NSA can retain encrypted communications of Americans possibly indefinitely - <AUTHOR> http://www.pcworld.com/article/2042673/nsa-can-retain-encrypted-communications-of-americans-possibly-indefinitely.html

<comment><AUTHOR> I had the terrifying thought that this could apply to HTTPS or SSH sessions. That's alarmist, though, right?

<comment><USER2> I assume that this applies to HTTPS and SSH sessions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I wonder if they might try to claim that this applies to ROT26. It would not be much more of a stretch than their other interpretations of the law...

<comment><USER4> Good point. Where does one draw the line between encryption,encoding and compression for example?

What if a communication itself is not encrypted but contains encrypted elements, like maybe a session ID?

<comment><USER3> "Where does one draw the line between encryption,encoding and compression for example?"

I am told that the FBI does not actually draw such a distinction when dealing with criminal messages. The term "null cipher" is used to refer to messages encoded in a non-randomized fashion that does not involve any secret key. I was being a bit sarcastic above, but honestly, I would not be surprised if the government tried to claim that base64 encoding counted as "encryption" in this situation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Isn't pretty much everything moving in the direction of always-on encryption, so this in effects means they can store everything..

</comment><comment><USER5> I'm wondering: what is the cost of such retention? If all intercepted data was encrypted, would that not eventually bankrupt the system?

While such a wide use of encryption seems unlikely, would it be possible to achieve the same effect by feeding the system with encrypted garbage? Even if it is eventually decrypted, it adds a lot of noise to the analysis effort, further increasing the cost.

</comment><comment><USER6> If you read the doc, it says also that domestic communication "reasonably believed to contain evidence of a crime... may be disseminated to Federal Law Enforcement authorities".

<comment><USER7> would that evidence and fruits of it be admissible in court?

<comment><USER8> Yes, of course.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Well then let's make them store the entire internet. It's about time that we encrypted everything. Flood the communication channels with encrypted chatter and let's see how long they can keep storing it all. If you really want to fuck with them intersperse your encrypted data with random bits from /dev/random. Even better, just steam random bits non-stop and every so often intersperse it with just a tiny bit of your real data.

The NSA knows how fucked they'd really be if everyone used end to end encryption. You can smell their fear.

<comment><USER10> You probably want to use urandom instead of random. /dev/random will block if the entropy pool runs out whereas /dev/urandom will not.

<comment><USER11> On Linux, yes. Not on the BSDs.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This is great! Now to backup my old photos, I'll tar them and encrypt them and email them to myself. I can always try FOI request and get them back!

</comment><comment><USER13> A good deal of encrypted material these days depends on the security of the private key, though -- e.g., HTTPS loses a good deal of security if the server's private key is known.

Given the reach of PRISM and related projects, and given that a lot of the internet was using 1024-bit RSA keys for HTTPS, it's a good question wondering how much of those private keys are still ... private.

<comment><USER14> I have always wondered about this. What kind of security do you really get if, for example, your SSL key is distributed to a couple thousand CloudFlare servers all over the world?

<comment><USER15> Zilch. Cryptographic security depends on good key management practices.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> And they can and do so for the rest of the world too, but who cares right? Only us citizens have a right to privacy at least according to hn.

</comment><comment><USER17> That is good because, provided there is not some enormous leap forward in number theory in the meantime, they can keep working on trying to break 256-bit key RSA encryption "indefinitely" as well thanks to a higher law by the name of thermodynamics.

<comment><USER18> Wait 25 years until Moore's Law catches up, and they can break all those 256-bit encrypted things you did back in 2013.

<comment><USER17> From Schneier in "Applied Cryptography" (1996):

"Longer key lengths are better, but only up to a point. AES will have 128-bit, 192-bit, and 256-bit key lengths. This is far longer than needed for the foreseeable future. In fact, we cannot even imagine a world where 256-bit brute force searches are possible. It requires some fundamental breakthroughs in physics and our understanding of the universe.

One of the consequences of the second law of thermodynamics is that a certain amount of energy is necessary to represent information. To record a single bit by changing the state of a system requires an amount of energy no less than kT, where T is the absolute temperature of the system and k is the Boltzman constant. (Stick with me; the physics lesson is almost over.)

Given that k = 1.38 × 10^−16 erg/K, and that the ambient temperature of the universe is 3.2 Kelvin, an ideal computer running at 3.2 K would consume 4.4 × 10−16 ergs every time it set or cleared a bit. To run a computer any colder than the cosmic background radiation would require extra energy to run a heat pump.

Now, the annual energy output of our sun is about 1.21 × 10^41 ergs. This is enough to power about 2.7 × 10^56 single bit changes on our ideal computer; enough state changes to put a 187-bit counter through all its values. If we built a Dyson sphere around the sun and captured all its energy for 32 years, without any loss, we could power a computer to count up to 2^192. Of course, it wouldn't have the energy left over to perform any useful calculations with this counter.

But that's just one star, and a measly one at that. A typical supernova releases something like 1^051 ergs. (About a hundred times as much energy would be released in the form of neutrinos, but let them go for now.) If all of this energy could be channeled into a single orgy of computation, a 219-bit counter could be cycled through all of its states.

These numbers have nothing to do with the technology of the devices; they are the maximums that thermodynamics will allow. And they strongly imply that brute-force attacks against 256-bit keys will be infeasible until computers are built from something other than matter and occupy something other than space."

<comment><USER19> I've seen this argument quoted a couple of times and blindly accepted it as a traditional Fermi-style attack on the problem. This is the first time I've pondered the implementation.

Schneier's argument that 3.2K is a limit is perhaps not the best one? Dilution fridges let you into the millikelvin quickly. Optical cooling can readily reach nanokelvin. Power dissipation remains a significant problem, but the power requirement is reduced by ~10^9.

From the quantum-computing side of things, it's not that crazy to imagine a 256 bit quantum computer, especially if you have a GDP-caliber budget. Researchers worldwide are working hard on the relevant technological precursors.

<comment><USER20> I'm under the impression that quantum computers buy you a square root. So instead of doubling the number of bits in your key to improve the strength of a key by a ludicrous amount, you should quadruple them.

In addition to this, I don't know how well quantum computers help against (good) symmetric encryption. They help against certain types of PKI because they give you the aforementioned speedup in factoring large integers. However, I think Schneier's argument holds, because brute forcing 2^256 possible keys is.. well, see the argument above about forcing a counter through all those states.

(apologies for not citing sources. Hopefully someone more knowledgeable can weigh in)

<comment><USER21> For AES you are correct. The best known quantum attack is Grover's Search Algorithm (but emphasis on 'known' here), reducing the key space to 2^128. RSA, however, is based on prime factors, so it can be broken with Shor's Algorithm, which means it will take on the order of (256)^3 operations.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Lets all generate lots and lots of cat /dev/random over ssh ?

<comment><USER23> Just use /dev/zero, no need to waste more energy than needed. The NSA is unable to tell the difference if the cipher is good enough.

<comment><USER11> Or, better random without ssh.

