Soylent 1.0 arrives at Ars: We mix it up and slurp it down - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2014/05/soylent-1-0-arrives-at-ars-we-mix-it-up-and-slurp-it-down/ <comment><USER2> The gas comment and upsetting of irregularity might seem humorous to the author, but as a biologist and the child of two physicians (one being a gastroenterologist), this seems very disconcerting. Certain foods that contain disproportionate amounts of certain ingredients (e.g. spices, excessive starches, excessive dietary fiber) do upset bowel movement patterns, but a mix of vitamins and nutrients shouldn't do that. It would be interesting to analyze the effects of a protein shake on bowel regularity and the effects of Soylent on bowel regularity on a single subject, and then compare the two.

Also, foul-smelling gas is usually caused when the balance of the gut microbiome is disturbed in some significant way, and this factor combined with the effects described by the author make me very anxious about the probable proliferation of Soylent. It's one thing for short-term effects, but what about Soylent in the long term? A hampered gut microbiome is severely detrimental to the health of a person's immune system.

EDIT: Just saw the amount of sucralose in each serving. Makes the gut irregularity a lot clearer. Still concerning, though.

<comment><USER3> Another explanation for the increase in gas and change in regularity might be that Soylent contains a fair amount of fibre, which is one thing that the typical American diet is lacking.

<comment><USER4> In that case a possible solution would be several drops of beano per can.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I am still amazed that this product is attracting some much attention. This product is crap, born out of plain gross ignorance.

\- Completely useless source of Vitamin D (D2 instead of D3).

\- All K1, nothing of K2.

\- Alpha-tocopherol as the only source of Vitamin E family (4 tocopherols and 4 tocotrienols)

\- Retinol as the only source of Vitamin A (80% should come from mixed carotenoids)

\- Iron ???? You should NEVER supplement with iron (probably the same for copper)

\- Inferior form of Magnesium (oxide). Should use citrate, or some chelated form.

I would go on and on all day long with this but it is the missing ingredients what is really disturbing:

Macro (carbs,protein and fat) plus micro (vitamins, minerals and trace elements) are just the tip of the iceberg when we talk about healthy nutrition. Where are all the phytonutrients (flavonoids, glucosinolates, phytoestrogens, carotenoids, etc) ? They are a "non nutritive", bioactive little molecules that make the fine tuning (read anti-cancer, immune system potentiators, etc) within our body. They are not essential for life, but they are indeed essential for health and longevity. There are 20.000+ known phytonutrients and it is now clear that they work together in synergistic fashion to provide their health benefits. Macros are as a good as the phytonutrients that come with them.

Phytonutrients are those little resistors, condensers and little chips you see in the motherboard that doesn't really get into the spec sheets: They seem to do nothing, but try to remove them and see your CPU blow up.

I go shopping once per-week and I can make a rare steak with sea salt and a big fresh spinach+tomato+olive oil+vinegar salad in 3 minutes, chronometer in hand. Liver with onions - once per week - take 20 minutes to prepare but it pays off: A authentic nutrient powerhouse.

I do love supplements, but I use them the way they are meant to be used: as supplements.

<comment><USER6> I see you hold strong opinions (I am very critical of Soylent myself), but it might be wise to re-visit the evidence for some of your strongly-held assertions --otherwise you might end up misinforming others, and yourself.

For instance, what you say about 'NEVER supplement[ing] with iron' is quite wrong. Iron deficiency anemia is quite common, especially for young women; and it is routinely treated by iron supplementation [1], even over-the-counter: if anything, iron's bioavailability in adults is very low, and it is difficult to exceed safe levels (although it's the opposite for children) [2].

Also Vitamin D2 is _not_ useless at all. Even though _some_ recent studies have shown _some_ limited evidence that D3 is stronger and longer-acting; decades of clinical practice have shown the safety and efficacy of high-dose D2 in treating severe vitamin D deficiency [3]. It's disingenuous to say otherwise.

And... what you say about Vitamin K1 vs K2 is also far from well-established. Putting aside the fact that actual clinical vitamin K deficiency is extremely rare in the first place, K1 is the most commonly used form for a reason: even though there has been some recent work indicating possible differences in bioavailability and function on the part of K2; current knowledge is still very limited, and there is not enough evidence to displace K1 as the main formulation approved for dietary supplements [1,2].

I could go on and on with other inaccuracies in what you said, but you get the idea.

Also be careful with overdoing that liver with onions habit. Even though animal river is very rich in iron and copper (which likely explains part of how you feel after eating it); it also happens to contain high amounts of vitamin A in retinoid (retinol) form, which as you correctly point out should be taken in moderation due to their much higher bioavailability _vis a vis_ carotenoids, thus increasing its potential toxicity [7].

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_supplement](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_supplement)

[2] [http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-and-supplements/lifestyle- guid...](http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-and-supplements/lifestyle- guide-11/iron-supplements?page=3)

[3] [http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/589256_4](http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/589256_4)

[4] [http://www.ilsi.org/Europe/Documents/Menaquinones%20and%20hu...](http://www.ilsi.org/Europe/Documents/Menaquinones%20and%20human%20health.pdf)

[5] [http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/scdocs/doc/nda_op_ej822_vit_k2_...](http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/scdocs/doc/nda_op_ej822_vit_k2_en.pdf)

[6] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liver_(food)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liver_\(food\))

[7] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_A#Equivalencies_of_reti...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_A#Equivalencies_of_retinoids_and_carotenoids_.28IU.29)

<comment><USER5> Great review.

I should have pointed out that we are talking about healthy subjects here. People with anemia should take iron supplements. I am with you here. Same for people with severe vit D. deficiency. In this case, any form of vit. D will benefit them.

Thanks for the advice about the liver. I only take it once a week and a very limited amount (maybe 70-80 grams). In this case, my main course if basmatic rice with the liver for some fantastic flavoring.

Yeap, I love eating real food.

<comment><USER6> Oh ok, got you. Thank you for clarifying.

Sure! As long as that's not polar bear liver [1]; you be mindful of other unlikely dietary sources of unusually high retinol content like sweet potatoes, pumpkins or cod liver oil [2]; and keep up with regular check-ups; you'll surely avoid hypervitaminosis A.

[1] [http://www.patient.co.uk/doctor/Hypervitaminosis.htm](http://www.patient.co.uk/doctor/Hypervitaminosis.htm)

[2] [http://bestnaturalfoods.com/newsletter/vitamin-a-too- much.ht...](http://bestnaturalfoods.com/newsletter/vitamin-a-too-much.html)

<comment><USER5> Case in point to show how I use supplements: My kids won´t take liver, no matter how hard I try to "hide" it. So, I give them 1/4 teaspoon per week of cod liver oil (green pastures, fermented).

Again, it´s not the supplements; it´s the product.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> If you know how, it's surprising how deliciously and nutritiously you can eat for ~$10/day, which is what Soylent currently costs. Doing so does require cooking and a bit of planning. Obviously, filet mignon is off the menu, but you'd be surprised what still is. Also, (properly chosen) real food is proven while Soylent is not.

So, what is the niche for Soylent?

People who know about nutrition know that you probably shouldn't trust the claims Soylent makes until it's been on the market for a while. People who know how and are willing to cook economically probably don't want to risk their health on an unproven product that won't save them money (currently). People who are largely ignorant of nutrition and eat ramen and Kraft Dinner daily probably won't want to give up the taste they'd be missing out on, nor pay _extra_ for it.

There are a few crazy people who will adopt Soylent as their primary staple, but the majority of business will likely be from people looking for novelty or an occasional time-saving meal replacement. Basically the meal-shake crowd. What's the best way to appeal to this segment? Claim that your product can be eaten daily without causing health-problems, just as Soylent is currently doing. Future variants might include calorically reduced versions for the diet crowd or a protein-boosted version for the (wannabe)body-builder crowd. There's plenty of commercial opportunity here.

Will Soylent actually change the world for the poor though? If they can bring the price down Soylent might make a difference with the educated poor, but that's a very small segment of the population. The uneducated poor will gravitate towards food that tastes better.

<comment><USER8> I find the "soylent is cheap and $10 a day" message very weird too.

$10 per person per day (in multi-month bulk, it $12.15 per day for a weekly supply) is on the expensive side for grocery shopping. If your goal is nutritious thriftiness, $2-5 per day is a very achievable goal. If you want cheap on a global "nutrition-crisis" level, $0.30-$2 is the goal. I've hear soylent mentioned in that context too.

It's only "cheap" when compared to eating out which seems like a very disingenuous comparison.

I'm not dismissing soylent. I'd be interested in trying it. But, calling it cheap is crazy.

<comment><USER9> I spend more than $10/day on lunch alone. Without eating out.

"Cheap" varies greatly by location, and expectation, and how much time you're willing to put into cutting cost. And if you're considering Soylent, presumably spending lots of time planning out your meal is probably not high on your list of desirable activities (I could probably easily cut my lunch cost, but I value the time it'd take at more than my potential savings)..

<comment><USER8> Sure.

$100 is a lot less than some other people spend on lunch. Bench pressing 100kg is easy for some people. I wouldn't call it light. When you say something is "cheap" it's always relative.

But, there is within the bounds of regular conversation there are some assumptions you make about things. If you say this jar of powdered chocolate beverage is cheap, I will assume you mean relative to coffee, tea or something else I'm likely to make at home and not relative to a barrister coffee or a martini in bar.

Here I think the logical comparison is other powdered foods (slim fast, protein shakes, weight gainers, etc) or grocery shopping.

<comment><USER9> > Here I think the logical comparison is other powdered foods (slim fast, > protein shakes, weight gainers, etc) or grocery shopping.

Then, let me repeat myself: I spend $10/day on lunch based on _grocery shopping_. Easily.

