Washio on-demand laundry service shuts down operations - <AUTHOR> https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/30/washio-on-demand-laundry-service-shuts-down-operations/ <comment><USER2> I tried washio within the last 2 months for the first time. It was much harder than using a neighborhood laundromat IMO.

I scheduled for it to be picked up and had to wait 2 days, versus the neighborhood folks who do it same day.

I paid $100 to do the laundry (plus a $15 recommended tip). I was expecting it to be cheap since I had a coupon but was blown away. I didn't do the math to estimate the costs going in. My SO and I, I guess, had a ton of laundry.

All in all, it's expensive and not a wonderful/magical experience. It serves a fairly basic need and with the price I paid, after 2-3 trips, it is cheaper for me to buy my own washer and dryer in no time.

I can now use this as a "look I was right" to my SO, because after I got the bill I said "they are going to go out of business with these prices".

<comment><USER3> _> I paid $100 to do the laundry (plus a $15 recommended tip). I was expecting it to be cheap since I had a coupon but was blown away. I didn't do the math to estimate the costs going in. My SO and I, I guess, had a ton of laundry._

That is _bonkers_ expensive. At my old place in Somerville, MA (not exactly a cheap place to live), $100 would be four large hampers full of laundry and my shirts would be pressed.

Of course, it's not a VC-backed startup, just an actual business, so it's not cool.

<comment><USER4> >>At my old place in Somerville, MA (not exactly a cheap place to live), $100 would be four large hampers full of laundry and my shirts would be pressed.

Was the before, or after the 10% Tufts discount though? If you're below 35, you gotta pretend you forgot your ID, and take that sweet sweet discount. Same for the Sushi place that's right next to the Tufts-discount laundry place.

In other (totally irrelevant) news from current-Somerviller to (past?) Somerviller: area around Davis has gotten almost on par with Harvard Square prices (in terms of rent). Things are crazy around here!

<comment><USER3> You're thinking of the place in Powder House Square, but they don't do pickup. (Also, Yoshi's was a regular lunch spot when I worked from home.) Teele Square Laundromat does pickup/delivery and was my go-to. I wouldn't have used the discount anyway, though; I don't need ten percent off and they work much harder than I do.

Somerville's prices are disgusting, as is most of the area--I just moved to Malden, where I've got a really nice 2BR that isn't in a falling-apart house for about two-thirds of what I'd have paid in Somerville or Cambridge. And I'm actually a touch closer to downtown Boston for when I want to go out...I thought I'd be sacrificing something I cared about to move here, but nope.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> While the VC backed services drop like flies, neighborhood businesses continue as if nothing happened. I've lived in the same neighborhood in San Francisco for 20 years. The local dry cleaner is still doing just fine, though a bit older and grayer.

I think the lesson here is that the Uber for X model was predicated on people being so unhappy with the incumbents that they would switch. Pre-Uber taxi services were criminally awful enterprises that deserved to get a beating. Local neighborhood businesses might be a bit low tech, but they know what they are doing (so there isn't much to disrupt).

<comment><USER6> Yes, plus there's also the size and frequency of the pain point to consider. Uber makes sense; millions and millions of us need to get somewhere at any given point in the day, and many of those millions have that need multiple times a day. An on-demand solution, conveniently at the click of a button on your phone, makes a hell of a lot of sense.

Laundry and dry cleaning? First, that's definitely not a daily need. Debatably a weekly need. Second, it's not really a _mobile_ need, and I don't just mean in terms of the device. It's not an on-the-go problem. Sure, the idea of on- demand pickup and dropoff sounds mildly more convenient than the traditional method -- but not so much more so that it's worth the price premium.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> The best part is that previous reporting on this company (discussed on HN contemporaneously here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7817895](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7817895)) indicated that they _weren 't actually even doing the laundry._ All that stuff had been outsourced to another company, called "Wash Then Fold" (WTF, nice touch).

At the time, I wondered if there actually proved to be any money to be made here what would stop Wash Then Fold from just setting up their own app and cutting Washio out of the transaction entirely. Three years later, here we are and lo and behold:

[https://www.washthenfold.com](https://www.washthenfold.com)

</comment><comment><USER8> Many times I'd look in my bag to find someone else's clothing. One time I ended up with a young ladies lacy underwear which kinda made me feel like a creep.

During my move from SF to Ann Arbor I made the mistake of outsourcing the washing of pretty much all of my clothing and linens with them. They lost all of it and couldn't find it for about a month.

Let's just say I am very glad I have a washer and a dryer in my home. Certain things just shouldn't be outsourced.

<comment><USER9> On the other hand, I've used a laundromat's "drop-off" laundry service for about a year, and only once received a piece of clothing that wasn't mine (a top, and a belt) and don't remember ever losing clothing (although it doesn't mean it didn't happen - would I miss a pair of underwear or a plain-colored t-shirt?)

<comment><USER10> it must have happened to _someone_ , because you got _their_ clothing (unless they just randomly added extra clothes to be on the safe side!) :)

<comment><USER9> Haha, sure, but the main point is that I don't think it was a catastrophe for the person who lost their clothes, either - at least, not on the level of losing nearly all of your clothes for a month.

Plus, since I knew the laundromat it came from, I could just return it and they could put up a "did you lose this shirt" sign, and have a reasonable chance of finding the owner.

<comment><USER11> Something doesn't have to be a catastrophe to suck. Losing clothes because the business you paid screwed up sucks.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This is just a service I don't get the mass market appeal for. Washing your clothes does not take that much time and dry cleaners are readily available in every city. So these companies don't seem to solve a real problem, rather they're just a luxury. Luxury products are hard to maintain:

<comment> et-al Since I moved to a place where the nearest laundromat is 2 blocks _uphiilll_ and pricey ($5/load), I admittedly did take a quick look into Washio, but noticed there was a minimum order of $20. It was a luxury service, or a good for fresh graduates who believe too much in the "your time is money" mantra.

If you want another "wtf, do we need this" service, check out TrashDay.co, saving us the _indignity_ of taking out our own trash.

<comment><USER13> > If you want another "wtf, do we need this" service, check out TrashDay.co, > saving us the indignity of taking out our own trash.

One more startup that makes the statement "assisted living for the young" that much more true about SF.

<comment><USER14> Wow. Who funded that?

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> >On top of that, Washio has seen fierce competition over the past few years from the likes of Flycleaners in NYC, Rinse, and Cleanly, which is already operational in New York and launching in D.C. in the next few weeks.

Curious what makes one service shut down while others continue. Better operational efficiencies? Better unit economics? They raised more funding so it's a matter of time before they all die?

Genuinely curious what makes one die and one thrive.

<comment><USER16> >They raised more funding so it's a matter of time before they all die?

I know where I'm placing _my_ bet...

edit: Ok, apparently overly snarky given down-votes...

How about this? Dry cleaning is a low-margin, capital-intensive business that already has a huge existing base of experienced competitors. If you live in a major city, your local dry cleaner already has pick-up and drop-off service on-demand. They can already keep your credit card on file. They already reap economies of scale by outsourcing the actual cleaning to huge centralized facilities. How much extra value does a company like Washio think they can really generate by letting you schedule it via app instead of via phone, and how much capital investment are they willing to make to capture that value? This is a tough business, and if _any_ company is going to succeed at consolidating it like Washio _et al_ are trying to do, they will have to spend _a lot_ to get there.

<comment><USER17> > If you live in a major city, your local dry cleaner already has pick-up and > drop-off service on-demand.

if they wanted to be an "Uber for laundry" they should have similarly tapped into underutilized resources - ie. their contractors should have been doing the laundry on personal washer/dryers in homes/garages... We'd see garages in residential neighborhoods full of washers/dryers, without permits, etc... Such an increased efficiency (due to the disruption in particular by cutting off the regulations related and commercial lease expenses) would have generated the required margins like in Uber and AirBNB cases. Of course, whether the world would be a better place for that - that as usually would depend on whether you're the one getting that margin :)

<comment><USER18> > _We 'd see garages in residential neighborhoods full of washers/dryers, > without permits, etc... _

Using city water and plugged on the neighbours' electrical power line.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Not a surprise.

Most of the "my mom used to do this for me" service startups are destined for failure.

If you can afford washio, you can afford a maid.

</comment><comment><USER20> So, washio is like the 3rd laundry service I used in SF that shuts down and makes me go to the next competitor.

I understand fierce competition + low margin + high growth required is needed and profitability is hard to reach, but so, I wonder what it takes (or how many similar failures) for the "market" to balance and finally come up with something sustainable.

By that I mean, ok, we've seen X number of the exact same laundry services failing. If the business model has been proven unsustainable multiple times in a row, why founders continue to try and investors continue to believe?

I'm wondering if at some point some kind of balance can be achieved where founders/investors will only build something that can be sustainable? Like, ok I'm happy it get cheap and fast laundry service right now, and i don't mind changing provider regularly, but if at some point the offer is a little more expensive and takes a little longer (the sustainable business model) then I guess I wouldn't have a choice and use this one (still better to most people than going to dry cleaning or wash my own stuff at the laundry 2 blocks away)

<comment><USER21> "I wonder what it takes (or how many similar failures) for the "market" to balance and finally come up with something sustainable."

It already has. As others have pointed out, just about every laundromat and dry cleaners already offers these services. Just not through apps.

<comment><USER22> Why isn't someone providing apps for these businesses? Perhaps apps aren't so important...

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> Why couldn't busy people just hack this on top of Uber? Call Uber to pick up your clothes and take them to the dry cleaner of your choice and pick them up the next day. Maybe Uber's TOS don't allow for pure cargo, but surely there are courier services that do. Maybe it would be more expensive than Washio, but there are a lot of people in SF with more cash than time.