<comment><USER23> With appropriate handshakes!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Mobile App Game:

test the forever stored future with ten thousand inviting Voynich manuscripts with buried url tripwire alert beacons and countdown n-folded damascene crypto layerings that annunciate when finally cracked and the hunter bot-spider races along the breadcrumbs, trips the wire, and `hello'!

</comment><comment><USER25> A bit offtopic, but is there a style associated with the image at the top? Particularly the way that eyeball looks, I've seen that style of artwork a lot when reading surveillance-related stories.</comment>


MIST – FPGA-Based Amiga and Atari ST - <AUTHOR> http://harbaum.org/till/mist/index.shtml <comment><USER2> The actual computer is [purportedly] available at the linked website: [http://lotharek.pl/product.php?pid=96](http://lotharek.pl/product.php?pid=96)

</comment><comment><USER3> This supports more than just the Amiga and ST. Better page here [http://lotharek.pl/product.php?pid=96](http://lotharek.pl/product.php?pid=96)

</comment><comment><USER4> It's (kind of) unacceptable that this has VGA out instead of HDMI. What were they thinking?

<comment><USER5> VGA is much easier to generate on an FPGA. Also, the project is a few years old.

<comment><USER6> What makes that so? Do most FPGAs lack serial outputs that could generate HDMI/DVI signals? It seems to me that VGA would be harder since you need a DAC.

<comment><USER7> Common FPGAs are limited to sup-GHz speeds. Common DACs (afaik) are parallel, letting them be driven at lower clock speeds than equivalent serial digital devices.

1920 x 1080 x 24bpp x (10/8 due to TMDS 8b/10b encoding) 60hz ~= 3.5 gigabits a second, / 3 (3 data lines in DVI/HDMI) = just over a gigabit per data line, plus surely some overhead that I don't know about. I'm not an EE but it sounds like it would be hard to generate a >1GHz signal on a <1GHz FPGA.

Whereas with an analog signal driven by 3 8-bit DACs, you're dealing just dealing with 1920 x 1080 x (VGA overhead) * 60hz = a 120~ megahertz signal that can easily be generated by any FPGA. (the 24bpp is irrelevant because it is being transferred in parallel)

<comment><USER8> What (I think) I know of the subject:

For a resolution of "1920 x 1080 @ 60Hz" the FPGA needs to run only at the pixel clock's frequency, which is "only" 124.416 MHz (1920x1080x60 / (10^6)). Then on every pixel clock cycle, the FPGA needs to present each bit of what makes-up-a-pixel on it's output pins. In case of 24bpp, that would require 24 dedicated output pins. In addition, a dedicated DVI transmitter chip would be required to serialize and encode that 24 wide bus to those DVI-compliant three differential signal lines in addition to doing the 8b/10b encoding. Roughly.

Or the FPGA could have a high-speed serializer built-it which could replace the dedicated chip.

~sigh~ I wish I knew enought about electronics to play around designing such a serializer, it tickles my fancy :)

<comment><USER9> The Parallella board has an HDMI transmitter connected to the FPGA, it uses the same generation of FPGA as the Mega65 that is described elsewhere in the thread.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


What Might Happen If an Airliner Hit a Small Drone? - <AUTHOR> http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/aerial-robots/what-might-happen-if-airliner-hit-small-drone

<comment><AUTHOR> Actual analysis: [http://www.uasamericafund.com/assets/micro-uav-safety- analys...](http://www.uasamericafund.com/assets/micro-uav-safety-analysis.pdf)

</comment><comment><USER2> "...there is no indication that allowing UAVs of three pounds or less to operate at least 5 miles from airports and at or below 400 feet will pose a significant increase in risk to manned aircraft."

<comment><USER3> From the article: "There's a good chance it'll take the engine out at high power," says Morse, but not necessarily."

Take out some/all of the thrust of an engine or takeoff or landing might make things interesting. Damage the wing surfaces or penetrate the wing might get far too interesting. Random, based on what happens to the fan blades and the heavy parts.

<comment><AUTHOR> The article says the blades wouldn't be defected. I can't imagine how can you pierce aluminum wing using some carbon composite.</comment></comment></comment>


Matt Williams is Digg's New CEO - <AUTHOR> http://about.digg.com/blog/greetings-new-ceo

<comment><USER2> _Our top priority is to make Digg as good as it used to be._

I have no idea why, but that line instantly made me remember 96's Clinton/Dole debates[1] (I must have read about this later since I was only 11 at the time). He does sort of correct himself in the next sentence, but I feel even saying that is awfully clumsy as a CEO's first post. It fails to capture the nostalgia for the old digg community and, imho, it fails to show optimism for the future.

[1] (from the nytimes) _Mr. Dole's biggest rhetorical mistake, however, was his clumsy offer to serve as ''a bridge'' to an America that he said was better in the 1920's and 1930's. It was an odd line coming from the party of Ronald Reagan, the arch-evangel of American optimism, and Mr. Clinton served notice that Mr. Dole would not be allowed to forget his blunder. ''We do not need to build a bridge to the past, we need to build a bridge to the future,'' Mr. Clinton said in elaborating his theme that he and the Democrats are the best leaders for the next century._</comment>


J.K. Rowling: The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination - <AUTHOR> http://harvardmagazine.com/commencement/the-fringe-benefits-failure-the-importance-imagination <comment><USER2> An oldie but a great speech (old HN discussion here: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=211832>). For anyone who's interested, here are some other extraordinary commencement speeches:

Steve Jobs: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc>

Bill Watterson: <http://home3.inet.tele.dk/stadil/spe_kc.htm>

David Foster Wallace: <http://www.marginalia.org/dfw_kenyon_commencement.html>

There is a lot of good advice and numerous great sound-bytes from all of these; but one of my personal favorites comes from Bill Watterson, who makes a point that I feel often gets overlooked at HN in our relentless pursuit of success:

 _Creating a life that reflects your values and satisfies your soul is a rare achievement. In a culture that relentlessly promotes avarice and excess as the good life, a person happy doing his own work is usually considered an eccentric, if not a subversive. Ambition is only understood if it's to rise to the top of some imaginary ladder of success. Someone who takes an undemanding job because it affords him the time to pursue other interests and activities is considered a flake. A person who abandons a career in order to stay home and raise children is considered not to be living up to his potential ― as if a job title and salary are the sole measure of human worth. You'll be told in a hundred ways, some subtle and some not, to keep climbing, and never be satisfied with where you are, who you are, and what you're doing. There are a million ways to sell yourself out, and I guarantee you'll hear about them.

To invent your own life's meaning is not easy, but it's still allowed, and I think you'll be happier for the trouble._

<comment><USER3> That's an amazing quote. Thanks.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This essay was the driving reason I created and ran failcamp(.org).

It's true: the most valuable lesson is not what you learn directly from your mistakes, but by realizing what you are capable of overcoming.

