When Boris Yeltsin Went Grocery Shopping in Clear Lake - <AUTHOR> https://www.nhregister.com/neighborhood/bayarea/news/article/When-Boris-Yeltsin-went-grocery-shopping-in-Clear-5759129.php#photo-6130393 <comment><USER2> Alright I got one:

So it's a chilly Thursday morning in Brno, and everybody's in line to buy meat. They're waiting and waiting, and the line's not moving at all.

Eventually a Party official comes out and says "Due to the conspiracy of wreckers, there isn't enough meat. All the Jews need to get off the line".

So the Jews all get off the line and go home, but still everyone's waiting and there's no meat. Hours pass, and eventually the Party official comes back: "I'm sorry to report that there's still not enough meat. Everyone who's not a Party member needs to get off the line."

So all the non-party members get off the line and go home. But still all the Party members are waiting and waiting, no meat. After another two hours waiting in the cold the official comes back and says, "We're sorry but there's no meat today. Everybody get off the line."

As they're walking away from the line, one of the people who was waiting turns to the other and says: "You see? The Jews always have it the best!"

<comment><USER3> EDIT: I misread the punchline of the joke. Ignore this.

        That's amusing, but at the same time it is horrifically anti-semitic. Especially given what the Jewish people went through in the years leading up the the Russian Revolution (One toddler was torn apart by a fascist mob, in another town a number of months later Jewish people were forced into a church and then the church and people burned alive).

<comment><USER4> How's this anti-semitic? I doesn't portray jews in a negative way. If anything, it points out antisemitism.

<comment><USER3> The punch-line of the joke is "the jews have it better, once again"

<comment><USER2> The punchline of the joke is that the Jews were treated the worst, and the antisemitic party members are going to resent them no matter what.

<comment><USER3> That's a fair reading, I guess.

<comment><USER5> That's the only reading.

<comment><USER6> They have it better because they got to leave first. Party members had to wait in line for hours. That was my reading of it

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The same thing happened in Venezuela in the early 2000s when they initiated price controls to make food more "affordable" for the poor. The variety of products was the first thing that dropped to only the necessities. Then even the necessities started to drop in supply:

> Further yet, price controls, expropriation of numerous farmlands and various > industries, among other disputable government policies including a near- > total freeze on any access to foreign currency at reasonable "official" > exchange rates, have resulted in severe shortages in Venezuela and steep > price rises of all common goods, including food, water, household products, > spare parts, tools and medical supplies; forcing many manufacturers to > either cut production or close down, with many ultimately abandoning the > country as has been the case with several technological firms and most > automobile makers. > [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Venezuela#1999–2013](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Venezuela#1999–2013)

<comment><USER8> My wife was a student in the eastern part of Germany in the early aughts, when life in pre-unification eastern Germany was still fresh in peoples' minds. One thing that people would say is that "before the wall fell, we had plenty of money, there just was never anything to buy."

When I hear people say "X shouldn't be subject to the market" I want to bang my head on the desk. You can't just decide that, e.g. food won't be subject to market forces by, e.g., imposing price controls. If you push on the balloon on one side, it will expand on the other side.

<comment><AUTHOR> However, it is fruitful to point out that not all markets are created equal. Even if an exchange of money takes place in return for goods and services, the market that exists is not necessarily a free market. Sometimes this is true even in the most idealized of cases.

For example, healthcare isn't composed of one market, but several between different operators operating under different market forces and regulatory rules. As it's too complicated to go into each, I'll go into one that's most apparent; the market between patients and healthcare providers (not insurance companies!).

Assuming the most idealized of cases that exist without external constraints and regulations, this market would never be a free market. Because the buyer will never be in the position to make the decision to _not_ buy the good. Even a rational free agent would not be in a position to disagree from making a purchase. The value each sentient lifeform places on their life is for all intents and purposes infinity in the healthcare context. No sane suicidal individual or hero would sign up for a purposeless, slow and painful death. This removes the essential mechanism that free markets have to regulate themselves; the freedom to _not_ participate.

In most markets, if a good or service is too expensive then the business selling them will go bankrupt or remain small due to a lack of buyers. This creates an incentive for a cheaper mousetrap to exist. But healthcare isn't like that. Your choice is severely limited. At best, you can choose between providers (though for serious, and sadly incredibly routine, issues the immediacy of needing treatment trumps this) and at worst you're unconscious and unable to make any decisions yourself. So the element of choice isn't present making it axiomatically not a free market.

Please note that I am not going into ancillary factors like the difficulties patients face in making informed decisions, the viral component that exists for certain classes of disease (you choosing not to do X in the case of a serious enough pathogen could lead to a sick household or an epidemic. See: the return of measles), the difficulty of rationing care (Americans spend more partly because they see their doctors less by design and are discouraged from accessing preventative care), and overall incentive misalignment between doctors, pharmaceutical manufacturers, hospital staff, insurers, HMOs etc that creates runaway effects.

We treat all markets in the same way, but they aren't all the same. The market for healthcare is different from consumer electronics and the market for plastic surgery (a procedure where I must note there is an option to say no). Reductively put, you can choose not to buy a MacBook Pro. But you can't choose not to treat sepsis. So why does our literature usually assume that both are the same?

<comment><USER9> >>this market would never be a free market. Because the buyer will never be in the position to make the decision to not buy the good.

A free market does not mean a market where a buyer has a choice of not buying something. It only means one where the market choices of agents are not constrained by coercive intervention of other agents.

We need to buy food, but the market for food is still quite free, and consequently, very efficient.

<comment><AUTHOR> > A free market does not mean a market where a buyer has a choice of not > buying something. It only means one where the market choices of agents are > not constrained by coercive intervention of other agents.

That's not how I was taught this concept. I know, Wikipedia is a bad source, but I would like to point out how widespread my specific interpetation is amongst the economics textbooks I've read;

 _In a free market, individuals and firms taking part in these transactions have the liberty to enter, leave and participate in the market as they so choose. Prices and quantities are allowed to adjust according to economic conditions in order to reach equilibrium and properly allocate resources._

Note, enter _and_ leave. This means both as a producer and a consumer, without this we cannot have efficient allocation.

> We need to buy food, but the market for food is still quite free, and > consequently, very efficient.

The food market is a really good counter-argument to mine, but when I was first making my observations, I found that food is a very different market that was originally constrained in similar ways but isn't. First is that it's a "market" that's nearing globalized post-scarcity (this doesn't preclude localized scarcity). We produce enough food that we can feed the global population twice over [https://ourworldindata.org/food-per- person](https://ourworldindata.org/food-per-person) (3k+ per capita for developed nations and 2k+ for underdeveloped ones).

Humans have reached this state due to government-sponsored research and sponsored application of revolutionary new technologies.

Second, our ability to process food has also led to a surplus in stored calories. We can feed ourselves even during catastrophes (though distribution will remain a challenge).

And third, historically (as I am not certain about this particular point, but it is consistent with my reading of history), prior to the green revolution, the food market was never this free - it has always been state managed to a varying degrees. From feudal lords and chieftains to the Roman grain dole, food has been a carefully managed resources until our time.

Due to its oversupply and heterogeneity, the food market has a very different structure and dynamics that are inherent to it. But, taking my argument at face value, I would argue that it is indeed possible to exit the food market - we can grow our own food! Even a small-ish farm with good practices can feed a family for a year or more using wild seeds, natural compost and herbicides alone.

<comment><USER10> This is an interesting comment, thanks! (Writing instead of just upvoting because the comment is deep in the gray)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! I have done my best to study about this topic as much as I can :)

I decided a long time ago that if I was going to be an entrepreneur; I was going to figure out how the whole stack works. And that definitely includes economics.

I'm doing my best to learn how to see things clearly and insightfully. :)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> > Yeltsin, then 58, "roamed the aisles of Randall's nodding his head in > amazement," wrote Asin. He told his fellow Russians in his entourage that if > their people, who often must wait in line for most goods, saw the conditions > of U.S. supermarkets, "there would be a revolution."

It's awe-inspiring to imagine that not too long ago the societal order of multiple countries depended on their millions of residents being ignorant of such a simple fact. What really gets my mind going is the next thought: what are some simple facts that would cause revolutions nowadays if made widely known?

<comment><USER12> I know people who genuinely believe that people in countries with socialized medicine have to wait months to see a doctor

<comment><USER13> ... Because that's true, depending on the situation.

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2014/06/13/if- uni...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2014/06/13/if-universal- health-care-is-the-goal-dont-copy-canada/#27492adb78d5)

>The most visible manifestation of Canada's failing health care system are wait times for health care services. In 2013, Canadians, on average, faced a four and a half month wait for medically necessary treatment after referral by a general practitioner. This wait time is almost twice as long as it was in 1993 when national wait times were first measured.

<comment><USER14> I had Kaiser. A month-and-a-half to see a specialist. Any specialist appointment - Heart or Brain is easily 2- 3 months out.

<comment><USER15> I think it depends on the area. I have Kaiser now, in the Silicon Valley, and I've never waited more than a day for a specialist. Oftentimes I can even go in the same visit as my GP after he refers me.

I think it's the same in Canada. In some areas there are no waits and in other areas there are long waits. I think they need to look at percentiles to get a more accurate measure.

<comment><USER16> How does that work? Is the specialist sitting there with no patients, waiting for a call?