<comment><USER24> Throw a tub of soapy water in the trunk. Air dry from the antenna.

<comment><USER9> Offer your passengers a 20% discount off their Uber ride if they spend it folding shirts.

<comment><USER25> We're Uber for laundry... on Uber!

<comment><USER26> I believe translated to modern startupese that's:

We're putting laundry onto the Uber platform.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> There is nothing wrong to see actual people. What would you do with your free time gained from not doing "administrative" tasks like seeing the laundry / buy food?

1\. Work more (for your boss)

2\. Spend money on XYZ so that at the end of the month your account is cleared and you have to work more --> 1.

<comment><USER28> Or:

1\. Spend more time with your kids.

2\. Spend more time outside looking at the birds.

3\. Working out at the gym.

4\. Go to the movies.

5\. Playing video games.

And considering you might make enough money, this trade off might be worth it. Plus, a lot of folks hate doing laundry.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> >That mission began from our kitchen counter, and led us through an incredible journey over the last few years as we became the nation's largest dry clean and laundry service.

[https://ourincrediblejourney.tumblr.com/](https://ourincrediblejourney.tumblr.com/)

<comment><USER30> I wonder if they are using 'incredible journey' ironically. Surely they know it's a clique.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> notable angel investors such as Ashton Kutcher and Nas

How do companies get Angel Investors from these people?

<comment><USER32> They each have associates/partners who look for startups in the usual places and share deal flow with other investors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> My laundromat recommended me to use Sudzy ([http://www.getsudzy.com](http://www.getsudzy.com)), they use free pickup/delivery from/to my laundromat, same price and allow me to get notifications about the progress. After using it for 3 times this month, I can tell it's the best solution for New Yorkers.

</comment><comment><USER31> [https://www.foldimate.com/](https://www.foldimate.com/)

I was curious if it existed.</comment>


Ask HN: Best way to find out later if I had Covid-19? - <AUTHOR> I would be curious to know after it blows over and the testing is no longer overloaded. How long do antibodies stay in the blood? Would I have to take a blood sample now and freeze it? <comment><USER2> Pinnacle BioLabs started shipping a COVID-19 IgM/IgG rapid immunoassay kit yesterday. EU and UK customers can get it now, USA has to wait on the FDA emergency clearance.

</comment><comment><USER3> Posted: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22609741](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22609741)

</comment><comment><USER4> Serial serum samples every 2 weeks, frozen. They could then be tested for virus inactivation and/or paired IgM/IgG titers. Not cheap.

<comment><USER5> I feel like if you think you have COVID-19, handling vials of your own blood is not the most advisable course of action.

<comment><USER4> Sure. A single sample taken after the epidemic could show IgG but might not be specific to this particular strain. I assume they don't have the capability to draw and centrifuge their own blood, so a lab would have to do it.</comment></comment></comment>


Spend 1 hour per day away from computer - Schmidt Says - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/05/20/us/20reuters-google-schmidt-disconnect.html

<comment><AUTHOR> I was reading this article (on my computer) and when Schmidt says "Take your eyes off that screen and look into the eyes of the person you love. Have a conversation, a real conversation"... well let's just say that I actually turned in that exact moment and looked at my wife to have a conversation, and she said "shhh, I'm watching my program on TV!" Guess we're a modern couple haha</comment>


Show HN: Merry Quizmas, a challenging holiday character quiz - <AUTHOR> http://merryquizmas.com <comment><AUTHOR> This is my first project using Redux + React + Rails. I like how it turned out. I hope you enjoy it.</comment>


How I Learn Difficult Skills – My Quest to Photograph a Galaxy - <AUTHOR> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKDe094o-Q8 <comment><USER2> Nice video, but it would be nice to know _also_ which telescope he used.</comment>


Show HN: StartupBase 2.0 (Redesign) - <AUTHOR> https://startupbase.io <comment><USER2> I would prefer a faster way to scroll through the markets. Reducing card size or having a light weight search field would improve it a great deal.

Tags on the "recent startups" that associated it with market/category/region to allow me to scan quicker without having to read the description for each company would be a huge plus.

I would include region on the top menu bar. Once I land on the region page I would like a map that broke it down into zones/continents/ clickable grid. It would help eliminate scroll fatigue.

I would move the email signup and get those "recent start ups" above the fold. I feel like you are more worried about me signing up vs. actually using the site.

<comment><AUTHOR> Wow.. This is a wonderful review. Thank you so much. I will definitely implement your suggestions.

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> I am the founder of StartupBase.

A couple of months ago, I launched StartupBase on Hacker News. It was good to get feedback from the community. Today, I launched a revamped version based on the community feedback.

What do you think? What do you like? How it can be improved? I'd appreciate your feedback.

</comment><comment><USER3> Images are not loading here.

I think you're using imgix for the images and it doesn't work with [https://](https://).

<comment><AUTHOR> Images are lazy loaded. They may appear after page loads. I can see all the images.

<comment><USER3> [http://i.imgur.com/5WDOtZu.png](http://i.imgur.com/5WDOtZu.png)

[http://i.imgur.com/zmv2GnU.png](http://i.imgur.com/zmv2GnU.png)

<comment><AUTHOR> It looks like the problem is with imgix. I will look into it. Thank you for reporting.

<comment><USER3> It is working already.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


How We Get to a Decentralized World Wide Web - <AUTHOR> https://media.consensys.net/joe-lubins-full-speech-from-devcon-5-how-we-get-to-a-decentralized-world-wide-web-1f83b35b2a0c <comment><USER2> Ok, so if being regulatory compliant is a requirement now accepted by Ethereum, then could you please talk about GDPR/CCPA and not just token sales?

I'm also not sure 500k downloads of the truffle framework is a good proxy for the number of developers in the ecosystem. How many times has the same person / automation called npm install and pulled that dependency in?</comment>


Guy Kawasaki: Will anyone pay for anything? - <AUTHOR> https://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/the-world/article/will-anyone-pay-for-anything-guy-kawasaki

<comment><USER2> Panel discussion with high school and college kids reveals shocking truth - young people tend to be broke.

<comment><USER3> From my own experience it's a "Time and Effort" vs "Money" thing. When I was young I was willing to put up with broken torrent connections, annoying ads, and other inconveniences in order to get stuff for free. Because I had more time than money and was willing to put in the effort.

As an adult I'd just assume pay the $1.99 or buy the $36 (a year) Pandora One membership so as to not have to put up with that stuff. Because now I have the money but there is much more of a demand on my time.

In that way I think these young kids aren't going to spend money they don't have now. But once they have enough money for media costs to be inconsequential they'll start paying for stuff.

<comment><USER4> Please forgive the extremely rude nitpicking: assume -> as soon

<comment><USER3> If you don't nitpick how will I learn? :)

Seriously though I do that on occasion and it always amazes me. It's like the motor part of my brain is completely separate from the creative part and so on occasion I'll type the completely wrong word because my fingers are somehow blindly transcribing what my inner monologue is saying. It's weird.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Nice little lessons for anyone who wants to sell to 'young' people.

I'll call out this point, however: "they never buy anything because of the advertising."

I've heard this before in market research groups, and even from business owners, but let me tell you - if you're buying some product, anything with a brand, chances are that advertising played some role.

See also this recent HN discussion - <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=690758>

<comment><USER6> Advertising serves two related but distinct purposes:

1) Trying to get immediate sales, as part of selling a good;

2) More important is marketing - building longer term awareness of brands, quality, and availability of goods.

When people downplay the effectiveness of advertising they are almost always thinking of its effectiveness at selling, where its major benefit to a company is through marketing.

<comment><USER5> Could hardly agree with you more Bill. I actually go as far as giving different names to the two purposes, and putting them into completely different areas of the business.

1) is 'Marketing' is Operations, it's about revenue today, and sits with Sales, product delivery etc.

2) is 'Positioning' (from the work by Jack Trout) is equity management, is about future revenue and sits with things like vision, culture, new product research etc.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> No, students won't pay for anything -- because they can't. They might spin this, but they aren't riding a half broken down 94 Chevy Lumina because they hate BMWs. Most college students are earning well into negative territory, taking loans to pay basic expenses.

At some point you make money at a rate that you can pay your bills and some is left over. Suddenly it's not economical for you to spend 14 hours a week roaming around trying to score free wifi. When you are older, time is the most limited resource, not money. Suddenly there aren't enough hours in the day to do what you want to do, and you will pay for things that let you do things you want to do.

</comment><comment><USER8> _Can it be that email is the killer app of social media?_

This should not surprise anyone. It would seem to me that few people would miss the irony involved when you get a message telling you that you have a message.

</comment><comment><USER9> Businesses will. Older more affluent customers will.

Too many startup founders aim for their own age group. I feel like the term "target market" never caught on in Silicon Valley. Not many companies start out chasing the 14-21 demographic unless you want to lock in a brand preference for later (i.e. Abercrombie). 21-49 is a lot better, affluent is a lot better, enterprise or b2b is a lot better, yet for some reason the competition is at the bottom because that is what founders know. Find the problems elsewhere and you will be much safer.

</comment><comment><USER10> I think this makes broad strokes using a finite subset of people. Of course they won't pay for facebook if they had to, imagine asking your parents for your $39 yearly membership to facebook...

I do enjoy what I get for free, but if push comes to shove I don't see myself leaving gmail no matter what the final yearly cost is.

</comment><comment><USER11> I always say "if i has the money I'll buy even if I don't need". That time i don't have even a paypal with null balance; now I have the money and even a CC, I still don't buy anything, unless it will convert to more money!

</comment><comment><USER12> That kind of sounds like "It's better to improve than invent"?

</comment><comment><USER13> And Gmail stands out as the one web-app that the kids love. Woot, they love the one innovative web-app that really improved something? Unbelievable.