After my catastrophic financial failure I, too, am confident in my abilities and no longer worry.</comment>


Ask YC : What's the best code repo/VC access strategies for a startup hiring interns ? - <AUTHOR>

i'm sure several of you have hired interns, or temp dev's but we're getting interns for the first time at hover.in
While im going to be turning their focus on pretty stand-alone projects [1] - am wondering how to juggle : - wanting them to learn/contribute to the main product code base - as well as keeping 'some parts' of the codebase restrictive
suggestions ?
should i just make a new repo ? some tricky branch dance ? will git 's pull method or some feature within svn help in the restrictive part ?
[1] PS: one of the generc project is btw over at http://hoverin.github.com/26th <comment><USER2> why do you want to be restrictive?</comment>


Why Is There a Rule Against Poetry Critics Quoting Poetry? - <AUTHOR> http://www.freakonomics.com/2011/09/13/why-is-there-a-rule-against-poetry-critics-quoting-poetry/

<comment><USER2> A step in the right direction: vagueness of fair use chills valuable expression. That is, copyright overrides human rights, and a recognition of the evil that this comprises.

This article also recognizes that "infringement" per se is probably economically advantageous.

But the bias of the writers is still pro-copyright. In the final paragraphs they end up stating outright that copyright is the only way to protect an author's income or something like that. The authors of the article are still on the slippery slope of copyright, which will ultimately lead them to sanctioning copyright over human rights.</comment>


Perform reverse geocoding locally and offline - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/AReallyGoodName/OfflineReverseGeocode

<comment><USER2> I'll integrate that into my app, just as soon as you get the file down to 24K.

<comment><USER3> If you use 20 bytes for the city name and 6 bytes for the GPS coordinate (no need to be too precise in a case like this) you can fit 880 city names in a file that size. The program could then search the file to see which city was closest. There are only about 300 cities in the world with more than a million residents, so use the remaining 580 slots to fill in all the gaps with sensible names, and you might have something workable. It'd especially work if you added "Area" at the end, as in "Denver, Colorado Area".</comment></comment>


Benchmark of Asynchronous Servers in Python - <AUTHOR> http://nichol.as/asynchronous-servers-in-python <comment><USER2> The error rate graph is extremely interesting/worrying:

"The performing servers return less overall errors. There is however, one exception. Cogen was able to return ALL its requests successfully no matter how hard it was hammered."

Why would the others decide to drop connections or return errors? Surely that makes them pretty unusable?

I wonder why they start dropping/erroring, and in what form?

<comment><USER3> Naively, you take N cpu-seconds to handle one request (say N=0.01).

That means you can't handle more than 1/N requests/second before you start to slow down all requests.

So if you don't have a bound of 1/N requests/second on your server, you'll have a latency increase if the connection rate goes above that. At some pt that latency increase will be problematic.

It's also may be worse than the naive assessment above, since resources required to process one request might be flat but might go up as total #conns goes up (you'll hit a wall if your memory usage is enough to get into swap, you may be ok with an O(1) lookup from socket->connection state tho).

A decision by the server to refuse a TCP connect when it's at a configured limit (or dynamically determined limit) can be detected by a load balancer more easily than the latency on what might be varied requests.

Realworld example: people like to set MaxClients on apache, and for good reasons.

<comment><USER2> FWIW terrible example, that's why Apache is always blowing up when it gets much load.

I'd much rather a server service all requests properly than fail. Then you can measure the load yourself, and load balance appropriately, knowing that all requests are being serviced properly.

<comment><USER3> > I'd much rather a server service all requests properly than fail.

Depends what you mean by "properly". If you mean "within N seconds", then when overload takes you over the point at which reqs take N seconds, _all_ your reqs are now failing to be served properly.

Whereas if you have a cap at M concurrent reqs (which you calculate so that your platform can service each of those M reqs within N secs), you get to handle M concurrent reqs properly under overload.

So, not under overload - same behaviour. Under overload, a cap allows M concurrent reqs to be handled properly, no cap allows none.

What alternative are you suggesting? Let the platform run slower as load increases until your alarm system pings you at a threshold and you then provision more servers?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> This may be a dumb question, but I really can't imagine. What reasonable real- world process would need more than 1400 HTTP connections per second (which is the worst performer) on a single process and single server?..

<comment><USER2> If you're doing Comet type things for a start.

Mibbit does around 2.5k/sec, but that's split over a few servers for memory/failover reasons.

I agree though, probably a niche use case, until more 'real time' stuff happens.</comment></comment>


Show HN: My first iOS app written in Swift - <AUTHOR> https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tellmewhen-my-favourite-authors/id940270967?ls=1&mt=8

<comment><USER2> Looks awesome!

Are you experienced with Objective-C or did you just pick up swift?

How would you recommend learning swift without covering anything more than the basics of Objective-C?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks adam419,

I've got four apps in the store now. The first, "Lend my stuff" is written in Objective-c.

PhotoOrganiser and Intervalos are written using Appcelerator's Titanium toolset (all written in Javascript but run as native apps). These have been the easiest to write and it's an exellent way of writing apps if your background contains Javascript.

I found Swift very easy to pick-up. It has a couple of gotcha's but once you get your head round these it's a great language. I'll be writing all my future apps in Swift.

<comment><AUTHOR> I'd also like to add that there's no need to learn any Objective-c in order to learn Swift.

<comment><USER2> Sweet! Do you have any recommended books for learning iOS with swift?

<comment><AUTHOR> The trouble with books is they become out of date, so its better to learn online in some fashion.

You could do a quick, short course such as BitFountain's [http://bitfountain.io/course/mini-iOS8/](http://bitfountain.io/course/mini- iOS8/).

I did the full iOS 8 with Swift course when it was on sale a couple of months ago, but it's back up to its $499 price.

<comment><USER3> Here's a link for $89, found this on google, actually went all the way through because I was intrigued enough:

[https://stacksocial.com/sales/the-complete- ios-8-developers-...](https://stacksocial.com/sales/the-complete- ios-8-developers-course-w-swift-pre-release#)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Code or it didn't happen - <AUTHOR> http://www.andreiboar.com/blog/code-or-it-didnt-happen/

<comment><USER2> The linked article's author thinks he should be coding instead of writing. Based on the number of misspelled words and mangled sentences in the article, he may also need to increase his awareness of the small details that are critical to making a programmer first-rate.</comment>


Ask HN: Does anyone else have problems with Instagram API OAuth2? - <AUTHOR> <comment><USER2> To temporary fix the issue, you could do the following:

change response_type=code to response_type=token. Instagram will redirect back to your site with something like /callback#access_token=123456. From here, send the user to a very simple page with the following snippet:

<script>

        if (window.location.hash && window.location.hash.indexOf('#access_token=') !== -1) {
            var accessToken = window.location.hash.replace('#access_token=', '');
            window.location = '/callback?access_token=' + accessToken;
        }

</script>

After that, you just use the Instagram API to retrieve user by access token then perform log in. This is not a recommended flow by Instagram but is a flow that works for now if your customers are constantly hammering you with support tickets as they did with us.

<comment><USER3> This solution is insecure. Any person can intercept token and make harm to your application.

<comment><AUTHOR> It doesn't seem too bad when enforcing https (using the return address whitelisting in the developer console). Am I missing something?

<comment><USER3> Customer will see token anyway

<comment><AUTHOR> Ah yes, of course. I did miss that. The implicit (client-side) auth flow gets the access token directly and doesn't need another request to the API, that's the whole point.

