make it to the end of the world, nor does he substantially discuss the end of said end.

<comment><USER3> Not everything needs a tl;dr.

<comment><USER4> This needed one. I'm on mobile and didn't want to open the article. I thought this was about an apocalypse.

<comment><USER5> At the risk of being snarky (and this IS meant in good humour just to make my point) can you provide me a 100 word precis of Romeo and Juliet so I don't have to bother reading it or going to see it?

<comment><USER6> At risk of being _extra_ snarky, that's called a synopsis and they're frequently used to determine if you want to read something....

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I enjoyed this article and I'm glad I took the time to read it. Did I learn about some new framework? No. Will I get ahead in the rat race because of it? Unlikely. Though I do feel enriched because of it. I was there when Walt shouted at Jonathan. I was there when Jonathan found out about Gail's death. Maybe I'm alone in finding the utility of an article like this. It wasn't rubbish nor poorly written. It was just right.

</comment><comment><USER8> Went to Antarctica around 2005ish, one of the most amazing things I've ever done and was quite cheap, thanks to the Argentine economic crisis. Don't let worries stop you.

</comment><comment><USER9> My favorite line was this:

> It's true that the most effective single action that most human beings can > take, not only to combat climate change but to preserve a world of > biodiversity, is to not have children.

However, I'm not sure I understand how not having children preserves a world of biodiversity.

<comment><USER10> _However, I 'm not sure I understand how not having children preserves a world of biodiversity._

Increasing human activity depletes biodiversity by converting land into monocultured farmland, and by polluting the environment. Having children increases human activity. Therefore, having children reduces biodiversity. QED

<comment><USER11> Ergo wars are good? Especially nuclear wars?

I find the whole "there are too many of us" argument tedious. It's probably easier for whole world to switch to renewables than to increase birthrates.

More people don't mean necessary more polluters, but also potentially more ideas how to stop polluting, or go to space.

<comment><USER12> Nuclear wars are probably pretty bad for the biosphere. Biological weapons are best if you want to kill humans with minimal environmental impact, I think.

But jokes aside, don't you see an ethical difference between killing people and not having children?

<comment><USER11> Biosphere will recover without all the pesky humans in the way.

That's kinda the point - if reducing human population is the goal, then wars are way more efficient means.

I think ultimately both those path lead to same road. The same road China is on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Personally I have really enjoyed the article and I am happy I took the time to read it all. To anyone who comes to comments first - give it a try. Like another commenter said - I do feel enriched after reading it.

</comment><comment><USER14> I enjoyed the prose to the degree of emailing the link to my family. Thinking of subscribing to New Yorker for the only reason of getting exposed to excellent essays.

</comment><comment><USER15> Unreadable rubbish.

</comment><comment><USER16> How on earth does an article like this have anything to do with hacker news?

<comment><USER17> Do you ever remember reading a reply to a comment such as you made?

If no: There are several similar ones each day.

If so: What did the reply say? (hint, this wasn't it!)

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I tried, but this article is terribly written, 10 minutes in and I have no idea what this article about (other then probably something to do with Antarctica).

Can someone with more stamina then me explain to me what this is about and what is the title referring to?

<comment><USER11> More stamina? This isnt weight lifting. The article is meandering, but not badly written.

It's about a guy going on a trip to Antarctica, and having flashbacks about his uncle and his life, including his uncle's affair with his mom.

<comment><USER18> What is the title referring to then? why the "end" of the end of the world?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> This article is too wordy, with zero photographs of Antarctica. Watch this video instead, which covers National Geographic's cruise ("expedition") to Antarctica:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isa9_gCH6do](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isa9_gCH6do)

<comment><USER20> That video is half an hour long. Here's a Google Images search for 'Antarctica' for those of us without the time to spare: [https://www.google.com.au/search?q=antarctica&tbm=isch](https://www.google.com.au/search?q=antarctica&tbm=isch)

<comment><USER21> That was helpful, thank you, but maybe in the future you could just select a choice one or two?

<comment><USER22> Here's one weird tip... uhh, the Top 10. You won't believe what happens next, #3 is _shocking_.

[http://www.ytravelblog.com/best- antarctica-10-highlights/](http://www.ytravelblog.com/best- antarctica-10-highlights/)

<comment><USER23> No mention of the Airdevrondix icefalls:

[http://www.wondermondo.com/Countries/An/Antarctica/Antarctic...](http://www.wondermondo.com/Countries/An/Antarctica/Antarctica/Airdevronsix.htm)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The NSA's crypto "breakthrough" - <AUTHOR> http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2013/09/breaking-cryptography <comment><USER2> Breaking public-key crypto would have to be the biggest coup in SIGINT in the history of _ever_. Much bigger than cracking the Enigma. Just thinking about the sheer volume of internet traffic at every level and in every country that relies on the security of encryption makes the possibility of it being fundamentally broken a literal nightmare.

I don't think it has happened. But _if it had_ , that would be the kind of secret that would go in the President's book of secrets right along with the existence of National Treasure or the Men in Black. :P Snowden would never have a clue.

<comment><USER3> Well, it would be a very well guarded secret. But even then the question is how public key crypto is broken. If they can easily generate exploits for implementations, because they know a essential implementation detail everybody else is missing, then it would be fundamentally different from being able to break RSA directly, or if they have a constructive prove of P=NP.

<comment><USER4> Remember that factoring primes isn't know to be NP Hard. There is no complexity breakthrough required, we just don't know how to do it quickly. So we don't get P=NP from any factoring breakthrough.

<comment><USER3> Depends on the breakthrough, we know that multiplication is in P and therefore factorization in NP. So a P?=NP breakthrough may or may not have consequences for integer factorization. ( Actually since I did write that, I wonder if P=NP would invalidate any public key crypto, since efficient encryption should be in P.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> One of the "nice" things about the NSA: they rely on pretty standard crypto-- the same kind the rest of us do!--for their less sensitive, but still classified, secrets. NSA Ciphersuite B ([http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSA_Suite_B_Cryptography](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSA_Suite_B_Cryptography)) is built into a _lot_ of gov/mil communications technology. And it's just RSA, ECDHE, and so on--all that same stuff available in TLS.

In other words: if the NSA break one of these "public" algorithms, you'll be able to tell; they'll soon be picking new Suite B ciphers. (There _will_ be a time-delay, but _not_ of the intentional "let's capture+break foreign transmissions before scaring them away from this cipher" kind. Re-securing our _own_ transmissions takes priority, always. Even if it was broken because of some "quantum leap"\--pardon the pun--we have to assume our enemies are advancing their own tech at roughly the same rate, so if we can crack it, they can too.)

<comment><USER6> Suite B does not contain RSA.

EDIT: To your latter point, some people would consider this to be a telling fact.

<comment><USER3> Judging from the wikipedia link, Suite B does not contain a public key cypher. Which either tells us, that the NSA does not use asymmetric cyphers because they are broken. _Or_ that they have a technical reason for it, like being able to do everything they want with key exchange, signature and symmetric cypher. So it is probably worth pointing out, that this speculations are interesting, but ultimately fruitless since we simply do not have enough information.

<comment><USER7> There's ECDH and ECDSA.

<comment><USER3> Yes, I should have read the wiki link. However my point was, that Suite B is so generic that we can not really speculate why the NSA did recommend this set of algos and not something else.

<comment><USER8> They've written up a case for ECC. More elsewhere in the comments, but a key point is "RSA's really slow if you want 2^256 security": [http://www.nsa.gov/business/programs/elliptic_curve.shtml](http://www.nsa.gov/business/programs/elliptic_curve.shtml)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> This article does a few things that make it seem poorly written. First, there's the sentence "But, analysing a particular colossal number and trying to determine whether it possesses prime factors is colossally difficult." No, it's not difficult to determine _whether_ a large number has prime factors. The answer to that question is yes. Determining which prime numbers are factors is extremely hard, and what they should have said.

Second, they use an example from GCHQ's public key cryptography work rather than the more relevant NSA work on differential cryptanalysis, which became public knowledge in the late 1980s, was discovered by IBM in 1974, and which the NSA was already "well aware of" in 1974 [0].

[0]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differential_cryptanalysis#His...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differential_cryptanalysis#History)

</comment><comment><USER10> Totally tangential, but... I must have seen that exact same photo of NSA headquarters 100 times over the past month, at the head of every blog entry related to it.

It is too much to ask the nation's photographers just to take a few more pictures from different angles? ;) It's as bad as as the Onion's opinion on Snowden ("Nation Demands New Photograph Of Edward Snowden"):

[https://www.google.com/search?safe=off&q=%22Nation+Demands+N...](https://www.google.com/search?safe=off&q=%22Nation+Demands+New+Photograph+Of+Edward+Snowden%22)

<comment><USER11> It's really hard to take pictures of the NSA and I wish I was joking. When you drive past it, on say MD's Route 100, there are signs stating not to stop or take pictures and police officers with their lights on at all times on the side of the road. You can't stop here unless it's an emergency. I'm not sure about the laws that back this up but I've never tested them.

<comment><USER12> In England there's the Official Secrets Act. Signs say something like "a prohibited area as defined by the Official Secrets Act".

There has been some paranoia around photographers taking photographs in public. The London police force had to issue guidelines for their officers about correct procedure. ([http://content.met.police.uk/Site/photographyadvice](http://content.met.police.uk/Site/photographyadvice)) ([http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of- photography/new...](http://www.bjp-online.com/british-journal-of- photography/news/1648032/met-police-clarifies-public-photography-guidelines))

It's probably not a good idea to stand outside GCHQ's fence and take photos. They'll claim it's to protect secrets - the privacy and secrecy of who works for them, for example. (Because there is mostly carpark between the doughnut and the public road). I don't know if someone would get arrested, but "they" would certainly feel able to use their anti-terror powers and the experience would not be pleasant.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> The Economist:

> _Does the NSA have a quantum computer in the basement of its headquarters in > Maryland (pictured above)? It is theoretically possible, but pretty > unlikely...