<comment><USER17> First, understand that there isn't really a Canadian federal health care system. The Canadian government (federal) transfers funds to the provinces, which operate health plans for provincial residents. The provincial health plans control the number of available specialists. A health care provider can only bill the provincial plan if they have a billing number, and the provincial plans manage billing numbers to limit/encourage specialists and to make sure doctors provide services in less populous areas. I don't know if it's still the case, but historically there was no private alternative available (so doctors couldn't operate a private practice that didn't need a billing number from the provincial plan). If provinces chose to allow private practices, the federal government threatened to withhold funds from the plan.

As with most western democracies, Canadian doctors are well compensated in comparison to the rest of society. But it is generally understood that they can make more money in the US if they qualify for immigration (and many can because of rules allowing people with specialist skills to get immigrant visas). This also contributes to reduced supply of specialists, and longer waiting times.

To get to see one of the available specialists in Canada, you have to have a referral from a primary care provider. Here in the US (in my experience) a referral is as simple as saying to your GP, "I want to see a cardiologist." Then your GP says "Oh, sure, this one's very good. I'll refer you." In Canada, your GP has to follow plan guidelines for referrals, and confirm that it is warranted. Then you get on the waiting list for the specialist. You'll wait for a consultation. At the consultation the specialist will determine whether or not you need treatment, and the urgency. Then you go on the waiting list for treatment.

Of course, Canadians with the financial resources are free to travel to other countries to obtain medical treatment more quickly. The provincial medical plans do not pay for treatments obtained outside of Canada. Medical "tourism" is not that unusual, including travel to the US and other countries.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWTGsUyv8IE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWTGsUyv8IE) \- linked from the article. I still remember walking into those stores with my mother during that era, to my eyes at the time that looked "just fine", I didn't know any better. Looking back now, not so much.

And as someone on YouTube pointed out, that was in Moscow, which had it much better than regions further away from the sources of power.

<comment><USER19> It looked like people were paying money for food. Did they indeed pay, or was some food free? How did that work?

<comment><USER20> Why would it be free?

<comment><USER21> Lots of us are unfamiliar with the day-to-day details of soviet communism. Were people paid for their labor? Was everyone given ration cards? Was a party membership enough to get some basic food from one of these stores?

I think the question is, was money abolished along with capitalism?

<comment><USER22> > Were people paid for their labor?

Yes. Different jobs paid different amounts, and people were paid for overtime. (With a bunch of malarkey about what exactly qualifies as overtime.) Some jobs had a harder time attracting workers, because of relatively poor conditions + poor pay, compared to others.

Most prices for essential goods (Basic food, housing) was set by the government to be very low. Many well-paid people had money, that they couldn't really spend in the official system.

> Was everyone given ration cards?

Yes. There were a large number of consumer goods (meat, vodka, butter) that were rationed. Other goods, of which there were no real shortages of (In the post-war period), were bought at regular stores. If you weren't a drinker, you would often trade your vodka ration to someone who was.

For yet other goods, of which there _were_ shortages of (Fresh vegetables, for instance), the government encouraged private production of them. Some Russians had plots of personal land.

You could have a plot of personal land in one of two ways. You could either be a collectivized farmer, and, after you met your annual slave-like obligations to the collective, you could work on farming your small personal plots. Alternatively, you could be a well-off city resident, owning a datcha (A small summer home, often with a small plot of land.)

You could then grow produce on your personal plot of land, and sell it at farmer's markets. Due to shortages, and artificially low prices in the official system, food at farmer's markets cost many times what it would cost at a grocery.

> Was a party membership enough to get some basic food from one of these > stores?

Official government prices for food were very cheap, and if you weren't picky, there was no shortage of cheap calories that you could buy. So, people weren't starving to death, but if you wanted more then your 500g of sausage, and 90g of butter/month, you needed to spend money in the private markets.

Party members in good standing had access to party-only stores, which sold more limited items.

> I think the question is, was money abolished along with capitalism?

No. You see, the Soviet Union never actually reached communism - for its entire history, it claimed to be in a transitional period, from capitalism to communism. Once communism would be reached, there would be plenty for all, and money would, obviously, be irrelevant! (Or not. The powers that be weren't super-clear as to how exactly that would work, and none of the citizens really gave a shit, because it was clear to everyone with a room-temperature-or- higher IQ that communism would not ever be reached in their lifetimes, and that it's better for your mental and physical health to not ask too many questions about it.)

But, in the meantime, as people were working their way _towards_ communism, money was still necessary as an incentive for good work. State-ran businesses did financial accounting, they would purchase raw goods from other state-ran businesses, would sell their products through state-ran stores. For consumer goods, there would be multiple competing brands, with different quality, and pricing.

The difference between the USSR and the USA, in this sense, is where the profits would go, and how much of the accounting was 'real'. The government would often place economic orders that it wouldn't need to pay for (If the army needs to move a 50 soldiers from Moscow to Vladivostok, it doesn't pay the transportation department the price of 50 train tickets.) It would also do financial malarkey with the profits of state enterprises (To subsidize things like staple foods, housing, education, medical care, etc, which were provided to the citizenry at below-cost prices.)

PS: Bonus point:

You may ask: Well, what did people who had extra money/vodka/etc do with it?

There were a few things you could spend it on - there were some non-essential consumer goods that had vastly inflated sticker prices. Luxury goods (Which you might buy second-hand from a party member, who bought theirs from an official, party-only store), and domestic appliances were one example. Cars, were another - they would cost multiple years of wages - and also came with a multi-year, sometimes decade-long waiting period.

Bribes were a third one - with a large bribe, you could often shave a few years off your waiting period for a car.

The black market was a fourth one - a lot of people in the Soviet Union stole from their workplaces. And I do mean a lot. There weren't department stores, you couldn't go into a Lowe's, and buy a bunch of new roof shingles for your datcha. Yet, everyone who cared about the roof of their datcha had new roof shingles. How was this possible?

The answer is, of course, elementary. What you would do, is get in touch with an alcoholic who works at the roof shingle factory, he will arrange for a pallet of shingles to fall off the back of the delivery truck, and you will arrange for him to get fifty rubles, and four bottles of vodka. He will be drunk for two days, the truck driver will buy a radio for his girlfriend, his workplace will do some accounting bullshit to try to avoid blame, the government construction site that expects these shingles will have to delay work for a week, and the Regional Minister of Construction Supplies will give a radio speech about how if we only worked really hard, to produce enough roof shingles, in a few decades, we will finally attain communism, and we might have department stores, where private citizens could go to, and purchase shingles for their datchas.

It's all insane, of course, but I've yet to live in a country which wasn't.

<comment><USER23> did you grow up in russia? great write up

<comment><USER22> Only during the very tail end of it. But I have asked all of these questions to my parents, and all four of my grandparents.

Between all of us, we had two cars, one datcha, one relative who was an agricultural auditor (and, therefore, recipient of food-related bribes), one black and white television, one vacuum cleaner, a few people with the status of 'victims of political repression' (awarded post-1991), one four-room apartment with a solarium (for six people), and one three-room apartment (for five people).

So, all-in all, we were quite well-to do. (Thanks to my grandparents, who were factory workers. My parents, who were physics professors, were not making very much.)

My earliest memories include standing in bread lines during the transition period in the early 90s, reading through textbooks with pro-communist pages crossed out, and listening to TV news announce a higher and higher dollar to ruble exchange rate on a day-over-day basis.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> It's interesting the notion of waiting in lines. Yesterday at Home Depot I needed a four foot length of hose cut from their hose area. Most employees, even a pair standing and talking right near the hose, said they couldn't help me, we needed someone from plumbing. They called three separate times for someone from plumbing and after 10 minutes or so someone arrived. But another man had been waiting since just before me, so he was helped first. That took an additional 20 minutes. Even once he came to me, it took maybe 10 minutes because the hose didn't have the right SKU and he didn't know what to put on the ticket.

So I had to wait more than 30 minutes for a single piece of hose.

I bet that's not as bad as lines were sometimes in the Soviet system, but it's not fantastic on its own. Imagine if Boris Yeltsin had to wait 30 plus minutes for a four foot length of hose that none of the employees standing around were able or willing to help him with...

I've been remembering to go to the small Ace Hardware store in town lately. They are much smaller but still seem to have stock of the right items, and I can get a person or two to help me immediately.

Capitalism as we know it played a big role in the abundance we've had here, but it has also left the US with the most expensive medical care and alienated individuals. Our system may be better than the Soviet system in many ways, but is it the best we can do?

<comment><USER24> Capitalism also funded the research and development of that medical care you're complaining about being too expensive. Better that it exists and is expensive rather than that medical care not existing at all.

<comment><USER25> This sounds like a positive claim that could use proof.

<comment><USER26> I think arriving at a hard percentage would be difficult, but I don't see how it is controversial that US government funded research has been well supported by capitalism and contributed much medical knowledge, or that there has been lots of private research and development work in the medical field in the United States (I guess lots and lots of development has been privately funded).

Of course, that history played out that way is a different argument than claiming that we could only arrive at our current level of medical knowledge by that path.

<comment><USER25> All we'd need to do is look at the tax code for health care businesses.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> Hmmm, I always thought it was me, but there really is a natural reaction of dismay, to witness what seems to be a bottomless pit of goods always on standby on store shelves.

In particular, with perishables, I look at the things that won't possibly sell before being removed for lack of freshness, and I've always considered it to be an absurd waste.