This is indeed rather unwanted, even more so with the new more restrictive API usage policy and the sandbox.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've managed to work around this by changing the API host name from 'api.instagram.com' to 'www.instagram.com' for the Oauth authentication flow.

Here's my fork for the omniauth-instagram Ruby gem, which is now allowing me to consistently log in: [https://github.com/stefl/omniauth- instagram/blob/master/lib/...](https://github.com/stefl/omniauth- instagram/blob/master/lib/omniauth/strategies/instagram.rb)

<comment><USER5> For me it doesn't works. I changed from 'api.instagram.com' to 'www.instagram.com' for the Oauth - have one "302 redirect" back to my site with "error 400". Strange...

<comment><USER6> Ditto here, it comes and it goes, but I can see this switch doesn't help our overall fail rate.

<comment><USER4> Okay, thought I'd mention it because it's had such a significant effect for me. So that possibly means that in my case the Auth0 <-> Instagram connection is something to investigate further.

<comment><USER7> Same here, made the change a couple of days ago and saw no change in failures.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> We started having same issue since last Friday (Dec. 15, 2016) after working fine for months. Same user can login via oauth on one wifi, but not on the other, or even on mobile cellular network. And even when it worked on that wifi at one point, it does not work at other times. We have not found a workaround to fix this, reported to Instagram 24 hours ago, waiting...I tried to login to my account on instagram.com first, then go back to our site, browser would log in automatically. So far, we don't have a solution yet.

<comment><USER8> Update: as of now, All of our accounts are magically working. I did asked my facebook friends to pass the issue's urgency to Instagram team.

<comment><AUTHOR> Just checked again, we're still seeing issues. I can reproduce, simply by using my personal account in a private window, it randomly fails in at least one of our environments (e.g. prod, staging, localhost).

<comment><USER8> It was working for us for the most of the day, but now acting up not working again...

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I reported this to a contact at Instagram and they said they are aware of the issue. They don't have an ETA for the fix yet, but they are looking into it. It's just odd that it seems so random with all of our customers.

<comment><USER10> Have you heard anything back from your contact at all?

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm creator of [https://picodash.com](https://picodash.com), I noticed the same issue about a week ago but did not get any complains from my customers, so debugged it for 8 hours until I found this (I know it will be hard to believe):

I kept getting "Matching code was not found or was already used." when using thru my oauth python code which btw has been working for 6 years now. But when I used curl to do POST, it worked, when I tried Curl again with same oauth code, it failed, So I think this is something that was recently changed by Instagram, the oauth code only works one time, I kind of remember this code could be used more than once before to make POST call, but there was time limit instead, after which using same code was failing.

So with me, this was always failing, but no complains from my customers, I could see logs that new people were signing up.

I started testing on localhost, I added debug logs, I did notice that there was 2 POST calls being made, so it was failing. I could see that 2 POST calls was made and first one did work and get access_token, but there was a second call made and this was error 400 and oauth flow was failing. Almost looked like a retry of POST call, cause my code should only make one.

I started trying different browsers, failed on all firefox,IE, safari, chrome. And then decided to try on my iphone, it worked 100%, so looked for difference, it was on LTE, so I guessed may be my wifi, switched to wifi on iphone and it started failing 100%. So now on my dev system, I connected modem directly to system without router and tried, it passed 100%, so it was my wireless router (I know weird), I tried another 3rd party instagram web app, had same issue but worked without the wireless router. So on Monday I got another wireless router and no issues, it started working. So this could be an isolated incident for me, I came to conclusion that I was using some old router that was dropping POST request and making second attempt and failing.

So I guess if this is affecting all your customer check you code by putting logs that you are making one POST request. Try making a CURL after you receive the code and make sure it is working on first attempt.

Today after reading this, I check my oauth login again, I did notice it fail few times, but when I try again, it is passing, so something changed again I think.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry, but this is definitely not a hardware, connection or session issue. Just check the rest of the thread. We're seeing issues over various links (broadband, mobile, datacenter) on different server locations (AWS vs. on dev machine) with or without private mode / logging out and then in.

I honestly wish it was something like this, at least then we could fix it.

The double POST requests you see is most probably because api.instagram.com returns a 302 response ("Found", i.e. redirect). This is a relatively recent change, but still weeks before those issues started.

By the way, your server refuses connection when you go to [https://picodash.com](https://picodash.com) directly (without www.). You might want to fix this.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> Some of our customers have complained how they were having issues with logging in with their account a few days ago. We've tested it on our end and it was working without any issue. However, we encountered the issue yesterday and still having it. However, a very few customers are not having any issue. Really weird and annoying. Reported to Instagram, still no feedback.

</comment><comment><USER3> What we know at this moment:

1\. It not depends on IP of API server behind instagram load balancer 2\. It appears on ipv4 and ipv6 both 3\. Problem not depends on delay between request code and exchanging this code for token 4\. Logout and login helps sometimes

</comment><comment><USER13> Has somebody any news regarding this issue ? I'm facing it too since some days... Quite randomly, seems to depend on device used and/or IP ... And maybe the alignment of stars.

</comment><comment><USER14> Same problem on our end. Some environments work for some users and not for others. Have tried all the StackOverflow suggested answers with no luck.

Reported issues but haven't heard back

</comment><comment><USER15> I've started having the same issue yesterday as well, noticed few times before but it was happening 'sometimes', now it happens all the time. Only workaround is to switch to implicit oauth as @xmrcivicboix suggested

<comment><USER8> Instagram has fixed the issue, at least it appears to be the case to us.

<comment><USER16> Are you sure about that? We're still getting this error.

<comment><USER8> at the time of my last writing, i was sure as all accounts are working fine. But today, it started acting up again. Now I had to change up to different wifi to login with Instagram.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I cannot get ahold of Instagram! This is impacting a lot of our users and there seems to be no channel of communication!

</comment><comment><USER18> Still not working here (explicit auth). Every attempt is failing with the error 400: Matching code was not found or was already used.

</comment><comment><USER10> May I ask if you guys have a link to where you reported this issue? I am having the same problem.

<comment><USER3> [https://www.instagram.com/developer/clients/manage/](https://www.instagram.com/developer/clients/manage/)

"report issue" button

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> It happens for us as well, it started this week. Lots of users complaining.

</comment><comment><USER20> In our case, it seems that most of our customer facing this issue is using business profile, any others checked this?

<comment><USER21> Not my case, I am having some problems with "normal" user accounts. Currently, it seems that logging out and login again fixes the issue.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I got reply from Instagram that they are aware of issue and working on it.

<comment><USER8> Nice. I find this issue is resolved. All of our accounts are magically working.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Having the same issue since a few days

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Currently I'm seeing a lot of 400 errors: "Matching code was not found or was already used."

<comment><USER3> We at smartmetrics.co experience the same issue. We noticed that issue affected not everybody, many customers still can use oauth. We contacted Instagram and Facebook support but got no answer.

<comment><AUTHOR> Pretty much our experience. We didn't figure out what caused it, the same Instagram account sometimes works and sometimes doesn't without a change in code on different instances.

Apparently it happens from time to time, there are some posts about this problem on StackOverflow. No answers though.

We tried many things, including resetting our secret. It's working now, but it's hard to tell whether our actions had any effect.