A Canadian firm called D-Wave is presently selling a specialised kind of quantum computer—Lockheed Martin, an American defence giant, and Google have each bought one—but it is not suitable for this kind of work._

In-Q-Tel - "About Us"

> _" We make investments in startup companies that have developed > commercially-focused technologies that will provide strong, near-term > advantages (within 36 months) to the IC mission. We design our strategic > investments to accelerate product development and delivery for this ready- > soon innovation, and specifically to help companies add capabilities needed > by our customers in the Intelligence Community._

"D-Wave Systems, Inc., the World's First Commercial Quantum Computing Company, Secures $30 Million in a New Equity Round From Investors Including Bezos Expeditions and In-Q-Tel" [0]

 _" Burnaby, BC - Milpitas, CA - October 4, 2012 - D-Wave Systems, Inc. today announced that it has closed a $30 million round of equity funding. Bezos Expeditions and In-Q-Tel (IQT) have joined the investment round. Bezos Expeditions is the personal investment company of Jeff Bezos. IQT is the strategic investment firm that delivers innovative technology solutions in support of the missions of the U.S. Intelligence Community."_

[0] [http://www.dwavesys.com/en/pressreleases.html#investment_201...](http://www.dwavesys.com/en/pressreleases.html#investment_2012)

<comment><USER14> The most advanced math a quantum computer has done to date is "factored 21 into 3×7, with high probability (Martín-López et al. 2012)."

Remember: companies are in the game of marketing hype to ride your scifi hopes and dreams. When you see a company saying "quantum" anything, discount their unqualified claims greatly. (Investors are not immune to being manipulated by hype. Claiming "they must be good because they have fancy investors!" provides no more weight to their ability than a hobo claiming he keeps the airplane aloft by snapping his fingers every 3.2 seconds.)

<comment><USER15> I think that's for "normal" quantum computers. D-wave is a different kind of quantum computer.

<comment><USER16> The D-Wave machine is not a general quantum computer.

For example, the quantum computer that factored 21 into 3 x 7 did it by using Shor's algorithm for quantum factoring in polynomial time. The D-Wave machine cannot implement Shor's algorithm.

The D-Wave machine would be more capable on a different problem, one that maps efficiently onto the D-Wave machine's problem space. But we're talking about factoring here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Sounds like we need a couple more Snowden's to come out from NSA.

<comment><USER17> Why? Because the government doesn't deserve to have any secret programs whatsoever? I've said it before and I'll say it again: Even if leaking XKeyscore and PRISM was morally justified, leaking the intelligence budget or leaking other programs is probably unwise. Remember that when we talk about leaking, we're talking about weakening the American government. We should at least think about the implications.

<comment><USER18> The American government is collecting as much data about as many humans as it can, which I find morally repugnant. I support efforts to make that more difficult, even if it weakens the American government.

<comment><USER19> Government strength is relative. Weakening the American government is equivalent to strengthening other Governments. Would you mind telling us which ones you prefer and why they are morally superior?

<comment><USER20> _Weakening the American government is equivalent to strengthening other Governments._

No, building petabyte-scale data centers to spy on you and me is what's weakening the American government. _We 're_ not the problem, right?

The NSA is like the drunk who looks for his lost keys under the lamppost, "because that's where the light is." Not only does the American government's idea of a hypersecure state not make us any more free, there's vanishingly little evidence that it accomplishes its purpose of making us any more secure.

<comment><USER19> The lack of evidence isn't surprising given that they are a _spy agency_. They may not be protecting the US from terrorism, but there are major geopolitical adversaries at work who have no scruples about using cyberwarfare techniques. There is something akin to the Cold War in play, and the NSA is a significant part of the US's position in that war.

<comment><USER20> Sorry, 1% of America's GDP is too much to pay for a suit-and-tie version of Anonymous.

<comment><USER19> How do you know?

<comment><USER20> We could take a 9/11 in the shorts every year, for what we spend on the tiger- proof rocks sold by the Intelligence Community.

That sounds like a fair trade considering the cost in human lives... except that there's no evidence we're "trading" anything but our own treasure and freedom.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Could it instead be ASIC technology on a massive scale? This might help break some of the hashing through very specialized chips.

<comment><USER21> According to [https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/09/the_doghouse_...](https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2009/09/the_doghouse_cr.html) if you built a chip that could could test a password with a single increment of a counter, and that chip was the most efficient chip theoretically possible, and you built a dyson sphere to capture all the sun's energy to run the chip, it would still take 32 years to crack a 192-bit symmetric crypto password.

ASICs may well be involved, but they'd need math advances or implementation bugs rather than just brute force.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Somewhat misleading title. No answers, just more questions on the topic.

<comment><USER23> Well, that's important to keep in mind:

There are no answers and there will never be, b/c:

We can never trust/accept any statements from any government, except for admissions of guilt.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> There's at least two other significant possibilities:

1) There's an attack against RSA which doesn't involve factorization

2) There's an attack against AES / Serpent / Twofish

I'd say the second is considerably more likely, firstly because the one NSA quote we have on it is "cryptanalyze, or break, unfathomably complex encryption systems" \- which sounds much more like a new attack like differential cryptanalysis which provides a general purpose attack against complex symmetric crypto ("unfathomly complex" sounds much more like AES than RSA).

In addition we have numerous quotes in recent days about how GCHQ is working on breaking the encryption on the Miranda hard-drive; which we now know to be a truecrypt drive.

<comment><USER8> On point 2, NSA still allows the use of AES-256 to protect top secret data: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSA_Suite_B_Cryptography](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSA_Suite_B_Cryptography)

<comment><USER25> Why is everyone assuming the NSA has to be using their own standards, behind close doors?

<comment><USER7> They don't. They use Suite A, which is an eclectic mix of proprietary algorithms. Firefly/Enhanced Firefly for key exchange (PKI), Joeski (allegedly a pair of algorithms for encrypting and decrypting other ciphers or firmware with the interesting property that encryption algorithm cannot be deduced from the decryption algorithm and vice versa), and a bunch of others. They have different algorithms depending on the specific information channel. Permanent data storage uses one (or perhaps a few), communications traffic uses others, and communications are further split depending on channel bandwidth and presumably long-term classification needs of the data.

They have to recommend Suite B to the government and military in cases where NSA validated hardware can't be used. Examples would be military communications with allies, garden variety agencies that can't afford or can't be trusted with Suite A modules.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> As a rule of thumb, I don't take any article that refers to Snowden's leaks as "revelations" seriously. The only new information Snowden revealed is that their programs are called PRISM, upstream and xKeyscore; and if a journalist learned the details behind those programs from Snowden -- when they've been going on for at least a decade -- they clearly don't know much about the subject.

<comment><USER27> What a ridiculous rule of thumb: Snowden got a lot of closely held information in front of the general public. If that doesn't count as a revelation, your standards are too high.

<comment><USER26> No, he really didn't. We knew that the USA intercepted any Internet traffic they could get their hands on, and we knew that big data companies were in bed with the NSA. If the talking point is that Snowden got these facts on mainstream news, that isn't a revelation, that's marketing. "Relevation" implies the idea didn't exist beforehand.

<comment><USER27> So a revelation isn't the revealing of a secret to people who don't know the secret?

(or to put it another way: revealing a secret to a population where the vast majority do not know it)

Snowden revealed the scale of the operation too, and the depth of the rabbit hole.

<comment><USER26> Not if that information is already publicly and easily accessible to that group. If I was to post a link to an existing but obscure Wikipedia article on Hacker News, it would be as much of a "revelation" as Snowden's "revelations."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> What worries me is that the breakthrough might just be a re-interpretation of the law.

</comment><comment><USER28> In view of this "breakthrough" leak, I am now supposing that Edward Snowden is a willing participant in psy-ops.

"An all knowing deity is a cheap cop."

</comment><comment><USER29> "algorithsm"

</comment><comment><USER30> p=np yo

<comment><USER31> Integer factorization is currently not known to be NP complete, and is expected to not be so. Therefore, even such a breakthrough as posited in the article would have no immediate bearing on the question of P vs NP.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integer_factorization#Difficult...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integer_factorization#Difficulty_and_complexity)

<comment><USER3> Other way round, multiplication is in P, so integer factorization is in NP. And a breakthrough in P?=NP could have implications for factorization.

<comment><USER31> > so integer factorization is in NP

I never said it wasn't.

> And a breakthrough in P?=NP could have implications for factorization.

Indeed, but what's implied in the article is that they might have made a breakthrough in factorization specifically, not in fundamental CS theory at large.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


How To Choose A Logo Designer - <AUTHOR> http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/11/09/how-to-choose-a-logo-designer/

<comment><USER2> Fight the urge to go with one of those logo factories that churns out dozens of rehashed logos. It's a waste of money.</comment>


Silicon Valley: The rise of the adolescent CEOs - <AUTHOR> http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/21/us-venture-young-idUSTRE81K06P20120221

<comment><USER2> Fake ID's were everywhere when I was in school. However, I never bothered acquiring one as I was a little older than my peers and just didn't get carded at most bars around Vanderbilt in Nashville. For those of you that haven't been in undergrad in the last five years, according to an undergrad I just talked to, good fake id's cost anywhere from $125-150 apiece and if you are lucky, a little more for a pair (backup).

That being said, it was kinda shocking to see the first paragraph mention that Josh Buckley has fake ids enroute from China. Having a fake id, especially having one confiscated seemed to be some sort of badge of honor to some people I knew in undergrad. I didn't get it. I would hear both friends and random people around campus hold a conversation that went as follows:

A: Where were you last night? I thought you were going to meet us at bar XYZ?