The other night, I walked by a Dunkin Donuts, and a garbage bag of donuts and bagels had spilled across the sidewalk. It was probably $100 worth of food getting dumped into a landfill because it was day-old baked goods. But the line out the door at eight in the morning meant that profits had more than cleared that margin of disposable food. How to reconcile that with the bums panhandling and playing doorman all day?

That stores display perishable products for the sake of advertising to foot traffic has always freaked me out on visceral level. To waste a quantity of human activity for purely ostentatious purposes doesn't sit well with one's primal conscience.

<comment><USER28> > It was probably $100 worth of food getting dumped into a landfill because it > was day-old baked goods.

100$ at their prices or 100$ of flour and sugar? I think what they mostly were throwing out was peoples work but that's exactly same thing as with any form of advertisement.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> [https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/werner-herzog- gorbachev](https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/werner-herzog-gorbachev)

Recent Werner Herzog interview talking about interviewing Gorbachev. He discusses a little about the Yeltsin years following and puts Putin's popularity in context of how bad things were during Yeltsin's term. Worth a listen if you have 20 minutes.

</comment><comment><USER30> Yeltsin here looks like just some late-middle-aged executive guy—which he was, as he wasn't president yet.

My favorite pic of his, from the time of actual presidency, is rather different: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Clinton_Yeltsin_1995.jpg](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Clinton_Yeltsin_1995.jpg)

</comment><comment><USER31> A very similar reaction to the Romanian communist chief of state when visiting a Macy's in New York: [https://twitter.com/NightmarEclipse/status/97837502295490969...](https://twitter.com/NightmarEclipse/status/978375022954909696)

</comment><comment><USER32> I'm from Clear Lake.

This is hilarious and is making its way through private threads I have with former astronauts and Nasa Employees.

Love HN.

</comment><comment><USER33> Really the key quote is:

> Yeltsin, then 58, "roamed the aisles of Randall's nodding his head in > amazement," wrote Asin. He told his fellow Russians in his entourage that if > their people, who often must wait in line for most goods, saw the conditions > of U.S. supermarkets, "there would be a revolution."

</comment><comment><USER34> The link in the article: "By contrast, this is what a Russian grocery store looked like at the same time."

I remember going back to my hometown to visit my parents, who live in a somewhat rural part of a "Red State." By the Walmart out by the run-down local mall, there's this depressing discount food store, which, as far as I can tell, exists for the people who are too poor to shop at the Walmart. Most of it contained boxes and bins like the Soviet store. Most of it was dry and canned goods.

There is great wealth and opportunity in the US. There is still something left to do, however. The solution isn't to emulate Venezuela or the Soviet Union, obviously. Yet, there is disaffection here in the US as well, and there is a reason for it. The solution isn't to punish and blame the disaffected.

</comment><comment><USER35> If only he could see the free food samples at Costco's and Korean groceries.

</comment><comment><USER36> "451 Unavailable For Legal Reasons" \- Sorry, this content is not available in your region.

Oh come on! Seriously?

</comment><comment><USER37> "In 1989 Russian president Boris Yeltsin's wide-eyed trip to a Clear Lake grocery store led to the downfall of communism."

It didn't led to the downfall of communism but it helped tremendously in Yeltsin's understanding what communism really was and is: just another form of human exploitation by a small group of elitists (or aristocrats).

Noteworthy is the following description of events which happened while travelling in the US:

""For a long time, on the plane to Miami, he sat motionless, his head in his hands. 'What have they done to our poor people?' he [Yeltsin] said after a long silence." He added, "On his return to Moscow, Yeltsin would confess the pain he had felt after the Houston excursion: the 'pain for all of us, for our country so rich, so talented and so exhausted by incessant experiments'." He wrote that Mr. Yeltsin added, "I think we have committed a crime against our people by making their standard of living so incomparably lower than that of the Americans." An aide, Lev Sukhanov was reported to have said that it was at that moment that "the last vestige of Bolshevism collapsed" inside his boss."

Source: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_Yeltsin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_Yeltsin)

In case anyone wants to know what actually led to the dissolution of the USSR check out this Wikipedia page: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Unio...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Soviet_Union)

</comment><comment><USER38> I remember this, but I wasn't sure if it was real or not. It seems like Yeltsin really did want to abandon communism after he visited a grocery store. Crazy.

Cool article.

</comment><comment><USER39> Any other Clear Lakers here?

<comment><USER40> Here! Always fun seeing Clear Lake mentioned on HN!

</comment></comment><comment><USER41> Actually Canada has a stronger claim to speeding the fall of Communism given that Gorbachev had a similar revelation when he visited Canadian supermarkets in 1983: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15129713](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15129713)

</comment><comment><USER42> He looks skinny.

</comment><comment><USER43> Khrushchev to Nixon in the 1959 Kitchen Debate, "...we will pass you and your capitalism in our advancement and wave to you as we go past..."

SOCIALISM... some people never learn

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CvQOuNecy4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CvQOuNecy4)

<comment><USER44> "...we will pass you and your capitalism in our advancement and wave to you as we go past..."

In our high-speed train. That's China.

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> supposedly something similar happened when Kruschev visited Los Angeles decades ago and thought that all the cars/trucks he saw jamming up roads and freeways were put there to impress him.

we tell ourselves these stories to make ourselves feel good about our misshapen consumer-oriented economy. and it doesn't quite work as well now because they more or less have the same stuff in China. also, we're buying a lot of that stuff from China, so it makes even less sense.

<comment><USER46> Is there any meaningful sense in which China is communist?

<comment><USER47> My understanding is that the party controls all land, has controlling interests in many if not most critical companies--as of 2016 the Chinese government owned three percent of all companies in China and up to thirty percent of industrial output[0]--and even theoretically independent companies have former Party officials or relatives of those officials running the show.

So it's surely not your textbook Leninist system, but it has many aspects thereof; I suppose you might characterize it as a mixed-command economy. It isn't what we would describe in the vernacular as "socialist"\--as that word today generally, outside of the fever swamps of the American right wing, refers to countries like the Nordic or other Western European countries that work within something of a mixed-market system; it's definitely more command- oriented than that, still. Leninist/Stalinist communism generally sports a number social factors that definitely still exist in China outside of the economic structure, such as strong informational control, a smorgasbord of human rights abuses, and a generally totalitarian mode of governance and operation.

So I guess the question becomes "well, what does 'communist' mean?" My own, inexpert answer would be "it's not 'communist', except insofar as 'communist' is defined to mean 'what China does'," and my own thinking is that today it maps more to an ethnonationalist--though this isn't a perfect description as many groups are accepted, but at the same time one can see see the routine oppression of Tibetans, Uighurs, etc.--totalitarian state with a largely centrally-controlled economy. That doesn't map to any historical definition of 'communist' that I know of, but reasonable minds can differ.

[0] - [https://www.brookings.edu/wp- content/uploads/2016/07/Wendy-L...](https://www.brookings.edu/wp- content/uploads/2016/07/Wendy-Leutert-Challenges-ahead-in-Chinas-reform-of- stateowned-enterprises.pdf)

<comment><USER34> _My own, inexpert answer would be "it's not 'communist', except insofar as 'communist' is defined to mean 'what China does'," and my own thinking is that today it maps more to an ethnonationalist--though this isn't a perfect description as many groups are accepted, but at the same time one can see see the routine oppression of Tibetans, Uighurs, etc.--totalitarian state with a largely centrally-controlled economy. That doesn't map to any historical definition of 'communist' that I know of, but reasonable minds can differ._

We've seen other centrally controlled ethno-nationalist governments in the past, particularly in the early to mid 20th century. The confusion we have in 2019 is that we label those historical examples as "right-wing." This is actually quite strange, since these historical examples had highly centrally controlled societies and economies. The government set prices, determined working conditions, and dictated who sold to whom. Centralized control extended to all aspects of society and culture. Those are hallmarks of far left and communist governments. As in present day China, human rights were nullified, and certain ethnic groups were vigorously oppressed. As in present day China, industry "worked closely with" the government, and while wealthy oligarchs were created, they were very much subject to the whims of the government. There was also very close control of the media and information access by the public.

The only real categorical differences I see amount to stated ideology, and thus lip service: Is ethnicity important, or is class important? I think that's 1) only relevant to how the ideology is propagandized and sold and 2) only orthogonal to the left-right axis. It might also have an affect on whether and how obviously rich oligarchs are allowed to exist. (Can't contradict the party narratives, too much.)

I think the "right wing" label being applied to such totalitarian governments with centrally controlled economies and many left-wing characteristics is itself a propaganda maneuver of convenience. It's really the degree of authoritarian control which is most important in 2019.

<comment><USER48> One of the ethno-nationalist governments you're talking about is obviously nazi Germany. Need I remind you that the nazis systematically privatized the entire German society? They also supplied prisoners to these companies, as slave labor.

Most of the corporate empires and fortunes exisiting in Germany today owe their legacy to the nazi party, a fact which they are obviously keen to hide.

Just one example out of many: [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany- nazi-bahlsen-idUS...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-nazi-bahlsen- idUSKCN1SK1BB)

Calling the nazi party "left wing" or "socialist" is blatant revisionism, which has become extremely common in conservative and alt-right circles.

Similarly, the USSR was a totalitarian state capitalist dictatorship. The state (ie. the party) owned everything, there was absolutely no collective ownership. There was still wage labor and a very clear hierarchy, not to mention absolutely massive amounts of corruption and grift. In that sense, nazi Germany and the USSR were surprisingly similar; a strong leader with all power consolidated at the top, concentrating ownership and power with a small wealthy elite.