There are certainly many parts of the world where $10/day for Soylent would not be competitive at all. And it certainly would be less competitive for people who value their time low enough to spend time keeping the cost down (I could probably cut 1/3 of my lunch bill by going to the cheaper grocery store 5-10 minutes away rather than the one downstairs from the office; and I could cut quite a bit off the bill by spending time finding the cheapest lunch meat, and the cheapest bread etc., but I won't).

But the point remains, that while $10/day may sound expensive, in many locations it is not, and even less so when comparing with "shopping as quickly as possible" vs. bargain hunting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm bothered by the amount of maltodextrin. (Among other things. But this jumps out at me.) Assuming this is correct:

[http://blog.soylent.me/post/68180382810/soylent-1-0-macronut...](http://blog.soylent.me/post/68180382810/soylent-1-0-macronutrient- overview)

That's a lot. As you can see it's the #1 ingredient in Soylent:

[http://blog.soylent.me/post/74770956256/soylent-1-0-final- nu...](http://blog.soylent.me/post/74770956256/soylent-1-0-final-nutrition)

They claim that the overall glycemic index (with fiber, etc.) is "rather low", but I can't find fasting vs. postprandial glucose readings that would substantiate this. By itself, maltodextrin has a rather _high_ GI. I do see that Rhinehart posted about this concern a while back:

[http://discourse.soylent.me/t/effects-of-soylent-on- diabetic...](http://discourse.soylent.me/t/effects-of-soylent-on- diabetics/4894)

...but does anyone have more recent info? Without more data, diabetics and prediabetics should best avoid this for now.

edit: A clarification - blood glucose testing won't actually tell you the product's GI, of course. And the important number to look at is glycemic _load_ , but that is easy to calculate given GI. The Soylent folks have not yet shared the GI afaik. (They would need to send it to a lab for testing.) Diabetics should already be monitoring their glucose levels anyway, so I assume they will figure out pretty quickly if this stuff spikes their blood sugar. It's not something you would want to replace all your meals with if that is the case!

Whether or not you are diabetic, it would be a good idea to go to your doctor and get complete bloodwork done before you start using this if you are planning to drink the stuff on a daily basis and _especially_ if you replace the majority of your meals. Get tested for the sort of things they check when you get a physical, but within a few months leading up to the point you start Soylenting. Test again 6-12 months after you start and compare the numbers, then kindly make a spreadsheet or something and share your results.

<comment><USER11> I've heard that they had no nutritionists onboard...

<comment><USER12> False: perhaps they had no accredited nutritionists. The founder has claimed to have read several texts.

<comment><USER13> Sorry but non-accredited nutritionists don't count as nutritionists.

<comment><USER14> They do. It's like art. The protected term is dietitian.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> That's a great writeup.

I can't wait to try mine once it arrives!

I almost forgot about the project and basically just wrote it off as $65 down the drain when they surprisingly emailed me earlier this week saying it had been shipped out.

Funny how the $65 still ends up going down the drain one way or another when you spend it on edible products.

I am curious about their project from a legal standpoint.

I live in another country and basically just clicked through some acceptance forms and sent them the money what seems like over a year ago now.

What happens to the soylent company if I die after ingesting it for a week or a month straight? Even if it wasn't what actually killed me?

On another note... after having done some research into making my dog's food... isn't soylent basically just dog food for humans? They take all the right amounts of industrial grade vitamins, mix it together with a substrate, and bake it into kibble bits.

Is soylent just kibble without the baking?

<comment><USER16> It's more like a meal replacement shake than dog food. It's very much like Ensure or Jevity or whatever. All of those do the same basic thing of trying to cover basic nutritional requirements.

The big difference is the marketing. Most of those products assumed you were either unable to eat or trying to lose weight. Soylent is roughly the same product but marketed to people who aren't interested in eating.

<comment><USER17> I think there's a significant difference in that Ensure and Jevity aren't meant to be sustainable as a long term food source, and don't optimize for cost per meal.

<comment><USER18> There must be some long term solution that exists already.

Think about people in comas, people who have parts of their jaw removed due to various oral and throat cancers.

If they can get the price down I'd probably try it too. Can't be worse than a protein shake as a post-workout supplement.

<comment><USER19> [http://www.amazon.com/s/?&field- keywords=tube+feeding+formul...](http://www.amazon.com/s/?&field- keywords=tube+feeding+formula)

It's not exactly expensive, not that I'd recommend trying it.

<comment><USER15> Yea really, you want to live off of an IV drip and never move?

Go for it, you will probably survive. Just not experiencing a very fulfilling life.

<comment><USER20> Well, if you have an Oculus Rift, you can jack into the Matrix.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> How is Soylent any different than mass gainer products or protein+carbs supplements like muscle milk?

Yeah I know, it cost 5 times more, taste worse and gives you tons of gas.

So why should I buy it over well known products?

<comment><USER22> You can't live off those products alone, you would miss out on important nutrients. AFAIK Soylent is a food replacement.

<comment><USER21> Take vitamins, take fish oil and you'll be fine. You can't live on just Soylent either. (Unless you chained up in dark room with Soylent as the only food available)

<comment><USER23> How do you know you can't live on just Soylent? Their CEO has been doing it for months.

<comment><USER24> All we know is that this one guy has survived on it for months. How will his health be after 5 years? 10 years? Both if he stops now and if he continues. Nobody knows.

And that assumes that everyone is the same as this guy.

<comment><USER25> Yes, nobody knows, that's why it's interesting to see instead of prematurely declare it impossible.

<comment><USER26> "Nobody knows" and "interesting to see" are very different to the claims made by Soylent:

 _" You can finally join the easy, healthy, and affordable future of nutrition."_

 _" What if you never had to worry about food again?"_

 _" For anyone that struggles with allergies, heartburn, acid reflux or digestion, has trouble controlling weight or cholesterol, or simply doesn't have the means to eat well, soylent is for you."_ (this one is clearly making medical claims and I am amazed that Soylent avoided regulators)

 _" Soylent frees you from the time and money spent shopping, cooking and cleaning, puts you in excellent health,"_

 _" there is much evidence that it is considerably healthier than a typical diet."_

People can do what they like with their bodies but the Soylent founders were shady by making these nonsense claims during fundraising.

<comment><USER25> Sure, but ceasarby didn't raise issues about Soylent's claims, s/he wrote "You can't live on just Soylent either.", and that's the post being replied to.

<comment><USER26> I don't understand.

You claim that Soylent is a fun experiment. Soylent don't. Soylent claim that you can replace all your food with this forever.

When someone says "you can't live off Soylent" and someone replies that it's a fun experiment letting people know the lies and misrepresentations from the producers of Soylent is a valid response. Soylent is not being marketed as an experimental product woth some risk. Soylent is being marketed as a finished product that has health benefits.

<comment><USER25> I do understand. That just wasn't what was under discussion here. The back- and-forth was about the possibility of living on Soylent-the-product, not about the claims of the company.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I'm into reef tanks. Its incredible difficult to mimic sea water conditions. A lot of people have great results for years but there system can still collapse within days. A synthetic alternative was started called the DSR method improving a lot but is still fragile.

To me this shows that nature is ofter more complex than we think. Soylent might include all product a body needs but what about chewing for example.

<comment><USER8> That's a good point, but I think you should take the "only soylent" idea with a grain of salt. I think it's more of a mechanical rabbit goal than a real one. Something to focus the product developers and the marketing. In real use, I expect this will replace some portion of what people eat.

<comment><USER28> That would be fine as an internal or pie-in-the-sky goal, but by making these claims they are exposing their customers to health risk and themselves to legal risk. There are hundreds of MRPs on the market, and many of them have more thought put into their formulations than Soylent, but none of them make the claim that you should or could live soley off the one product for any extended period of time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER29> Cooking is enjoyable (even if I suck at it) and eating together with others is an important social ritual.

Soylent takes all the enjoyment and the little bits of social interaction still present in our lives out and replaces them with 'fueling up', a hyper- optimized model for an already stressed to the hilt working life.

But that's why slowing down a bit is actually good. Take your time to cook, chew your food and talk with your fellow human beings. Share your meals, every day.

Sure, preparing and cooking food takes time. But you know, that's actually a good thing and I'm saying that as someone that would probably spend a lot more time still on the computer if cooking and sharing the cooked food would not be an important part of my daily schedule. And I'll _never_ give that up. So I guess soylent isn't for me. I prefer my foods to be fresh and tasty, and I think I can do that for roughly the same amount of money that this goop costs.

Variation is good, social interaction is good, I can't see the point in soylent, not to mention the interesting question of what will happen long term healthwise if you switch to a mono-cultural product like this for any significant fraction of your diet.

Best of luck to those that are going down this route, meanwhile I'll spend some time with my friends and family with salads, sandwiches, pastas and other foods over here.

<comment><USER25> HN takes away all the enjoyment and the little bits of direct social interaction still present in our lives and replaces them with text-only messages, which lacks the fundamental attributes of physical presence, and I'll never give that up, so I guess HN isn't for me.

Best of luck to those that are going down the route of online discussions, meanwhile I'll spend some time with real people and not just bits.

<comment><USER29> That analogy really does not hold water.

HN allows you to interact with hundreds of people from all over the globe, something that you could not do in real life, it would be a physical impossibility.

On top of that it does not replace you normal day-to-day interaction with others, nor does it aim to do so, it simply complements it.

Soylent does not do anything regular food does not already do except (probably) save some time, replaces enjoyment of food (taste, smell) and good company with slurping sludge and aims to replace.

Nice try though.

<comment><USER25> The company may aim to replace all their users' meals with Soylent, but the user can have different aims, which can just be to replace the occasional meal that you had to rush, even if that's just once a month. Even the creator still eats normal meals with friends and family.

Besides, it only replaces company if the only thing you can do accompanied is eat. Otherwise, it might actually save you time to do other social activities, instead of having to drive home and spend 90 minutes preparing and eating a meal.