<comment><USER14> Everyone I know uses gmail for the same reasons I use gmail: it has a nice itnerface, is easy to use, has plenty of useful additional features, rarely goes down, provides loads of space so I don't need to worry about deleting stuff that I _might_ want later, its spam filter works well and ... its free. Being free is the main thing though, because google could drop one or more of their other features and I'd still use it, but force me to pay and I'd look elsewhere. Why? Because I can.

Not that I'm not willing to pay for a good service - I am (and do), but I need a lot of additional value over what I can get for free. Gmail gives me a lot of value, but I have yet to be convinced that its enough to pay for.

<comment><USER15> Value is the right word. I wouldn't pay for gmail (even though I LOVE it), because it's one small part of my larger internet existence.

In a vacuum, I might pay for gmail. The problem is tied up in the fact that I also use 10-15 other services (twitter, facebook, etc...) that I might also have to pay for. If I could consolidate all of those into one place and pay just one bill, well then I might be tempted to pay.

The fragmented nature of the web itself makes monetization difficult.</comment></comment></comment>


Are all telephone calls recorded and accessible to the US government? - <AUTHOR> http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/may/04/telephone-calls-recorded-fbi-boston <comment><USER2> I've said it before and I'll say it again: anonymity online and encrypted communications are one of the most important problems we're going to going to face in the coming decades. Hackers should be working on those, not clever ways to serve ads or geolocating your latest locally-sourced coffee.

If you don't believe the US is already permanently archiving vast swaths of communication, it's not a big leap of imagination to picture it happening in five or ten years. Likewise the government might not have the computer power to _analyze_ those archives _today_ , but in five or ten years, I'd bet on it.

Some people don't mind that the government stores their emails. "I'm fine with it because I know they're going to catch the bad guys" or "I'm fine with it because I have nothing to hide". Those are certainly powerful (though flawed) arguments for the situation _today_. Those people are perhaps picturing filing cabinets in some dank warehouse filled with paper printouts of their emails, which due to space constraints will be shredded or forgotten in ten years. The reality is that thanks to technology, what we say today is being stored and archived _for-ev-er_ and can be indexed and retrieved _easily and indefinitely_. Why does that make a difference? Because _today_ , what you say and do might be lawful. But laws and societies change over time, and the government will still be able to go back and dig up what you said decades ago and use it against you.

That's really what scares me--because today, I, like most people, don't have much to hide. But who knows what laws or culture will be like in 20 years, and what can be used against me that I said so very long ago? Can you imagine working at the WTC and having a bad day, and jokingly sending an email to a coworker about bombing the place because you're so mad. 9/11 happens a year later, the government looks in its archives for the email you sent, and in a post-9/11 frenzy sends you to Guantanamo to "await trial". Or it doesn't even have to go that far; some government spokesperson lets your name slip in an interview as a "suspect" and the media attention you'll get will forever ruin your life even if the government does nothing.

<comment><USER3> > Or it doesn't even have to go that far; some government spokesperson lets > your name slip in an interview as a "suspect" and the media attention you'll > get will forever ruin your life even if the government does nothing.

Unless the government gets out of the business of handling birth certificates, driver's licenses, etc. they're simply going to have your name.

Secure communications channels is certainly an important topic though, but given what happened to Sunil Tripathi in the aftermath of the Reddit swarm to find the Boston Marathom bomber(s), perhaps it's possible that your biggest "online threat" in the future won't be part of the government at all.

You get the wrong Google, Facebook, or random datacenter sysadmin upset and you could find yourself in hot water with even less of a legal recourse. It's just as easy to imagine roving bands of vigilantes in that dystopian future as it is to imagine Big Brother, is it not?

I get why this (COMSEC) is an important problem; what I don't get is why so many otherwise very intelligent persons focus on the government as the sole problem area. The government is mostly staffed by either those who are actually idealistic, or those who are too incompetent to hack it in the private sector. Certainly Google and Facebook have better IT infrastructure than 99% of the government.

P.S. The U.S. Constitution forbids "ex post facto" laws that make previously legal behavior illegal after-the-fact. If you believe that the Constitution actually means anything you shouldn't worry about currently legal things being held against you in 20 years. If you believe the Constitution won't hold up in 20 years then it's kind of pointless to worry about any of the other laws, they'd be just as shredded.

<comment><USER4> It wasn't too long ago that the US had the HUAC committee, and ruined many people's reputations by digging up what they'd said in the past.

<comment><USER5> Using something said in the past to embarrass in the present is one thing. It is often justified, like with "mission accomplished" or the "the fundamentals of the economy are strong."

Prosecuting for something that was legally done in the past is a whole different issue.

<comment><USER4> Government sponsored embarrassment isn't the same as putting someone in jail, you are right.

However, taking away someone's ability to make a living (see the Hollywood blacklist, etc.) is leverage that can be used to control behavior. The HUAC hearings were a big bad thing that was done. It wasn't as bad as slavery, for example, but it is something that happened very recently and I think we want to avoid.

<comment><USER5> /nod

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> My recollection of the NSA's legal interpretation is that they feel they don't need a warrant to record everyone's traffic; they only need a warrant for a human to subsequently access those recordings.

The twist this puts on "having nothing to hide" is that it means you have to trust everything you say now will _forever_ be considered benign, rather than just at this particular moment in history.

Open Whisper Systems is a project I work on to help untap your phone: <http://www.whispersystems.org>

<comment><USER7> It's not a completely ridiculous legal interpretation. The 4th amendment is implemented via the exclusionary rule, which excludes evidence from a court case obtained from an unreasonable search. As a matter of history and practice (the exclusionary rule predates the Constitution), the 4th amendment is in many ways a rule governing criminal procedure more than it is a privacy rule per se.

Now, today the prevailing view is that the 4th amendment is that illegal searches are unconstitutional even if the exclusionary rule can't be invoked (see, Bivens v. Six Unknown Named FBI Agents), but there is still this contour in the law that distinguishes collecting data from trying to bring it into evidence.

The argument here is probably wrong, but not ridiculous.

<comment><USER6> To be clear, I don't actually think it's worth trying to influence what is or isn't the legal interpretation that we might desire.

We can't _blame_ power for establishing systems of control, just as we can't _blame_ a tiger for mauling a zoo keeper: it's the nature of the thing. It's what we should expect, no matter how much time we spend coaxing or training it.

I'd much rather invest energy into developing solutions that allow us to communicate securely, rather than investing energy into asking those with power not to monitor our insecure communication.

<comment><USER8> The critical difference is one is a tiger with limited reasoning ability and the other is a human being. So, I can and should be pissed at people in power when they overstep their bounds.

<comment><USER9> And this being "pissed" achieves what exactly? Does your level of pissitude work as leverage to affect the reasoned-out behavior of these other human beings? If so, through what mechanism?

<comment><USER8> Being pissed leads to me donating money to the ACLU, voting, and voicing my opinions.

<comment><USER10> One of those might do something.

<comment><USER11> It's asinine to suggest that we remove vocal outrage from our political dialog. It is one of the finest tools of change. Just look at all the faux outrage over "high unemployment" under Bush 43 (average of around 5%), and compare it to the lack of outrage in today's economy. No, I think outrage is not something I'll give up to please supposedly enlightened people like yourself.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> The first question that comes to my mind - is this technically and economically possible?

How many minutes does the average person spend on the phone per day? I found some numbers in the range from 6 to 28 minutes per day. Let's just pick 15 minutes. This times the population of the states (313.9 million) divided by two yields 39,237,500 hours per day. Storing this at 8 kbps requires about 128.5 TiB per day or 45.8 PiB per year.

At $40 per TiB this is less than 2 million dollars per year. So technically and economically this should actually be possible. But that is just storing. Performing speech recognition, analyzing the data and extracting information is probably the much harder task and I would guess that it is still infeasible to do this with all phone calls.

<comment><USER13> No doubt that intelligent processing on that scale will be feasible in time, and most likely soon. Opinion surveillance at the scale of a nation is too strategically important.

And when it will start happening, it will also apply to today's data.

<comment><USER14> > And when it will start happening, it will also apply to today's data.

I hope everyone else noticed this as well.

Even if the tech to do crazy analysis does not exist today, the tech to record all the data for future use is quite real.

<comment><USER15> Well, the statute of limitations hasn't changed, so just cross your fingers the march of technology isn't _too_ fast... ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> I kind of doubt that they have every phone conversation recorded and archived for all time. But I'm not sure what exactly the incentive is to tell people that they do. If they said, "no, we can't get any of that", it would encourage criminals to be sloppy (and us citizens to not scrutinize them too much). But they say, "yeah, we have everything", which encourages the criminals to use strong cryptography. (And if they've broken AES, they're probably not going to publicly reveal that to our enemies by using it against you in your drug possession case.)

It just doesn't make much sense.

</comment><comment><USER17> If the government is already recording everything, why do they have to reach out and reprogram cards to get access to specific people? [1] I think the illegal things the government does to get more access is evidence they don't have total access at this time.

[1] [http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/04/verizon- rigmaiden-a...](http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/04/verizon-rigmaiden- aircard)

<comment><USER18> That just shows that the FBI don't have access to everything all the time, which is probably true. I've worked for groups before where you'd know that someone else in the same group had the data you were interested in but it was less bother to go and get it yourself than it was to make a freedom of information request and wait a month for that to process.

One of the few advantages that smaller groups have against big systems is that big systems don't totally trust other people in their own systems. Even the police classify their information hierarchically - maybe this bit of information only needs to be known by inspectors in firearms units, etc ,etc.

<comment><USER19> Just because they ask for access doesn't mean they don't already have it. It just means they haven't collected it in a way that can be used in a court case.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> If it is happening, it might some day be culturally accepted. There are steps after that. Are you allowed access to your own history? One big business aspect of gmail is that - easy searchability of your whole email history. It will contain stuff written by other people as well. Will there be some policy of email expiration?