The actual far left is composed primarily of socialism, communism and anarchism. All are defined by the collective ownership of the means of production. Not state ownership or party ownership, but _collective_ ownership. Their main difference is whether a state exists (socialism) or has withered away (communism) or if all forms of hierarchy have been abolished (anarchism).

<comment><USER34> _The actual far left is composed primarily of socialism, communism and anarchism. All are defined by the collective ownership of the means of production. Not state ownership or party ownership, but collective ownership._

This either exists only on small scales, or as a fiction. On the scale of national governments, it's always a fiction disguising state control. Whether it's a totalitarian state controlling corporations or a totalitarian state controlling "collectives," it all just amounts to a totalitarian state with some form of disguise.

The real revisionism is putting a fig leaf of one form or another on all forms of totalitarian governments with centrally controlled societies and economies, then saying they're vastly different because of these different fig leafs. It's more fundamental to observe how they behave historically with regards to human rights. The most important aspect is the authoritarianism.

<comment><USER48> I assume you propose capitalism as a better way? Unfortunately the free market is a utopian myth.

Personally I agree with anarchism that all hierarchies must be abolished, including monarchy, wage labor and even the concept of the nation state itself.

Greed and territorialism have only ever brought grief and misery. The people in power have succeeded in dividing us into easily-manageable tribes and set us against each other, and while we squabble they reap the rewards of our work.

You really should look into anarchism (or anarcho-communism). Peter Kropotkin and Mikhail Bakunin are good places to start. I would also recommend Max Stirner, for a good introduction to individualist anarchism.

<comment><USER34> _I assume you propose capitalism as a better way? Unfortunately the free market is a utopian myth._

No disagreement there.

 _Personally I agree with anarchism that all hierarchies must be abolished,_

Such societies don't exist. Societies which are highly communal exist until they reach about 450 people. Even then, they develop hierarchies of personal power.

 _including monarchy, wage labor and even the concept of the nation state itself._

Arbitrary and corrupt hierarchies need to be reformed. It's an ongoing process. That's built into human nature. There are also good hierarchies which have done much good in human history.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> While recounting anecdotes and making witty observations, let's not forget that this man was responsible for bringing incredible misery upon the people of Russia. Not he alone, but he was the main one.

Also a drunkard, a dictator and a darling of the West.</comment>


PS4 costs $381 to build in teardown – only $18 less than retail price - <AUTHOR> http://allthingsd.com/20131119/teardown-shows-sonys-playstation-4-costs-381-to-build/ <comment><USER2> > _That is only $18 shy of the PS4's $399 retail price, leaving Sony little > profit margin on the sale of the device itself._

Wait, the retailer takes a significant cut too. They're not selling these things for free. Sony doesn't receive the full retail price, so Sony can't have "little profit margin", they're definitely selling them at a significant loss. Or am I missing something?

<comment><USER3> You're not missing anything. The gaming console market has almost always been driven by a give away the camera and sell the film type of business model. They'll make their money on games and dev licensing once the installed user base is big.

<comment><USER4> Yep, this is par for the course when it comes to gaming consoles. Although the PS3 sold at a lose during launch, does anyone know the profit margins nearing the end of the console's life? Surely hardware gets cheaper and the manufacturing process gets more refined as time goes on, so I'm curious to know how much the same technology costs to produce now, compared to day one. Anyone know the numbers?

<comment><USER5> > does anyone know the profit margins nearing the end of the console's life

Came here to ask the same question. I'm curious what the final P&L was for the PS3 console (not software/licenses), over its entire run to-date.

<comment><USER6> AFAIK the only bits of Sony making money right now (well, prior to the PS4 launch) are the content (music/movies) and insurance businesses. So my guess is the PS3 has been a net loss for Sony (unlike the PSX and PS2).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> "Such thin gross margins on a consumer electronics product are rare"

For games consoles, it's extremely common for them to be sold at a loss. (Nintendo used to be the exception)

<comment><USER3> Exactly. Whoever wrote this article doesn't know much about the console gaming business.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> Hell, Sony execs ought to be _fly-me-to-the-moon ecstatic_ if the PS4 actually costs less to manufacture than its retail price. Let's not forget that it was estimated that the initial run of the PS3 was sold at a loss of up to _$300 per unit_ :

[http://www.edge-online.com/news/isuppli-60gb- ps3-costs-840-p...](http://www.edge-online.com/news/isuppli-60gb- ps3-costs-840-produce/)

 _" Electronics supply chain researcher iSuppli's analysis showed that Sony loses $306.85 per 20GB hard-drive equipped PS3 sold, not including packaging, controller or cables. The amount is greater than the loss incurred from the 60GB model, which has a $241.35 difference between the cost and retail price."_

</comment><comment><USER9> As other posts have mentioned, Sony is certainly taking a loss. In the long term it is probably worth it for them in this instance since the $400 price ($100 less than Xbox One) really cut the legs off the Xbox One in the wake of the always-connected DRM fiasco (which Microsoft has since backed off on).

There's plenty of places for them to make up the difference if the original intent of increasing percentage of marketshare works (and it seems to be): they get a cut of every game sold, they are likely to sell a lot of PS+ memberships, accessory sales (extra controllers, the PS4 camera) and they will almost certainly get costs down faster than the retail price on the eventual redesigns (PS4 slim or whatever) in a couple years.

On a related note, I've had a PS4 since Friday and the machine is very, very nice.

<comment><USER10> The controller is much better than the older PS controllers. Unfortunately the only game I have is Battlefield 4 which likes to crash every 15 minutes and delete my save files (not a PS4-specific issue).

<comment><USER9> I don't have BF4... my gaming on the PS4 has been blissfully crash free thus far. I agree about the controller, the older Playstation DualShock controllers were too small for my hands and would cause cramping after a while.. haven't had that happen with the DualShock 4. I do kinda wish the analog sticks were non-symmetrical the way they are on the Xbox/360/One controllers, but that's a fairly minor detail and I have no other complaints about the controller.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> That seems rather natural.

It wouldn't even be surprising if they sold the consoles at a loss, considering there is a lot of money in owning as much as the market share as possible, due to game sales but most of all the ever growing "online store" phenomenon.

The fact that the PS4 costs a good chunk less than the XBox One and is perceived as being the more powerful console will serve Sony well, I predict.

<comment><USER12> > It wouldn't even be surprising if they sold the consoles at a loss

Of the Wii, the XBox 360, and the PS3, only the Wii wasn't sold at a loss at release. The idea that they would sell at a loss isn't new. They make their money on the games.

IIRC, there were even people promoting buying the original XBox just to mod it and run Linux on it, because every sale was a hit to Microsoft's pocket (since you weren't using it for games).

<comment><USER13> They make money on game licensing for sure, but the economics of consoles is based on the falling cost of production over the lifetime of the console. That's why consoles have 5+ year lifespans.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> "With the component cost and the retail price so close, it's possible, Rassweiler said, that Sony is taking a very small gross margin or even a possible loss on the console in hopes of making it back on games. "If your cost is within $10 to $20 of the retail prices, there's very little chance you're making a profit on the console," he said."

I feel like this understates it. Of course they're making their money on the games. These discs (or even better, digital DLs) cost close to nothing to spit out, yet sell for $60 each. Of course, Sony doesn't make get all of that profit, but come on, Sony isn't stupid -- it's obviously trying to produce a high-end, expensive console with plans on making money on the games.

<comment><USER15> ´These discs cost close to nothing to spit out, yet sell for $60 each.´

What's that supposed to mean? These discs have contents that took years to develop.

<comment><USER16> Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding was that Sony licenses the discs to the publishers, so in fact to Sony the discs do cost next to nothing (in which case you'd want to include the price of developing/manufacturing the console to make the discs not "cost nothing," not the cost of developing the games, which is on the publisher).

<comment><USER15> That actually makes more sense. Thanks for clarifying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> The article seems to really skew things for some reason. As others have pointed out, it's actually very common for consoles to sell at little or no margin.

Importantly for Sony, the cost of manufacturing the PS4, relative to the cost of the system at retail versus how things were with the PS3 is a vast improvement. Sony is likely taking a small loss on the console, but took very large losses when initially selling the PS3.

They were in the position of having to sell a lot of games and accessories to make up for the loss on the PS3, whereas even a single game or accessory sale probably makes up most if not all of their loss on the PS4.

The article also really misses some crucial points. For one, it's not just about games. There are accessories (controllers, playstation camera, controller charging stations, covers, etc.), digital downloads (skins, avatars, etc.), Playstation Plus, Sony's music streaming service, and a whole array of revenue streams that are fairly high margin and in most circumstances the loss they took on the console should be made up quickly.

From another angle, Sony is already at a price advantage and there's a decent chance they won't discount the device as manufacturing prices drop. This is the exact opposite position the PS3 was in as it was much more expensive than it's competition and Sony had to continually discount the machine to stay in the running with the Xbox 360.

Finally, a small aside. I think it's interesting now that the PS4 is on x86 and using a straightforward unified memory architecture. Doing a bump on this (double memory, double cores, double GPU compute units) doesn't seem very far fetched and could probably happen at a similar price point within 5 years. This would give Sony a new console with a huge back catalog of games that would not need to be ported (and could even have "HD" add-ons for download), plus a bunch of new power for games on an architecture developers are already familiar with. All this and it would likely cost a lot less to develop as opposed to developing new hardware from scratch as has been done for every generation previously. I think it would be an interesting move and could allow Sony to have a long running platform to compete with.