It's perfectly reasonable to have reservations about Soylent, but your comment just sounds like a "damn kids with your video games, get off my lawn".

<comment><USER29> > It's perfectly reasonable to have reservations about Soylent, but your > comment just sounds like a "damn kids with your video games, get off my > lawn".

Actually, your commented tried to ridicule, whereas mine was made in good faith and would have likely been exactly identical if I'd written it at 25 instead of nearly 50. In fact, back then I probably needed the health and social aspects of food and company more than I do today (and I was well aware of it).

I simply laid out my reasons for definitely not jumping on this bandwagon, and I don't have any dog in the race financially or otherwise.

So, what's your motivation for attacking anybody that dares to raise doubt about the product, or that maybe simply disagrees with their philosophy with such energy?

9 comments in one thread is a bit much.

<comment><USER25> I don't know your age, nor do I care. Your comment (and others here) just strikes me as unimaginative and slightly self-aggrandizing; pontification on the value of shared meals and slowing down makes for boring reading. It's fine that you (and I don't mean just you) don't have an interest in Soylent, but I don't have an interest in getting a car, and yet I don't go around posting on Tesla threads about the value of walking and the dangers of cars.

Do you know the Onion's story of the man who mentions he has no TV[1]? That's how those posts sound to me.

I don't have a horse in this race, I'm not in any way associated with Soylent, nor do I even plan to buy a pack. I don't trust it as a meal replacement, and I think their claims are overreaching. I have no problem with concrete criticism, and you don't see me replying to ("attacking", as you put it) people raising valid questions, just those posting just to tell us how much they don't need it and those writing unprovable claims.

And they may be 9 posts (although they were only 8 before this post), but most are back-and-forth with people that replied to me.

[1] [http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-constantly- mention...](http://www.theonion.com/articles/area-man-constantly-mentioning- he-doesnt-own-a-tel,429/)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Soylent is a weird and interesting case.

I feel like 99 out of 100 times an identical product gets produced by a supplements company and no one notices. Somehow, this one seems to have really really interested (or really really pissed off) people.

One possible narrative is "blandness is a virtue". All the pictures are bland beige stuff in a plastic jug. The people drinking it look normal, not athletic or exceptionally pretty. Their expressions are neutral.

The 'water of food' is, I suppose, a compelling idea.

<comment><USER30> Soylent's rise in popularity reminds me a bit of Lifelock. The CEO comes out and makes very ambitious claims. In Lifelock's case, that was the whole, "here's my SSN." [0] For Soylent, it's the CEO living off just that for months on end [1]. These types of sales pitches continue for months until the claims prove false and then the product marketing is changed. Maybe Soylent is different, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

[0] [http://www.wired.com/2010/05/lifelock-identity- theft/](http://www.wired.com/2010/05/lifelock-identity-theft/) [1] [http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and- drink/could...](http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/could- soylent-replace-food-the-drink-that-claims-to-contain-all-the-nutrients-the- body-needs-9334154.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I have to admit that when I first heard of this product I thought it was ridiculous and would never take off.

Considering it's now been officially launched, I have to say "Impressive job Rob!" and will publicly eat my words.

</comment><comment><USER32> I don't think the point is whether Soylent will replace food entirely (even though the creator thinks so) or it will 'undermine and erode the food traditions of developing cultures'. Rather to me it seems to be the commodification of (absolute) nutrition which has never been done before. Much like the japanese who have commodified sex and relationships (see cuddle cafes, boyfriends for hire), people can now pay just for complete nutrition without having to buy food, and would do so if the cost saving to them is more valuable to them than the enjoyment derived from the meal.

Obviously this is circumstantial but I can see it being a hit for entrepreneurs or the generic yuppie who has no time for a long lunch/needs to save for that mortgage.

<comment><USER20> Oh yeah, the Japanese invented prostitution.

Aren't they are weird?

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> Although I am not a huge fan of this, I believe that eventually we will end up using this. It might take 5 - 10 years but soylent-type will be used in our daily life. Today with our busy life's cooking something simple takes an hour to complete. Soylent is ready to go in an instant.

Although it will not completely eradicate normal food, as eating is as well a bonding. Here at least in Cyprus, we will have a weekly sit down on Sunday, of 10-20 if not more of family and relatives. This is very important time.

It will take years for population to actually adjust to the idea of drinking there food.

On the plus site, this will eventually be used by astronauts I believe and Mars colonization plans.

<comment><USER34> > Today with our busy life's cooking something simple takes an hour to > complete. Soylent is ready to go in an instant.

How slow do you have to be at cooking for something simple to take you an hour of your time?

I can prepare a slow-cooked stew in well under 15 minutes, head out for the day and come back to a house that smells wonderful and 5-10 meals worth of food. It won't cost me 50-100 dollars either.

<comment><USER35> So you can peel for 5-10 meals worth of vegetables AND cook it all in under 15 minutes (slow cook it at that)? Well, you must have found a way to bend spacetime or something. I understand one hour is very long, but no need to go overboard in the other direction either.

<comment><USER36> I think it was the preparation time, not the cooking time. You can prepare a vegetable soup from raw vegetables in less than 15 minutes. With some training you can do that in 5 minutes. You'll need an extra 30 minutes simmering though but no more work after preparation unless you want it mixed. You really can't overcook a vegetable soup. You can even keep it a couple of days in the pan without it getting sour. It's a hassle free meal.

But you are right, the truth lies between 15 minutes and an hour.

<comment><USER34> Yeah that's prep time, but it really is just 15 minutes. No simmering, just peel and chuck in some veg & spices and a joint of meat.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> You can see this as a kind of progression of the supplement industry, one where the delivery stands a better chance of matching the promise: For example, Coca-Cola and Milo both marketed themselves as a form of "medicine" or "health food" early on, and then only later reworked their image as they became more evidently unhealthful to the public. And bodybuilding supplements have their own extremely checkered history[0]. Over time the categories of supplements with actual nutritional value have stuck it out in the market as they've proven themselves.

So I see Soylent as another step forward - the necessary food processing to make these kinds of sophisticated supplement blends has gotten cheaper and more widely available with time, enabling more experiments.

So the news for the future looks promising. It'll probably get cheaper. The nutritional value is likely to go upwards in future versions as more data is uncovered. And if it shows signs of success then there will be competing alternatives, for sure.

[0] [http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/sex_news_sports_...](http://www.t-nation.com/free_online_article/sex_news_sports_funny_grok/the_history_of_the_supplement_industry_part_i)

<comment><USER38> Coca-cola was originally a medicine in the same way the medical marijuana is today though. The "Coca" in "Coca-cola" referred to the cocaine that was in it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER39> And so begins the biggest experiment in human nutrition since the Dutch Famine of 1944.

<comment><USER29> You must be unaware of the famines raging in 2014 and just about any year before that in other parts of the world. The Dutch certainly had a hard time of it in '44 (my grandmother's diary is amazing reading) but it does not in any way compare to some of the stuff going on TODAY and on a MUCH larger scale.

<comment><USER40> The interesting factor of the Dutch famine in 1944 was that it occurred in one region of a fairly isotropic 'developed' country, in a society where masses of scientific and psychological measurements could be conducted for decades afterwards. These could be compared with the same metrics for people in the unaffected regions.

That's not something that occurs after most famines, in which the survivors are generally anonymous.

<comment><USER29> Right, that's the relevant difference. Thank you for the explanation. The 'cohort' being that isolated in space and time must have helped. I can't see how soylent green users will be subjecting themselves to the same kind of analysis but that may be another example of my ignorance.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Is there any concern over the use of rice protein vs whey or another complete protein?

My understanding is that rice protein comes up short with the amount of Lysine present. Not sure if Lysine shows up in other ingredients at high enough levels to compensate.

[http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/cereal-grains-and- pasta/...](http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/cereal-grains-and-pasta/5709/2)

<comment><USER42> Maybe they are planning to make it Vegetarian/Vegan.

I myself am allergic to Milk Protein. So drinking anything with whey powder or similar is impossible for me.

<comment><USER41> There was an article a couple weeks back that mentioned they were looking into Spirulina as a protein source. It was mentioned as part of long term sustainability and bringing down the cost per meal. So providing a vegetarian/vegan formula may be part of their long term goal.

Though, still concerned about protein completeness in the current formula.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Looking at the nutritional facts, this looks like a great substitute for off the counter mass-gainer shakes. I'm really into weight lifting but sometimes struggle finding the time to eat meals while at work and still hit my daily caloric surplus.

</comment><comment><USER44> To alleviate poverty, Governance must be decentralized for 1,350,000,000 people in India. Each state In India should have separate currency.

</comment><comment><USER45> The first bite it with the eye, and Soylent looks like a cat vomit smoothie.

</comment><comment><USER46> I wouldn't touch this with a 10 foot pole. Sad how we are so brainwashed to just do maths on nutritional intake. ever heard of vital energy in food?

<comment><USER47> I'd take mathematics over homeopathic nonsense.

<comment><USER46> well, its sad how people downvote things they don't understand.. but I'd expect that in hackernews.

Also, what I said as absolutely nothing to do with homeopathy.. shows how clueless that comment was.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Lots of people are comparing it to meal-replacement alternatives, but I'm unimpressed with how it compares to much more mundane foods, like a 7-11 burrito that has a very similar nutritional profile, retails for $1.69 in single quantities, and is much easier to prepare (2 minutes, no dish washing, no need to refrigerate for settling)

[http://www.nutritionix.com/7-11/7-select-burritos-beef- bean-...](http://www.nutritionix.com/7-11/7-select-burritos-beef-bean-green- chile-burrito-10-oz)

<comment><USER49> I'm very much not what you might call "pro-Soylent", but even I think that calling its nutritional profile "similar" to that a convenience store burrito is ludicrous.