In the end we get to something like in science fiction. Hannu Rajaniemi's Quantum Thief has externalized common memory and also your private memories that can be recovered. Also pieces of them that can be shared directly. Such centralized systems have a whole host of new security problems.

</comment><comment><USER21> my first thought was, "what's a recording?"

is buffering packets in a network device a recording? using metadata for traffic/performance analysis?

</comment><comment><USER22> Probably voicing an opinion in this thread might get you investigated at some point in the future....

<comment><USER23> In that case, let me be the first to say:

Dear CIA, FBI, NSA, DIA, DHS, TSA, etc:

Fuck you.

Thanks,

Mindcrime

I don't give a shit if they investigate me or not. One can't live one's entire life in fear, damnit. Either principles mean something and we need to stand up for and defend them, or not.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> This thing is always coming up, will someone show me some actual evidence and I am not talking some crack pot agent turned whistle blower saying "THAT DO THIS AND THAT", not ECHELON and not the base they are building. I am talking evidence. Logging every single thing? Everything? The data storage that would be required for that is insane. All of these "whistle blowers" have something in common, they are making money off of this, from books to interviews. I am not about to trust them any more than I am their previous employers. Why is it I am ment to question everything the US does but I am ment to blindly trust anyone who says they are doing something like this?

<comment><USER25> There has been publicised information (by major news outlets) that points to this for a long time. And Echelon is also not some crackpot's dream. What's to doubt? Even the CIA CTO said at some point that the "record everything they can and keep it forever":

[http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/20/cia-gus-hunt-big- da...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/20/cia-gus-hunt-big- data_n_2917842.html)

The CIA Chief Tech Officer. What more proof do you need? As if they're gonna let you have a peak at their data centers! If you don't believe they do it at whatever scale it's possible at this point, then you're delusional.

And, no, "The data storage that would be required for that" (logging every call) is not insane by any means. Even a medium-sized corporation could afford it nowadays, and we're talking about the government here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> Are skype calls being recorded now too? They had pretty good security until recently. The independent security review they posted on their site is like.. 8 years old now.

</comment><comment><USER27> The more data they have the less they know. Most people with extreme voiced opinions will do nothing. Thinking doesn't mean doing and doing doesn't mean thinking.

<comment><USER28> The problem is that if you ever cross them, they have over 10 years worth of every type of your electronic communications to sift through for dirt. Not only do they have all that on you, which gives them some unknown but extremely worrisome level of insight about you, but also on all your friends and family and colleagues. And the likelihood of crossing them keeps growing.

<comment><USER27> Well I don't deal with them... so I don't care. They don't have to worry about me crossing them.

<comment><USER29> The point is that you do deal with them, you just don't know about it. You also have to factor in the odds that there will be a false positive affecting you.

Your name might be on a no-fly list, even though you aren't "crossing them." There might be "100% verified" data which links you to some event, as there was with Brandon Mayfield's fingerprints, even though that connection is 100% wrong.

These are all low-probability events. Odds are, you don't have to worry. But every time you have to wait in line for security screening, remember that it's a false positive because they are worrying about you crossing them.

<comment><USER27> And that's why I have not traveled in years. You're going to harass me, I am not going to play. It's going to hurt the economy, but that's your fault, not mine.

<comment><USER30> but then you're not really free are you? free in the sense that you self- impose restrictions on travel. do you feel free? (honest question, cause your stance is intriguing)</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Will headphone jacks return in 2019? - <AUTHOR> My trusty Pixel XL (bought in 2017) is still reliable, but the security updates will stop later this year[1]. Is there any hope for us that prefer headphone jack and the "pure android" experience a.k.a. Nexus/Pixel lineup? Is there any hope that we see? Is this one of the inevitable wave of change that we'll be swept by?<p>[1] https://support.google.com/pixelphone/answer/4457705?hl=en <comment><USER2> I found it interesting that my latest issue iPad has a headphone jack. Not all departments have the same courage it seems and I'm glad for that.</comment>


Let's make the web faster: Tools to discover and improve your site performance - <AUTHOR> http://code.google.com/speed/tools.html

<comment><USER2> For performance benchmarking, httperf is at the top of their list. I wouldn't recommend it but only b/c the configuration parameters are very confusing for anything but the most simple tests. For quick gut-checks, I prefer siege (Apache Bench is viable too but it's quirky). For sophisticated or heavy duty tests, I preferred using Grinder or Tsung (JMeter is a time sink). They also recommend Pylot which I haven't used but Corey Goldberg is active on Twitter and other places.

For monitoring they recommend mon.itor.us. They're pretty good but they don't have a free plan. <http://browsermob.com/> is pretty cool b/c they use real browsers and they can run your selenium tests.

Some free options for monitoring a single site: <http://wasitup.com>, <http://pingdom.com> and <http://blamestella.com> (that last one is my product and all the plans are currently free).

And remember: what you measure you get!

<comment><USER3> Mon.itor.us _is_ free. It's the free version of Monitis.

<comment><USER2> Yes, but the monitoring interval is 30 minutes which is not useful in most cases.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> I've found trying to make your websites faster is kind of a drug. They can just never be fast enough. You start with Google Page Speed, and before you know it you're profiling your CSS for slow rules in Safari ...

For most database-driven applications though the real latency is almost always in the database. You really need something like memcached to totally remove the bottleneck. I think oftentimes frontend speed demons are trying to answer the wrong question.

<comment><USER5> I totally agree that it's like a drug... eventually you'll start getting excited about an request time improvement from 15ms to 10ms by tuning your memcache client library...

Realistically, though, basic client-side optimization (e.g. expires headers, minification and concatenation, unobtrusive javascript) is low-hanging performance fruit that can make a website seem a lot faster with very little work. Since, tuning a database-driven app takes a lot more skill and time, and most people haven't even done the client-side stuff, Google focuses on that.

<comment><USER6> Backend tuning also involves a lot of black magic, whereas going down the YSlow checklist and knocking things off _will_ improve your perceived user load speed. If you don't gzip, gzip. Bam. Done. It will work. Tuning the database, on the other hand, crikey -- how many chickens does one have to sacrifice to become an expert DBA anyhow?

<comment><USER7> I think the DB equivalent of turning on gzip is slapping an index on your primary keys [EDIT: should be "on your primary data column"]. Not exactly expert material, and quite useful.

<comment><USER6> I am unaware of a commonly used database where primary keys are not indexed by default. Granted, on a good day I can spell SQL correctly, but it was my impression that primary keys imply an index by definition. Can someone rectify my understanding?

<comment><USER7> Yeah, you're right. Call it slapping an index on the column holding actual data. My bad.

(The reason that primary keys tend to be auto-indexed is simple: to verify uniqueness, you need to check whether the primary key of the record being inserted is already in any record. Doing this without indices would be painfully slow.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I agree front end is where the majority of the latency occurs. Luckily there are automated solutions out there to tweak performance but my favorite is <http://blaze.io> because they do all the performance adjustments in real-time and you get the power of a leading CDN.

</comment><comment><USER9> Can someone shed some light on what JSLint has to do with performance?

<comment><USER10> JSMin (and other compressors) often cause terrible, hard-to-understand bugs in sloppy code. Passing JSLint helps avoid a lot of those problems.</comment></comment>


Google Buys Wavii For North Of $30 Million - <AUTHOR> http://techcrunch.com/2013/04/23/google-buys-wavii-for-north-of-30-million/ <comment><USER2> This one makes a lot more sense than the yahoo acquisition considering Wavii actually developed their own algorithms

</comment><comment><USER3> You could just build your own... [http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2013/04/23/how-to- make...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2013/04/23/how-to- make-30m-without-spending-any-of-your-money-in-your-spare-time/)

<comment><USER4> from the article - "Don't worry if your app is down most of the time. It just needs to work well enough to demo and take screenshots of." ... ha ha

They laid down the whole plan on the paper to get bought so easily. Ideally this is what it takes rest is up to us...how we execute it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER5> Looks like they're headed to the Knowledge Graph team, but I'd like to see some love for the news division, especially from NLP badasses like Wavii.

<comment><USER6> Since Knowledge graph is a team, not a division that may actually be the case since it's possible the author actually meant "Google Knowledge", which is the catch all internal unit for all of Google's search-related products (of which News is a part).

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> If I was google or Apple, I would have gone after Prismatic. I've used both and Prismatic seem to have much better technology.

<comment><USER8> Yeah. I think Prismatic has the best technology in terms of machine learning and NLP. With it, maybe Prismatic is worth more than their budget.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> This [1] makes one feel if Google is really interested in acquisitions like these or just tossing some money around.

[1] [http://thenextweb.com/apps/2011/09/02/google-closes- aardvark...](http://thenextweb.com/apps/2011/09/02/google-closes-aardvark- social-search-as-part-of-labs-shutdown/)

<comment><USER10> 'Interested' is a hard to prove word. The best one can really say without statements from Google VIPs is that acquisitions frequently do not seem to lead to successful services and so they're probably better seen as either expensive acquihires or gambling on hits.

(I have an in-progress analysis of Google service/product shutdowns at <http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns> and one of the solider looking results so far is that even being generous and marking as 'alive' any acqusition's products which were merged into something like Maps or Google+, products which were part of an acquisition are much more likely to be shutdown than internally-developed products.)

<comment><USER9> Thanks for the link to your analysis. Should give it a read :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> NLP is on fire at the moment...

<comment><USER12> In what context?

<comment><USER4> first summly now this

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Congrats, folks!

</comment><comment><USER14> I'm guessing the average employee get's to cash out a little under $100k or do they get locked in? I wonder what the Google retention bonus is like?