<comment><USER3> Looks like now it's working for all accounts. We haven't reset client secret. Hope Instagram fixed this.

<comment><AUTHOR> Unfortunately we're seeing issues again. So it really didn't help or the effects have weared off by now.

It's a bit frustrating with no reaction from Instagram/Facebook and not even an entry on the status page.

<comment><USER3> The same for us

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Any response from Instagram?

</comment><comment><USER23> Same problem

</comment><comment><USER5> Same problem

</comment><comment><USER7> Same problem here.

</comment><comment><USER24> today all work nice!

</comment><comment><USER25> Same problem

<comment><USER8> should be fixed, check now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> We are having the same issue. Really annoying that it works for some users and for some others doesn't. Even same user sometimes works sometimes doesn't.

</comment><comment><USER21> I have just tried different environments we have with different users that were consistently failing last week (even this morning) and I have been able to get an access token using the server approach. Can anybody else test with their apps if the problem is fixed for you? Fingers crossed.

<comment><USER9> What exactly is the server approach?

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> We're experiencing the same issue here. Reports from multiple clients over the last few days. Surely enough checking the logs yields an invalid_credentials error.

Trouble is, we can't faithfully reproduce the issue from our network, but clients are reporting failures to authenticate every time they try!

Have contacted Instagram for an update. Anyone else still experiencing the issue?

<comment><USER16> Same here, we are still getting this error.

<comment><USER8> I think everyone posted, replied under this thread (and many other stackoverflow threads) experienced the same issue. The issue seemed resolved for us just yesterday for a day, but today, it started acting up again, had to switch up wifi to log into Instagram. We also added email login after this incident.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Anyone know if the problem has already been solved?

Thank you!

<comment><USER21> Not sure if the issue has already been solved but I have tried with different accounts in different environments we have for our app and it was working fine for all the accounts. Previously, it was very easy to reproduce the problem. Fingers crossed!

<comment><AUTHOR> Same here, no problems anymore for more than two weeks now.

<comment><USER27> Thank you guys! ;) We will disable the client side authentication. If we encounter problems again I will comment.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Are We Different People in Different Languages? - <AUTHOR> http://lithub.com/are-we-different-people-in-different-languages/ <comment><USER2> Short answer? Yes, you certainly can be.

A friend of mine is a foul-mouthed dirty scoundrel when he speaks Portuguese with Brazilian friends (where he grew up for half his childhood), a normally- swearing Texan cowboy when he speaks with American friends (where he went to college), and a swear-words-have-never-touched-my-lips gentleman when he speaks received pronunciation with his British friends (other half of childhood in London).

He's the same person... but entirely different people.

Another anecdote, when I taught English in Brazil, I had one adult student, a lawyer, who was entirely serious and down-to-business with a deeper voice when speaking her native Portuguese, but in English she spoke like a little girl, at a much higher pitch, and a much sunnier personality.

But on the other hand, another very multi-lingual friend of mine is exactly the same person in every language -- same attitude, same swearing, same everything.

So not sure what it says about your personality... or personalities... :)

<comment><USER3> I believe, at least for your anecdotes, that this has less to do with language, and more to do with context.

We all speak (and behave) differently when we are with our parents, our colleagues and our friends - and arguably online, even when speaking in our native tongue in all these (and other) scenarios.

That is not to say that certain languages don't lend themselves better to certain forms of expression, but I'm not convinced your anecdotes support that argument.

<comment><USER4> Anecdote, but I speak Japanese and English both as native languages (learned them simultaneously growing up). I definitely have different personalities in each language, and can attest to both there contextual influences (working in bigcorp Jalan does things to you) and also that inherent influences of the language mechanisms. Japanese is grammatically and structurally built with a control and deference mechanism.

<comment><USER5> I also speak Japanese and English, but I learned Japanese while living in Japan in my 20's. Did you grow up in Japan or in a western country? I'm wondering if, as the blog post implies, that the situation/period in life in which you learn the language changes your personality in that language.

<comment><USER4> I grew up in California, in a household speaking Japanese at home, and going to two schools at the same time: one American school 5 days a week, one Japanese school all day Saturday following the Japanese government curriculum (it was mainly for students going back to Japan after their families' overseas work assignment was over).

All my friends were Japanese until middle school, and my social life was dominated by Japanese. Definitely didn't fit into American elementary school at all and was a problem student.

But then I stopped going to Japanese school in HS, and then figured out how to excel in American school, met likeminded friends for the first time, etc.

Then I went to work at a Japanese megacorp in my early 20's.

It's a strange mix of time spent using the language.

<comment><USER6> Do you like that you grew up getting to know two cultures, or do you wish it had been different? Growing up bilingual sounds super cool to me, but people who actually did it often tend to sound less excited about it.

<comment><USER4> Mixed feelings.

In a vacuum, it's a net positive to be able to understand an additional language very well. But I've felt that my life would be easier in Japan if I were "more foreign", since I wouldn't be subjected to the expectations of a domestic person while actually internally being a foreigner.

Also I'm convinced that had I spent the resources that would put towards Japanese into English, I would have become much more proficient at English earlier in my life. That would have translated into better verbal test scores, and may have meant I wouldn't have had such a hard time in my younger years in school. Then again plenty of solo-English speakers of the shy nerd bretheren have problems at school of not fitting in, so this isn't only a language issue.

Honestly it's just a grass is greener type of situation. It's brought me great advantages (I wouldn't be doing my current company without this advantage, and I genuinely think the language is a beautiful and sonorous one, and the cultural traditions are admirable), but it's also held me back in many ways compared to my 100% American English peers as well.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> >Only one—my single American—was monolingual.

Two American cyclists were cycling in Europe.

Someone flagged them for help. He spoke to them in German.

The Americans indicated they did not understand.

He then tried French. Then Italian. Then Spanish. Then Portugese. Then Russian.

Finally, the person showed his irritation and took off looking for someone else who could help him.

One America turned to the other and said "Do you think we Americans should learn more languages?"

The other scoffed "Why? Look at this dude. He knew so many languages but it didn't help him, did it?"

<comment><USER8> English is the worlds most important language. 52.3% of websites pages are in English, the next highest percentage is Russian at 5.4%. People in other countries learn it just to study things not related to English, like Medicine.

The advantages gained by say a French speaker learning English are huge. An English speaker learning French, or even Mandarin? Really not so much. This attitude of "those Europeans are so much more intelligent than us, look at all the languages they know" really needs to die. They know English because they need it and it gives them an advantage. Or often just because they want to watch popular TV shows.

BTW English is the most commonly language spoken in Europe as well. The days of Europeans learning the languages of their neighbours is largely over; Norwegians and Swedes, Germans and Dutchmen are much more likely to converse in English than to know each others languages. In your hypothetical scenario, the person would have almost certainly tried the national language first, then English.

<comment><USER9> > or even Mandarin? Really not so much

Not right now, I can easily see that being different within the next century though. Probably too late for us, but not for our children and grand children.

<comment><USER8> Why do you expect the language of a middle-income country with a rapidly aging population and unsustainable economic model to somehow become more useful in the next 100 years?