</comment></comment><comment><USER50> India should buy this company or do something very similar. I mean the country India, the government. This could be a big step towards solving hunger. We should look for optimizing mass production. And it reduces cost of wood or gas, distribution and packaging wastage, spoilt food and the like.

To take my country's example, this should just be free. If people are hungry, get our desi version of solyent. Nobody is forced to have it, yet they have better nutrition than anyone else right now including the rich people eating unhealthy fried stuff.

<comment><USER51> If the government of Indian bought it and then managed it like the existing ration system that would not necessarily actually improve the lives of the intended beneficiaries.

<comment><USER50> Sure. I am not disagreeing that management needs to improve.

What I'm saying is that the future of rationing should be this, not the current system. The current system does not ensure nutritional value and there are other expenses involved in preparing a meal. As a country of 1.2B the basic meal (a packet of desi-solyent or whatever) should be free.

This of course applies to all countries and all such public distribution systems. I just used India for an example.</comment></comment></comment>


Volkswagen Emissions Investigation Zeroes in on Two Engineers - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/articles/vw-emissions-probe-zeroes-in-on-two-engineers-1444011602 <comment><USER2> The rest of the commenters are quick to dismiss this article as presenting scapegoats, but I'm very keen to see more in-depth investigation about how this was orchestrated.

There are a lot of different ways that this type of cheating can develop over time, and simply saying "lots of people knew must have known about this" isn't very satisfying to me.

There are plenty of ways that upper management can stay in the dark. In the case of Deepwater Horizon, BP didn't make the decisions that lead to the blowout, but created excessive pressure for cost-cutting. In the case of Barings Bank, the managers were genuinely unaware of the rogue trader's fraud, but allowed him to bypass internal controls.

There are important lessons that will come out of the VW case and I'm very interested to learn them. The dismissiveness of the comments here is really disappointing, on the other hand.

<comment><USER3> It seems like the majority of people saying these are scapegoats didn't read the article that closely. It clearly says these two engineers were top aides to the former CEO.

Regulator's aren't stupid enough to be fooled by a couple of junior engineers being offered up as a sacrifice. They'll definitely go after the highest-level people they can get.

<comment><USER4> A top aide to the CEO sounds like exactly the kind of person who would be the fall guy in a scandal like this. Important enough for the regulators to be happy, but not someone who has actual power in the company.

<comment><USER5> The ceo has already fallen on his sword at volkswagon

<comment><USER6> Not really. In a case like this people will likely go to jail, so resigning isn't a big deal.

<comment><USER7> * resigning with a 30 million payout

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> "Engineers" in this context meaning "Heads of engineering departments". These guys aren't individual contributor engineers.

</comment><comment><USER9> > in August 2007,[..] It rebranded the company's diesel engine TDI—for > turbocharged direct injection.

Huh? VW's diesel engines had been TDIs for well over a decade at that time, for example my 1996 Golf was a TDI. The TDIs are awesome engines. I previously had a gasoline engine with the same horsepower rating, but the TDI was better in every way: unkillably high torque at low RPMs (I could go from a standing start to 4th gear without ever pushing the gas pedal), great acceleration at high speeds (at 160 km/h, hit the pedal and it _goes_ , whereas with the gasoline engine it was hit the pedal and ... wait ... wait ... still trying to accelerate ... wait ). And of course far, far better gas mileage.

<comment> semi-extrinsic The reason people perceive diesels to be better is that they have much flatter torque vs RPM curves, so any schmuck can make them accelerate without shifting to the correct gear. If diesel engines gave better performance at the same amount of horsepowers, and used less fuel, why don't we see diesel engines used in horsepower-limited racing car classes? Why has Ferrari and Lamborghini not ever offered a single diesel engine?

<comment><USER9> "The Audi R10 TDI, usually abbreviated to R10, is a racing car from the German car manufacturer Audi. The car is a classic at Le Mans, winning every year since its introduction until it was replaced by the R15. [..] It was the first diesel-powered car to win either of those events. "

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audi_R10_TDI](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audi_R10_TDI)

<comment> semi-extrinsic The LMP1 class is not restricted by horsepower, which is what I said. Nascar or WRC would be examples of classes with horsepower limits.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> _" For more than a year, Volkswagen executives told the Environmental Protection Agency that discrepancies between the formal air-quality tests on its diesel cars and the much higher pollution levels out on the road were the result of technical issues, not a deliberate attempt to deceive Washington officials."_

[http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/Volkswagen-...](http://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/Volkswagen- denied-deception-to-EPA-for-nearly-a-6520476.php)

So VW is telling us that this year of lying to the EPA was done _completely by these two engineering managers_ and nobody else in the VW executive staff?

<comment><USER11> Where did they say that? They are suspending people left and right and there are investigations ongoing against Winterkorn.nright now there has nothing final been said yet.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> I had an interesting conversation with a co-worker today, about why unit-test coverage is always bad unless enforced.

I decided that it's because even though my boss and myself will have good intentions, we can both mutually decide (without ever discussing it) that the tests should slide - I will try to meet his deadline, he won't check too hard.

Unless there are credible _institutions_ that take that decision away from us (a build bot that refuses to deploy untested code for example) we will slip towards worse.

Management does not need to apply pressure towards misbehaviour - they simply have to not constantly strive for best behaviour. Our expectations fill in the rest.

As such, we are unlikely ever to find an email from the board saying "Hans, frig the tests next week, we can't be arsed to invest in catalytic converters", but the organisation decided that anyway.

I think it's to do with lack of candour - see the Pixar book out recently

<comment><USER13> This is not on the same league. Your unit-test coverage example is closer to the Toyota incident. Surely, it was a catastrophe, and lives were indeed lost, but no one actively inserted a "speed up when driver hits the breaks" feature into the firmware.

A closer analogy to the VW case is if the build bot actually did exist, but you wrote some nefarious unit test that just spit out all OK results regardless of what the exercised code did, so that you were allowed to merge whatever crap your team produce, as long as it actually compile.

If that is the case, we can discuss different possible assignations of responsibility, but you cannot claim that some good intentioned people just slide into misbehavior due to not paying enough attention. Someone had to be aware they were actively cheating!

<comment><USER12> But my unit tests do do that ;-)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> It will be interesting to see if the investigators manage to obtain an email chain which will show where the pressure to do this came from - from day 1 I've felt it was unlikely that this was an isolated incident, or one which management weren't tacitly aware of, and I would be very surprised if it doesn't turn out that we find out where it all came from - my bet is that it was pressure from above that led to it, but that's just a hunch - it may be that management didn't know what was going on, and the engineers took it on themselves to cheat. But either way, I don't think we're near the bottom of this yet.

<comment><USER15> Proof is in the version control commits.

</comment></comment><comment><USER16> Scapegoats, in other words. People don't do this on their own.

<comment><USER17> These guys were heads of the teams of other engineers that constructed the software.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> I can see it already: "[Car manufacturer]'s Self Driving Car Crash Investigation Zeroes in on Two Engineers."

</comment><comment><USER19> It is outrageous to suggest that the blame lies with a handful of people and not a whole division of the company. I don't work in the automotive industry, but I do work as a design engineer in the semiconductor industry and for a mature product in a highly competitive industry, I can guarantee that the external test wasn't the only test that these cars were put though. When we release a chip external reviewers will run it thorough a handful of benchmarks, but we run far more tests internally because when you are building complex systems, not everything that you plan for happens, and you need an extreme level of detail to be able to understand and fix performance problems. Literally hundreds of engineers will participate in performing these measurements, and most of them, along with the whole management tree up to the CEO (especially for an important consumer facing product), will participate in interpreting them. Not doing this means getting left in the dust by your competitors. There is no way that only a small number of people knew about this. Two is laughable, people here with software engineering backgrounds should be highly skeptical that any piece of software in a product with as many users as a car was only examined by two people. The only explanation is that a large number of engineers and managers knew about this and did nothing.

<comment><USER20> One of the people named is Audi's chief engineer, and they're both described as "being in charge of R&D" at VW. So I would presume they're pretty high up the food chain, not the low-level guys who actually wrote the if: test then: cheat bits.

<comment><USER19> Still I can't believe that so many people must have known about this and just let it happen. Sad. This is a tech oriented forum and I hope some of the engineers reading this would act differently in a similar situation.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> In my opinion, this is going to get far worse for VW. People bought cars expecting the stated fuel economy - if they submit their cars to the recall, there's likely to be a class-action suit aiming to recoup enough cost to pay for the difference in fuel costs over the life of the car.

Cars that don't go through the recall process will continue to pollute at a greater rate and will earn the ire of the EPA (here in the US).

It's going to cost them a huge amount of money to satisfy both the EPA and their customers.

<comment><USER22> It's going to get worse, but not for the reason you state. Changing car performance (acceleration profile, etc.) for the worse is a necessary outcome of fixing this issue. That's why people will sue.

<comment><USER21> You're right - I was assuming the pollution controls would only result in a lower fuel economy. On the other hand, degrading the car's performance to improve emissions is the opposite end of the spectrum. Since fuel economy versus performance provides an entire spectrum of tuning options, it will be interesting to see exactly which trade-offs they make in the ECM's code.

<comment><USER23> It seems premature to assume they can fix the problem with code changes alone. If that's the case, the performance drop will likely be beyond acceptable. The required changes could make the vehicles physically unsafe to be on the road (think, being unable to accelerate out of danger's way because now you need 60 seconds to go from 0-50 km/h). If the option for a compromise between performance and regulatory requirements is already possible with the current hardware, wouldn't the cars likely have already shipped as such?

It seems much more likely that there will be parts replacement involved, and we may soon discover that the entire engine must be swapped out. This is unlikely to be feasible for cost, but bricking cars to intolerable driving conditions is also not enough. It's going to be really interesting to see how this develops. Done properly, this would probably be the end of VW. So I'm sure we'll see some half-assed solution that doesn't work for the consumer, but lets the company survive for a few more years until they finally collapse from consumers taking their future business elsewhere.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> wasn't the last Great Recession simply due to some poor schmucks making mistakes while calculating risk estimates for bonds ratings?