B: I was there but I had my id taken away and the bouncer wouldn't sell it back to me for $50 like they usually do.

A: Oh bummer, I hate it when they do that, you actually had a good id.

B: ya, I know, now I will have to go buy another, but I am going to go to the same guy because it was so good. What state should I be from this time?

A: blah blah blah

I guess the ultimate badge of honor is being stupid enough to discuss illegal forms of identification that are in the mail to you. Josh, good luck with your business, but you sir were wearing your idiot hat when you took this interview.

<comment><USER3> I don't think it is such a bad thing to brag about, unless you mean that he might get into trouble with customs.

He is a CEO of a company and is building it (in part) with other peoples money. He shouldn't have to put up with stupid rules that are meant to fence in kids.

<comment><USER4> "I don't think it is such a bad thing to brag about"

Except for the fact that it is completely, 100% illegal. A guy at my sister's college went to federal prison for creating fake id's. Also, a friend of mine got caught with a fake by police, she got off with community service and no marks on the record, but only because of a very expensive lawyer paid for by her parents.

<comment><USER3> Certainly. But at the same time men like him cannot be bound by rules designed to constrain normal teenagers -- for the simple reason that they are not normal teenagers.

<comment><USER4> I agree that the laws may not be fair, especially regarding drinking age.

Regardless, A CEO should not openly admit to illegal activity to a journalist (or anybody really). That seems very unwise and immature.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I do think it odd that the legal drinking age is well past the age of majority. I think it would do much to smooth out this sort of odd situation if we dropped it to 18, like most of the rest of the world.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_age>

I also think it odd that we don't seem to have an option for emancipation based on financial independence (which some countries do). If you're 16 and running a company, you really ought to be able to sign your own contracts.

<comment><USER6> It used to be 18:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Minimum_Drinking_Age_A...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Minimum_Drinking_Age_Act)

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> While it's inspirational to hear of people succeeding despite their relative youth and/or inexperience, I'm a little concerned that it's becoming a perverse point of pride.

I've seen multiple startups pitch to VCs and emphasise the fact that they skipped college. Is that such a good thing?

<comment><USER8> It's not a good thing. We're reluctant to fund people who haven't done enough of college to know what they'd be missing if they skipped it.

<comment><USER9> I've always viewed you/YC as a bit disingenuous in the way you evangelize startups over college.

Even though I've read many of your essays and hangout on HN quite often, that was my overwhelming impression. I'm very glad to find out I've been wrong this whole time and that this is in fact your stance - much respect FWIW.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is troublesome for me because I'm around that age and obviously not an entrepreneur or CEO, but rather committed to focusing and deepening my software development skills when I enter the job market in the coming year.

I'm really not sure how much I can learn from people who are the same age or just barely older than me, given that I've been coding since I was 13 and focused exclusively on it, while they may have started coding later and transitioned to splitting their focus between coding and the other aspects of starting a company sooner. I'd much rather work for (and learn from) someone who has been in the software industry for a long time, but wonder if that preference will keep me out of the youngest and most exciting companies.

</comment><comment><USER11> It does come to something when, as a 28 year old who has yet to form their first startup, I feel old and behind the times. I'm not sure how healthy this perception is, but I suppose it at least motivates me.

<comment><USER8> It's not a problem. I was 30 when we started Viaweb.

Empirically the worst danger of being older may be that it's harder to recruit your friends as cofounders.

<comment><USER12> You were the creator of viaweb? What was it like working at yahoo instead of running your own company. Did you retire early(?) or your job is flexible enough that you're still working? I haven't finished your book yet, only half way through, great discussion on the culture though.

<comment><USER13> You're probably getting downvoted because all the answers you seek are readily available.

<http://paulgraham.com/articles.html>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I totally related with this article. I started my company when I was 18 in Australia and now, at 20, I've come to silicon valley and I can't even legally go to a bar for a drink. I once got halfway to a super-relevant networking event full of potential customers, only to find out that it was in a bar and I was too young to legally get in. And I sympathize with the lack-of-car issue - thank goodness my co-founders are both in their mid thirties so they can rent a car. Otherwise I'd be pretty stuck for transport around here.

</comment><comment><USER15> This just in: some people have family money (or connections, which is the same thing). This is newsworthy, how?</comment>


What Andrew Chen and A16Z get wrong about Uber and marketplaces - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@davecraige/what-andressen-horowitz-gets-wrong-about-marketplaces-ce130cbb7537 <comment><AUTHOR> Thanks for giving this a read. I appreciate it.</comment>


An Interactive Guide to Human Networks - <AUTHOR> http://ncase.me/crowds/ <comment><AUTHOR> This has been posted in the past but might not have been seen by many.</comment>


How is it possible for Apple to patent Natural Language based filtering? - <AUTHOR> http://www.google.com/patents?hl=en&lr=&vid=USPATAPP12286691&id=UU3OAAAAEBAJ&oi=fnd&dq=Natural+language+based+filtering&printsec=abstract#v=onepage&q&f=false

<comment><USER2> This is a patent application NOT a granted patent, and I haven't yet found any reason why it would ever be granted a patent.</comment>


Climbing with Atomic Clocks (2006) - <AUTHOR> http://www.leapsecond.com/pages/atomic-tom/

<comment><USER2> There are now chip-scale atomic clocks: [http://www.microsemi.com/products/timing-synchronization- sys...](http://www.microsemi.com/products/timing-synchronization- systems/embedded-timing-solutions/components/sa-45s-chip-scale-atomic-clock)

You probably can't afford them to do a science experiment with your kids. Hopefully they'll start putting them in everything so hobbyists can pull them out of eBay finds, like they currently do with time references from cellular base stations.

<comment><USER3> Yep, and they're making their way into wrist and pocket watches too.

[http://www.hoptroff.com/collections/atomic- timepieces](http://www.hoptroff.com/collections/atomic-timepieces)

[https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/846511652/the-worlds- fi...](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/846511652/the-worlds-first-true- atomic-wristwatch-the-cesium)</comment></comment>


LED Strips as 7 Segment Display - <AUTHOR> http://rubyist.github.io/blog/2014/01/20/led-strips-as-7-segment-display/

<comment><USER2> Try [http://rubyist.github.io/](http://rubyist.github.io/) to read this post</comment>


Qantas hopes its ultra-long-haul flights will go the distance - <AUTHOR> https://www.ft.com/content/cd83ad98-ebcd-11e9-a240-3b065ef5fc55 <comment><USER2> What's the point of linking things behind a hard paywall?</comment>


Last words of flight crew during airline crashes - <AUTHOR> http://planecrashinfo.com/lastwords.htm

<comment><USER2> That's the saddest thing I've read in a while: a depressing combination of the mundane, touching and tragic. It's like Hemingway's 6 word story, there's so much drama packed into some of those phrases.

I wonder why many of the quotes have expletives masked as #, but then there's this one stuck in there: "That's all guys! Fuck!"</comment>


Despite promises, cell carriers are still selling your real-time location data - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2019/01/09/us-cell-carriers-still-selling-your-location-data/ <comment><USER2> This is blogspam that adds nothing new to Vice's original journalism: [https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave- a-b...](https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/nepxbz/i-gave-a-bounty- hunter-300-dollars-located-phone-microbilt-zumigo-tmobile)

HN discussion here (still on the front page as of my reply): [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18857220](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18857220)

It's frustrating that TechCrunch seems to get a pass on their worthless blogspam when other blogspam posts are removed.

<comment><USER3> You could email the mods at the footer Contact link and ask them to change the link and explain why. They might say yes!

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> FWIW this post is a summary of an investigation posted and discussed yesterday: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18857220](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18857220)

(The TC summary is lengthy enough that it's not necessarily blogspam)

</comment><comment><USER5> This stuff makes me so mad. It's to the point I don't want to carry a phone anymore. Why is it that people aren't allowed to record my conversations but they can record my real time location?

It's a problem at every level of the stack. I have a phone device that I have very little control over (thanks Apple and Google!) that talks to service providers who know who I am. Those service providers are shady and sell my real time location and I have literally no choices for a cell provider who doesn't do this. Then there is obviously a huge market for buying this collected data.

Where in the stack do we fix this? Do we need a data custody law first so I can track who the problem players are? Do we need devices that we have some control over so we can manage when they beacon out? Can we simply say that we (US citizens) have some right to privacy over our electronic data?

Seriously, these practices are abhorrent.

<comment><USER6> I've been really getting into growth and marketing lately as I want my ideas to take off. If I'm building a new company I want to be able to get users quickly.

This stuff is REALLY screwing us over.

Users are insanely skeptical now. This data is insanely valuable for growth but if the industry creates an entire generation of people who REFUSE to be monitored we're going to be in a horrible situation.

If someone is legitimately just interested in the cities you're visiting I don't think this is much of a problem.

For example, say their product is only available in San Francisco. It doesn't make sense to try to recruit users in New York.

This makes it much easier so get initial users as you can just buy ads for users in San Francisco, potentially saving a massive amount of money on your ad campaign.

With Polar ([https://getpolarized.io/](https://getpolarized.io/)) I need to have analytics about what users do in the editor. What they click on, etc.

Polar is a research tool for reading and annotating PDFs and caching web content for later reading.

I get regular complains from users to disable all analytics.

I might ship it as an advanced feature for users to opt-out but I don't have any nefarious use case here. My only goal is ti figure out if you're using feature X or not.