<comment><USER15> Crunchbase says Wavii only has five employees and only took ~$2MM in funding. So, I would bet it's more than $100K total. The funding is all listed as a 2010-07 seed round. I expect they raised more than that. But, given their acquisition price and business model it sounds like things worked on well for them and at least the founders were well vested. Or, did you mean actual cash excluding any GOOG options/RSUs?

My understanding is that a 4 year lock-in for non-execs (techies) is a standard requirement by Google during acquisitions. I've heard of some people negotiating it down to 3. But, almost everyone I know got 4.

<comment><USER16> 4 year lock-in only applies to non-execs? What is it for execs?

With this, an engineer at a startup has a worse deal?

<comment><USER15> I'm sure it's situation dependent with execs. If you have a very mature company in a new vertical w/ significant revenue (like a YouTube) and they want you to continue to run the product that would be a very different situation than a small acquihire where the execs may just be essentially engineers or dev team leaders at Google. Of course, the execs likely organized their start-up governance in a way that gives them negotiating strength in the deal. I can't imagine a start-up where the engineers would be involved in the negotiation and decision making beyond their own transition/retention.</comment></comment></comment></comment>


Open Letter to the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees - happy-go-lucky https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Open_letter_to_the_WMF_Board <comment><AUTHOR> There are many issues with the WMF T&S team's actions.

They completely bypass the community procedures in place, deal out arbitrary sanctions without any explanation or justification and simultaneously refuse to deal with real issues that the community(ies) really can not deal with.

Quoting a Wikimedia steward (Rschen): "I know for Croatian [Wikipedia] we stewards point-blank asked T&S if they would do anything about it and they said no."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_response_t...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_response_to_the_Wikimedia_Foundation%27s_ban_of_Fram)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_response_t...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_response_to_the_Wikimedia_Foundation%27s_ban_of_Fram/Archive_2#Two_similar_bans_&_one_%22conduct_warning%22_on_Chinese_Wikipedia)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_response_t...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_response_to_the_Wikimedia_Foundation%27s_ban_of_Fram/Archive_2#FYI:_Similar_incident_in_de.wp_some_months_ago)

<comment><USER2> I don't have a skin in this game either way, but the discussion about the open letter [1] has multiple, mostly unrefuted and partially acknowledged posts claiming that the arbitration process was not working, lead to negative behavior remaining unmitigated and is in need of improvement.

The open letter itself acknowledges this fact.

If processes aren't working, sometimes a shakeup and ensuing drama is required to improve things.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Com...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Arbitration_Committee/Noticeboard#Open_letter_to_the_WMF_Board)

<comment><AUTHOR> Sure, the Arbitration Committee and the processes associated with it are not perfect. But is an unaccountable, invisible and all powerful judge, jury and executioner institution like the T&S a good or fair thing? If you look at the context apart form just the Fram case, you will see that T&S behaves very strangely.

</comment></comment></comment><comment> gjsman-1000 For more context: [https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikiped...](https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikipedia- ban-editor-culture-war)

<comment><USER3> "On June 10, the Wikimedia Foundation did something unprecedented in its decade and a half history: It banned a user from the English-language Wikipedia for a year."

No they didn't. From editing it, perhaps; and using one specific persona. Anyone can read wikipedia without being logged in, and it's trivial to create a new account on any site.

<comment><USER4> That's nitpicking. When someone says they're banned from Twitter it means their account can't be used to make tweets, not that they cannot read Twitter while logged out, or that they can't make a new Twitter account.

<comment><USER5> Well, from where I sit, it's a huge difference in terms of how much I should care about it. I have a limited amount of outrage and try to ration it to the issues that are the largest societal problems.

<comment><USER6> The point isn't that there isn't a difference between the two ideas: it is that _clearly_ the word "banned" means the latter, not the former, and so it is strange that anyone could possibly have misinterpreted the sentence.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Fram (wiki mod in question) is apparently the Linus Torvalds of the old-guard Wikipedia community. "He's a prolific genius!" vs "He's a toxic asshole!" and much like the Linux community there have been no effective systems to deal with someone like that.

It's telling that the Wikipedia community's response is "How do we deal with WMF" and not "How do we deal with this admin"

<comment><USER8> I am generally on the side of Linus being a toxic asshole, but,

1\. I would consider it inappropriate for the Linux Foundation to remove Linus _without the involvement of the community_. They're there to be stewards of the project, not to run it, and while I have problems with Linus, I also have (different, unrelated, not directly comparable) problems with the corporate control of LF, and it would set a precedent that other decisions are in the hands of LF. And besides there's the practical problem that if Linus is still wanted by the community, banning one toxic asshole won't change the culture. If LF wants to advocate for the community to decide they no longer want Linus, that would be fine (and I'd honestly support it) and they should implement the community consensus if it emerges. (If they want to no longer pay Linus upwards of a half million dollars per year, that would certainly be within their rights, too.)

2\. Along those lines it seems difficult to believe that Wikipedia's culture problem is a single dude. If we admit for the sake of argument that we do want WMF to ban assholes (which I can see the merits of), that's likely to translate to mass bans, which the existing community governance structures should at least be consulted in. (Even if one of the possible conclusions is "the existing community leadership are all asshole enablers and need to be stripped of power," make that decision _after_ having the conversation.)

3\. From reading around [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:FRAM](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:FRAM) it seems like he's one of the most vocal opponents to new features being pushed by WMF that the community seems to not be enthusiastic about. See the comment starting "In the absence of any explanation, the cynic in me guesses...."

<comment><USER9> Quite clearly, Fram was told to stay away from a user named LauraHale (in March 2019) - to avoid any interactions with her or her content completely. Essentially, it's a restraining order.

So what did he do for him to get a Wikipedia "restraining order" against him?

AND... he broke that restraining order by mentioning her in some comments.

I mean, this isn't some statement about "banning all assholes" so much as action against a single person who refused to stop harassing another person.

<comment><USER10> _Fram has also clashed with LauraHale who is the girlfriend of the WMF chair and has made noises about going to the Trust and Safety people before. No one knows if WMF chair was recused from decision to ban Fram. Pretty much everyone sees an obvious conflict of interest._

[http://wikirev.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2222&start=10](http://wikirev.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2222&start=10)

<comment><USER11> I'm not sure there's any solid evidence that she's the girlfriend of the WMF chair - that mostly seems to be a salacious rumor. However, there does seem to be evidence that the WMF chair and Laura Hale directly worked together over at Wikinews on the same topic area that Laura Hale and Fram ended up in conflict over on Wikipedia (sports in Spain). That seems like a better thing to focus on than juicy gossip.

<comment><USER12> The only solid evidence is that Fram used the word "fuck", as that was the diff provided to him. Everything else, including the incident with LauraHale or any potential relation between her and WMF is just speculation people are rushing into in order to find an explanation to WMF action.

This is why the Open Letter is so elegant written. It does not speculate. It addresses the core issue which is the lack of solid evidence and community process.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> I see this from a high-level.

There's a power-struggle going on where one body is taking an action another body feels they should have control or at least input into.

That this power-struggle occurs and especially that it happens in public is healthy, IMO.

But ArbCom should really be looking itself in the mirror right now. The fact is, under their watch Fram was free to be a huge asshole to contributors for some 15 years. ArbCom suggests that someone should have told them they needed to do something. But that seems like a very weak excuse for the senior conduct body. _You_ are the ones who need to be setting and enforcing the rules that allow for contributions!

IMO no organization should tolerate assholes, so they got the result right but clearly did not do it the right way. I think ArbCom needs to handle these cases, at least a decade quicker than in this case.

<comment><AUTHOR> But there are indications of corruption within WMF, capriciousness of the T&S team, and no evidence against Fram was given.

<comment><USER13> I agree T&S did not handle this the right way.

My main point is ArbCom should have already handled this, perhaps a decade ago.

So they are broken. If they want a healthy Wikipedia their first priority should be fixing themselves. They should understand why a toxic asshole was running free for many years under their watch and how they can prevent it from happening again. Maybe they are doing this behind the scenes, but it's not clear to me they even understand they have a problem.

(BTW, no one seems to be disputing that Fram is an asshole. Maybe I missed it, but if true, then there's no question that in a community-driven site, something needs to be done about it. Some people seem to want to believe that it could be simultaneously true that Fram could be a big asshole AND be a good editor. In the context of a community-driven site, those people are wrong. Driving off potentially valuable contributors is cardinal sin.)

<comment><AUTHOR> I am not that well acquainted with Fram, and the term asshole is not precise enough; but you really do need some well intentioned assholes if you want to run wiki-style projects. The problem is that wikis are free to participate to, but not everybody is well intentioned or capable of constructive and positive participation. Those people are more harmful than "assholes", and Fram used to take care of such people from what I gather.

Edit: I did not down-vote you, nor would I do it if I could.

<comment><USER14> No. That attitude is incompatible with Wikipedia.

It's also wrong to suggest that fram was only abusive to people who shouldn't have been on wikipedia. Read the thread and buzzfeed articles linked here: even people on his side describe him as toxic.

<comment><AUTHOR> > It's also wrong to suggest that fram was only abusive to people who > shouldn't have been on wikipedia.

Quite a claim, maybe give some evidence for that? I saw no example of such behavior.

> even people on his side describe him as toxic.

I am tempted to call you "toxic". Terms like "brusque", "rude", "asshole", "harasser", "toxic" are not equivalent, but you repeatedly try to assign some of those labels to Fram based on others.

"Brusque, bordering on rude sometimes" is not even a bad thing for a Wikipedia user. And "like Inspector Javert at times" is not really as strong as "toxic".