</comment><comment><USER25> glad they found the culprits. I was absolutely certain it would be renegade engineers and the higher level up (politically secured allies) have nothing to do with it. Torches and pitchforks everyone.

The amount of restraint I have to exercise as an ex-consultant who made his living working for the likes of Audi, VW & Siemens nobody here can possibly comprehend.

<comment><USER13> Did you seriously said the word "renegade"?

Even if their superiors did honestly not know that they were loading fraud- ware in the vehicles, this is most likely the result of systemic social dynamics and perverse incentives. Mutually exclusive goals get set with no regard to the laws of physics or reason. Everyone who dares mention this self selects outside of the management hierarchy, so the whole chain of command becomes an echo chamber of overconfidence.

Then, at the end of the day, something has to give. It was the emission control testing in this case. It could have been much worse.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Do I miss that in the article, or is it really not stated from where the information that the investigation is focusing on them is coming? People "familiar with the matter" as only source? It would be a pretty bold (and irresponsible) move from a criminal investigation to leak suspects to the press that early, given that this will destroy their career. Stuff likes that needs prove or very very strong hints pointing at them, enough to start a trial, and there is no word about that.

I understand everyone who thinks that this looks like presenting scapegoats. This stinks. The whole article shouldn't have been published like that, and we should not upvote it.

</comment><comment><USER27> I'm sure these engineers weren't acting on their own here.

<comment><USER28> Well, seeing how one is titled the "Chief Engineer" I wouldn't be too surprised that he represents an entire department (or many) and is the last stop before board of directors.

<comment><USER29> To me, having been in the auto industry as a peon, Chief Engineer sounds like a person with a Junior Middle Manager pay level without officially having any direct reports.

<comment><USER30> That's odd, I work in an auto company, our chief engineer is the head of all engieering, he reports to the GM, who reports to the board of directors.

Another odd thing though, is that VW apparently puts their compliance responsibilities under engineering management. Our compliance department, which I work in, is an independent department. That has its own difficulties with being less integrated with development, but we don't have any competing goals.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> These scapegoats are old dudes; they might really be the right scapegoats (as opposed to the a couple of junior or mid-level coders, one might expect).

</comment><comment><USER32> > Both men developed an international reputation as engineers, said Ferdinand > Dudenhöffer head of the Center of Automotive Research at the University of > Duisburg-Essen.

> "It will be difficult for Volkswagen to replace them," he said.

Genuinely legendary engineers, _and_ allegedly with the balls to cheat (but not quite the balls to stand on principle). It will indeed be hard to find that combination among the remaining legends.

</comment><comment><USER33> Why didn't this same link I posted earlier get picked up when peterthomas submitted it? I think they are the same? Seems like HN had a glitch? [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10330573](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10330573)

</comment><comment><USER34> Strangely, nobody talks about the investors... Did they command such a cheat ? After all, the top engineers are already 2 levels deep in the management (top level being investor, then CEO, then tehe engineers) so they're relatively low enough to be scapegoat...

</comment><comment><USER35> "regulators are considering steps to tighten emissions standards for diesel engines"? - interesting that the old emissions standards were (one presumes) absolutely fine, until somebody turns out to have been cheating.

<comment><USER36> I think you've got to look at this as a process of gradual refinement in which both government and industry participate. The government wants to achieve its overall objectives of reducing emissions over a long period of time (decades); it knows that if it just set the emissions targets at the target on day zero the entire industry would fail to meet them and the industry would collapse. So the regulations have to be set with some idea of what is currently achievable or within reach of the industry given an economically feasible amount of investment.

So the aim of the regulation is to push the industry in the direction you want them to go at a rate which gets everyone to the destination without destroying the industry. And every so often the regulations need to be tightened to keep the development process moving forward.

<comment><USER37> ...at the expense of the consumer who can't get a decently priced compact pickup (among other examples)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> Some of these comments seem to be proof that not everyone commenting on here reads the articles before giving their views.

</comment><comment><USER39> surely management at fault here for undue pressure? NASA / Morton Thiokol

</comment><comment><USER40> I assume they are the scapegoats.

<comment><USER25> of course your "assumption" is right.

"head of" is a low level (entry-level) mgmt position in these places. No idea why anyone would down-vote you.

<comment><USER41> This is HN, remember. Engineers are demigods here, freshly sprung from Athena's head herself, but one step removed from Zeus.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER42> It's going to be ridiculous that people will go to jail for this and not any of the people responsible for the subprime mortgages.

<comment><USER43> So, I've been wondering about this. Who, exactly, would you want to see in jail for "subprime mortgages" and on what charge?

I hear people say the general statement a lot, but I'm not sure who specifically they're talking about.

<comment><USER44> Obviously we need to jail all of the people who fraudulently accepted loans they knew they couldn't pay back. Obviously.</comment></comment></comment>


Researchers publish Snapchat code allowing phone number matching - <AUTHOR> http://www.zdnet.com/researchers-publish-snapchat-code-allowing-phone-number-matching-after-exploit-disclosures-ignored-7000024629/ <comment><USER2> I'm one of the authors of Snapchat FS [1]. In order to build this, my coauthor Chad and I had to reverse engineer their API, which included decompiling the Android APK and snooping around for the call site of util encrypt.

While a lot of the security problems they have could indeed be fixed, I think it's worth noting a couple things.

* The Snapchat API is _fundamentally_ insecurable as it exists today. The problem is not that Snapchat could have secured their API against unauthorized access and simply failed to do so, it's that their API cannot possibly be secured, AND they happened to make some bad mistakes along the way. Even a serious security team would have been unable to lock everything down. They might have locked some of these issues down, but they would not have gotten all of them.

* So, while I sympathize with the feeling that Snapchat is anti-OSS and anti-hacker, realistically, I also sympathize with Snapchat's position. They don't have that many options. What are they going to do? Their public position -- i.e., that you should not break their TOS -- does not strike me as especially unreasonable considering that investing millions into security will still not give them a bulletproof solution.

* Also worth noting is that Snapchat does not unilaterally ignore security inquiries, or at least, they did not ignore me. I emailed them personally and the response I got (from a high-level employee) was warm and encouraging. I did not get the cold shoulder. In fact, I found our interactions quite pleasant, and it made me want to help them lock things down.

Ultimately I think it's easy to write off the team as just a bunch of incompetent fools, but let's be realistic here: _it 's easier to break things than make them provably unbreakable_.

Again, yes they've made some bad mistakes, but posturing about breaking a system that cannot be secured is perhaps not the best use of Gibson's obvious talent. The same also goes for the many other security researchers who've audited the API.

[1] [https://github.com/hausdorff/snapchat- fs](https://github.com/hausdorff/snapchat-fs)

<comment><USER3> Hi, I'm one of the authors of the above release [1], and the exploit we primarily talked about (find_friends) isn't really an issue with the protocol as a whole.

We understand the need to support legacy clients, but Snapchat could easily limit the damage this exploit could do.

It wouldn't be that hard for them to make the best of what they have, by auditing all the code that typically has these exploits, and from that point onwards, also auditing riskier areas in the code base periodically.

But yeah, we have seen an improvement in some of the Snapchat client code, which indicates there are probably some bright new developers that have just joined the team. We just find it pretty bad that in this time, we haven't seen attempts (on our end, server side may be different) to secure the protocol.

Also regarding communication, we haven't heard a word from Snapchat in 4 months, neither has the reporter of this story, Violet Blue. If any of the guys from Snapchat are reading this (or you can pass on a message), tell them they're free to message us at email@example.com.

We're pretty easy to contact. [1]: [http://gibsonsec.org/snapchat/fulldisclosure/](http://gibsonsec.org/snapchat/fulldisclosure/)

 __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __*

Just saw your edit, the purpose of this release wasn't to tell everyone we're the nth person to reverse engineer Snapchats protocol, but rather to bring attention to the particular vulnerabilities.

I can speak for the rest of our team, and we're pretty sick of Snapchats protocol, and this will most likely be our last release regarding it.

(Also I noticed newlines broke, kinda fixed that)

<comment><USER2> Yeah, I agree with pretty much everything you said. I too think they could do a lot of things better. Yes, they've been really really slow to fix known issues. I did not mean to denigrate your work, which seems solid. :)

I'm just saying, 9 months down the road, if they had the optimal version of their security protocol, someone could still break in and write a post that "audits" it, just like we get every couple of months on the HN frontpage. Everyone would laugh, again. Some people would know that it's as good as it gets, but most people would just be in it for the circle jerk. There's no win for them here. That's all I'm saying.

*

Also, seeing your edit responding to my edit, sorry, I sometimes post before I work everything out perfectly. This isn't really an indictment of you guys specifically. I think your work is great.

<comment><USER3> Thanks, and that's totally fine. I agree with you, Snapchats definitely flawed from the start, but as long as we get rid of gaping holes in their security such as the find_friends exploit, at least they're halfway there.

(OT, but you have a really cool project list btw :P)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I have been following with their API changes since it's major update in early 2013, and anyone could have exploited the phone lookup function easily, because everything is there in the open. I was surprised by how easy it was to decompile the Android app:

      public static boolean NEEDS_FUCKED_UP_NEXUS_422_SETTINGS()

      Timber.d("Looks like camprevs gon hide dis shit", new Object[0]);

There really is no way for the Snapchat team to completely prevent others from reversing their API. A client is the endpoint after all. In order to make things difficult for hackers, they could do the following: 1\. Implement a custom protocol over TCP/IP, kind of what Skype does. 2\. Obfuscate the hell out of it and everything else. 3\. Roll out new updates with both APIs. 4\. After a reasonable amount of time, break backwards-compatibility on server side.