<comment><USER7> I think there's a distinction to be made with respect to "needing" a user's data in order to be able to provide service at all (for example, a user's age as you cannot permit them to use your application if they're under 13) vs. user data that makes it _easier_ to provide the service, or in your example, advertise your service, to users. If your users are telling you they don't want to give you that data perhaps you should consider listening to them.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> When I was in the wireless industry, we did many shady things and had all the lawyers and lobbyists to back us up. We could change any laws that got in our way. My employer was never remotely interested in ethical issues. They were only interested in paying subscribers. I could go on all day with examples if HN were interested.

As a funny side note, we would joke that our best customers were drug dealers. They always paid on time and always in cash. They could not afford to miss any calls.

<comment><USER9> Why does our society tolerate so much evil?

Most days I learn something new about how people somewhere are being evil.

<comment><USER10> Doing the right thing takes work, effort, time, and money.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> If Apple really wanted to put its cash to use, it could build its own cellular network. Privacy focused, no surprise fees, integrated billing for desktop/laptop/iOS/watch devices.

There's enough bad will against the existing ISPs/mobile carriers that Apple could swoop in and gain a lot of market share very quickly. And customers could save money by combining their home internet with their mobile plans. The future is a singular wireless data subscription without any routers or modems.

<comment><USER12> Really love this idea. $237BB in their piggy bank according to their most recent 10K. Since the era of carrier subsidies is more or less over in North America, this might accelerate their transition into services company in a major way.

<comment><USER11> A buildout of a nationwide cellular network is almost tailor-made for the amount of cash they have in the bank, and almost the entirety of their would- be competition is universally hated. Seems like a no-brainer to me, and unlike other things they could spend their money on, a cellular network could always be sold off if needed. Not true for investment in A.I./self-driving cars/marketing/failed products/etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I thought carriers required user consent to get the E911 location data? It does have some legitimate uses. This location data is used by financial companies and one of the reasons you don't need to do travel notices at some of the major banks. They'll actually ping the E911 location when they see a credit card auth in new geographic location. Check your TOS at your bank, there's probably something buried in it about consenting to pulling mobile phone location to prevent fraud.

<comment><USER14> That's not a legitimate use. 911 is for emergencies. Emergency, security, terrorism are always the excuse used to strip us of our rights and our privacy.

<comment><USER13> E911 is the data set. It's just the triangulation data from the cell towers. There's also GPS data which is more accurate but the carrier doesn't get that data but apps can get it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> This is why "promises" and "industry self regulation" are meaningless. People need government to protect them from companies' greed, which here means: regulatory agencies with teeth.

"Self regulation" only works when there is a monetary incentive for companies to keep their word, for example in ecological agriculture.

As for mitigation, does anyone know if MVNO users are also subjected to their data being sold?

<comment><USER16> Are today's government officials more starstruck with or paid off by big corporations than they were back in the Microsoft antitrust era? Big business gets away with so much bad behavior today but, in the US at least, it seems like years go by and nobody cares enough to pass regulation to preserve the basic right to privacy.

<comment><USER17> With notable exceptions, today's political campaigns are often financed by wealthy individuals and companies. The type of politicians which receive contributions are, unsurprisingly, the type whose views best align with those individuals and companies. This funding is instrumental in lifting many of these politicians into office. When a question of political control or regulation of companies arises, it is also unsurprising that these politicians often see things from a certain perspective.

<comment><USER18> Corporations aren't allowed to "finance" "political campaigns." When OpenSecrets says stuff like "Google" contributed $X million to Democrats, it's lying. What really happens is Google _employees_ contributed that money.

<comment><USER17> While on paper there is are still limits on direct contributions to campaign organizations, the Citizen's United decision (combined with SpeechNOW vs. FEC) enables companies to instead donate to SuperPACs which are in theory independently controlled. I personally believe the distinction is for all intents and purposes meaningless. Doubly so when considering how little enforcement of the separation has actually been pursued.

So, yes, I do believe companies finance political campaigns. Whether the money flows through campaign organizations is not an important distinction to me.

<comment><USER18> It's not a matter of what you "believe." In election law, the "campaign" is a specific thing and financing it is something with specific meaning. Having an independent entity run ads because it happens to support that candidate is not "financing the campaign."

Leaving that aside, SuperPACs account for just 15% of election spending in 2016. It's inaccurate to even suggest that corporate money and money from wealthy donors is the dominant factor in campaigns.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> m-p-3 The frustrating part is that you cannot protect yourself from that outside of turning your cellphone off or putting it in airplane mode.

<comment><USER19> Airplane mode does not disable GPS.

It could be queuing positional and temporal data, and awaiting a connection to later send.

<comment><USER20> That isn't how this data is obtained though. It's all known on the carrier side. It does not rely on your phone submitting it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> It's pointless to think the industry will regulate itself, they can't help it. If there's a shred of profit to be made in anything give it time and it will be done as long as it's not illegal and often even if it is.

</comment><comment><USER22> > ...given that two-thirds of the U.S. population aren't going to switch to a > carrier that doesn't sell your location data.

To be fair, what are our options, exactly? If we want anything near acceptable coverage and price, that is.

<comment><USER23> >To be fair, what are our options, exactly?

This is key. This is how citizens will lose their expectation to privacy. I fear that in the near future there will be no 'safe' option and you will be forced to forfeit your privacy rights to participate in the digital world.

<comment><USER22> Mobile will become as essential as internet in general has become to participate in larger society.

I see it starting at the bottom. Tired of being tracked and trapped inside class barriers, the homeless and destitute will be the first to adopt extreme privacy-oriented protocols such as regularly cycling burner phones, using mobile VPNs, stripped-out GPS modules, and anonymous software such as Signal but which don't rely on phone numbers as identifiers. The poor will stop using phone numbers altogether. Perhaps charity services will exist which help aid this transition.

It will also start from the top, as we already see high-level CEOs using encrypted messaging and privacy-oriented protocols. They will see the obvious need for such services.

The overwhelming majority, the middle class, will be the last to adopt such practices and take back control of their privacy.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Of course they are. They have to show growth quarter after quarter. Until investors stop punishing companies for not increasing growth every quarter, this will continue. Everything is money driven. There's no thought to the consumer any more. There doesn't have to be as there isn't any accountability to the consumer; they have nowhere else to go.

</comment><comment><USER25> Are there any known ways to obfuscate cell location data? There are sim addons that can change IMSI to circumvent carrier lock[0], would IMSI obfuscation be a viable option to defend against cell tracking? [0] [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbo_SIM](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turbo_SIM)

<comment><USER26> The carrier needs to know which cell you're talking to do route calls to your phone, and after that it's just a matter of triangulation to narrow it down. But even without triangulation the company knows what neighborhood you're in, by design.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> .

</comment><comment><USER28> US needs (something like) GDPR. 2% to 4% of revenue is a good starting point for a penalty. In the absence of a penalty why would anyone running a Telco company not take the extra cash from selling data.</comment>


How to Fly - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/guides/travel/how-to-fly <comment><USER2> Original title is "How to Have a Good Flight".

How to Fly is another thing:

[http://www.extremelysmart.com/humor/howtofly.php](http://www.extremelysmart.com/humor/howtofly.php)</comment>


Ask HN: Is it practical to be a programmer who cannot read/write English? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> Yes. There are hundreds of thousand of developers across China, India, Russia, etc who don't know any English. They make some amazing software.</comment>


The Woman Who Is Preserving the Smell of History - <AUTHOR> http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/meet-the-woman-who-is-preserving-the-smell-of-history <comment><USER2> I'm afraid this is slightly off-topic: does anyone know what Atlas Obscura has been doing differently for the past few months? They've been around since 2009, and were a pretty quiet corner of the internet, but a few months ago they underwent some sort of redesign (logo changed, at least) and now I see their links everywhere (HN, reddit, facebook, reposted on twitter/tumblr.) I'm all in favor of it, as I love the site, but I'm curious if anyone has noticed the same trend and could shed some light on how these things happen.</comment>


Direct to Brain Video Brings Virtual Reality to Life - tefo-mohapi http://www.iafrikan.com/2017/02/12/direct-to-brain-video-brings-virtual-reality-to-life-2/ <comment><AUTHOR> Direkt to brain, eh?</comment>


Ask HN: A computer for children? - <AUTHOR>

I'm the proud parent of two children whom I'd like to introduce to computing at a young age.
The thing is I don't want them to be passive media consumers; they've had next to zero screen time so far (eldest is three, youngest has just turned one) and I'd like to keep it that way w.r.t. entertainment media (i.e. not the awful "four year old parked infront of YouTube for an entire day" model).
So I'd like to build them a rig that encourages experimentation and deep learning, and which can be extended later to include interesting projects like robotics.  Ideally something close to a modern version of my own childhood experience, which was a microcomputer ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstrad_CPC#CPC464 ) that when powered on quickly dropped into a (BASIC) REPL that gave instant feedback.
I was thinking of building a setup with the following:
- A decent mechanical keyboard.  I currently use a Unicomp with an integrated trackball, and my three year old already enjoys 'typing' on that, and it's handily indestructible.  http://www.pckeyboard.com/page/UKBD/UB404LA
- A Raspberry Pi 2.  I've used an original Raspberry Pi for a few projects now (most recently controlling a DSLR for time-lapse photography) and I love the thing.  It's close to the old micros in spirit: plug in, power on, and it's running. http://www.raspberrypi.org/raspberry-pi-2-on-sale/
- An LCD monitor.  I was thinking a matte-finish 24" or larger, high-res with HDMI.  Nothing out of the ordinary there.
The real question surrounds software.  After attending RubyConf and seeing a Sonic Pi ( http://sonic-pi.net/ ) demo I'm definitely keen on that, but otherwise I'd really appreciate some guidance.  What software would people recommend to get children interested in computing, and also impart good skills?
Back in the olden days I'd have gone straight to LOGO and a turtle robot. <comment><USER2> You can get Kano. Or just their OS and docs (it runs on RPi, should run on RPi2)