</comment><comment><USER18> This is the first major console launch in many years where the console itself is being sold at a profit - previous launches have sold the hardware at a loss, and clawed back the profits on software. I believe this is true of the PS1, PS2, PS3, 360 and original xbox.

The headline could be 'PS4 not being sold at a loss!' instead of 'PS4 is only just scraping a profit'.

<comment><USER19> It's still not being sold at a profit. Software engineering, marketing, etc. are not figured into the price.

<comment><USER20> He's referring to "COGS", meaning "cost of goods sold" which only includes costs directly related to the actual production and sale of the products sold. Indirect costs, such as R&D and marketing, are not usually included in COGS under US standard accounting practices (but are in some non-US accounting practices).

Under standard accounting practices (GAAP), COGS is the only common above-the- line expense item used to determine gross revenue (aka gross income). Essentially all other expenses are deducted from gross income to determine net income (i.e., profit or loss).

<comment><USER21> So sunk costs don't matter? How does that work out in the long run?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Sony will also make money on hardware accessories. Most PS4 owners will buy an additional controller ($59 retail, $18 teardown) and many will buy a PS4 camera ($59 retail, no teardown price listed here, but I've seen sub-$20 estimates discussed elsewhere).

</comment><comment><USER6> It seemed to me that Apple could really have screwed Sony and Microsoft by announcing a game-capable AppleTV successor based on iOS (either requiring an easy port or simply running existing iOS games using other iOS devices as controllers). But thinking back on it, it would be even more devilish to wait for Sony and Microsoft to sell a few million consoles at a loss and then do it just when they might have started making profits.

</comment><comment><USER23> Well i suppose that they are selling them at break even points. Sony surely gets pretty decent wholesale discounts on the BOM and probably give 50-80 dollars to the retailers. Which means that the outlook for next gen is bleaker - even the developers of the console are wary of the next few years.

</comment><comment><USER24> I have an original PS3 (via eBay) which I acquired about 2 years ago. I wanted this one as it still had the hardware to play PS2 games (I have a few). Today is mostly used for playing Blu-ray disc (after Portal 2 was completed)! I thought about getting the PS4 however the fact that it cannot play MP3 files (or all the other stuff over DNLA) is a show stopper for me. I was not planing to use it as an MP3 player (I have a media center PC hooked up to an external DAC to an Tube Amp). However the fact that they purposely removed such a basic function stops me from buying one. It is a jerk move on their part and I will not support them by buying the PS4.

<comment><USER25> It's coming: [http://www.engadget.com/2013/11/12/playstation-4-will- suppor...](http://www.engadget.com/2013/11/12/playstation-4-will-support-cd- and-mp3-in-the-future/)

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> This is not really surprising when figure the cost to build a comparable PC. When I say comparable, I mean comparable in size, specs, etc. Yes, you can get a big case, discrete gfx card, cpu, and cheap together a machine for about $400, but once you start making a smaller PC, it gets a bit harder to really match what Sony has done.

Since the XBone is basically the same machine + kinect sensor, I'm guessing the teardown price is going to be something like $400-450. Neither company is making money on the hardware obviously.

<comment><USER27> GDDR5 could potentially eat about a lot of that difference.

<comment><USER26> That is a very good point.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Consider that PS4 will be sold for a couple years with identical specifications. Manufacturing cost will drop while yield increases, memory gets cheaper and so on. Eventually they will move to a smaller case, further integrate chips shortening the BOM, reduce power supply demands and so on. Look at the different PS1, PS2 and PS3 revisions on Wikipedia, it's quite the lesson.

</comment><comment><USER29> What many people are also overlooking is that while a gap of $18 at console launch doesn't leave much profit margin, over the length of the console's life they may become much cheaper (more profitable) to produce and sell, so maybe they are offering a future-adjusted-yet-still-profitable-if-all-goes- according-to-plan price point?

</comment><comment><USER30> I don't see any signs that this takes business deals into account: volume pricing that covers other products (Sony makes many other products that use similar parts), cross-promotion (getting paid to ship specific demos or software), etc.

<comment><USER31> As for volume pricing it almost certainly does take that into account. Most electronic component manufacturers publish "Budgetary price per xK pcs" which I assume is where most of prices mentioned in article come from. For even slightly specialized parts this number tends to be significantly lower (tens of percent to order of magnitude for some parts) than price given by distributor even for same xK volume discount. Also most significant parts that are used across different Sony products tend to be either insignificant (passives) or manufactured by Sony (or semi-custom parts manufactured for Sony).

<comment><USER32> I doubt there are published prices on the web for the volumes that Sony is buying. Much smaller companies than Sony make special deals with suppliers for parts.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> $318 is purely cost of parts and labour.

Doesn't include years of R&D, manufacturing setup, advertising, shipping, support, finance-related costs, retailer mark-up, QA and repairs, etc.

Production costs will drop, but they are likely years away from profits.

</comment><comment><USER34> Have they never heard of the "Significant figures"? I doubt they estimate to 0.3%.

In fact, I would not be surprised if the estimation error is bigger than 5%, so we don't know if they are selling at a loss or not.

</comment><comment><USER35> Related post from a couple days ago (re: Valve's SteamOS)...

      https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6745386

And, from that article...

> Sony may have lost between $4 and $6 billion on PlayStation 3.

</comment><comment><USER36> Considering the PS4 is much more powerful than the Xbox One, which also goes for $100, I'm not surprised they're making very little money (or even losing in the early days).

</comment><comment><USER37> I'd say randomly guessing that 1/3 of processors are useless is pretty out there. I'm sure Sony has smarter process than that.

<comment><USER38> It's not a random guess - it might surprise you just how low the yield actually is on CPUs.

Yield is inversely proportional to die size, so the larger the die, the lower the yield. Yield is also lower on newer manufacturing processes. Both apply here. Furthermore, although some chips might be only marginally defective and 'binned' to a lower SKU that option isn't open to Sony. They have no use for those lower-clocked chips.

Chip manufacturers never publish their yield figures, but if you look around you'll see yields of around 60% are certainly not uncommon or unheard of.

<comment><USER39> Are you sure about that? My background is limited but my understanding is that chip makers will set their spec limits far higher than need be. The chips then get tested, and those that struggle at the higher frequencies will be designated as the lower end processor. Or those which have a single low speed core will be designated as "tri-core" processors.

I know these practices wouldn't apply too well when you're making a PS4 with a single performance level, but that 60% yield still sounds horrible from a process design perspective.

<comment><USER40> Well, it depends on how you measure 'yield'. 60% yield at hitting "high-spec" could easily mean 90% yield at "low-spec".

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> This is the entire point of the console ecosystem. Give the razors away at a lost, make the money on the blades.

</comment><comment><USER42> Still pretty good, considering most consoles are sold for heavy losses in their first few years.

</comment><comment><USER43> Consoles don't make money. Games make money. It's always been this way.

</comment><comment><USER44> I wonder how much they pumped into your advertising for this. I can't go anywhere without hearing or seeing something relating to the PS4.

Weirdly, absolutely nothing from the Xbox One

<comment><USER45> That's pretty at odds with my everyday experience. I see Xbox One advertising ALL THE TIME. I'm in NYC however and I'm sure it varies by location.

<comment><USER46> Same here... I have seen tons of XBox One advertising over the weekend, but very little about the PS4.

<comment><USER47> PS3 was the same way. Xbox completely dominated in the advertising space. I've seen XBox One advertisements on TV but not PS4.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


N95 masks are being exported from the US - <AUTHOR> https://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2020/03/30/i-spent-a-day-in-the-coronavirus-driven-feeding-frenzy-of-n95-mask-sellers-and-buyers-and-this-is-what-i-learned/#438089856d44 <comment><USER2> By the end of the day, about 280 million masks from warehouses in the U.S. had been purchased by foreign buyers and were earmarked to leave the country, according to the broker — and this is all in one day.

Based on his knowledge none of the masks had been purchased by buyers in the U.S.

</comment><comment><USER3> Any way to read this without paywall?

<comment><USER4> [https://outline.com/wkbJJB](https://outline.com/wkbJJB)</comment></comment>


Apple faking 489 to 815 PPI on iPhone 4 ads - <AUTHOR> http://www.digitalsociety.org/2010/06/apple-using-fake-489-to-815-ppi-on-iphone-4-ads/

<comment><USER2> Also, none of my friends are as attractive as the models used on the Facetime page. Stop faking my friends. Apple, please fix this.

<comment><USER3> As a side note, doesn't the guy talking to the woman with the baby look like a younger and chubbier steve jobs? You know iClone is coming soon. Everyone will get a hot model. Hell with Microsoft, I'm switching for sure when that happens.

<comment><USER4> I'm thinking that Jonathan Ives is turning in to Steve Jobs.

<comment><USER5> Ive, not Ives.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Isn't this obvious to anyone seeing the ads? I don't think people skiing are actually going to fly out of my TV when I see those ads, or that a humanoid rabbit is actually going to try to steal my Trix.

<comment><USER7> I think a better example would be do people think they will experience similar changes to the people in the before and after photographs (beauty/weight loss/dental) or do they believe the examples of computer speed/performance improvement (download times or computing performance) products.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I also posted this on the article:

No one that sees these videos or ads on the web will be using a 300dpi screen so they need to overcompensate. A more interesting comparison will be what resolution they show in their print ads.