<comment><USER3> Hahahaha, I don't think making it harder to reverse would be any better, it would probably motivate people even more (deobfuscation is too much fun and fairly easy!).

They should really just focus on improving what they have and pushing clients towards a safer protocol slowly.

Snaps being stolen will always happen, but I do like the approach Instagram took to preventing spammers (getInstagramString(), it stopped everyone until they adapted!).

<comment><USER4> Yep, but at least that would be fun, don't you agree?

I also wonder why didn't anybody set up a Snapchat bot yet: it could successfully impersonate multiple humans by forwarding snaps between pairs of unsuspecting users, gathering a lot of data that way.

<comment><USER5> Actually, I know of one set up by a friend: snaproulettebot. You send a snap, and it sends you a random one back later from another user. Being called "snaproulettebot" makes it pretty obvious what it is, but you could do it in a more opaque way.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> And 4 Billions dollars was not enough...

</comment><comment><USER7> The user experience that has contributed to Snapchat's success is the ability to message with untrusted partner with constraints established by the central server and client. The biggest constraint is certain level of inconvenience in logging and redistributing the contents of the conversation.

Snapchat's business value could evaporate if clients that subvert the constraints on the user experience proliferated. The discussion seems to indicate that the technical barriers to this outcome are deeply inadequate. Snapchat looks like they are primarily going to use mechanisms to block the distribution channels of the Play Store and iTunes to ensure user experience integrity. This has the potential to fail catastrophically.

</comment><comment><USER8> In further news, DRM is _still_ mathematically impossible.

</comment><comment><USER9> So basically Snapchat app cant know what client is legit and wht client is not, so you could write your own snapchat client ?

<comment><USER10> this is pretty fundamentally true of clients in general... if the code is on my machine, i can modify it, end of story.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Hey Gibsonsecurity,

Just wondering about Snapchat's claim to have 70% users.

Could they have possibly run the names of users through a gender DB to get a rough percentage?

<comment><USER3> We thought about that, and it would be pretty misleading. If they did find out data that way, they should really tell people how inaccurate it can be.

<comment><USER12> Why not just take a random sample of 5000 users and look at their snaps to determine if they're male or female? You won't be exact but you'll know if it's 70% women instead of 50%.

<comment><USER3> Obvious privacy reasons that would probably get Snapchat sued, but otherwise, yes that would probably work.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> This changes nothing.</comment>


Ask HN: Investment Advice from Hacker News - <AUTHOR> Hello Everyone and Merry Christmas!
I have a feeling Hacker News will have some interesting thoughts on investment ideas over the next 5-10 years that are going to give good returns.
I would love to know your opinions on medium to long term investments, funds and companies expecting to outperforming the market and why you think this. I look forward to some interesting suggestions. I realise few people here are professional investors but I almost think it's better to get a more forward looking/technologists view of where we'll be. What are you investing in and why?
Finally and slightly tangentially it would be awesome if the HN community got to invest directly in YC companies; I'm sure there would a big demand from people here (even if it was only 1% or so) and it would make interesting relationships between the community and companies more possible.
Thanks and have a great new year! <comment><USER2> Not useful advice, but a reminder:

"Never invest more than you can afford to lose."</comment>


Visual Group Theory: What is a group? (2016) [video] - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwTQdOop-nU <comment><USER2> Group theory originated in a very visual and geometric ways studying the symmetries of various objects, before the modern definition of group was given. Many groups studied today are still geometrical in nature: the dihedral groups are the groups of symmetries of regular polygons, the symmetric groups are the groups of permutations of a set with N elements and so on and so forth.

After the notion of group was formalized (a set with an operation satisfying some axioms) it was natural to ask oneself what was the advantage of this apparently more general and abstract definition. Turns out (that's a theorem of Cayley) that every group is isomorphic to a subgroup of a symmetric group (that is a group of permutations on some set) so arguably we didn't get that much more generality while moving from the first geometric groups to the modern abstract ones!

<comment><USER3> Can't pass an opportunity to link Arnold's excellent _On teaching mathematics_ ([https://www.uni-muenster.de/Physik.TP/~munsteg/arnold.html](https://www.uni- muenster.de/Physik.TP/~munsteg/arnold.html)) for those who have not read it. As he states:

> What is a group? Algebraists teach that this is supposedly a set with two > operations that satisfy a load of easily-forgettable axioms. This definition > provokes a natural protest: why would any sensible person need such pairs of > operations? "Oh, curse this maths" \- concludes the student (who, possibly, > becomes the Minister for Science in the future).

> We get a totally different situation if we start off not with the group but > with the concept of a transformation (a one-to-one mapping of a set onto > itself) as it was historically. A collection of transformations of a set is > called a group if along with any two transformations it contains the result > of their consecutive application and an inverse transformation along with > every transformation.

> This is all the definition there is. The so-called "axioms" are in fact just > (obvious) properties of groups of transformations. What axiomatisators call > "abstract groups" are just groups of transformations of various sets > considered up to isomorphisms (which are one-to-one mappings preserving the > operations). As Cayley proved, there are no "more abstract" groups in the > world. So why do the algebraists keep on tormenting students with the > abstract definition?

<comment><USER4> > So why do the algebraists keep on tormenting students with the abstract > definition?

In my personal experience, the ability to extract the motivation and build up intuition is considered to be skill that the "students" have to develop for themselves and this is part of their learning process. Those that are not sufficiently successful will fail - and that is OK in such a system.

<comment><USER5> You'd prefer that a century of professional mathematicians of the past never have had their careers, since their way of thinking doesn't pass your bar of complexity?

<comment><USER4> Not my bar, personally I think this is a crap attitude but one that I experienced.

<comment><USER6> It should be noted that group theory, as far as i can see, is a rather new development and a century is not much in the evolution of didactic.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> This is so fantastic. Thank you so much.

I am downloading all of his channel right now to watch and I don't know how to thank you :)

</comment><comment><USER5> There are very few pictures and no animations, in this "Visual" Group Theory. It's almost all text slides.

<comment><AUTHOR> You might be interested in the project that comes with the book that this course is based on groupexplorer.sourceforge.net</comment></comment>


Unsolicited Advice for My Three Sons - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@rufybaby/unsolicited-advice-for-my-three-boys-in-no-particular-order-9f31c0394404#.rkquk3ire <comment><USER2> > When microwaving, hit 66 seconds, 99 seconds, or 2:22 rather than even > numbers. Why? Because 60 seconds is no more likely to be an appropriate > amount of time to heat a cup of tea than 55 or 66 seconds. They are all > arbitrary time periods. And you save a couple seconds. More important than > the time savings is the ability to think for yourself.

The amount of time this saves me over a lifetime, I probably just spent reading this.

<comment><USER3> It will probably save you around 1 hour every 5 years. XKCD did the math [https://xkcd.com/1205/](https://xkcd.com/1205/).</comment></comment>


A Simple BGP: BGP protocol fixed from route leaks - <AUTHOR> https://radar.qrator.net/tools/simple-bgp <comment><USER2> Neat idea!

Some technical details from clicking through to the github repo for their fork of BIRD, detailing the config and protocol changes you'd need to make for interoperability:

Change in BGP Configuration: In each BGP protocol section you must set a role option. Currently, there are 4 possible values for this option: 1) "provider" \- neighbor is your upstream provider; 2) "customer" \- neighbor is your customer; 3) "peer" \- neighbor is your peer; 4) "internal" \- neighbor is part of your AS or company (in case of multiple AS). Without setting a role in BGP protocol section you will receive error message from config parser. Also you could set strict_mode option in BGP protocol section. In this scenario BGP session with your neighbor will be established only if your neighbor also support Roles and corresponding Role is correct.

BGP Protocol modification: There are two main changes in BGP protocol behaviour: 1\. BGP Update modification: to routes that were learned from upstreams or peers add special non-transitive attribute "Local Announce" (BGP Path attribute code 19). On links with upstreams and peers filter out routes with determined attribute; 2\. BGP Open modification: to OPEN messages add new capability option "Role" (Capability code 38), in which broadcast value of Role configuration option. Establish connection only if speaker and its neighbor have appropriate pair of Roles: (provider, customer), (customer, provider), (peer, peer), (internal, internal).

</comment><comment><USER3> Shouldn't this be something that's proposed and implemented by the IETF, since BGP is an IETF standard?

[http://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/idr/charter/](http://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/idr/charter/)

<comment><USER4> Invention and prototyping come before IETF submission. But some people think the IETF process is kind of broken, especially when it comes to open source.

<comment><USER5> I don't know what kind of broken you are reffering to, but it's painful to see what "they" (the idr wg) are doing with BGP. Most RFC contain something like: "since BGP is such a widely used and stable protocol, let's add more stuff to it!" And the go on changing semantic of existing encodings in a way that forces unimaginably hairy hack unto any reasonable existing implementation (see flowspec, see multiprotocol, see add-path, ...)

I'd rather have tens of tiny protocols running on network, that one such BGP bug-carrier.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Hi guys,

I am one of the guys responsible for this development. We do mean to (at least) try to do draft with IETF. We do realize that IETF process might feel funny and painful, but running the bgp the way it is even more painful.

Sort of trying to scratch our own itch..... Wish us some luck, we will need it in quantities.</comment>


Primer explained ... - <AUTHOR> http://xkcd.com/657/large/

<comment><AUTHOR> I'd never heard of the film "Primer," but during my usual check-up of the XKCD site I found the above graphic. The plotting of "Lord of the Rings" was, to my mind, brilliant. I'm a graphical thinker at the best of times, and this is an excellent representation of the travels, alliances, and action.

So then I saw "Primer" and I thought - that's my kind of film/book, so I've gone to find out more about it. There are explanations on the web, but now I want to see the film.