As for other "kids" friendly environments, you have \+ the MIT Scratch/ Blockly drag-and-drop visual coding environment (Kano has blockly and they build the interface with the RPi Minecraft (cf [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTjN_1GFsfk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTjN_1GFsfk) ))

\+ Python / Ruby / JS "for kids" books; HumbleBundle is currently having a book bundle that include a few "Programming Language" for kids book [https://www.humblebundle.com/books](https://www.humblebundle.com/books) ; you will find online a few other books (e.g. [https://inventwithpython.com/](https://inventwithpython.com/) [http://ruby4kids.com/ruby4kids](http://ruby4kids.com/ruby4kids) ) based on doing games)

\+ you can have the Sugar image (what's the OLPC is running) setup to run , [http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Welcome_to_the_Sugar_Labs_wiki](http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Welcome_to_the_Sugar_Labs_wiki) . It has a lot of nice apps, and it includes a nice Logo inspired Turtle environment (TurtleArt / TurtleBlocks)

If you decide to go into hardware as a way to get your kids started, then look at Arduino also (e.g. [http://sylviashow.com/episodes/s1/e3/full/arduino](http://sylviashow.com/episodes/s1/e3/full/arduino) ), or a simple robot controlled by your RPi.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'm working on a project which you might find of use in a little while: [http://codemancergame.com/](http://codemancergame.com/)

</comment><comment><USER4> I used an older netbook with a wireless mouse. Super cheap, portable, and not powerful enough to be too big of distraction. Benefit of being "kid sized" and very sturdy. Mostly used it for old Sierra games and such.

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Sometimes I wonder if finding an old Apple system with a turtle robot and a copy of LOGO might not be the best approach...

<comment><USER5> The classic systems were worlds ahead of most modern ones in one very important respect: documentation.

The Tandy/Radio Shack books for the Color Computer series (and it's astoundingly good LOGO implementation) were amazingly clear and concisely written with lots of examples, and because in those days even a disk drive wasn't a guarantee, all the examples were written to be hand-typed and experimented with.

There were even books in those days that aimed to teach kids machine language! [1]

That said, I think Djikstra and Felleisen may be slightly right about the long-term usefulness of old-fashioned BASIC and LOGO for learning, but there are a few books in modern languages that come close.

Hello World![2] was explicitly written to hearken back to those old manuals, by a father aiming to teach his 12-yo son programming with Python.

Land of Lisp[3] and Realm of Racket[4] also call to mind those old books as well, though they're targeting a bit older audience and have their quirks (LoL is a bit in-love with huge nested trees and a-lists in the examples, and Realm of Racket tends to gloss over a lot of the examples and expects you to just read the sample code rather than walking you through the process completely).

The Little Schemer[5] is also a fantastic little book that takes on the form almost of a set of brain-teasers, and teaches recursive thinking entirely by example and in methodical detail. The later chapters can be a bit stumpy, but if you go through the book step by step in regular sessions it builds on itself pretty well.

All of these are aiming at around the 12+ age range though, I don't think there's much out there anymore for anything younger.

[1] [http://boingboing.net/2013/05/16/1983s-wonderful- introducti....](http://boingboing.net/2013/05/16/1983s-wonderful- introducti.html)

[2] [http://www.amazon.com/Hello-World-Computer-Programming- Begin...](http://www.amazon.com/Hello-World-Computer-Programming- Beginners/dp/1617290920/ref=dp_ob_title_bk)

[3] [http://www.amazon.com/Land-Lisp-Learn-Program- Game/dp/159327...](http://www.amazon.com/Land-Lisp-Learn-Program- Game/dp/1593272812/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1424104092&sr=1-1&keywords=land+of+lisp)

[4] [http://www.amazon.com/Realm-Racket-Learn-Program- Game/dp/159...](http://www.amazon.com/Realm-Racket-Learn-Program- Game/dp/1593274912/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1424104092&sr=1-4&keywords=land+of+lisp)

[5] [http://www.amazon.com/Little-Schemer-Daniel-P- Friedman/dp/02...](http://www.amazon.com/Little-Schemer-Daniel-P- Friedman/dp/0262560992/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1424104092&sr=1-2&keywords=land+of+lisp)</comment></comment>


YouTube seeks 'responsibility' - <AUTHOR> https://www.latimes.com/business/story/2019-12-27/susan-wojcicki-youtube-responsible <comment><USER2> Of much greater concern is that the vast majority of videos on the internet are on youtube.

It's a fantastic service, and I am awestruck by its potential, but letting one corporation that's only interested in its own profit control all this information is a mistake. Its curational snafus and conflicts of interest are just symptoms of this.

<comment><USER3> > Of much greater concern is that the vast majority of videos on the internet > are on youtube

Nope. Youtube host currently around 6B videos (adds around 1.2B a year). Facebook is currently around 3.5B, Instagram around the same, Twitter around 2.5B, Tiktok close to 1B etc. The general internet is around 26B videos and counting.

What makes Youtube important is the fact that most users think of it as a search engine. You can always find it on YouTube, while it's "impossible" to search for videos on Twitter or Facebook.

<comment><USER4> Facebook contains mostly copies of content hosted somewhere else.

Instagram / Tiktok content is pure garbage unless you're into the teen / faux- celebrity type videos.

Twitter has some interesting content but it's really hit or miss.

<comment><USER3> > Facebook contains mostly copies of content hosted somewhere else.

Not true. Youtube host around 3% of unique videos and everything else are copies, or from somewhere else or each other. Same applies to many platforms, but Tiktok and Instagram. Surprisingly, those are the two most innovative platforms when it comes to new content.

I'm not saying you have to like it, just that their content is unique.

42.98% of content on Twitter is reactionary (gifs/memes) and is under 5s. No other platform has these kind of number. For instance on Tiktok, only 0.59% is under 5s and 4.81% for Instagram.

<comment><USER5> Where are these stats coming from? I'm curious to find more.

<comment><USER3> Look what I do for living [0]. Long story short, we see data on ~100 platforms and all of their content.

[0] [https://pex.com/web-analytics.html](https://pex.com/web-analytics.html)

<comment><USER4> This isn't proof and looks more like an advertisement.

<comment><USER3> Not sure what kind of proof would you like. We built our whole company around this kind of data.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> It seemed apparent that the video host and the video recommendation/curation systems just need to be two entirely separate parts of the puzzle. The host can be transparent, allowing anything that isn't unlawful to be posted but with no way to discover new content without already learning about it from another source. (This should probably be decentralized, but IDK if the current efforts are good enough for video at YouTube scale)

Then, you can rely entirely on other social media outlets or a indexing service (that can preferably index video from multiple services, like TiVo used to do and Apple is trying to do right now. Or how torrent trackers work.) to give you access to it. If you think this video curation system isn't to your standards, you could just change to another one or build one yourself.

<comment><USER7> The conflict is that curation / recommendation is profitable because it "closes the loop" on the skinner box, you can push towards content that will keep people watching or that makes more money.

But Google don't want to be responsible for "recommendations" their own algorithms generate.

So they need to figure out a way to make responsibility for the actual content somebody else's problem while still being able to "optimise for engagement" a.k.a direct the click stream.

<comment><USER8> tldr; google wants to reap the rewards, but externalize the costs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I think Silicon Valley - or the internet-using part of society at large - urgently needs to discuss what "neutral platform" should mean in the first place.

While freedom of speech and freedom of enterprise are important, we expect there to be clear responsibilities and basic safety rules in any other part of society. Yet, the "neutral platform" concept seems a tool designed to do away with responsibility altogether:

E.g., in case of disturbing videos available to minors, YouTube is not responsible because they are a neutral platform, users are not responsible because they are minors and uploaders, while responsible in theory, can easily stay anonymous and unreachable for anyone. It seems pretty clear to me that a system like this is easy to exploit.

</comment><comment><USER10> Revoking section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA) seems like an incredibly blunt hammer to apply to a problem that I'm not convinced anyone fully understands yet. (Indeed the more cynical part of my brain believes legislators are seeking to punish YouTube/Google rather than identifying a harm and mitigating it.)

Surely there's a scale by which liability can be applied. Suppose this principle could be achieved: The more a company intervenes into a neutral platform, the more that intervention is subject to regulation or liability.

When applied to the YouTube situation, it could be that YouTube faces no responsibility in policing user uploads, but YouTube does face some responsibility in policing the output of the recommendation algorithm

</comment><comment><USER11> I love the coinciding timing of this submission with that other one: "YouTube's Rabbit Hole of Radicalization [pdf]" [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21902416](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21902416)

</comment><comment><USER12> Sounds almost as fun as "safety". The things these PR people come up with!

</comment><comment><USER13> [http://archive.md/vG6CL](http://archive.md/vG6CL)

</comment><comment><USER14> The article does its best to avoid the phrases "free speech" and "censorship". They get only a single, off-hand mention, as part of someone else's position.

<comment><USER15> Nobody has any free speech rights related to Google-hosted content. If Google pulled the plug on YouTube tomorrow and vended 0% of the videos it hosts, there'd be no recourse for content creators. Nothing about the US interpretation of free speech implies an obligation for YouTube to host any content or no content.

The only reason a question of "censorship" matters is because the safe harbor legal protections American content providers enjoy include a certain (poorly- defined) objectivity regarding their hosting decisions.

<comment><USER16> > Nobody has any free speech rights related to Google-hosted content. If > Google pulled the plug on YouTube tomorrow and vended 0% of the videos it > hosts, there'd be no recourse for content creators. Nothing about the US > interpretation of free speech implies an obligation for YouTube to host any > content or no content.

People always say this when this topic is brought up. But nobody is talking about the constitutional _right_ to free speech. We all understand that Google is _allowed_ to do whatever it wants on its own platforms.