There's also the uncomfortable fact that many Chinese people just think it's funny that a foreigner speaks their language, or they feel like they have something over you because you have to talk to them on their terms.

(I say this as a Mandarin learner, btw)

<comment><USER9> Because that middle income country is the second biggest economy in the world and could be number one in the next century.

<comment><USER8> In the next century, UN projections predict that the population of China will have dropped to 940 million, from its current value of 1,340 million. [1]

More immediately, Chinas population will peak in 15 years or so, which means its labour pool is already shrinking. Many East Asian countries are facing the same issue of course (South Korea, Taiwan) and Japan is dealing with it already. But these countries are all high income democracies - how will a middle income dictatorship deal with a rapidly aging population? How can they push through that to become even more economically productive, as you envision? I don't see it.

Chinas official GDP figures are hugely questionable btw, at least one province has been caught fabricating data [http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-18/chinese-province- ad...](http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-18/chinese-province-admits-it- fabricated-economic-data-three-years) [2]

I don't know why so many people seem to extrapolate Chinas rise in the past few decades out indefinitely into the future. I don't see it ever becoming a high income country - at least not under its current system.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_China#Populati...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_China#Population_projection)

[2] [http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-18/chinese-province- ad...](http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-01-18/chinese-province-admits-it- fabricated-economic-data-three-years)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'd say yes, but to some extent. My native tongue is Russian, but i'm also fluent in English. I often find myself cursing like a sailor in English (mostly in a group of close friends) while I find cursing in Russian absolutely disgusting. This is hard to explain, but when I say "fuck" and "shit" it really doesn't mean much to me because it isn't said in my native language. Somehow it doesn't register as me cursing the same way it does when I curse in Russian. If i do slip and curse in Russian i always catch myself right away and then feel bad about it for a few hours. I always found this weird and wonder if anybody else experiences it this way?

PS. It makes me wonder how much of it has to do with Russian cursing being more "colorful" for a lack of a better word and more diverse than in English. You can make a dictionary of Russian curse words which will rival English lol. I'm exaggerating of course, but it's a pretty massive vocabulary of vulgar terms.

<comment><USER11> You're definitely not the only one, I've talked about this with friends and it's quite common, as far as I can tell.

I swear in my native language too, but I perceive it very differently in English. If someone calls me a "twat" or something like that, I'd probably not even register it. Also, I think of certain words (for example "nigger", "paki") like completely meaningless words, not that I ever used them.

<comment><USER12> Regarding your second paragraph: I find the English word "cunt" extremely interesting, because my own native languages (French and Portuguese) simply do not have any words that convey the level of offensiveness that seems to be communicated by it.

I guess this probably has to do with English speaking societies being, generally, way more prudish than French or Portuguese speaking societies.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I lived and worked in France for two years in my early twenties and really made an effort to make good friendships with local French and try to adapt to and understand the culture. Once in awhile people would hear me speak to people back home in Canada on the phone and on several different occasions they commented to me that I speak much more loudly and boisterously in English. It was very unconscious to me.

In short, yes, speaking a different language can very much affect your personality. But it is not just the language, it is the culture that you express that language within, and also how the structure and vocabulary of that language itself reflects the culture in which it is used.

My favorite thing in France was when I would learn some new word or concept and I would "get" how to use it in French, but I couldn't fully and perfectly translate it to English because of how it just doesn't work quite the same within our culture.

e.g.: "C'est normal." It seems like an easy translation, but it requires a real understanding of the differences between French and English/American cultural views of conformity to really be able to see how it doesn't translate quite correctly. It means sort of "how things should be" or "as expected", but even that isn't quite correct, because the "should" is so implicit and assumed in a way that we don't assume in English.

<comment><USER14> Could _c 'est normal_ be translated "That's how it goes"?

I am not fluent in French, but I know that just because English has a word that looks like a Latinate one, it doesn't mean we use it the same way. In English, "normal" has two uses. First, it has a kind of insulting meaning, like "boring", "average", etc., as is often captured when people say things like "I don't want to be normal, I want to be unique." When we use it more straightforwardly, we tend to limit it to medical or scientific situations: "My blood pressure is normal." So it feels a little stiff.

Another thing to think about is whether a word's meaning is bent by its sound. In English, "normal" is stressed on its first syllable. NORmul. It kind of just stops there and stands, boringly. But isn't in French it stressed on the second syllable? NurMAAAAAL. It kind of trails off, and by doing so, seems at least to me to convey the meaning of "Oh whatever, _c 'est la vie_, that's just how it goes". So you have to use an English word that also trails off, like _goes_.

<comment><USER15> Good translation.

You are right about intonation of 'normal' in French, though spoken French is _always_ stressing the last (pronounced) vowel of every word by default.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This article doesn't really go into what the title suggests so much as it explains that we prefer languages for different reasons. The author talks about several of her students that chose not to use their native language to write because of their negative associations with the language.

"For me, language was a kind of initiation into multiple realities."

This is how I feel about learning a second language. I feel that I'm opening a door to a land of adventure that had previously been closed.

<comment><USER17> You are very right. After learning the third, you start to feel a glimpse of some more universal structure in your brain, that pinpoints meaning to expression in languages you know. So you can tell "this cant be said in English, it is too Spanish", or something like that. And it is very useful to learn at least one Eastern Asian language with non-latin script, to get full experience of this kind. Your own depths are unfathomable, and every language pulls the cover, unraveling the abyss of your own mind.

<comment><USER18> Do you know a substantail number of Indians speak atleast 3 languages. 1st is their regional language where they were born, another is Hindi and the third is English. And it's not considered out of the ordinary at all..

<comment><USER17> This may well be the reason of the very fact that India has more kids with IQ>120 than the U.S. has all kids combined.

<comment><USER19> Maybe what you're saying is true, but I work for an Indian IT consulting company in Europe and from my experience Indians with IQ > 120 (or even > 100) are extremely hard to come by.

<comment><USER20> One company probably isn't a very good sample. Why are you giving IQ tests?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> Personal anecdote: My mother tongue (Persian) is very complicated when it comes to conveying respect to strangers. You need to be very careful to use the right terms and exchange obligatory niceties. That's why I often try to hide my mother tongue when interacting with fellow Iranians. For instance, it's a lot easier to order food at an Iranian restaurant in English than Persian. English just means business.

<comment><USER18> languages where you can convey respect by certain forms of words and its inherent link with social status or superiority are a pain to get the initial social coordination. cause you're judging and gauging consistently on how to play it especially with strangers.

<comment><USER22> Frickin' Japanese. There are some social customs that tie into this: when two salarymen meet for the first time, the first thing they do is _wordlessly exchange business cards_ , so that the right honorifics, registers, verb forms, and such can be used depending on who outranks whom.

<comment><USER17> And they have so many words to express degrees of gratitude and denote degrees of favours. So I was told by a fellow startup guy who speaks Japanese.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Korean language has built-in social framework for respecting the elders. Different words used when speaking to someone older vs. younger. The language enforces filial piety.

When I learned German, French and Spanish I struggled with gender specific features in them.

When I learned English, I struggled and still struggle with the use of articles, like the "the".