<comment><USER13> > Quite a claim, maybe give some evidence for that? I saw no example of such > behavior.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-06-30/Special_report)

<comment><AUTHOR> LOL, I posted that link in a top-level comment in this thread.

Can you give an actual example where Fram was abusive, harassing, whatever? This link contains (as far as contra-Fram material goes) only unsubstantiated accusations (concerning a medium where public examples should be relatively easy to find).

<comment><USER13> This is a link to Fram's own words. This link appears in the content of your link.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=895438118](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=895438118)

Do you think that's good for a community?

Obviously words like "asshole" and "toxic" include value judgements". But I don't think it's a very strong value judgement in this case.

<comment><AUTHOR> Do you think saying "fuck" is harassment?

Fram's edit you linked is on point criticism of the Arbitration Committee and I think it may have been good for the community. It would have been better, more efficient in transmitting its intended message, more influential if it were written in a better style (the kind exhibited on HN).

I concur that there is danger of Fram's edits promoting bad style in other Wikipedia editors; but there is a tradeoff here that must be made, because good style takes effort and time (both for practice and execution), more so when one lacks relevant education; and some things need to be said (often saying something sooner is more effective than saying it later, too).

I guess some people place most blame on the use of the word "fuck", but using it was warranted. Think about what such profanity can accomplish, it has the power to give a certain tone to one's message. Those who wield language with great command and effectiveness might think of ways to accomplish the same or better tone without using profanities, but for the rest of us profanities are a sometimes necessary shortcut through all the time and exertion needed for better style.

Anyways, let us suppose you want to make Wikimedia projects more "civil", how long of a ban/block do you think profanities should warrant? Two days? A week? Certainly not a year, at least not the first time such a sanction is used.

All the scrutiny Fram has been given during this scandal really ought to have found some more serious violations by Fram to warrant a year long ban.

But let us not forget that nobody outside the WMF employ even knows why Fram was actually banned, nor what should they do not to be banned themselves. The T&S is a complete unknown. They refuse to fix some huge issues (like with the Croatian Wikipedia), but hand out apparently unwarranted unexplained unappealable bans across some Wikipedias (like what happened to Fram). The fact is that Foundation employees mysteriously attacked the community that produces value for the Foundation, of course it is going to raise big questions, which the Foundation is not even bothering to answer!??

The thing is, the community volunteers to produce valuable content for the Foundation, thus trust in the good intentions of the Foundation employees and governance is needed. Ironically the Trust and Safety team made that trust implode and a shroud of fear rise by issuing unexplained bans that well may be malicious or misguided or corrupted, but the community just can not judge the T&S team's actions, because they are unexplained, not supported by any evidence. Even as rulemakers the T&S team does not work, because their actions are totally unexplained, they give no guidance as to how one should act in the aim of not being banned.

It might turn out in the end that Fram was rightfully banned (maybe the issue is something like child pornography), but that will not matter, because the issue is not Fram, the issue is that Foundation employee (or contractor, which is what most of T&S are [0]) actions are not accountable to the community.

[0] [https://wikimediafoundation.org/role/trust-and- safety/](https://wikimediafoundation.org/role/trust-and-safety/)

<comment><USER13> I don't care about the word "fuck". I don't think it's useful to pluck one word of it out and try to discuss it out-of-context, though.

Without stretching, IMO, the post is angry, aggressive, stupid, arrogant and abusive.

Anyway, you asked for an example and you've been given one. If it hasn't penetrated by now I don't think it will, but you have it.

<comment><AUTHOR> Fram was right to be angry. That it showed in his post is, as I said in the grandparent comment, only bad for him and the message he was trying to convey. And notice that you are calling him arrogant while saying "If it hasn't penetrated by now I don't think it will" to me.

To be honest the fact that profanities themselves are not the thing that bothers you is even more unsettling to me than if it were the case. Suppose your standards (what they are is not at all clear to me) were imposed on Wikimedia projects. Who would be capable of judging by them and making heads roll? And what would be implications for free speech?

One thing that has not been noted up to now in the discussion, is that even if T&S has, say, decided to impose standards like your's on Wikipedias (which does _not_ appear to be the case, although as I have said already, everything regarding their action is murky), how would it be fair to arbitrarily, without notice or warning start imposing them on Fram specifically.

Again, while you are attacking Fram you are spinning the discussion away from greater issue of a charity corporation being nontransparent to the extreme in making heads roll in the community its value is based on. How are the Wikimedia project communities (some call it a movement, actually) supposed to keep their spirit necessary for volunteering with such arbitrarily capricious and totally unexplained bans happening?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> He did the same thing as Linus, he didn't mince words when he showed the door to people who persistently wrote crap articles. It's the intersection of academic entitlement (students _really_ believe that just showing up and making an effort should be rewarded with good grades, no matter how good the outcome is) and American discourse (no rude words, hurt feelings are more important than substance).

<comment><USER16> The whole point of "professional" discourse is to keep emotions and feelings out of it so the substance can be the focus. If you start insulting people then it is going to trigger an emotional response. That's how most humans work. If you choose not to be careful about how you word your criticism, then you are also choosing to inject emotion into the conversation, thus distracting from the substance.

You can be blunt and direct without being an asshole. It's not that hard.

<comment><USER17> But sometimes professional discourse just isn't effective.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> Hard data, please. What did he do specifically?

EDIT: For the downvoters, my question is because I'm tired of being manipulated by parties on both sides of any issue only disclosing what interests them.

<comment><USER19> >Fram is also known within the community as an asshole. "He's like Inspector Javert," one Wikipedian wrote of Fram recently, comparing him to the ruthless and inflexible antagonist of Les Misérables. "Brusque, bordering on rude sometimes," another longtime admin, Floquenbeam, told BuzzFeed News. "He has a reputation for almost always being right on the underlying merits in a dispute, but going about it in a fairly obnoxious way." Over the years, Fram has clashed with other admins, with editors, with ArbCom, and with the foundation itself.

Fram explained that he had received two previous "conduct warnings" from the foundation's Trust and Safety Council for his incivil style toward other Wikipedians.

[https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikiped...](https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikipedia- ban-editor-culture-war)

Personally, I'm reminded of Linus Torvald's "voluntary" leave of absence.

With great power comes a great need to act with civility?

<comment><USER20> The man is not going around stripping people of their rights because he's upset about how people talk to him. I don't think escalation of "I don't like his style" to "he should be banned from participating for a year" is appropriate, no matter how much that style upsets the sweet-sounding passive aggressive types.

I, for one, would prefer a world of people who act in good faith, even if they address issues in a coarse and gruff manner at times; to a world of petty, passive-aggressive crybullies who ultimately contribute nothing of value, nothing but a veneer of shallow procedural "niceness".

<comment><USER19> From the article, there seemed to be multiple instances where users reported that they were harassed by Fram across the site after having a dispute with him.

That goes well beyond merely being blunt or rude.

>BU Rob13, a former member of ArbCom who recently retired from administration, said that Fram's behavior toward him, including "taking shots" at him in an edit summary and following him to unrelated cases, felt like harassment.

[https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikiped...](https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/josephbernstein/wikipedia- ban-editor-culture-war)

The statement the powers that be released would seem to bear this out.

>In a statement to BuzzFeed News, the organization said it had leveled the ban to maintain "respect and civility" on the platform. "Uncivil behavior, including harassment, threats, stalking, spamming, or vandalism, is against our Terms of Use, which are applicable to anyone who edits on our projects," it said.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Bye bye Wikipedia, it was nice while it lasted, looks like you got taken over by the totalitarians.

 _[The Wikimedia Foundation's (WMF) Trust and Safety team] have reiterated that they are not willing to reconsider the ban, nor will they turn the full evidence over to the community or ArbCom for review._

<comment><USER21> I guess I'm not surprised. Articles on contentious topics have always had people trying to control the narrative. As Wikipedia got more and more widely trusted/respected, you'd imagine that people would pay money to do it.

I assume there have already been attempts at decentralized, more democratic versions of it?

<comment><USER22> Wikipedia certainly has its issues in regards to bias on many topics, and I can see the allure of decentralization, but I wonder if it's really the solution. It seems to me like it would just make things worse Instead of each side policing each other and helping keep bias to a minimum, it would likely result in multiple extremely biased "versions" of the truth, with each version treated as gospel by its respective fans while dismissing all others.

Imagine two people arguing about the validity of climate change, with one of them citing ExxonPedia.org and another citing GreenPeacePedia.org. It would be a nightmare.

<comment><USER23> > Imagine two people arguing about the validity of climate change, with one of > them citing ExxonPedia.org and another citing GreenPeacePedia.org. It would > be a nightmare.

True, but one of them will be loved by Google, so their side will be widely visible, while the other will not. I don't see any incentive for the side in control of Wikipedia to not want this.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> It might also be interesting to read the today's articles in Wikipedia's news magazine The Signpost.

Did Fram harass other editors?: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-06-30/Special_report)

A constitutional crisis hits English Wikipedia: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-06-30/Discussion_report)

Mysterious ban, admin resignations, Wikimedia Thailand rising: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-06-30/News_and_notes)

</comment><comment><USER24> Here's one of the accusations[1] that is posted publicly on Wikipedia:

> A troll on an offsite forum posted a graphic written depiction of myself > engaged in sexual activity with another editor. Fram repeatedly posted a > link to this depiction on Wikipedia, even after it was revision deleted.

If Fram did this then there should be a log viewable by a Wikipedia admin.

There are apparently over 1,000 admins. At least one of them should be able to scroll back through Fram's activity, find the case cited, and report publicly that they can corroborate this anonymous accusation.

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2019-06-30/Special_report)

</comment><comment><USER25> One of the hard lessons I've learned over the course of my career is that no matter how "valuable" or "irreplaceable" an employee is, if they are toxic, you should fire them immediately. The damage done to a company by keeping toxic people always outweighs the damage done by firing them.