<comment><USER9> Well, looking at the keynote slide, the samples are heavily zoomed in so 'old' pixels are depicted as tens of screen pixels high. For an honest portrayal, it's easy: 'new' pixels just need to be depicted as half-as-high. Sorry, but the '300dpi' blather is complete reality-distortion nonsense. :)

<comment><USER10> Do you have the slides? I just saw the image from the guy's site. I'm not sure how much the angle of the photo will compress the distant (high quality) letter. those displays are huge, so maybe the letters are 30' apart? it's not clear how far away the camera is.

They are kind of weird samples. For example the big pixel side is highlighting 25 pixels, but you could easily draw a 16 pixel square and assert the light row should go in the next sample. Also, the big side is taken from a point with a -1 slope, but the little side is much steeper, maybe 5? It seems like you'd want to compare the same section of both letters.

Also, it's not really clear to me why each red box in the lower left sample has 2 or more colors. That seems like a good indicator that the red box != one pixel.

<comment><USER11> The second, black and white, example is a screen shot from the Apple website: <http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/retina-display.html>

The interactive examples further down appear to be realistic though.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> Actually, I just realized... for the _effect_ of what they're claiming (pixels smaller than you can see), this is a perfect comparison. Blocks to none. Sure, they're achieving it by bending the rules, but I got the impression that 300dpi played second fiddle to _"your eye is unable to distinguish individual pixels."_ [1]

[1] <http://www.apple.com/iphone/features/retina-display.html>

edit: their side-by-side comparison shows the correct number of pixels between the two.

<comment><USER13> The side-by-side hover-loupe (under "In a word, resolutionary") is very very good at demonstrating the difference.

The loupe uses the image below. You can open them and verify that no cheating has been used. The 3GS image has 2*2 pixel blocks all over. The images don't have subpixel antialiasing (as they have to be viewable on all kinds of monitors), so I expect them to look a tiny bit better IRL.

iPhone 3GS: [http://images.apple.com/iphone/features/images/retina- resolu...](http://images.apple.com/iphone/features/images/retina- resolution-3gs-20100607.jpg)

iPhone 4: [http://images.apple.com/iphone/features/images/retina- resolu...](http://images.apple.com/iphone/features/images/retina- resolution-4-20100607.jpg)

Try view the images. A truly great difference.

<comment><USER14> A truly great difference if your iPhone was the size of an iPad.

Put them both on the screen and stand far enough back to equalize them with the size of an iPhone held up at a reasonable reading distance. They will both be equally unreadable.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I liked the old adverts that tried to show you how sharp DVDs were...on VHS.

<comment><USER16> I seem to recall current ads doing the same thing comparing digital cable to analog....

<comment><USER17> Same with DVD vs Blu-Ray

<comment><USER18> Can you actually see the difference between DVD and Blu-Ray?

It may just be me, but it appears that they are not much sharper than the DVDs (unlike the DVD vs VHS change) and most of it is marketing.

<comment><USER19> Be sure to check this chart: [http://hd.engadget.com/2006/12/09/1080p-charted- viewing-dist...](http://hd.engadget.com/2006/12/09/1080p-charted-viewing- distance-to-screen-size/) and compare that to the viewing set up you had.

It is very, very, very easy to put yourself in a situation where 1080 is useless. The cutoff for where your 1080 40" TV might as well be a 720 TV is 7 to 8 feet; further away than that and you can't tell the difference between 1080 and 720. At about 12 feet you've lost HD entirely. Many people have setups that fail these criteria. And this is a continuum, not a sharp cutoff, so if you're on the far side you may be able to tell a difference but not think it's worth it.

Now, all that said, well-upsampled DVDs are much closer to BluRay than people selling BluRay would like to admit. It isn't the same, but I couldn't call it "night and day", certainly.

<comment><USER20> All true, but worth a brief addition: these viewing distance / screen size / resolution models all assume average adult vision, so if you are one of the folks both lucky and unlucky enough to have above-average vision (or below, for that matter) you should take that into account.

As but one example, the parent's example transition at 7 to 8 feet would occur around 10 feet for me. Above-average vision is great on paper but translates into more expensive displays positioned farther away. :(

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> It was not the high-quality of the "a" on the right that was exaggerated, it was the low quality of the one on the left.

The "a" on the right is fine, it is there to represent the kind of image in which you no longer are able to detect pixillation, going above of the supposed 300dpi limit, like what would happen on the iPhone4. On the other hand, presenting on the left an "a" with half the quality of the one on the right would probably be too difficult for people to spot the difference.

If they were fair on that slide, it probably would be interesting to analyze if people would really notice the difference or if they would just pretend they did (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperors_New_Clothes>). Sure thing, it would not have that much of an impact, at least until all of those people get the chance of having the new iPhone in their hands.

<comment><USER22> It's still a lie.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> Adding to that the fact that their clever semantics is making it _sound_ better than it is (claiming '4x more pixels' - which is true, but it's just 2x the resolution)...

It's the best mobile device screen out there, hands down. They really don't need to do that.

</comment><comment><USER23> People always seem to forget that this is _marketing_. They're trying to show what the difference is _like_ , they don't need to be exact.

<comment><USER24> "I'm not lying about how big the fish was, just giving you the effect of what it was like to catch it."

<comment><USER19> And if the _effect_ is the main point of the communication?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> I was wondering about that. It did look like the "after" image was just someone using the font at full resolution, rather than being properly scaled down.

</comment><comment><USER26> The ratios in the demo are correct if you compare them not to the iPhone 3G but to desktop monitors at 72dpi.

But seriously, this is all to demonstrate the difference. It's not a 'claim'. After all, 815dpi will look the same to the human eye as 370dpi…

<comment><USER9> The graphics may not be honest, but they are indeed truthy.

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> Is 300 really the max of the eye, I wonder how that is calculated. For instance, if you had a 1 pixel line at about a 15 degree angle, does that mean you would see no aliasing effects?

<comment><USER28> <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1412296>

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> I don't understand how the author of this article gets his numbers of 489 to 815 PPI. Can someone explain this?

<comment><USER30> Original iPhone = 163 PPI.

25x more pixels (5x the resolution, count the block) = 815 PPI.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> From the article: "Do you really need 300 PPI on a 3.5 inch phone?"

Do you really need a phone? Marketers don't sell needs, they sell wants.

</comment><comment><USER32> This is a bit of sensationalist non-news, isn't it? I mean, we all know how exactly _every single computer software/hardware manufacturer_ always use "resolution-less" photographs in their ads on computer screens, cellphone screens and so on.

<comment><USER9> I think when you're _specifically_ comparing resolutions, and you make one resolutionless and the other not... well, I'm sorry but it's not quite the same.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> "So you're calling Apple out on their supposed exaggeration of the pixel density

based on… Screenshots from compressed videos?"

unbelievably dumb blog post.

<comment><USER34> Oh right, because compressing video _adds_ information...</comment></comment>


Show HN: Psto: a single package.json to run your single-post web page in no time - <AUTHOR> https://gist.github.com/plugnburn/927c4d14db1ddcacc491 <comment><AUTHOR> Explanation: this is a follow up on Keith Cirkel's series of articles about using just NPM as a build system, and I decided to take this madness to an absolute level.

Start with a single package.json and end up with a ready single-post web page in less than 2 minutes... of course, if you already have a post formatted in Markdown. :)

Surge.sh deployment included.</comment>


Launched Employplan: Skill management solution that works - <AUTHOR> https://employplan.com <comment><AUTHOR> I am thrilled to announce that we launched Employplan!

We are revolutionizing Skill Management by tightly coupling it with Team and Project Staffing.

With Employplan you can: 1\. Learn if your people fit with their skills where they are 2\. Manage skills in your organization and let your team members lookup who knows what 3\. Plan hiring and learn where your skill gaps are 4\. Find outliers and hidden talents in your team 5\. Compare courses from over 40 online schools 6\. Gamify skill development

Along with improvements to UX, we are also rolling out a new pricing model, taking a step forward for startups, our solution is now free of charge for up to 10 users. No credit card required!

Achieve more with fewer resources thanks to optimizing the skills in your organization!

Check us out now: [https://employplan.com](https://employplan.com)</comment>


From Filesystems to CRUD and Beyond - <AUTHOR> https://www.cloudatomiclab.com/post-crud/ <comment><USER2> I'm aware of one filesystem implemented on top of S3 using FUSE that makes a serious effort to be fully POSIX-compliant: ObjectiveFS [1]. It doesn't map files directly to S3 objects, so you can't access your ObjectiveFS data directly using other tools. As I understand it, it treats S3 objects more like the blocks in a log-structured filesystem. I've successfully used it to run applications that aren't "cloud-native" in an environment where VMs are (at least theoretically) ephemeral.

[1]: [https://objectivefs.com/](https://objectivefs.com/)

</comment><comment><USER3> BTW Multics didn't have the first filesystem; its design was influenced by experience with earlier systems like CTSS also developed at MIT. The AI lab's ITS OS also had a filesystem, though inferior in many regards to Multics's design.

An interesting side point relevant to the article: the original intent of Multics was that _pages_ would be the basic data structure, with the filesystem essentially merely a way to keep track of groups of pages when they were not otherwise in use or when a way was needed to refer to them. (The actual initial implementation fell short of this ideal.)

<comment><USER4> (author here) Thanks. I found it quite hard to find references to early filesystem papers, I must try harder.