Languages reflect and reinforce culture and mindsets. I am a different person in each language.

Reading translated books is a great mental and cultural exercise.

Elena Ferrante reads better in English than the original Italian.

Jhumpa Lahiri reads better in English than Italian.

<comment><USER24> Indonesians also use honorifics when addressing elders. I find that i'm much more respectful to elders that i talk to in Indonesian than in English.

<comment><USER25> Many languages have the sigular vs plural "you" distinction that is heavily used to indicate degrees of social standing and/or respect, that are utterly lacking in English. When you come to English from those languages, it sounds very blunt and disrespectful initially.

Russian also uses names for this purpose, since we have first + last + patronymic, various combinations of those when addressing someone denote various degrees of familiarity and deference. E.g. first + patronymic is respect for authority or seniority (but sometimes used jokingly); last name alone is very impersonal; first name + plural you is respectful while asserting equal authority; and first name + singular you indicates a more personal relationship (friend or at least close acquaintance). Some combos, like last name + singular you, are outright insulting in and of themselves - curiously, historically that was the combo used by aristocracy to address inferiors. And as conversation develops, it's not uncommon for people to start with the most formal form of address, and gradually dial it down by mutual consent, often implicit.

And, because of all this, addressing someone by name repeatedly over the course of the conversation is more common in Russian than it is in English - because of all that extra meaning attached to it.

<comment><USER26> It is not that rigorous in Russian, though. "First name + patronymic" combination is often used among equals (supposedly equally qualifed/approx. same age group) as a matter of style or tradition, which engineering or research bureaus are especially known for. I've personally encountered such usage in university and in a factory IT departments; my friend, working as mechanical engineer in a big industrial complex, has the same observation. However, despite the inclusion of patronymic, personal pronouns tend to be singular in that case. Such style of referencing perhaps lies between full- blown formal interaction and a joking context as in a casual speech.

Another subtlety is an explicit and implicit addressing style unification among unequal participants.

I. [explicit] When you are referring to superior, using the aforementioned "f.n.+patronymic", he is expected to return you in the same way, even (or especially...) in the case of student-professor interaction.

II. [implicit] You are still expected to use formal addressing, when addressed informally by superior - _but when that expectation holds, it is actually considered unacceptable, or bad style at least, for superior to use such addressing_ ; unless you're in the student-professor relationship with the superior, or you're working in some shitty-unwitty paperstocking dogfood reselling organization, or you're unskilled/simple-skilled labour in a government institution. Rephrasing, superior should make sure that you both use the same addressing style (ie. as in I.).

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> This is a commonly-observed phenomenon, in linguistics it's called code switching[1]

1: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code- switching](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code-switching)

</comment><comment><USER28> I speak four languages (English, Bengali (mother-tongue), Hindi fluently and Lao semi-fluently). I just find that every language has some specific quality of expression that is unique to it and hence when you use that language to its maximum potential, you are expressing a side of you that you could not express in another language.

My speech is much more colorful (I don't mean in a dirty foul-mouthed way) in Bengali than any of the other languages I speak - I can express nuances while maintaining a style that I cannot in another language I speak without losing either the style or the nuance. I find Hindi is also very expressive that way. For the lack of a better word, I feel I'm unable to be equally "juicy" in English. Of course, I'm not a native English speaker so probably the limitation is me and not the language.

<comment><USER29> I'm a native speaker of both Bengali and English, and my experience matches yours. Out of curiosity, which dialect of Bengali do you speak?

Separately, something I've long found interesting: sarcasm (the way we understand the concept in English) doesn't really come across in Bengali. I don't mean that Bengali people are incapable of sarcasm, but almost invariably, the Bengali speakers I know only make sarcastic comments in English, never in Bengali.

Or, to put it more accurately: there is a way of expressing ironic sentiment in Bengali, but it's very different from how we'd think of it in English, both textually and in the delivery.

<comment><USER30> Perhaps we should make Hacker News a Bengali site instead of an English one.

<comment><USER28> That would be beautifully ironic because I perceive HN as an Adda[1] of intellectually stimulating nature. And everybody knows, Bengalis love Adda.

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adda_(South_Asian)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adda_\(South_Asian\))

<comment><USER30> Thank you! that's very interesting. The NYT article linked there seems pretty good. Maybe I'll submit it here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> I often feel less shy about sharing personal details in languages I've learned (vs. my 'mother tongues'). Or similarly, I feel more comfortable lying.

<comment><USER32> Something along similar lines, I am not very comfortable in using cuss words in my native language whereas I feel less compunction in using cuss words in languages I have learned. In general I swear rarely, but when I do feel like swearing I feel it easier to do so in learned languages. Probably with my native language the cuss words trigger a stronger emotions, and making their usage repugnant (for me).

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> > "River" in Polish was a vital sound, energized with the essence of > riverhood, of my rivers, of my being immersed in rivers. "River" in English > is cold—a word without an aura. It has no accumulated associations for me, > and it does not give off the radiating haze of connotation. It does not > evoke."

This is how I feel about foreign languages as well. Things don't feel as "heavy" somehow. In my native language, official things sound very official, strict and serious, in English it's just the meaning, factually.

Or for example when I read English technical (CS, math) books it evokes the same feeling that I took from Numberphile, or online tutorials etc, while the equivalent book in my language would sound and smell like school and obligations instead of exciting and fun things.

</comment><comment><USER34> Yes. In my opinion, entirely. I'm also a believer that how one chooses to speak impacts their behavior and ultimately how they think (of themselves and others).

People who speak negatively tend to be negative people. I find the opposite to be true as well, as long as the speech is genuine. Someone "faking" their optimism could of course be a really negative person, regardless of how they speak. I think believing what you say plays a big role.

I find myself complimenting others and thanking people for things more frequently in Japanese. Not just as a formality - but because it seems so much more natural than in English.

And I think it is very important that any person who speaks only one language does their best to embrace another culture and learn a second. It will change how you think about many things.

</comment><comment><USER35> You should read this [http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-morality- chang...](http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-morality-changes-in-a- foreign-language/)

</comment><comment><USER36> From a neurological point of view -- quite possibly yes.

In that, as one becomes fluent in new language, different centers of the brain (perhaps entirely different from those used for developing one's mother tongue) are activity. And literally new brain tissue grows in these regions. So when these newer centers are activated... in part, it's literally a different "you" that's being engaged.

Just another among the many side benefits of becoming bilingual.

</comment><comment><USER37> Interesting article, but very one-sided. Yes, there are a great many ways people are different when they switch languages. But the basic realities of human existence, like being bodies that have to eat and so on to survive, and living in a three-dimensional world, and, are still basically the same. Oh, and that is why it is possible to translate, imperfectly but still to a great extent, between different languages.

<comment><USER17> It however asks an important question about our internal wiring. During the lat two years I started to think that our wetware runs different AIs, when we think in different languages.

</comment></comment><comment><USER38> Obviously. I am dumb in any other languages, except English and my mother tongue.

<comment><USER39> This made me laugh. For a long time, I felt like I could only speak like a child using Norwegian (my second language). It has improved, but there are things I still can't properly express.