<comment><AUTHOR> How to get rid of someone that gets in your way, or you just do not like that someone? Just label him "toxic"!

<comment><USER25> Everybody knows who the toxic people are in an organization. That's pretty much the definition of toxic. Conversely as the old saying goes, if you think _everybody_ in the organization is an asshole, it's likely the real asshole is you.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> My, my... That's some legalese thrown in there. What a contrast with the declaration of the independence of the cyberspace.

Snark aside, it really looks ugly from the outside.

</comment><comment><USER27> if this letter amounts to support of status-quo for Wikipedia-en editors, then "phooey" on that.

<comment><USER28> It's basically the arbitration committee scorning the trust and safety committee of the wikimedia foundation for overstepping into what should of been a case handled by them and the community.

<comment><USER29> I am reminded of when the "weboob" package was removed from Debian (itself a reasonable action)… by Debian's _Anti-Harassment Team_ , not by the Debian FTP masters or anyone who usually removes packages.

EDIT: I was misinformed, as geofft correctly point out in a comment below.

<comment><USER8> That is untrue: [https://bugs.debian.org/914179](https://bugs.debian.org/914179)

Any member of the Debian community (even just a user) can file an RM bug against ftp.debian.org, if they provide justification. That is the standard procedure. The FTP masters perform the removal, but in the majority of cases someone else (the package's own maintainer, a member of the release team, a member of the "QA team" which is also everybody) files it, and says "request of maintainer"/"QA"/etc.

It is clear from the linked bug that antiharassment requested the removal and ftpmaster performed it. That's normal procedure. And the text was clearer than usual that ftpmaster should make their own independent judgment about whether it was justified (even though they always can).

<comment><USER29> I stand corrected; I only knew what I had read about it.

Also, I now see that Wikipedia's T&S committee had a plausible reason for not referring the matter of Fram back to ArbCom: It could be argued that ArbCom might be biased against Fram, considering Fram's comments on record about ArbCom.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The problem when an extremely popular person (in some circles) needs to be held accountable to the rules.

Like when OJ was on trial. Or Bill Cosby and Louis CK were found to be creeps.

So this Fram gets a few warnings about his behavior crossing the line, but continues on. Who's going to take him on?

<comment><USER30> This comparison isn't appropriate.

<comment><USER9> I'm not actually comparing his alleged acts to those of those people. It's an unfair comparison, and I didn't intend to imply there was equivalency there.

Just the difficulty of enforcing rules on people who are extremely popular. Couldn't think of any better examples.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Sadly, it does not matter.

People read, get riled, takes sides and form poles.

Lots of wasted energy.

Fram. Banning Fram. Local vs central cabal governance. WWF can play the bad cop and take the hit. There are more Frams, more ArbComs and more WWFs to take their place.

Some day bots will rule, grafting in disparate knowledge graphs.

Is the internet gonna stop using Wikipedia?

If the humans are smart, best stick together and (start) build consensus and trust networks.</comment>


World's biggest museum exhibition of Bob Ross paintings. How'd it wind up in BC? - <AUTHOR> https://www.cbc.ca/arts/it-s-the-world-s-biggest-museum-exhibition-of-bob-ross-paintings-so-how-d-it-wind-up-in-b-c-1.5659949 <comment><USER2> This will probably be a very unpopular opinion, but I think that making an exhibition of Bob Ross' paintings makes no sense, as the painting themselves have close to zero artistic value. The real artistic value of Bob was performative, and is inextricably tied to his use of the video medium. The exhibition has a simple tv showing some episodes of his show, but that should be the tentpole of the display, not just one addendum. The painting in themselves are artistically irrelevant divertissement, they are important only because they were painted by Bob Ross. Owning one would be justified by that, but exhibiting them as work of arts on their own merit? Meh.

<comment><USER3> You'd have to explain how you price artistic value before anyone can argue with that. But these paintings are also cultural artifacts of a popular show. That they're paintings has misled you.

"While serving as a tribute to the artistic legacy of an artist whose name and work is as well known, this exhibition looks to explore the deeper questions around nostalgia, high and low art, art history, the cult of celebrity, pop culture, the art market and ultimately what is worthy of being exhibited and preserved in our museums. Bob and I both agree there are no wrong answers and I am fascinated to explore these questions."

This exhibit directly invites you to discuss the worthiness of the paintings, so I say it DOES make sense to make an exhibit of Bob Ross' paintings. How could anyone hope to judge them fairly without seeing them first?

[http://pentictonartgallery.com/bob-ross- exhibition](http://pentictonartgallery.com/bob-ross-exhibition)

<comment><USER4> >You'd have to explain how you price artistic value before anyone can argue with that.

Nobody knows. Its what people are willing to pay.

Banksy sold his art at a pop up in NYC. Hardly anyone bought: (and one negotiated half price)

[https://gothamist.com/arts-entertainment/video-banksy-set- up...](https://gothamist.com/arts-entertainment/video-banksy-set-up-pop-up- booth-in-central-park-and-only-had-three-customers)

<comment><USER3> I think what you've said is fine concerning monetary value. But I want to be clear I was talking about artistic value. It's important to make the distinction as this is a museum exhibit.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Well, BC is covered in many forests so it's certainly known for lots of happy little trees.

</comment><comment><USER4> He painted each one 3 times (3 per show).

Bob Ross Inc. has a lot. Stored in less than optimal conditions.

The video here is pretty good (Where are Bob Ross's paintings): [https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/12/arts/bob-ross- paintings-m...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/12/arts/bob-ross-paintings- mystery.html)

the video is the main, but the text part ends with this:

'In 1994, the talk show host Phil Donahue asked Mr. Ross to "say out loud your work will never hang in a museum."

"Well, maybe it will," Mr. Ross replied. "But probably not the Smithsonian."'

</comment><comment><USER6> My kids secondary school uses Bob Ross on YouTube in mindfulness sessions. The kids seem to love them...</comment>


Congrats to the winners of the MobileBeat Tesla Award: Loopt, AdMob and more - <AUTHOR> http://venturebeat.com/2008/07/24/congrats-to-the-winners-of-the-mobilebeat-tesla-award-loopt-admob-and-more/

<comment><USER2> I kinda cringe when mobile reimplementations of desktop ideas, such as AdMob, are compared to Tesla.</comment>


N is a Number : A Portrait of Paul Erdős - <AUTHOR> http://onionesquereality.wordpress.com/2010/04/21/n-is-a-number-a-portrait-of-paul-erdos/

<comment><USER2> The biography of Paul Erdős, _The Man Who Loved Only Numbers_ , is a great read. [http://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Loved-Only- Numbers/dp/07868636...](http://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Loved-Only- Numbers/dp/0786863625)</comment>


Harvard admits to receiving $9M from Jeffrey Epstein - <AUTHOR> https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/461224-harvard-admits-to-receiving-9-million-from-jeffrey-epstein <comment><USER2> The Hill does a decent job of reporting this without sensationalizing it. Of note: They accepted money from him, but it was all _prior_ to his 2008 conviction in Florida. I don't fault Harvard for this, and I think this is just one of those tangential stories that pop up whenever the media sensationalizes something.

Also note that this is Harvard, which is separate from the MIT Medial Lab story (which I kind of think is being blown out of proportion). Epstein donated to both schools, and I'll bet that he donated to others which we will find out about later. But what are these schools supposed to do? Give the money back? If you can take dirty money and turn it into valuable research, isn't that a good thing?

<comment><USER3> The primary difference is that the MIT institution took money from him despite being internally barred from doing so. As you mention, at least Harvard did this before the original trial.

As far as your last comment, there's been a lot of historic and present discussion around exactly that blend of science/ethics (WW2, milgram, etc.)

<comment><USER4> Just wanted you to know that what you said is known to be false, "the MIT institution took money from him despite being internally barred from doing so"

See [http://news.mit.edu/2019/letter-preliminary- facts-0912](http://news.mit.edu/2019/letter-preliminary-facts-0912)

"when members of [the MIT president's] senior team learned that the Media Lab had received the first of the Epstein gifts, they reached out to speak with Joi Ito. He asked for permission to retain this initial gift, and members of my senior team allowed it."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> There actually was a lot of Epstein news that dropped last night (presumably with the idea that the Democrat debates would drown it out):

1\. This Harvard statement. "Money's gone, too bad".

2\. MIT President Rafael Reif admitted to signing an Epstein thank you note and attending a meeting discussing Epstein's contributions. He also threw his whole staff under the bus.

3\. Reid Hoffman admitted to arranging meetings with Epstein on Joi Ito's request. He shockingly threw Ito and unshockingly MIT under the bus.

[2] [https://news.mit.edu/2019/letter-regarding-jeffrey- epstein-a...](https://news.mit.edu/2019/letter-regarding-jeffrey-epstein-and- mit-0822)

[3] [https://www.axios.com/reid-hoffman-jeffrey-epstein-mit- donat...](https://www.axios.com/reid-hoffman-jeffrey-epstein-mit- donations-206d7254-e4dc-4079-9974-631fbe669b3d.html)

EDIT:

This submission is now [flagged]. There's no flame war going on in here to sink it so not sure why it would be removed.

<comment><USER5> You seem up to date, has anyone figured out where Epstien got all the money from yet?

<comment><AUTHOR> No, it's still a mystery. Right before he died, he moved it all into a trust and named Bill Gate's advisor as his executor:

[https://nypost.com/2019/08/20/ex-bill-gates-adviser- shocked-...](https://nypost.com/2019/08/20/ex-bill-gates-adviser-shocked-to- be-named-one-of-jeffrey-epsteins-executors/)

Gates himself has a lot to answer for. The MIT emails show Epstein funneling $2M from Gates to Media Lab. He also flew on Epstein's jet to Florida and hasn't answered why.