<comment><USER3> Much of that early information may not be digitized.

<comment><USER5> Even if it is, it may not be widespread knowledge. E.g. WoFS, the first embodiement of many ideas found in ZFS and friends, is virtually unknown, despite being developed in the late 80s, and with documents available online.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "so in summary, don't use filesystems for large distributed systems."

Don't use a _normal_ filesystem for large distributed systems.

Being able to seek() on a file (without having to download it first) is something that is very underrated these days

just like databases, clustered filesystems also conform to CAP. You need to pick which part of the triangle you need.

I really like GPFS, as it has lots and lots of hooks (like S3) for events. It also has "HSM" which allows you to optimise which part of CAP you want based on arbitrary parameters (for example I've seen a rule that was if the file was an image, larger than 1000pixels and red, put it on long term storage.)

<comment><USER7> > just like databases, clustered filesystems also conform to CAP

Instead of being like databases, I like to think filesystems (clustered or not) as one type of database. Of course that is just more of a mental trick rather than any deep insight to anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I don't really understand this post. It reads like a neutral description of differences between kv/content addressed storage and file systems, but then concludes that you shouldn't use file systems for distributed systems. Further motivation is needed.

</comment><comment><USER9> > I quite like the term "value store" for these.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content- addressable_storage](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content- addressable_storage)

<comment><USER10> He literally talked about CAS right before that, here's the whole quote: 'The core part of git is a content addressed store. I quite like the term "value store" for these.'

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Hash-based cache-busting is pretty much CAS, and a widespread practice. Using CAS for user uploaded content is somewhat common, too.

</comment><comment><USER11> uhhhhh

CRUD has been around forever. Like literally, since the mainframes.</comment>


Show HN: Endpoints.dev – Pastebin for HTTP Requests - <AUTHOR> https://endpoints.dev <comment><AUTHOR> I've just released endpoints.dev - Use it to get a unique, private url that will store & display all http requests made to it. Use your unique URL with 3rd party tools to see what requests they are making, without needing to spin up a webserver. Or, use it for experimenting with XXS, phone-home, and other http based pen-testing.

<comment><USER2> Just out of curiosity, what's with all the freaky class names? Like class="sc- jTzLTM ipDHfO", class="sc-jzJRlG hdyVuB" etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> they are auto generated by `styled-components` - a great option for "css in js" in the React ecosystem

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> Great project! There is also alternative site that I used before - [https://webhook.site/](https://webhook.site/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks! webhook.site also looks great, I love their inclusion of an email address... I might take some inspiration from them in my next iteration ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Feature request: give me a URL I can bookmark or share with team-mates for the HTTP inspector bit. It looks at the moment like I get a random URL to send requests to but I have to use the same browser to ensure that the endpoints.dev homepage knows who I am so it can show me the traffic.

<comment><AUTHOR> Great idea, having a perma-link as an alternative to the browser cookie would be very nice - I'll add this to my list :)

I'm currently working on user accounts, which will eliminate the need to use the same browser.

<comment><USER5> Please do not require to login! The sharing via a second unique url would be great for teams and I could use it right away. If I have to convince all my colleges to login that would kill it for me :/

<comment><AUTHOR> I understand the frustration of too many logins :)

If I do end up adding user accounts, it would only be to add extra functionality (persistent URLs etc) - the existing functionality + potential perma-link feature would all remain available without an account.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> That's awesome! I like these. Yesterday I was looking for some website that would send me EventSource/SSE Messages so tjat I could test what is going on on Android...

Here's another server for testing HTTP: [http://httpbin.org](http://httpbin.org)

</comment><comment><USER7> Is the unique endpoint "secure/random" enough? I imagine you would end up with some amount of live session cookies, tokens, api keys, and so on, that would have some value for people guessing uris.

Edit: Ahh, missed the JWT pairing. I read "Pastebin for" too literally.

<comment><AUTHOR> This was definitely a concern... Each unique subdomain is checked for collision before being assigned, so no two users will receive the same endpoint. Additionally, it is assigned with a jwt, so even if someone was to brute force an endpoint that has been assigned to someone else, they would not be authorized to see the request data.

<comment><USER8> If I knew somebody else's unique subdomain, I could set my browser cookie on my local computer to that value and it seems to just load the other subdomain just fine. I tested this with 2 different browser on my same laptop. Maybe it won't work if the other person is on another computer?

I could also just set the subdomain to anything I like (by setting the cookie value) and it still works just fine.

Ah no, I can still set the cookie to the other person's subdomain on another machine.

Edit: add extra sentence.

Edit2: format.

<comment><AUTHOR> Oh boy, that's an embarrassing bug!

Found the issue, and I'm working on fix now

Edit: bug squashed - this should no longer be an issue

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Some time ago I built a similar tool, with the main difference being that it doesn't store any data, so you need to have the webpage open to receive the request info. Since I use it mostly to debug issues and quickly inspect something of the fly, that works for me.

It is available here: [https://github.com/dethos/webhook_logger](https://github.com/dethos/webhook_logger)

(You can quickly deploy it on your own server, if you don't trust a hosted service).

</comment><comment><USER10> I like the simplicity! Some of the other options out there are pretty elaborate and not straightforward to get started.

One thing I'm always looking for in these is the docker run one liner. Because if I incorporate a tool into my work, how do I better ensure it's going to stay around by either pragmatic paid plan or OSS self host?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, simplicity is definitely what I am aiming for!

Making this an OSS project is the direction I plan to take - just need to tidy up the code a bit before making it public :)

The current implementation is serverless on AWS though, and most of the "complexitly" is in the infrastructure, so as convenient as they are, I don't think I'll aim to dockerize it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Could you extend the headers by default?

It's annoying to have to click a super small > every time to extend. That doesn't look like a button and is too small to click by the way.

Is it running on HTTP/2? It's converting all headers to lowercase. Might be a side effect or HTTP/2 or cloudflare.

</comment><comment><USER12> Another good alternative [https://beeceptor.com/](https://beeceptor.com/)

* named subdomain / endpoints

* Build Rest API and Mocking responses

* HTTP Intercepting

* HTTP Proxy pass

* nice UI, live updating, json formatting, sharable requests, etc

</comment><comment><USER13> Show me your pretty requests everybody:

[https://2f5799dcfb.endpoints.dev](https://2f5799dcfb.endpoints.dev)

# Update

Interesting:

\- Lots of IPV6 requests coming from HN.

\- What is the "dnt" header most requests carry?

<comment><USER14> It is the "Do Not Track" header[1], which indicates that the user doesn't want to be tracked.

[1] [https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/DN...](https://developer.mozilla.org/en- US/docs/Web/HTTP/Headers/DNT)

<comment><USER13> OMG. So people who do not want to be tracked voluntarely add another bit of tracking data to their requests.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Right now the Headers column is essentially useless because the json renderer doesn't seem to want to display beyond one level of depth so you just see "[{...},{...},etc]". Can you make this more usable? Maybe add some kind of expansion ui where it will pretty print the headers in multiple lines?

<comment><AUTHOR> The header details can be expanded by clicking the ">" arrow to the left of the "[{...},{...},etc]"

I think this could be a bit more intuitive though, thanks for the feedback!

<comment><USER15> Ah. Yes its not very intuitive. I would personally have used a "+". But I think the bigger issue that makes it unintuitive is that the cursor CSS is set on the entire <p> tag of the condensed JSON, but the click event is only set on the ">". If you set the click on the entire <p> as well, then it becomes more obvious that clicking the row does something.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> How do you generate that unique endpoint? Do you have some worker that generates https config? Whats your magic ?

<comment><USER17> Not the author, but there's no config that needs to be generated. Just run a HTTPS server with a wildcard cert that serves all traffic from a wildcard 'vhost' *.example.com to your application code. Then, your application can just look at the Host header to see which 'endpoint' it should serve.

<comment><USER16> Thanks! So I dont need to register every sub-domain? I thought that I must register every sub domain name on my DNS config.

<comment><AUTHOR> Wildcard DNS records (i.e. `*.example.com`) are your friend in situations like this :)</comment></comment></comment></comment>


The curious case of our iOS app (Prey) - <AUTHOR> http://preyproject.com/blog/2012/03/the-curious-case-of-our-ios-app <comment><USER2> My first job out of uni was for a startup in Melbourne, Australia. After 3 years the place was running out of cash. The company was betting its entire future on this iPhone app that we were developing for them (iPhone 3G era). It was finished in about 3 months and we submitted it to the app store. Apple had taken over 2 months to reject the application and the process to get it approved took almost 6 months. This was a voip app and Apple's reasoning was that it was potentially competing with their own products. By the time it was approved the company was pretty much finished and I'd taken up another job.

As crappy as the whole process can be it is still a million times better than pre-iPhone Nokia. We had to pay thousands of dollars to get a dongle license just to be able to develop for Nokia phones. After you finish you have to pay money and submit it to an "approved" test house so they can run through a bunch of test cases. If your app failed you had to pay again and resubmit.

<comment><USER3> Note that with respect to Nokia what you describe is no longer the case. Last I checked it took 1 Euro to register as a developer, and Nokia QA+signing is free. Developers get 70% cut as elsewhere.