Free speech, however, is not only a right. It is an ideal. It is something some people value independent of the constitution and law.

<comment><USER15> Free speech is valuable for its utility; it helps hold power accountable and can open up avenues for seeking truth of the world.

But it can also hinder those efforts, and speech in that direction is no ideal to be upheld.

<comment><USER16> So, you're for free speech as long as it's the kind of speech you like?

<comment><USER15> As long as it's the kind of speech that isn't harmful to people. Whether I like it is immaterial.

the right to free speech doesn't protect the right to yell fire in a crowded theater. Even the nations with the most liberal interpretations of the meaning of free speech have put constraints on it.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> YouTube would never have gotten where it is, if this newfound puritanical quest had bitten it before. And looking back at this moment in it's history, YouTube of the future will regret stymying what was a thriving platform, both economically and freedom of speech wise.

If Google wants to turn YouTube into a Hulu/Netflix competitor, it should concentrate on it's Google play video brand, and simply drive YouTube searches there for certain mainstream-studio content</comment>


Documentary about startups around SF (27min video) - <AUTHOR> http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2012/s3572792.htm

<comment><USER2> I caught the second half of this and enjoyed what I saw. Pretty interesting getting some insight into the setups and what is going on for us Aussies. Now to catch the first half.

<comment><AUTHOR> yeah it was a good show - they had the founder of 500 startups on there as well as Steven Levy from Wired.</comment></comment>


Sony's problem is memes, not security - <AUTHOR> http://www.leavesofcode.com/2011/06/sonys-problem-is-memes-not-security.html

<comment><USER2> To be specific, it is a meme now that Sony has bad security. Because of this, hackers are more willing to attempt hacks against Sony, because A. they feel greater confidence in their chances at success, and B. people spread stories that confirm preconceptions, so succeeding in a way that confirms the "Sony has bad security" preconception will increase their reach, and therefore their feeling of reward.

Take, in juxtaposition, OSX's security. It is a meme that OSX is more secure than Windows—even though the opposite is true, as each Defcon competition proves. However, because of the prevalence of the meme, few amateurs are willing to attempt to hack OSX; most virus, worm and exploit writers instead tend to get their start hacking Windows. Then, because people tend to fall into patterns of doing what has brought them success in the past, when these people become security professionals (whether white-hat or black-hat) they specialize themselves to the Windows malware/exploit ecosystem—and the meme perpetuates itself.

<comment><USER3> There are also quite a lot more Windows machines than OSX machines. Hacking Windows has a higher expected rate of return (whether it's information extraction, phishing, botnet creation, etc.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> _Fighting to keep their system closed, to keep users from something as innocuous as installing Linux on their hardware is not worth the trouble at this point. Learn when the winds have changes, and go with it._

Just to play Devil's advocate...

Perhaps Sony is taking the "maximize shareholder revenue" avenue. What is their financial loss for months of PSN downtime? A few people switch to xbox live? They have to provide a few free accounts?

For their other hacked services, they can simply shut them off as failed experiments, fire all the developers, and save even more money.

Because there is not some huge fine for leaking all the credit card information, this doesn't affect Sony at all, financially. But allowing people to run Linux means they may take a loss on a lot more devices (and if they don't take that loss, people will buy Wiis or Xboxes instead), and it makes piracy a lot easier. If piracy becomes too rampant, developers will stop targeting the Playstation, killing the entire line of business.

So while it makes them look dumb to keep getting hacked over and over again, maybe it isn't hurting them at all.

<comment><USER5> The problem is that now Sony's laughable security has become a meme that's growing in strength with every breach.

In the last week I've mentioned Sony's situation to a number of lay people who've never owned a Sony gaming machine but have all heard about these security issues and insist they'll never trust Sony with personal information ever again.

Every time a new headline is printed it strengthens this image.

<comment><USER4> _they'll never trust Sony with personal information ever again_

Fair enough, but Sony isn't in the "personal information" business. They can always create some new company to handle the PSN billing, which is the only personal information that matters to their bottom line.

<comment><USER6> Such divisions rarely will actually occur to someone considering whether to use a Sony product. More generally though, I question that most people are going to think about this too much before buying - they'll think more about the downtime.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Agreed, but their problems are memes AND security. They could have had the bastard image and still established a secure infrastructure (like, for example, the TSA).

<comment><AUTHOR> Certainly true that they should have better security, but at a point when so much stirred up, no amount of security will protect you from the havoc of thousands of determined hackers. Its better, at that point, to try to quell the storm than build stronger walls.

<comment><USER7> I agree that by acting smarter they could have limited their exposure, and by limiting their exposure, avoided being hacked so many times (i.e. <http://throwingfire.com/security-through-obscurity/>), but a company as large as Sony really should've gotten their security auditing act together a decade ago. All of the vulnerabilities that were exploited in the past few days were scriptkiddie-things -- SQL injections and archaic versions of Apache. I mean, come on.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Sony's problem is having people around who think storing passwords in the clear is OK.

<comment><USER9> You would be _very_ surprised at the number of people in management positions at any size company that think this is OK.

At the jobs (consulting and otherwise) I've held in the last few years 75% of the companies stored passwords in plaintext. I'm _not_ justifying it in any way shape or form, but Sony shouldn't be singled out. Until there is an immediate and clear financial incentive to use proper security companies are going to continue to ignore it.

<comment><USER6> I'd say that's neither surprising nor something to be annoyed about. It's the developers who should know better, and their responsibility alone to inform management about why.

<comment><USER8> Worker: Boss, this is bad, we shouldn't do this.

Boss: If we don't save passwords, how can we email passwords back when they forget them?

Worker: . . .

Boss: Don't change anything.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> That opening paragraph is the most beautiful writing about memes that I have ever read. Absolutely lucid.

<comment><USER11> Hmmm, I would say that honor should go to Richard Dawkins who coined the term itself 35 years ago: <http://www.rubinghscience.org/memetics/dawkinsmemes.html></comment></comment>


MongoDB 3.6 RC release notes - <AUTHOR> https://docs.mongodb.com/master/release-notes/3.6/ <comment><AUTHOR> A lot of great new features with this update.

 _Highlights_ Passes Jepsen, The Industry's Toughest Database Test - [https://www.mongodb.com/mongodb-3.4-passes-jepsen- test](https://www.mongodb.com/mongodb-3.4-passes-jepsen-test)

 _Tunable Consistency_ \- [https://docs.mongodb.com/master/reference/method/Mongo.setCa...](https://docs.mongodb.com/master/reference/method/Mongo.setCausalConsistency/)

 _Retryable Writes_ \- moves the complexity of handling temporary system failures from the application to the database.

 _Change Streams_ \- The application can register for notifications whenever a document or collection is modified, enabling downstream applications and consumers to act on new data in real time, without constantly querying the entire collection to identify changes

 _Fully Expressive Array Updates_ \- can now perform complex array manipulations against matching elements of an array – including elements embedded in nested arrays – all in a single atomic update operation [https://docs.mongodb.com/master/release-notes/3.6/#array- upd...](https://docs.mongodb.com/master/release-notes/3.6/#array-update- operator-enhancements)

 _Schema Validation_ \- DevOps and DBA teams can now define a prescribed document structure for each collection, which can reject any documents that do not conform to it. [https://docs.mongodb.com/master/reference/operator/query/jso...](https://docs.mongodb.com/master/reference/operator/query/jsonSchema/)

 _Security Controls_ \- IP whitelisting, all networked connections to the database will be denied unless explicitly configured by an administrator

 _End-to-End Compression_ \- wire protocol compression to network traffic between the client and the database. 80% savings in network bandwidth.

 _Sessions_ \- [https://docs.mongodb.com/master/release- notes/3.6/#sessions](https://docs.mongodb.com/master/release- notes/3.6/#sessions)

 _Improved scalability with the WiredTiger storage engine_ \- a single MongoDB instance running with the WiredTiger storage engine can support over 1 million collections.

 _Subqueries_ \- A more powerful $lookup operator [https://docs.mongodb.com/master/reference/operator/aggregati...](https://docs.mongodb.com/master/reference/operator/aggregation/lookup/#lookup- syntax-let-pipeline)

 _R Driver_ \- [https://jeroen.github.io/mongolite/](https://jeroen.github.io/mongolite/)</comment>


Acting Chief of I.R.S. Forced Out Over Tea Party Targeting - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/16/us/irs-says-counsel-didnt-tell-treasury-of-tea-party-scrutiny.html

<comment><USER2> Word is he is resigning in early June one day before his scheduled retirement.</comment>


Ask HN: Opinions about LiteSpeed Web Server - <AUTHOR>

Just noticed that wordpress.org says it's "Powered By LiteSpeed Web Server". I had never heard of that web server before. I checked the company page and it's advertised as especially fit for Rails and PHP deployment. Has anybody used it in deployment? How does it compare to Ngix/Lighttpd/Apache/etc? <comment><USER2> Trying 188.8.131.52... Connected to wordpress.com. Escape character is '^]'. GET / HTTP/1.1 Host: wordpress.com

HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: _nginx_ Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2012 02:09:43 GMT Content- Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Connection: close Vary: Accept-Encoding Last-Modified: Sat, 21 Jan 2012 02:09:42 +0000 Cache- Control: max-age=299, must-revalidate Vary: Cookie X-hacker: If you're reading this, you should visit automattic.com/jobs and apply to join the fun, mention this header. X-Pingback: <http://wordpress.com/xmlrpc.php> Link: <[http://wp.me/1>](http://wp.me/1>); rel=shortlink X-nananana: Batcache

<comment><USER2> Why pay for a web server when you can use nginx for free?