Obligatory connection to hacking/web: Would your web site benefit from a diagram like this, to assist those whose thought processes aren't the same as the sheeple? Is that niche market worth worrying about? Your early adopters might think in that sort of graphical manner.

</comment><comment><USER2> now if he could only do one for "Lost" I'd be set.</comment>


A Rover Named After DNA Pioneer Rosalind Franklin Is Headed for Mars in 2020 - <AUTHOR> https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/bjqjva/a-rover-named-after-dna-pioneer-rosalind-franklin-is-headed-for-mars-in-2020 <comment><USER2> If you want to learn more about Rosalind Franklin, I recommend reading three books: Watson's book on the discovery of the structure of DNA (with a heavy prior: he's a colossal asshole who wrote the book to give him the best light), Maddox's biography (The Dark Lady of DNA), and The Eighth Day of Creation by Horace Judson.

The third book is the most important because Franklin gave her scientific notes to her friend Aaron Klug and Judson did some very careful sleuthing to extract what Franklin did and how Watson & Crick got access to, and reduced her role in, the data that led them to deduce the three dimensional structure of DNA. In an extraordinary example of parallel reconstruction, he demonstrated that Franklin actually made all her data and speculations available in a departmental publication and a talk, addressing the controversy about how W&C got access to her data, and when.

the book is amazing all-around. It's a tough read (I make it through maybe a page or two a day before having to put it down) but very well researched via first-person interviews.</comment>


Show HN: §, an interactive toy I built to accept my offer from Khan Academy - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/andymatuschak/Khan-Academy-Offer-Acceptance-Toy

<comment><USER2> Perhaps a video or gif would help show off your work. Currently the set of people who will see it is: {saw this post} ∩ {own a mac} ∩ {familiar with xcode} ∩ {willing to clone the repo}.

Probably a small number of people

<comment><USER3> Actually I don't know what would have happened if the recipient didn't have a Mac. I don't have one - and probably never will, not a big Apple fan here, so if I have received that I would probably have said "WTF?", and probably would have reconsidered my offer - not sure about that though because the OP seems to be quite talented.</comment></comment>


I stopped worrying about the future and learned to code for the present - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/capgemini-dynamics-365-team/opportunity-cost-for-developers-a02aa3dc1035 <comment><USER2> Kudos to the article for focusing on requirements from the outset, as generally speaking, software development does this all too rarely. I would paraphrase (and slightly alter) the article's recommendations:

1\. Write the requirements down at the outset.

2\. Rank and prioritize requirements.

3\. Reject requirements that are unreasonable (for now), but keep a record of them in case that changes.

4\. Try not to make rejected requirements fundamentally impossible in the future.</comment>


Sky Drone Demonstrates Bvlos Flight with a Yuneec H520 over 4G/LTE - <AUTHOR> https://www.skydrone.aero/blogs/news/bvlos-flight-with-a-yuneec-h520-and-sky-drone-4g-lte-upgrade <comment><USER2> Great video.</comment>


F.D.A. Approves Second Gene-Altering Treatment for Cancer - <AUTHOR> https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/18/health/immunotherapy-cancer-kite.html <comment><USER2> And congratulations once again. This kind of therapy is a big deal because of just how different it is from standard 'drugs'. This is a precise and intentional genetic change to a patient's own immune cells to provide it a _new_ capability. This new capability permits one's own immune system to detect a cancer with precision, clearing it from the body without harming other non-cancerous cells. The same protein doing the work here can be easily tuned to become more and more precise, and the scaffold of the technique can be ported to other targets relatively easily - again very much unlike most small molecule drugs. In this way it is nothing like most any drug of the 20th century. And there are many more to come.

There are >100 in the FDA pipeline right now for various types of cancer [1]. And the concepts used here to introduce DNA encoding proteins that confer NEW functions can be used to introduce any number of new functions.

So in less than 2 months, the FDA has approved 3 gene therapies:

1) Cure for Leukemia (Novartis' CAR)

2) Cure for Blindness (Spark's hRpe65)

3) Cure for Lymphoma (Gilead's (nee Kite) CAR)

Here's our description of the designed protein in case you want to learn what it does at a molecular level, or want to design your own:

[https://serotiny.bio/notes/proteins/car19/](https://serotiny.bio/notes/proteins/car19/)

[1] (paywalled CAR trails list): [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27613725](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27613725)

</comment><comment><USER3> This is the full text of the study? [http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/hon.2437_7/full](http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/hon.2437_7/full)

Is that really it? Shouldn't they have to publish something substantive before approval? It doesn't have to be in a journal, but somewhere on the FDA site, etc.

<comment><USER2> There are a LOT of papers out there about CARs [1], how they work, and what their effects are. The DNA sequence used here has been effectively frozen for quite some time as it runs through all sorts of examinations.

Further, your link is to the description of an Oral Presentation, not even a paper. It's not supposed to have data associated with it.

This is the paper from the Phase I results of the same therapy (I very much appreciate that the paper is open-access):

[http://www.cell.com/molecular-therapy-family/molecular- thera...](http://www.cell.com/molecular-therapy-family/molecular- therapy/fulltext/S1525-0016%2816%2945375-X)

[1] [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=chimeric+antigen+r...](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=chimeric+antigen+receptor)

<comment><USER3> Thanks, here is an example of the type of questions I would expect a doctor to ask (which is impossible if no study is published).

Looking at your paper I can't really tell what they did to determine CR. Did they only do PET-CT? The paper they cite[1] mentions some biopsies (for some cases), etc but they only show any results for that assay.

Assuming it was only PET-CT for now, they say[1]:

"Typically FDG-avid lymphoma: in patients with no pretreatment PET scan or when the PET scan was positive before therapy, a post-treatment residual mass of any size is permitted as long as it is PET negative."

So positive/negative is apparently based completely on relative metabolic activity. Just looking at figure 1B in your paper, it appears that baseline vs 30 days is done perhaps using different exposures. Or for some reason the intestines were much more active at 30 days (patients ate more recently?).

1) How do they ensure there isn't some response to the drug/environment that has increased general metabolic activity, thus decreasing the relative signal from the tumor?

2) Were the people processing and examining these scans blinded to the fact they were part of a drug trial? There seems to be ample room to play with exposures, etc here.

[1] [http://ascopubs.org/doi/10.1200/JCO.2006.09.2403](http://ascopubs.org/doi/10.1200/JCO.2006.09.2403)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> 375K, would insurance cover that?

<comment><USER5> The cost is actually inline with what would be expected from a cancer cure. The NHS uses 20000 - 30000 pounds/quality adjusted life year [https://www.nice.org.uk/advice/lgb10/chapter/judging-the- cos...](https://www.nice.org.uk/advice/lgb10/chapter/judging-the-cost- effectiveness-of-public-health-activities) which would be about $40,000/quality adjusted life year.

If this drug provides on average 10 quality years of life, then this would fall under the guidelines as cost effective.</comment></comment>


The un-celebrity president: Jimmy Carter shuns riches, lives modestly - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/national/wp/2018/08/17/feature/the-un-celebrity-president-jimmy-carter-shuns-riches-lives-modestly-in-his-georgia-hometown/ <comment><USER2> Like Cincinnatus, returning home after the war and taking up his plow.

Two things have always struck me about Jimmy Carter:

1 - He was willing to nominate Volker to Fed chair even though he knew Volker's plan of raising interest rates massively would cost him (Carter) re- election. I believe he would have survived even the Iran crisis but for that, but it was the right thing to do. Reagan got all the credit for it since it started under Carter's watch and finished under Reagan's.

2 - he has such a reputation for Polite gentility and self sacrifice (see above) yet his maneuvering through the primary season and at the democratic convention was masterful -- he was dispassionate but brutal in putting the (political) knife into rivals, and was happy to do so publicly. That genteel/man of the people schtick extended to his use of the pronunciation "nukular" even though he had worked for Rickover and attended to the navy's nuclear school!

A complex guy whether you like him or not.

<comment><USER3> The Iranian hostages were released the day of Reagan's inauguration. Reagan would have bombed Iran. Carter's diplomacy were just about effective as Obama's lines in the sand. Sometimes diplomacy through a gun barrel is needed.

<comment><USER4> Reagan, whose government later sold weapons to Iran while talking up an embargo to keep Iran away from the Soviets and to potentially help release hostages from Lebanon? Got a source on that claim?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Jimmy Carter is without question one of the all-time great ex-presidents. Whatever the successes or failings of his administration, he's used his time since to improve the world, and is honest, uncorrupt, and suitably (ex-)presidential.

<comment><USER6> Funny you should say that on the anniversary of the Gwangju uprising, where Jimmy Carter sent the military to go massacre students protesting the US- installed military dictatorship in South Korea

<comment><USER7> Can you please provide a source for this info?

I can't find Jimmy Carter's name in this research: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwangju_Uprising](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwangju_Uprising)

<comment><USER6> [http://articles.latimes.com/1996-10-07/local/me-51336_1_sout...](http://articles.latimes.com/1996-10-07/local/me-51336_1_south- korea)

<comment><USER8> Your claim that, "Jimmy Carter sent the military to go massacre students" is not supported by that article. It was an interesting read, though.

<comment><USER9> > According to declassified U.S. documents I obtained under the Freedom of > Information Act, the Carter administration gave prior approval to Chun to > use the army to quell the wave of unrest that shook South Korea in the > spring of 1980. The hundreds of State Department and Pentagon cables > contradict the official U.S. claims that the Carter administration was > surprised by Chun's resort to force and had no advance knowledge he was > deploying paratroopers trained to fight in North Korea against his own > citizens.

<comment><USER8> Again, your claim that, "Jimmy Carter sent the military to go massacre students" is not supported by that article.

You appear to have a reading comprehension problem.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I decided to submit this because I have always been fascinated with Jimmy Carter. What a genuine, decent person. But history has judged him as one of the worst presidents.