<comment><USER4> He probably could have been a bit clearer but he did acknowledge that Nokia's procedures had been changed by putting "pre-iPhone" in front of Nokia's name.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Prey iOS app dev here,

The app is technically ready to be submitted I'm waiting on some last graphic details that need to be designed yet, so as the post says any day next week we will submit the app which will be diligently tweeted (@preyproject) and hopefully (with Apple's blessing) it will become available on the last days of this month.

In the meantime, you can check what we've been doing here: <https://github.com/prey/prey-ios-client>. *

*As you may note, it doesn't compile since the project includes the In-App Purchases classes which are private and part of a submodule. Delete those references and you'll be good to hack :)

</comment><comment><USER6> That's frustrating. Especially since the Kindle app falls under the category of "paid content is available, but no references are available in-app".

With all of the great improvements Apple has made to the App Store submission process, it's frustrating there's still such inconsistency and so few ways to speak with someone reasonable. From what I hear the review team is busting their asses off, but it's still frustrating (and a bit baffling) for something that represents such a large part of the success of iOS.

<comment><USER7> It's easier to pick on prey than it is to pick on amazon, large companies in general are bullies but apple especially, watching continuous slow motion train wrecks like this makes my stomach turn. But hey, that's the way the world goes I guess.

<comment><USER8> I honestly think it's one of those Yahoo/Facebook-type deals. If Apple tries to frivilously deny Amazon's app, they risk pissing off the dominant player in the ebook market, who could sue for all kinds of random things relating to iBooks. Prey lacks that leverage.

<comment><USER7> Exactly, so as I said originally, Prey is a much easier target than amazon. Also more people would be actively angry they couldn't read their books on an apple device than would be angry they couldn't use prey on their apple device.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> so i used to have a lot more sympathy for people who got fucked over by apple in this manner. and i guess i still do feel sorry for them, but my main emotion when reading stories like this nowadays is an intense sense of frustration that developers continue to deal with the apple/ios ecosystem at all. it's always been an abusive relationship, and nothing looks likely to change about that, so why do it? is the money really that good?

<comment><USER10> I have to agree.

"We'll probably include a bonus discount to users who upgrade via the App Store" Really? You didn't choose Apple, the users did. Please explain to me why it makes sense to reward people for making your job harder?

By all means have a sale, but at least run a parallel 'Thank you for using a dev-friendly platform' sale for android/laptop users.

<comment><USER5> It's not a reward for Apple. It's a discount to thank/compensate those who read about the iOS client being available when it wasn't.

The in-app purchases can be managed outside the app so probably this "discount" will be temporary.

Then again, it isn't a bonus because you are an iOS user but the fact that we had a broken promise.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> We had a similar experience with an app last year. Submitted, rejected for small reasons, submitted again, no word for four weeks despite constant attempts to contact Apple, then a phone call. Turns out they also have some rules they don't publish. I asked for their explanation in writing and they were unwilling to give it so I had to go to my Board of Directors with nothing to show for why the app was not approved for weeks. Had to rip out a huge part of it and recode over a two week 18 hour day madness before being approved in 20 minutes after submission (they do help out when you bend over).

As for the rule.....basically, unless you are the New York Times, you are not allowed to use their recurring subscription payment model. It's "public" per se, but they don't let anyone use it unless you are a massive publishing company and fit into their preferred business model.

</comment><comment><USER12> My app, Cocoyon is built explicitly for the purpose of tracking the location of your friends in real-time. We initially got the exact same "Your app does not include features that require persistent location." rejection.

What the really wanted from us a was a battery usage warning in the description.

</comment><comment><USER13> Regarding the point about storm trooper imagery, these images have to be licensed by LucasArts etc. This is why even if I drew Donald Duck and put it in the public domain, you are unable to use it in your product without licensing the necessary rights for it.

</comment><comment><USER14> Its instances like this that reveal the inherent problems associated with app stores tightly controlled by a single company.

</comment><comment><USER15> Honest question here: Why would I use this product instead of Apple's free "Find My iPhone"?

<comment><USER16> The primary function is on the paid app that an admin can monitor many devices (iphones, android devices, laptops, etc) from a single interface, and even get periodic reports that a device is still functioning properly and at a known location.

If the only device you own is an iPhone, there's probably not an advantage. If you've got several devices or are in a small company IT department with a mixed environment, it unifies them in a very nice way.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> iOS applications must be bringing really huge money if people are ready to put up with this kind of abuse.

</comment><comment><USER18> I love the complaint about data. Oh, the app is trying to conserve battery, but the explanation isn't explicit enough so we'll count that as a flaw.

</comment><comment><USER19> Can someone please explain to me why Apple still has yet to be investigated for anti-trust?

<comment><USER20> Because the only monopoly they have is on Apple products. There are other phones, other laptops and other tablets available. No one is being forced to develop for IOS, no one is being forced to buy Apple products whether they want them or not. They may be the currently dominant player in the smartphone category, but unless both Google and Microsoft decide to abandon that market they can't be said to have a monopoly.

tl;dr: You may not like their policies regarding selling their software to their audience, but you are not required to participate in their marketplace to sell software.</comment></comment>


Brainstorming the Future of SCADA Systems - <AUTHOR> https://www.automationworld.com/brainstorming-future-scada-systems <comment><AUTHOR> For years SCADA systems have lagged behind in technology when compared to other software areas, specially those targeting end users. With IoT this has to change.</comment>


Starbound developer writing new game in Rust (Q&A) - <AUTHOR> https://www.reddit.com/r/rust/comments/78bowa/hey_this_is_kyren_from_chucklefish_we_make_and/ <comment><AUTHOR> I love how many of the creators of libraries that Chucklefish decided to use are active in this thread and asking question about how their library is being used. It's really something else to have such an active and open community as we're seeing in rust.

</comment><comment><USER2> This is very enlightening, pretty sad that the NDA regarding console dev kit precludes upstreaming their changes to stdlib. This is a pretty regressive attitude from console makers.</comment>


Haiti earthquake: 360° video - <AUTHOR> http://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2010/01/world/haiti.360/index.html?hpt=C1 <comment><USER2> Amazing video, quite the tech behind that. If you pause the video and look around (instead of doing it while 'driving') you can clearly see how much damage there is to the buildings.

I'm a bit bothered by how fast the car is driving with all those pedestrians nearby and by the absolutely anti-social move where he crosses in to the opposing lane to pass stuck traffic driving at that same crazy speed though.

I hope they take that drivers license away for good.</comment>


CasperJS in your browser - <AUTHOR> http://www.casperide.io

<comment><USER2> You should title this, casper js in your browser. But this is really cool. How did you build it?

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for the suggestion - I've updated the title.

Actually it runs the script on a server and uses socket.io to push the results back to the browser in real time.</comment></comment>


Englanders' greasy fish and chips blamed for 64-meter-long fatberg - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/01/englanders-greasy-fish-and-chips-blamed-for-64-meter-long-fatberg/ <comment><USER2> That's nothing, Thames water found a _two hundred and fifty meter long_ fatberg a couple of years ago:

[https://corporate.thameswater.co.uk/Media/News- releases/Mons...](https://corporate.thameswater.co.uk/Media/News- releases/Monster-fatberg-longer-than-two-Wembley-football-pitches-clogging-up- Whitechapel-sewer)

Pan and wok cooking is more likely to be a culprit than the deep frying done by fish and chip shops; with the latter the used oil is drained, collected and reprocessed into bio fuels.

</comment><comment><USER3> "Baby wipes are causing hundreds of thousands of blockages in the UK sewer system and costing the country £100m every year … wipes made up about 93% of the material causing the sewer blockages."

[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/dec/12/baby- wip...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/dec/12/baby- wipes-93-percent-matter-causing-uk-sewer-blockages)

"The vast majority of wipes on the supermarket shelves are made from polypropylene, a type of plastic. … Many people ask "can you flush biodegradable wipes?" The simple answer is – no. You shouldn't flush any wipes at all!"

[http://www.natracare.com/blog/can-you-flush-wet-wipes- even-b...](http://www.natracare.com/blog/can-you-flush-wet-wipes-even- biodegradable-wipes/)

</comment><comment><USER4> "Englanders' grease"? Is that an underhanded insult regarding the origins of people who visit Sidmouth...?

As an "Englander", I don't think ever been called one in my life! I think its main use is pejoratively in "Little Englander", which I'd normally assume "Englander" was shorthand for.

Perhaps it was selected to avoid "men" in "Englishmen"? "Tourists'" may have been more correct (and gender neutral)...</comment>


What the game 'Werewolf' teaches us about Trust and Security - <AUTHOR> https://eaves.ca/2013/11/07/what-werewolf-teaches-us-about-trust-security/ <comment><USER2> For those of you who want to see how 'Werewolf' plays out, there's a great implementation of the concepts of this game on Steam in a indie game called 'Town of Salem' so you can try it yourselves: [http://store.steampowered.com/app/334230/](http://store.steampowered.com/app/334230/)</comment>


Shame your non-paying clients in public - <AUTHOR> http://vesess.com/blog/curdbee-call-out/

<comment><USER2> Don't do it.

Might be a way to encourage them to pay you, but to your prospective clients who don't know the backstory behind nonpayment, you will seem petty and vindictive. Maybe you didn't deliver as promised, or the bill just slipped through the cracks by accident by ending up in the engineering department instead of accounts payable.

The facebook/twitter route is a public record, not only for the client but for you.

Do what's right for you, not what's wrong for them.

<comment><USER3> I'm pretty sure the date has something to do with this announcement ;)

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Amazing to have a real service like that. What do other HNs think?</comment>