Trying 188.8.131.52... Connected to wordpress.org. Escape character is '^]'. GET / HTTP/1.1 Host: wordpress.org

HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: nginx Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2012 02:10:41 GMT Content- Type: text/html; charset=utf-8 Transfer-Encoding: chunked Connection: close Vary: Accept-Encoding X-nc: HIT luv 139

<comment><USER3> Business-level support, like 24/7 phone service.</comment></comment></comment>


Does exercise slow the aging process? - <AUTHOR> http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/does-exercise-slow-the-aging-process/?_r=1 <comment><USER3> I don't know if it will actually slow down aging (which is a very wide concept). But I do have a 'proof of 1' that cycling a lot will wear out your knees and hips prematurely.

Bodies are like machines, if you use them a lot they will wear out because of over-use. If you use them very little they will atrophy.

The balance is probably somewhere in the middle, yes, exercise but don't overdo it.

<comment><USER4> _Bodies are like machines, if you use them a lot they will wear out because of over-use._

This is a poor analogy. Bodies can heal (i.e. regenerate tissue). Machines cannot. If this analogy was true, ultra-marathoners would be wearing out their joints rapidly. That's not what is being observed though.

What is true is that you can injure joints by increasing the workload too fast. Joints can strengthen and adapt to increased loads but it happens slowly. So don't go from running 5 miles per outing to running 10 miles. Limit yourself to a gradual increase.

[http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal....](http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0083867)

[http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1948208,0...](http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1948208,00.html)

<comment><USER5> There is no question that bodies _are_ in fact machines, there are parts that regenerate and parts that don't. Many extreme sport enthusiasts carry life- long consequences of parts they broke during their activities.

The issue here is more if the oxidative stress put on your components is offset or even completely overshadowed by the biochemical benefits of exercise, and there is indeed reason to believe that a moderate exercise regime - not unsurprisingly - may yield optimal results.

Exercise too little and your body's machinery will start to suffer from use- it-or-lose-it symptoms. Exercise too much and you will cause an inordinate amount of mechanical wear that cannot be regenerated, plus there may be some biochemical stresses as well.

I know "do it in moderation" makes for a shitty headline that interests nobody, but all things being equal that should probably be the take-away here. I agree with you about gradual increase being advisable, but perpetually aiming for your physical limits may not be the most appropriate course of action for individuals who are already fit.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> And to add to the confusion, you have another study considering the opposite conclusion. The study explored the effects of exercise increasing free radicals and advanced aging.

[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9177582](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9177582)

<comment><USER7> This study sort of makes an assumption that increased free radicals causes (at least in part) aging (free radical theory of aging). The relationship between radical oxygen species (free radicals) and aging is not at all clear to my understanding. (this paper is from 1997)

Moreover, it's possible that the tissues most susceptible to oxidative stress during exercise (i.e. muscle) are also most adapted to handle it. So overall, yes ROS increase but mostly just in muscle where it is well-adapted to handle it, and the benefits of exercise (lowering blood pressure, better circulation, etc) trump any detriments of increased ROS.

Edit: Found this review [ [http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23434764](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23434764) ] that considers evidence that ROS may actually be a part of a pro-survival signal cascade

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> My wife and I are reading this book called "Move Your DNA" (by Katy Bowman). She has an interesting thesis: modern exercise is "junk movement" (like "junk" food). The idea is that humans were meant to move more throughout the day, and that trying to cram all of our needed movement into a small 45-minute block is similar to how junk food crams tons of calories into a small bit of food.

We're not finished with it yet, but initially, I find it interesting.

<comment><USER9> Then you have studies showing High Intensity Training (HIT) where you only exercise three minutes per week is beneficial. But it may depend on your genes.

[http://www.bbc.com/news/health-17177251](http://www.bbc.com/news/health-17177251)

>The idea is that humans were meant to move more throughout the day

My parents are always on the go gardening, going to auctions, walking a bit, always doing something. Dad eats a lot but eats everything fish, shellfish, many kinds of meat, all kinds of vegetables he gets a huge variety of food.

I'm sitting watching my computer screen not moving, I eat a limited diet and I think I will be worse off than my parents. And I think Millennials will be even worse I've never seen so many fat people at such a young age, at least bottom out at mid 40s and not mid teens.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> This is an observational study and proves correlation, not causation. People whose bodies age slowly for whatever reason are more likely to be athletic, especially in the 40-65 age range they called out.

</comment><comment><USER11> > _this study is purely associational, so cannot show whether exercise > actually causes changes in telomere length, only that people who exercise > have longer telomeres._

> ...

> _So the message seems clear, he says. "Exercise is good" for your cells, and > "more exercise in greater variety" is likely to be even better._

Fascinating -- the first quoted sentence is logically equivalent to saying, "If you have short telomeres you're statistically unlikely to exercise much."

The conclusion that exercise leads to shorter telomeres is empowering and optimistic, so it's no surprised the American scientists and press ran with it. The conclusion that people who exercise regularly are genetically predisposed to it is _disempowering_ , though, and it wasn't mentioned at all. (It is consistent with jasode's sibling comment that exercise can speed up the ageing process, though.)

I'd also be interested in the inverse correlation -- are sedentary lifestyles associated with shorter telomeres? What proportion of people in the study actually did exercise, and what proportion had shorter telomeres? Essentially, "show me the numbers in all of the boxes and let me draw my own conclusions."

</comment><comment><USER12> Previous comments: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10468025](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10468025)

</comment><comment><USER13> Personally, I think the question of the effect exercise has on my lifespan is irrelevant.

A lot of people talk about exercise being valuable because it makes you healthy. I like all the wonderful benefits of being healthy and in good shape, yes, but I also genuinely like exercise. There is basically nothing as incredible as the right kind of physical exertion for me.

If exercise is a vice, who cares? It's worth it.

<comment><USER14> Right on. For me, exercise provides a very convenient way of challenging myself. The fact that I look fantastic and I'm very fit are really cool side effects.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> "Sitting is the new smoking"

<comment><USER16> very true.

<comment><USER17> Except that it isn't. It would take a lot of obviously sitting-related deaths for it to warrant comparison to smaking. Stress may be the new smoking, but sitting is definitely not.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> The most interesting result from recent research into exercise is this:

[http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=159410&Cult...](http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=159410&CultureCode=en)

[http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep18259](http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep18259)

An open access paper on exercise in identical and non-identical twin pairs was recently published, the data suggesting that long-term differences in physical activity between identical twins don't result in any significant difference in longevity, even though other differences in health outcomes are observed. We might draw parallels between this and similar results observed in a mouse study from a few years back, in which the exercising mice had better health but no increase in maximum life span. The researchers here theorize that the well-known epidemiological association between exercise and increased life expectancy is perhaps as much a matter of genetics as of choice.

For any observed statistical relationship in humans there are always questions of causation. This is especially true in the web of associations related to aging and mortality in population data, in which life expectancy, wealth, social status, intelligence, education, exercise, diet, and culture all have ties to one another. That we pay great attention to these relationships is a function of having no good way to treat aging, I've long thought: we care about trivial differences in life expectancy of a few years here and a few years there because this is all that is in our power to change right now, and that will continue until the development of rejuvenation therapies. Life expectancy and exercise are linked robustly in many data sets, and even more so now that accelerometers are so cheap and ubiquitous that even large studies can use them to obtain actual rather than self-reported data on physical activity. There are studies to demonstrate longer life expectancy in athletes, longer life expectancy in those who exercise modestly versus those who are sedentary, and so forth. What are these studies measuring, however? For example, what if people who are more robust and would live longer regardless of exercise tend to exercise more? Or perhaps exercise levels are a good proxy for lower levels of visceral fat tissue and consequent chronic inflammation - themselves linked to greater risk of age-related disease and mortality.

The results of this study definitely muddy the waters in the search for causation and mechanism in exercise and mortality reduction, providing evidence to support a state of considerable complexity in the relationship between exercise, genetics, and outcomes in health. Nothing in biology is ever as simple as we'd like it to be, so this should perhaps be expected. Regardless he data presented below should be added to the many past studies on exercise and mortality, and its weight balanced accordingly - never take any single set of data and interpretations as gospel in science. This doesn't change the consensus, which is that you should exercise, and that you are expected to obtain benefits by doing so. It does add subtlety to the picture, however.

</comment><comment><USER19> Circulation. The difference is like between a rainforest and semi-desert. Efficient regeneration of tissues.

Of course other factors matter. Air quality, variety of foods, water sources, sleep patterns, noise, stress, ecology in general.

There is nothing new about these notions - actively working peasants in unspoiled remote areas are champions of longevity.

</comment><comment><USER20> Whether that study is true or not 'do exercises' at least you can have a healthy and fit body in your available life span.

</comment><comment><USER21> I think the operative question is does it slow down aging at a rate faster than the time you spend exercising?

<comment><USER22> A precedent study showed that 1hr of sports increased your life by 8hrs. 1hr very intensive sports increases it by 16hrs, 1hr of walking increases it by 2-4hrs. The study concluded on the fact that it probably only works up to 7-10hrs per week, as that's the level which makes injury more probable. They say "probably" because injury doesn't shorten the lifespan, it only makes in uncomfortable. Which is probably what you want: Longest comfortable life, followed by rapid descent.

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> According to the law of headlines the answer is "no".

</comment><comment><USER24> Aerobic exercise actually speeds it up due to increased oxidation in the system, but, in general, any BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) increase also speeds up your demise, but this is in the ideal situation where we all die naturally, not from chronic disease, cancer, etc. Why? Because our cells can't divide indefinitely (Hayflick limit [0]). Any activity that increases growth factors also can speed up cancerous growth. So, don't run, don't exercise - just walk, do gardening work, and other normal human activities.

[0]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayflick_limit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayflick_limit)

<comment><USER24> All gym-goers and runners gang up and downvote me... but this won't change what I said. Read up, educate yourself, research other species, and you'll find the truth.