<comment><USER6> One day I will not be surprised at how deep the rot goes, but today is not that day.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> There is a huge difference with what Harvard did and what MIT's Media Lab did. According to the article, Harvard didn't take any money from Epstein after his conviction, while at the Media Lab they continued to take it _even after MIT put Epstein on its donor blacklist_ , and tried to hide the source of the funds.

<comment><USER8> > Media Lab they continued to take it even after MIT put Epstein on its donor > blacklist,

Turns out this was a misrepresentation:

* [https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614299/mit-media-lab-jeff...](https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614299/mit-media-lab-jeffrey-epstein-joichi-ito-signe-swenson-disqualified-fundraising/)

Apparently "disqualified" status was a flag in their CRM essentially just meant "don't bother trying to cold call this person", usually set after three failed attempts to fund-raise from them. It in no way signaled any kind of prohibition on fundraising, and only available to development staff in any case. The whole tangent was essentially spurious and signified nothing except that his donations weren't coming in through fundraising cold calls.

But the real shocker is:

* [https://president.mit.edu/speeches-writing/preliminary-fact-...](https://president.mit.edu/speeches-writing/preliminary-fact-finding-about-mit-and-jeffrey-epstein)

Media Lab's acceptance of donations from Epstein was known and approved by senior staff in MIT administration, the president even sent a thank you letter. The Media Lab had been directed by the administration to keep Epstein's donation's anonymous to avoid him using MIT for publicity or to enhance his own reputation.

So this whole idea that Ito was demonstrating mens rea by concealing his actions from the administration appears to be completely false. I find it shocking that MIT took a week to clarify this point.

Kinda sad that HN has had three front page stories repeating this allegation that Ito hid the donations from MIT, but a submission of the link to MIT's statement that the administration knew and directed keeping them anonymous is totally buried. I could understand being burned out on the subject, but now we have this Harvard thing at the top...

<comment><USER7> Thank you very much for posting it, this is an important piece of information I was unaware of, but note your links are broken.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Good article that highlights how institutions review and vet donors. I'm impressed that Harvard refused $$ from Epstein after his 2007 conviction. The school shouldn't be punished for $$ it took before charges came to light.

</comment><comment><USER10> Remember when MIT thought it was morally prudent to let the government throw the book at Aaron Swartz because it could alienate their commercial partners? They did that while actively courting a sex-trafficking pedophile.

Imagine valuing JSTOR's copyright more than human life and dignity.

</comment><comment><USER11> As someone who works in the Advancement (fundraising) space for a university (not in the US), Harvards behaviour is IMHO quite ethical.

Whilst institutions will do due diligence on major donors they are not geared to be investigative units. So unknowingly accepting donations from a tainted donor is not something I would hold against them nor would I expect them to return the money or donate it elsewhere.

The key takeaway is that they refused donations from Epstein once his activities were known. Absolutely the right course of action.

</comment><comment><USER12> Whatever Epstein did, it's good that his money be put to good use like helping education and research rather than being burned because he touched it.

Harvard has nothing to 'admit', they did nothing wrong, and there is no point in them getting rid of the money they have left.

<comment><AUTHOR> Epstein cited his relationships with these schools (built through fundraising) repeatedly both to intimidate his victims into silence and convince authorities to let him go. This wasn't a case of him sending a check and walking away, he was extracting a lot of value for his predatory operation from these institutions. They should face the music for their role in what happened.

<comment><USER13> > They should face the music for their role in what happened

Harvard and MIT didn't play a role in Epstein's non-donation related activities. They have nothing to answer for.

Next you're going to tell me anyone that takes any Bill and Melinda Gates foundation money has to answer for Microsoft's monopolistic practices in the 90's.

This witch-hunt stuff needs to stop.

<comment><AUTHOR> They actually did play a role in his non-donation activities. Multiple professors at both schools are credibly accused of participating in Epstein's child sex trafficking. MIT allowed Epstein to bring girls to the campus (Harvard hasn't released enough info to know if he did that there as well). MIT _sent Epstein a Disobedience Prize orb_. MIT leadership worked to actively conceal the donations.

There was a lot of very questionable things going on. They didn't just get a check and call it a day.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> I work at Harvard. This is the letter referenced:

The Office of President

Dear Members of the Harvard Community,

All of us have been horrified by the revelations regarding Jeffrey Epstein, and I write today to update our community on steps we are taking in view of current information about his philanthropy to Harvard.

Let me start by emphasizing the obvious: Epstein's reported criminal actions were utterly abhorrent. They flagrantly offend the values of our society and this institution, and we condemn them. We also recognize the profound pain that Epstein caused to his victims and their families, and we commend their courage in coming forward to bring his crimes to light.

Epstein's connections as a donor to this University, and other institutions, raise important concerns. With that in mind, two weeks ago I asked for a review of his donations to Harvard. Our decentralization makes such a review more complicated than it would be at some other institutions. I want to emphasize that this review is ongoing. Our review to date indicates that between 1998 and 2007, Epstein made a number of gifts to support various faculty and institutional research activities across the University. The largest of these was a $6.5 million gift in 2003 to support the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics. The University received other gifts, which totaled approximately $2.4 million, based on current information. Each of these gifts from Epstein and his affiliated foundations to Harvard University predates his guilty plea in June 2008. To date, we have uncovered no gifts received from Epstein or his foundation following his guilty plea. Moreover, we specifically rejected a gift from Epstein following his conviction in 2008. We have also recently learned that Stephen Kosslyn, a former faculty member and a beneficiary of Epstein's philanthropy, designated Epstein as a Visiting Fellow in the Department of Psychology in 2005. We are seeking to learn more about the nature of that appointment from Dr. Kosslyn, who no longer works at the University.

The majority of Epstein's gifts were designated for current use, not as endowed funds, and nearly all were spent years ago for their intended purposes in support of research and education. Our ongoing review of these gifts has identified one current use fund and one small endowment designated to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences with a total unspent balance of $186,000. After consultation with the Dean of the FAS, we have decided that the University will redirect the unspent resources to organizations that support victims of human trafficking and sexual assault. This is an unusual step for the University, but we have decided it is the proper course of action under the circumstances of Epstein's egregiously repugnant crimes. The issue of the gifts given to institutions by donors at Jeffrey Epstein's suggestion, is also one that has emerged in recent days, and we are looking into this as part of our ongoing review.

Epstein's behavior, not just at Harvard, but elsewhere, raises significant questions about how institutions like ours review and vet donors. I will be convening a group here at Harvard to review how we prevent these situations in the future. I also hope to engage our peer institutions to consider how we can collectively improve our processes. We can all learn from each other.

Let me end where I began. Jeffrey Epstein's crimes were repulsive and reprehensible. I profoundly regret Harvard's past association with him. Conduct such as his has no place in our society. We act today in recognition of that fact. And we do so knowing that the scourge of sexual assault continues to demand our close attention and concerted action.

Harvard is not perfect, but you have my commitment as president that we will always strive to be better.

Sincerely,

Lawrence S. Bacow

</comment><comment><USER15> This guy has his hands everywhere, it's insane.

<comment><USER16> The Harvard connection was more widely known than the MIT one until recently.

<comment><USER17> The importance vis-a-vis MIT is the dates. If this article is accurate Harvard stopped taking the money once he was a convicted sex offender, MIT didn't.

<comment><USER7> \--- Well, MIT put Epstein on their donor blacklist, but Joi Ito specifically circumvented that and tried to hide the source of Epstein's donations in 2013. ---

Edit: I stand corrected as nullc points out below (and why no strikethroughs HN?)

<comment><USER8> > MIT put Epstein on their donor blacklist, but Joi Ito specifically > circumvented

Turns out that is essentially false, see my other reply to you in this thread.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I would have commended Harvard and MIT for not taking Epstein's money, with the reasoning that he was a scientific lightweight trying to buy academic clout. As of now, it just sounds like damage control. It takes zero courage to join the herd in saying that sex crimes are horrific.

The justice system means that -- after you committed a crime and done your time -- you are supposed to rehabilitate and rejoin society. I feel the horrific crimes cloud our judgment in this regard: Epstein paid the fine, did the time, and came out on the other end. Again, I am not saying it is wrong to forever brand someone as a persona-non-grata, but it is the easy and predictable way out, distancing yourself to save face. Epstein was sick, paid his debt to society, but we deem his crimes unforgivable, and in shutting down society to rehabilitated criminals, we make sure they also do not get a chance to turn their life around for good.

<comment><AUTHOR> He notoriously did not do his time for his crime. He got such a blatantly corrupt sweetheart deal that Acosta had to resign due to it. The lawyer that got him that deal? Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz. Also accused of sexually abusing young girls with Epstein.

<comment><USER18> Then take it up with the justice system (or intelligence), don't blame Epstein for taking the sweetheart deal, or use that deal to justify further punishment. Similarly, when cops avoid jail time for shooting incidents, society should stop referring to them as murderers when they are acquitted (Zimmerman, Yanez, ...). Accept the decisions of the court, or work to improve them. You have no right to play your own judge. Especially in the Epstein case it is common to take allegations as facts, and this is ugly, since a judge has not even rendered a decision (yet, here we are using allegations as justification for societal excommunication).

<comment><AUTHOR> What is ugly is child sex trafficking. The justice system has failed here, hence the public's anger.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Why on earth did this get flagged?

<comment><USER19> I suspect flagging by alumnus or a desire by HN to avoid salacious topics.

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Epstein probably realized, that it is not difficult to buy influence at institutions and individuals, that are already corrupt in their core.

Whether those institutions are politicians, educational facilities or other organizations...

The litmus test keeps it real... Doesn't it?</comment>