</comment></comment><comment><USER40> Answering the question

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilingualism#Personality](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilingualism#Personality)

</comment><comment><USER41> I probably am. My wife could tell if I was speaking English or Japanese on the phone based on my body language.

</comment><comment><USER42> "You are a product of your environment." \--Clement Stone

</comment><comment><USER43> My French definitely gets better the more drunk I am.

</comment><comment><USER44> This article is unreadable on my Android mobile.

</comment><comment><USER45> Pls consider making the website mobile friendly.

</comment><comment><USER46> I speak two languages fluently: English and Russian with English being my mother tongue.

I find when people speak a language other than their mother tongue, their voice is higher from the concentration it takes to make the second language. Also, I do agree--when you speak a language your personality is affected by the culture of the language you're speaking. One personality for English, another for Russian--in my case.

<comment><USER8> > I find when people speak a language other than their mother tongue, their > voice is higher from the concentration it takes to make the second language.

Huh! I've wondered about this. I'm male, and my voice is much higher when speaking my girlfriends language - who unsurprisingly has a higher pitched voice than me. I figured it was just because I mimic her to pronounce things, but that actually makes sense as well.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> ROTFL. This is translation not from Sanskrit, but from Traditional Chinese. Dude, you really need to learn some languages. Try Russian. Latvian has many words taken from Russian in 19th century.

<comment><USER47> Languages borrow words from neighbours, just as peoples get influences from neighbouring peoples, so it is hardly a surprise that Latvian language has Slavic words - and Russian language has borrowed lots from neighbours, as well as substantial amount of words from English, German and French languages. Not just in 19th century, but for the past 1000 years; a significant impact to Russian language was during the time of Peter the Great when cultural opening brought lots of new words.

<comment><USER48> Indeed, there are so many words of French and German origins in the Russian language, that linguists have lost their count. This is to do with the Russian nobility, at different periods, helming from those countries and/or it being the language of the court at the time (same as with French in England, however briefly). There is no shame in borrowing. Good languages copy, great languages steal.

<comment><USER47> I don't even really know Russian, I've never studied it; but I have learned the alphabet, and I can typically understand some part of newspaper articles etc simply because there are so many loan words from languages I know (English, German, Swedish and Finnish).

There is a movement to "purify" Russian language of loan words, which sounds silly: [https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/20/russia...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/20/russia- nyet-foreign-words-duma)

<comment><USER17> Yup, silly it is. I made a survey of preferential by understanding term for "widget" in Russian among Russian businessmen this January, and got about 90% "pro" votes for using the borrowed English term. Practical people do not care for "purity".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> As a Latvian speaker, I must say, that particular language is very poor in expressing abstract concepts and expressing suspense. The language was quite literally designed by Germans as 'slave language'. It had major redesign in 20-ies, but surprisingly most of books in Latvian were published during Soviet times. I agree with hero, Latvian is 'sweet'. It is very good in expressing practical concepts, and as daily conversational speak is much more 'positive' than Russian or English with their multitude of meanings behind simple expressions.

UPD: Example of sweet positive character of Latvian. Latvian for "How do you do?" is "Ka labi iet?", means literally the same, but asking person is also telling that he is sure that everything is OK and somehow cheers up spirits of the respondent in this short expression.

UPD2: For those native Latvian speakers who care to read Russian and they are many, here is study summing up the first 400 years of Latvian books [https://dspace.lu.lv/dspace/bitstream/handle/7/2152/Konferen...](https://dspace.lu.lv/dspace/bitstream/handle/7/2152/Konference_2006_Dagnija_Ivbule.pdf?sequence=1) And you know, in 1956 there were 7.9 million books printed in Latvian language (!). Quite a figure for a nation of 2.5 mln people.

<comment><USER48> As a native Latvian speaker, I have no idea what you're talking about. In comparison to other languages spoken on the European continent, Lithuanian and Latvian have retained more of the features of what linguists call Proto-Indo- European (PIE), a language spoken circa 3500 BCE. It was certainly not "designed by Germans as 'slave language'". Perhaps that's what you were taught during the "ommunist" times under the Soviet occupation. Incidentally, this was also a time of Russification[1], i.e., marginalization of languages spoken by the native population. You can see how this would fit nicely into their narrative. Latvian speakers today, though, would really appreciate if people could stop spreading such falsehoods. That'd be really nice too, Jevgēnij.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russification)

<comment><USER17> This is bullshit. I spoke about it with Edgar Leitan, who is native Latvian speaker, born in Rezekne, and is Professor of linguistics specializing in oriental languages, in Vienna University. Ask him yourself. [http://edgar- leitan.livejournal.com](http://edgar-leitan.livejournal.com)

Latvian as a language never lived better under the USSR, because Russian revolution performance was much ensured by Latvian soldiers hired by Lenin, and that was never forgotten. Among the highest Soviet officials there always been Latvians. Boris Pugo being the last.

Learn your own history from professionals, not from tabloids full of hate speech.

UPD: By the way, its Latgalian that is PTE. Latvian is simplified Latgalian. It may look as a bit of exagerration, but truth is worth discovery.

<comment><USER49> > I spoke about it with Edgar Leitan, who is native Latvian speaker, born in > Rezekne, and is Professor of linguistics specializing in oriental languages, > in Vienna University.

Is he, though? [http://univie.academia.edu/EdgarLeitan](http://univie.academia.edu/EdgarLeitan) says "University of Vienna, Department of South Asian, Tibet and Buddhist Studies, PhD Student"

Nothing personally against him, but "South Asian, Tibet and Buddhist Studies" is pretty far from Indo-European linguistics. Also, it's not unusual that native speakers have craziest ideas about their own languages. You don't automatically gain a deep insight into the history of your language just by being a native speaker.

<comment><USER17> He delivers Sanskrit course in Vienna.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Warner Bros. pushing delays to 56 days for Netflix, Redbox and Blockbuster - <AUTHOR> http://allthingsd.com/20120105/warner-brothers-will-make-netflix-redbox-blockbuster-wait-longer-for-new-movies/

<comment><USER2> Seriously, who gives a fuck?

99% of the Hollywood output is filler. I've got over a hundred DVDs in my Netflix queue. The 3 I have at home might get watched this weekend, or they might idle for 2 or 3 weeks until we get a chance to watch them. I can barely remember the titles, and much less care about the release dates. At the rate I'm going DVD players won't even made manufacturered anymore before I get through my queue. And I'm supposed to care about a 2 month DVD release delay?

Hollywood shoots itself in the foot, and then insists on finder bigger guns with which to do so. Eventually they'll delay the release dates so long nobody will remember they wanted to see the movies anyway.

<comment><USER3> At a couple points I emptied out my queue so it would have been nice to have had new releases, but I realize this isn't typical.

I guess the idea behind this windowing is that advertising will create demand for new releases and lead to more sales since that demand can't be satisfied by Netflix/Redbox. It's cool to say you don't care or aren't affected by advertising, but a lot of people are.</comment></comment>


Terrarium - <AUTHOR> https://wasm.fastlylabs.com/ <comment><USER2> Fastly labs engineer here - happy to answer any questions about this!

<comment><USER3> Hey! Any plans for python anytime soon?</comment></comment>