And let me be even more direct: you're endorphins junkies!

<comment><USER25> You're being downvoted because your reasoning is pure nonsense. Yes, cells can divide only a limited number of times. And then they die. But guess what: your body is capable of creating new cells. This is in fact what happens when you lift weights: new muscle tissue is generated.

<comment><USER26> > Yes, cells can divide only a limited number of times. And then they die. But > guess what: your body is capable of creating new cells.

If I read this correctly, you imply that "creating new cells" is somehow an alternative to cell division. This isn't true - cell division is in fact the only mechanism by which new cells normally(1) come to life.

Consequently if the GP was correct in general in saying that cells can divide only a limited number of times then yes, eventually the organism would lose the ability to regenerate and die. The reality is that not all cells have a limit on the number of divisions. Majority of differentiated cells do, but a few special types of cells have no such limit. These are called stem cells. Many tissues have stems cells on standby waiting for signals that trigger regeneration. Cancer cells often break out of the limit, too (2).

Telomeres provide a mechanism that limits the number of cell divisions - <USER2> get shortened on each division and once they become too short the cell loses the ability to divide further. Stems cells (and some cancer cells) express an enzyme called telomerase (3) that extends the telomeres to their original length after cell division.

(1) Reproductive cells (sperms and ovums) can also create a new cell by merging, but this isn't relevant for somatic cells.

(2) Cancer is a neat demonstration of the dangers that uncontrolled cell division poses for a complex organism and explains why most types of cells have their division machinery restricted or disabled.

(3) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomerase](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telomerase)

<comment><USER24> Boosting telomerase is a double-edged sword - it can make cancer bloom, too, and we all have some cancerous cells in us.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Hi,

I maintain the world's biggest spread sheet of life span experiments.

I believe slowing aging can increase life span.

It turns out that the effect of exercise on all-cause mortality is well studied.

My big spread sheet summarizes about 80 experiments.

They show that exercise usually lets us live longer.

A histogram of their results is at

        http://morse.kiwi.nz/kingsley/lib/exe/fetch.php?cache=&media=science:histogram_of_exercise_vs_all_cause_mortality.png

I think the trick is to not OVER train.

I'm told that over-training is worse than no training, and just working up a light sweat is good.

More findings from data mining my big spread sheet of life span experiments are at

        http://morse.kiwi.nz/kingsley/doku.php?id=science:kingsleys_big_spread_sheet_of_life_span_experiments

</comment><comment><USER27> Hi,

I maintain the world's biggest spread sheet of life span experiments.

I believe slowing aging can increase life span.

It turns out that the effect of exercise on all-cause mortality is well studied.

My big spread sheet summarizes about 80 exercise experiments.

They show that exercise usually lets us live longer.

A histogram of their results is at

        http://morse.kiwi.nz/kingsley/lib/exe/fetch.php?cache=&media=science:histogram_of_exercise_vs_all_cause_mortality.png

I think the trick is to not OVER train.

I'm told that over-training is worse than no training, and just working up a light sweat is good.

More findings from data mining my big spread sheet of life span experiments are at

        http://morse.kiwi.nz/kingsley/doku.php?id=science:kingsleys_big_spread_sheet_of_life_span_experiments

Thanks, Kingsley

</comment><comment><USER28> Perhaps cardio training. But bodybuilding will probably not slow down aging; I suppose it wears one down physically, and also imposes a huge load on the central nervous system. It would be nice to have a scientific study on this, to see to what extent this is true.</comment>


When does an Angel investor become a VC? - <AUTHOR>

At what point does an angel investor become more of a VC? when they're investing more than 1/2 a million? a million? or when they want more then their share of the company.
I've heard of "Angel Investors" giving 100K for 51 or 52 percent of a company... to me this is more of a VC move...
Any thoughts? <comment><USER2> the major difference between an angel and a VC is that the former normally invests his own funds. on the other hand, VCs manage a pool of money invested by others through a fund.

<comment><AUTHOR> That is a good point, but where do you draw the line between somone wanting to help you, and someone wanting to rape your business.

<comment><USER2> no one can draw a line like that. everyone wants to see their own investment reap profits.

secondly, VCs mandates are not to rape your business. their goal is to make money. whether they end up raping your business by trying to make money is another topic all together. that is why it is important to find the appropriate VC for your business. if you find the right one and play it right, you should not get 'raped'.</comment></comment></comment>


Elixir Releases and Phoenix and Gigalixir - <AUTHOR> https://blog.gigalixir.com/elixir-releases-on-gigalixir/ <comment><USER2> Would be great if Ecto migrations are included in the tutorials. From what I've seen, most Phoenix apps have some database shipping alongside.

<comment><AUTHOR> You're totally right, and most tutorials include ecto but for this post we wanted to focus on elixir releases since they are the _new_ thing :)</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Are Domain Specific Languages Still a Thing? - <AUTHOR> A long time ago, I remember DSLs were all the rage. The Future was a vision of custom languages designed around the business problems and embedded into apps. But today it doesn't feel like that's the case.<p>Besides specialised languages for UI, and logic. Does anyone build custom DSLs for each application or industry? <comment><USER2> The hype comes and goes, but they always have and always will be, in one form or another. But they don't always get called DSLs. Put the idea in your toolbox, and use where appropriate. Call it a DSL or something else based on what is currently cool.

Good programmers have long known that you should build your language up towards your application, and then write your language within that language. What tools are available to do that and where the line is drawn will vary. But you'll find customized languages buried in your database (SQL), configuration languages like [https://github.com/vstakhov/libucl](https://github.com/vstakhov/libucl), specialized build configuration languages like make or ant, regular expressions for text matching, and so on.

Some languages encourage building external languages that you then parse and act on. Others encourage customizing an existing language to your needs. (Our Glorious Leader published a book in the mid-90s on doing that with Lisp, see [http://www.paulgraham.com/onlisptext.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/onlisptext.html) for details.) There have even been languages which are designed to be easily implemented in other languages, with whatever customizations you want. For example I personally worked with code from the 1980s that implemented a Forth variant to write financial models in.

But the idea doesn't have to be literally a new language. Squint sideways at any API, object model, or library and you can see it as a language. Conceptually there is a close parallel between scripting web services, and writing a TCL script that uses prebuilt commands written in C. If you can see the parallels and see how principles from the one apply to the other, the odds are that you'll be doing both better. Whereas if you don't see it and reinvent the wheel from scratch, you're going to wind up learning lessons the hard way that were learned many, many years ago.

All that said, writing and maintaining a language is significantly harder than writing business code. Therefore you'll always see rather more people writing code in languages, than writing languages to make code easy to write.

<comment><USER3> Good, very concise

 _All that said, writing and maintaining a language is significantly harder than writing business code._

The same can be said for writing good APIs and libraries, isomorphic to your second point.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> People in the thread have been citing HTML and SQL as examples of DSLs. Those are examples of _universal_ languages but not of _domain-specific_ languages as envisaged by the proponents of DSLs.

The DSL "philosophy" as presented in for example The Pragmatic Programmer from 2000 was that every programmer should write his or her own domain language as the situation requires. That every project should come equipped with its own language, codifying that business problems business rules.

That philosophy, and the surrounding hype, has completely died down. Put simply, it wasn't a good idea. More languages makes it harder to communicate, not easier. Plus, writing a good DSL that someone other than the creator of said DSL can understand is tons of work. Instead, what one aims for is generality.

<comment><USER5> ggplot2 is a solid dsl example. Use it with margrittr.

I agree with this in the main unfortunately ... I was a proponent of DSLs and did my best to try make them whenever practical. The only pattern that's worked out for me is the builder pattern. This doesn't require much work, and you get something functional that works as you might expect that people appreciate.

Again ggplot, epic example. Other examples , Varnish, Dockerfile, Nginx, ufw, etc

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'd count the likes of AWK, shell scripting, PostScript, Perl, and even (depending on how you define "language") HTML as domain-specific languages, so they do seem to be a thing still.

Personally, I tend to use them quite a lot in my own projects. These aren't commercial (and often aren't released at all), so might not count. Still, it's very handy to be able to embed a DSL into a complex project to provide programmability, and most of the modern scripting languages tend to be too large and/or too slow for my purposes.

My DSL of choice for this tends to be TCL-based, as I can easily extend the language in task-specific ways and drop the parts of the language that aren't useful for the task at hand. This results in something capable, tiny and fast.

</comment><comment><USER7> Every complex program is a DSL interwoven with the programming language, so yes. Unfortunately most languages are terrible at separating the DSL from the main language like most lisps.

</comment><comment><USER8> DSLs are endemic in the ops stack. Think HCL for terraform or VCL for varnish.

<comment><USER9> nginx, cloudformation, and any other JSON-y extension out there

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> By "DSL", do you mean only a text file bundled with the application? I'd say the simple answer is that the median language got a lot more powerful. We write DSLs in code now, just like Lisp programmers have all along. We just don't tend to call them a "DSL" any more.

</comment><comment><USER11> Do code generators count, e.g. [https://chisel.eecs.berkeley.edu](https://chisel.eecs.berkeley.edu)

</comment><comment><USER12> What about something like Robot Framework? It is used as a test language and is in widespread use to test websites as well as embedded systems. The underlying language is Python, a scripting language which might also be a DSL under some definitions.

</comment><comment><USER13> I last developed a small DSL in 2016 at my last company that's still in production. I haven't seen another since!

<comment><USER14> "That's still in production" says nothing. Rarely is any code taken out of production once it's put there in my humble experience. Not to rain on you though: good work getting a dsl out there.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> JavaScript is universal domain which kind of shorted out the metaphor. CSS is web front end. R is big noodles. Perl is good for parsing HTML with regular expressions.</comment>