I was in third grade when Carter was running for re-election against Ronald Reagan. Our teacher gave us an assignment to create a campaign poster for your favorite candidate. I chose Jimmy Carter, and added the campaign slogan, "I will gladly trade peanuts for the American hostages" (referring to to Carter's history as a farmer and to the Iran hostage crisis [1]). I thought I was really clever at the time, but now I think I was just being a stupid smartass.

Whenever I have seen Carter in the press since his presidency, it always seems like he is going something unambiguously good, like building houses with Habitat for Humanity or trying to negotiate peace agreements between unfriendly countries as an unbiased mediator.

I think we won't have this great man with us for much longer. The world will be a worse place when he departs.

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

<comment><USER10> _But history has judged him as one of the worst presidents._

I wonder if that is a fair judgement or whether he was just the victim of the economic cycle and external forces.

<comment><USER11> Not stopping the overthrow of the Shah (and then admitting him to the United States) may have been a mistake because of the hostage crisis that unfolded and also created geopolitical instability that continues to this day.

<comment><USER12> > Not stopping the overthrow of the Shah (and then admitting him to the United > States) may have been a mistake because of the hostage crisis that unfolded > and also created geopolitical instability that continues to this day.

Fighting to defend a dictator the West effectively installed to suppress a populist movement was unlikely to have a better outcome than the Shah being ousted.

People in the West seem to forget the Iranian Revolution was _extremely_ popular in Iran.

Why was it popular?

Because the Shah was a corrupt and oppressive regime that was hated by the Iranian people. The Iranian Revolution wasn't the first time he was forced out of Iran either.

This delusion that Iran could be "ruled" by the Shah as a positive outcome needs to stop. It isn't borne out by the facts and it would have ended up collapsing eventually. Popular leaders don't need organizations like SAVAK to torture its own people.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> If you're interested in where Carter came from, I can't recommend _An Hour Before Daylight_ [1] highly enough. The man's a great writer, and he grew up in a fascinating time and place.

You've also got to give a lot of respect to someone who could have made themselves much wealthier, but said "No."

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Hour-Before-Daylight-Memories- Boyhood...](https://www.amazon.com/Hour-Before-Daylight-Memories- Boyhood/dp/0743211995/)

<comment><USER14> Lots of people take off work to be with their family. Lots of people work for non-profits as a career. Great teachers are notoriously underpaid. Though most of them don't write memoirs.

<comment><USER15> Most of them were not elected President of the United States.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Jimmy has his priorities straight. A humble man who tells the truth. And knows what is most important in this life. Hint: it's neither wealth nor power.

<comment><USER17> I get you, but rhetorical power is just another form of power. Carter maximizes the power of his truths by eschewing wealth and direct organizational power.

<comment><USER18> It's true (pretty much by definition) that rhetorical power is a form of power. But it's a further, cynical step to conclude that if someone acts in a way that confers rhetorical authority, they must be doing so just for the sake of that authority. You're assuming away the possibility that someone might be genuinely acting, at least in part, from principle.

<comment><USER17> I disagree that it's cynical. I think maximizing the power of your ideas and principles is laudable, and can have great returns. Tying ethics to tangible reality _increases_ the value and urgency of ethical behavior.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> How has no one pointed out after 8 hours that this man who "shuns riches" receives a pension that puts him in the 97.7th percentile of income[0], a fully funded office, medical benefits, and no housing costs other than property tax? For a majority of America, that would be riches beyond belief. Let's not forget he plays golf with billionaires.

I'm sure Mr. Carter donates a substantial portion of his income and lives rather modestly by choice, but most people don't have that choice.

Edit: slight numerical correction, source.

[0]: [https://dqydj.com/income-percentile- calculator/](https://dqydj.com/income-percentile-calculator/)

<comment><USER20> I'm not really sure where you're going with this.

The point of the article, it seems to me, is that he has consciously chosen a modest, communitarian life, even though he could certainly arrange for more lavish surroundings.

Is your argument that he's paid too much? If so, what do you think is reasonable compensation for one of the most stressful jobs on earth?

<comment><USER19> My point is that we have a system of government that is for and by the rich, where billionaires tell the millionaires in government what they want, and then they get it. Your opinion does not matter to them [0].

Someone receiving a $206K/year pension, according to the 4% safe withdrawal method, is the equivalent of having $5.1M in a retirement account, except this is better, because it doesn't run out. Most people won't see that much money over their entire careers. This is not someone we should hold up and say "this person shunned riches," because it's not true.

[0]: [https://www.upworthy.com/20-years-of-data-reveals-that- congr...](https://www.upworthy.com/20-years-of-data-reveals-that-congress- doesnt-care-what-you-think)

<comment><USER20> Sure, he has access to money—-no argument there—-and his life will always be comfortable.

On the other hand, how can you say that he's not shunning riches, or at least their trappings? They live in Plains, Georgia. Their big Sunday dinner is casserole and one Solo cup of "bargain Chardonnay" with the neighbors. They turned down living quarters in favor of a pull-out couch in their office. It's not at all the stereotypical lifestyle of someone with millions in the bank. Hell, parts of it make my lifestyle (academic scientist) seem opulent—-we at least have IKEA wineglasses!

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> He's not the exception. Our presidents who leave office and amass enormous wealth (as well as celebrities and wealthy people Americans want to vote into office) are the global exceptions. Most "civil servants" in other countries serve their terms and go back to their regular jobs. The real story would be why America is the cultural anomaly.

<comment><USER22> Truly, we in the U.S. need to look _at ourselves_ for what we have wrought and currently suffer under.

We claim to want these things, then attack those who manifest them.

We preach understanding and forgiveness, then refuse to exercise it in understanding limitations others face -- external as well as internal -- and working with them to improve things.

No society's perfect. But, America has managed to raise sloth and hypocrisy to new levels.

As I've aged and observed, I've come to think of us more and more, as and become a bully nation.

Of course, a man like Carter doesn't "fit" into that. Which is a credit to him.

Or, depending upon your perspective, his ultimate failing.

(Something I associate with all too well.)

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> Modest living sets individuals and their ideas free.

<comment><USER23> _The tennis court at former President Jimmy Carter's private home is swept twice a day, his pool is cleaned daily and his grass cut, his flower beds weeded and his windows washed on a regular basis — all at taxpayers' expense_

Relatively modest.

<comment><USER20> From a few lines below in that article:

"President Carter would be glad to reduce the frequency of routine maintenance at the discretion of the Park Service," Ms. Congileo said."

The back story is that he donated the house to the National Park Service. And, as even the Republican who oversaw that said, the cost is essentially a rounding error.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> We remember him in Panama for signing the treaty that gave us back the Canal and the surrounding military bases. He's the only US president I would shake hands with

<comment><USER21> You should check out "Panama's Rusty Lock."

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> I loved the quip about the presidential cooler that they use to store leftovers.

President Carter is the kind of down-to-earth person I would want to hang out with, while at the same time using his position to build thousands of homes and fight river blindness and give vaccines to millions of people.

I wonder if another person like him will ever ascend to lead the United States.

<comment><USER13> I generally try to vote for the presidential candidate who grew up with greater economic hardship. It tends to be a pretty decent predictor of character. (Admittedly, a pool selected for those who did _and_ who rose to become candidates)

No comment on the opposite...

<comment><USER26> Regressing one step further you could also vote in the primary for the same criteria (within reason).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> An admirable man. He is doing great work today.

His leadership came at a tough time, and he did not bring prosperity. The country did much better under his successor, Reagan.

We all have potential for good, in our own ways.

</comment><comment><USER28> He has yet to apologize for going to Venezuela and legitimizing the re- election of Hugo Chavez, who was violently repressing independent media and rounding up dissidents, by calling the Venezuelan election process "the best in the world".

<comment><USER14> The downvote brigade in this thread belies the appreciation of a kinder, more civil approach to public life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> Easy for a lame-duck to say...

</comment><comment><USER30> The most "un-celebrity"? I'd say carter is the most "celebrity" ex-president we've had in a long time. He has used his celebrity to advocate for his charities ( habitat for humanity for example ) and for human rights ( same sex marriage, race equality, etc ) and political issues ( north korea, iran, etc ).

If you equate celebrity with making it rain in clubs, then I guess carter is "un-celebrity". But the guy has been the most visible ex-president in media. Think that makes him the most celebrity ex-president in history.

<comment><USER31> I just read a story about Obama and Arethra Franklin yet you think Carter is the most visible ex-president?

<comment><USER14> OK. Second most celebrity is fair. Why downvote a valid opinion, folks?

<comment><USER31> I didn't downvote you but my guess: because your "opinion" included facts that were so obviously incorrect that they could only be the result of tremendous amounts of bias that make you unable to correctly judge reality. Which makes your "opinion" not a useful contribution on a site that (tries to) value correctness.

If you were able to express your opinion without resorting to tremendous amounts of hyperbolism that make it trivially easy to imagine you as a frothing-at-the-mouth partisan you probably would have been able to more effectively convey whatever it was you wanted to get across to the readers at HackerNews.

<comment><USER14> That wasn't my post.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> His privilege is showing. Just like only 10% of the America is rich, only 10% of the world has at most a lower class American standard of living.</comment>


Ask HN: Please give us your valid feedback to improve Skillendar. - <AUTHOR>

Skillendar is back! Now with more focus on you and your neighbourhood.  Please have a look and give us your valid feedback on design, usability, features etc.<p>A bit about Skillendar: Skillendar is a neighbourhood network for you to connect with and reach out to your local community. Like Facebook is a network for friends and LinkedIn is a network for professionals, Skillendar is for your neighbourhood. Also Skillendar has a unique calendar based skills search that helps you find the availability of people in your neighbourhood who are open to share their time or provide a service, at a glance. Hence the name Skillendar, short for 'Skills On Calendar'. <comment><AUTHOR> Clickable <http://www.skillendar.com></comment>